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Several accounts and summaries of current historical research on Chinese science, technology and medicine appeared in the late 1970s. Although none of them was aimed at offering a total perspective or comprehensive treatment, they have spelled out key elements and pro­ vided some background information on this critical but neglected matter.

Nathan Sivin’s "Next Steps in Learning about Science from the Chinese Experience" (1974), a contribution to the symposium on

"Science and Society in China and Japan" at the 14th International Congress of the History of Sciences, pinpoints three major approaches taken in the study of traditional Chinese science in recent decades:

^Chapters that make up the book are: "1. Novae and pulsars"; "2. Abacus, binary numbers, and magic squares"; "3. Maps on paper, silk, and stone"; "4. The Great Wall"; "5. The oldest seismograph: dragon heads and toad mouths"; "6. The compass"; "7. Kites, rotors, bal­

loons, and parachutes"; "8. A cheap substitute: paper"; "9. The black art"; "10. Paper money, inflation, and currency reform"; "11. Gunpow­ der and cannons"; "12. Silk, caravans, and profits: The Silk Road"; "13. Columbus was Chinese".

^There are six chapters: "Introduction"; "Astronomy"; "Ancient Chinese medicine"; "Ancient Chinese technology: paper, printing, gunpowder, compass"; "Inventions, inventions, inventions"; "Enginee­ ring in ancient China".

(1) textual studies; (2) chronological and biographical investiga­ tions as represented by the Science and Civilisation in China Pro­ ject, the Academia Sinica in China, and the Kyoto Research Institute of Humanistic Studies; (3) a relatively new school in East Asia and the West ’’whose first priority is to comprehend exactly and inte­ grally the inner texture and external connections of scientific thou­ ght and work as originally understood by Chinese practitioners.”^ According to Sivin, these research initiatives have far-reaching consequences for the universal history of science, as they suggest

firstly, "an enormous contrast between traditional Chinese and modern European approaches to historical explanation” , and secondly, "con­ stant movement of ideas and mechanisms to and from other cultures.

The report by Sivin in the 1978 Chinese Science and that by John S. Major in the 1980 issue of the same journal were both inspired by trips to the People's Republic of China.^ Reading these accounts of meetings and first-hand observations gives one a fairly good sense of the Chinese institutions, organisations and individuals involved as well as the general trends and directions of research in that country

(e.g. the growing importance attached to material artifacts and archaeological findings).*

E-tu Zen Sun’s "Chinese History of Technology: Some Points for Comparison with the West" (1979) has a totally different orientation. This paper for the Symposium on the History and Philosophy of Techno­ logy is essentially an introduction to features associated with

^Nathan Sivin, "Next Steps in Learning about Science from the Chinese Experience," in Proceedings. . . 14th International Congress of the History of Sciences. Tokvo / Kyoto. 1974 (Tokyo: Science Council of Japan, 1974-75), vol. 1, pp. 12.

^Sivin, "Next Steps," pp. 13-16.

^Sivin went as "a member of a group of ten astronomers, one of five scientific delegations sent to China each year as part of an exchange program between the Committee on Scholarly Communications with the P.R.C. (U.S.A.) and the Scientific and Technical Associa­ tions (P.R.C.)": Nathan Sivin, "Current Research on the History of Science in the People’s Republic of China," Chinese Science. 3

(1978), 39. Major went with the Han Studies Delegation, also spon­ sored by the Committee on Scholarly Communications with the P.R.C.

^One can also learn some handy practical tips such as the language to use in communicating with Chinese historians of science.

recent Chinese, Japanese and Western scholarship on traditional Chinese technology. The author first identifies "two main areas of concentration: 1) The reconstruction and explication of traditional techniques and practices, and 2) an examination (still at an early stage of development) of the effect of Western influence on Chinese t e c h n o l o g y . W i t h i n this broad framework, various elements and practical matters are reckoned and addressed: field investigations, the abundance of Chinese written records on the technical tradi­ tions, the publication of several Chinese, Japanese and Western translations of Chinese classical works on technology, research projects by Needham and the Kyoto group led by Yabuuchi Kiyoshi, the beginning of serious studies in the U.S. on the history of Chinese technology, two ground-breaking publications by contemporary Chinese scholars, the problem with Chinese technical terms, the awareness of the importance of placing technological developments within their socio-economic settings and contexts, and the reliance on etymologi­ cal inferences versus the use of archaeological evidence. While

these were indeed vital concerns and prominent landmarks in the re­ search on traditional Chinese science and technology in the 1960s and

’70s, one may be excused for doubting if the particular manner in which these trends and characteristics have been distilled, articu­

lated, and portrayed are suitably balanced or helpful. In some instances, the point in question is so heavily condensed that the scope of the matter and the extent of the complexities is not even hinted at.^ On other occasions, extended treatment is given to a

^E-Tu Zen Sun, "Chinese History of Technology: Some Points for Comparison with the West", in The History and Philosophy of Techno­ logy. ed. George Bugliarello, and Dean B. Doner (Urbana: U of Illi­ nois P, 1979), pp. 38.

^For example, after reading or listening to the paper one learns little about Western endeavours and output in the field except for Needham’s Science and Civilisation in China and the MIT East Asian Science series — something of which one might already have prior knowledge — as other activities are taken care of in only two sentences: "If translations of entire works are rather scarce, surveys and monographic studies are more plentiful and of high quality", and "Chinese science and technology as a serious academic discipline has also made its appearance in the United States": Sun, "Chinese History of Technology," pp. 41-42. It should not take more than a couple of sentences or minutes to mention the names of others who have carried out seminal research in various traditional Chinese

single item or a particular element.^

Christopher Cullen has taken a three-pronged approach in his contribution to the reference work Information Sources in the History of Science and Medicine (1983). First, he introduces to the reader major Chinese sources and Western-language publications, that can provide further i n f o r m a t i o n . ^ Next, an outline of some aspects of Chinese philosophy is offered. The last part is a systematic presen­ tation of the main disciplines and departments in Chinese science. Here, central issues and main themes in each subject area as well as titles of a few pertinent Western studies are highlighted.^

The fate of the Science and Civilisation in China Project is a matter that cannot be easily ignored, and its research as well as publication process is of substantial interest to both critics and faithful followers. Though not to be regarded as a solemn pronounce­ ment or detailed statement on the matter, some clues were supplied by Needham himself in an article in the 1980 Interdisciplinary Science Review. Three aspects are mentioned: "Description" [of the project]; "Methodology" (divided into: "Chinese sources", "Iconography",

"Living tradition", "Terminology", "Skeletal structure", "The unity of the Old World"); "Organisation" (divided into: "The side-dishes", "Financing").

technologies (e.g. Margaret Medley in ceramics technology, Noel Barnard in metallurgy, John Combridge and André Wegener Sleeswyk in mechanical engineering, Tsien Tsuen-hsuin in paper and printing. Else Glahn in building technology). By doing so, the neophyte can go away with concrete leads to pursue.

^For example, a detailed explication on different interpre­

tations given to a type of ploughing instrument is furnished in order to illustrate the need to consider not only documentary sources, but also archaeological remains, depictions on frescoes, etc.

^Chinese materials introduced include the thirteen canons or classics, the official dynastic histories, topically arranged ency­ clopaedia, and collectanea. Information on Western aids include, for instance, the availability of good translations for most of the

classics, and the usefulness of E. Wilkinson’s The History of Impe­ rial China: A Research Guide (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard UP, 1974) as a guide to the standard histories.

^Cullen's classification and terminology are similar to those used by Sivin (e.g. the division into "qualitative" and "quantita­ tive" sciences).