Download or read book Chinese Technology in the Seventeenth Century written by Yingxing Song and published by Courier Corporation. This book was released on 1997-01-01 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This 1637 classic on the history of traditional Chinese technology, profusely illustrated with 152 original woodcuts, covers agriculture, textiles, mining, metallurgy, chemical engineering, boat-building weapons manufacture, and more. Rich in scientific and historical background, its many annotations round out an impressive survey of technological progress.
Download or read book The Crafting of the 10 000 Things written by Dagmar Schäfer and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2011-04-15 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The last decades of the Ming dynasty, though plagued by chaos and destruction, saw a significant increase of publications that examined advances in knowledge and technology. Among the numerous guides and reference books that appeared during this period was a series of texts by Song Yingxing (1587–1666?), a minor local official living in southern China. His Tiangong kaiwu, the longest and most prominent of these works, documents the extraction and processing of raw materials and the manufacture of goods essential to everyday life, from yeast and wine to paper and ink to boats, carts, and firearms. In The Crafting of the 10,000 Things, Dagmar Schäfer probes this fascinating text and the legacy of its author to shed new light on the development of scientific thinking in China, the purpose of technical writing, and its role in and effects on Chinese history. Meticulously unfolding the layers of Song’s personal and cultural life, Schäfer chronicles the factors that motivated Song to transform practical knowledge into written culture. She then examines how Song gained, assessed, and ultimately presented knowledge, and in doing so articulates this era’s approaches to rationality, truth, and belief in the study of nature and culture alike. Finally, Schäfer places Song’s efforts in conjunction with the work of other Chinese philosophers and writers, before, during, and after his time, and argues that these writings demonstrate collectively a uniquely Chinese way of authorizing technology as a legitimate field of scholarly concern and philosophical knowledge. Offering an overview of a thousand years of scholarship, The Crafting of the 10,000 Things explains the role of technology and crafts in a culture that had an outstandingly successful tradition in this field and was a crucial influence on the technical development of Europe on the eve of the Industrial Revolution.
Download or read book The Crafting of the 10 000 Things written by Dagmar Schäfer and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2011-05-15 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The chapters in this book cover 'Asian Studies: East Asia' 'Biography and Letters', 'History: Asian History', 'History European History', 'History of Science', 'Literature and Literary Criticism: Asian Languages', and much more.
Download or read book Cultures of Knowledge written by Dagmar Schäfer and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2011-10-28 with total page 403 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Identifying four spheres of knowledge culture in the history of technology in China, this book offers an introduction to the transmission of knowledge and detailed contextual descriptions of individual technologies in China such as porcelain, silk, and agriculture.
Download or read book The Shorter Science and Civilisation in China Volume 1 written by Colin A. Ronan and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1978-06-29 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Joseph Needham's Science and Civilisation in China is a monumental piece of scholarship which breaks new ground in presenting to the Western reader a detailed and coherent account of the development of science, technology and medicine in China from the earliest times until the advent of the Jesuits and the beginnings of modern science in the late seventeenth century. It is a vast work, necessarily more suited to the scholar and research worker than the general reader. This paperback version, abridged and re-written by Colin Ronan, makes this extremely important study accessible to a wider public. The present book covers the material treated in volumes I and II of Dr Needham's original work. The reader is introduced to the country of China, its history, geography and language, and an account is given of how scientific knowledge travelled between China and Europe. The major part of the book is then devoted to the history of scientific thought in China itself. Beginning with ancient times, it describes the milieu in which arose the schools of the Confucians, Taoists, Mohists, Logicians and Legalists. We are thus brought on to the fundamental ideas which dominated scientific thinking in the Chinese Middle Ages, to the doctrines of the Two Forces (Yin and Yang) and the Five Elements (wu hsing), to the impact of the sceptical tradition and Buddhist and Neo-Confucian thought.
Download or read book The Shorter Science and Civilisation in China Volume 1 written by Colin A. Ronan and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1980-06-19 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Joseph Needham's Science and Civilisation in China is a monumental piece of scholarship which breaks new ground in presenting to the Western reader a detailed and coherent account of the development of science, technology and medicine in China from the earliest times until the advent of the Jesuits and the beginnings of modern science in the late seventeenth century. It is a vast work, necessarily more suited to the scholar and research worker than the general reader. This paperback version, abridged and re-written by Colin Ronan, makes this extremely important study accessible to a wider public. The present book covers the material treated in volumes I and II of Dr Needham's original work. The reader is introduced to the country of China, its history, geography and language, and an account is given of how scientific knowledge travelled between China and Europe. The major part of the book is then devoted to the history of scientific thought in China itself. Beginning with ancient times, it describes the milieu in which arose the schools of the Confucians, Taoists, Mohists, Logicians and Legalists. We are thus brought on to the fundamental ideas which dominated scientific thinking in the Chinese Middle Ages, to the doctrines of the Two Forces (Yin and Yang) and the Five Elements (wu hsing), to the impact of the sceptical tradition and Buddhist and Neo-Confucian thought.
Download or read book Crisis and Transformation in Seventeenth century China written by Chun-shu Chang and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 1998 with total page 472 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Describes the social and cultural transformation of seventeenth-century China through the life and work of Li Yu
Download or read book Science and Civilisation in China written by Joseph Needham and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1974 with total page 548 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Science and Civilisation in China Part 2 Mechanical Engineering written by Joseph Needham and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1965-01-02 with total page 1022 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As Dr Needham's immense undertaking gathers momentum it has been found necessary to subdivide volumes into parts, each to be bound and published separately. The first part of Volume 4, already published, deals with the physical sciences; the second with the diverse applications of physics in the many branches of mechanical engineering; and the third will deal with civil and hydraulic engineering and nautical technology. With this part of Volume 4, then, we come to the application by the Chinese of physical principles in the control of forces and in the use of power; we cross the frontier separating tools from the machine. We have already noticed that the ancient Chinese concept of chhi (somewhat similar to the pneuma of the Greeks) asserted itself prominently in acoustics; but we discover here that the Chinese tendency to think pneumatically was also responsible for a whole range of brilliant technological achievements, for example, the double-acting piston-bellows, the rotary winnowing-fan, and the water-powered metallurgical blowing-machine (ancestor of the steam-engine); as well as for some extraordinary insights and predictions in aeronautics.
Download or read book The Shorter Science and Civilisation in China Volume 1 written by Colin A. Ronan and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1978-06-29 with total page 347 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Joseph Needham's Science and Civilisation in China is a monumental piece of scholarship which breaks new ground in presenting to the Western reader a detailed and coherent account of the development of science, technology and medicine in China from the earliest times until the advent of the Jesuits and the beginnings of modern science in the late seventeenth century. It is a vast work, necessarily more suited to the scholar and research worker than the general reader. This paperback version, abridged and re-written by Colin Ronan, makes this extremely important study accessible to a wider public. The present book covers the material treated in volumes I and II of Dr Needham's original work. The reader is introduced to the country of China, its history, geography and language, and an account is given of how scientific knowledge travelled between China and Europe. The major part of the book is then devoted to the history of scientific thought in China itself. Beginning with ancient times, it describes the milieu in which arose the schools of the Confucians, Taoists, Mohists, Logicians and Legalists. We are thus brought on to the fundamental ideas which dominated scientific thinking in the Chinese Middle Ages, to the doctrines of the Two Forces (Yin and Yang) and the Five Elements (wu hsing), to the impact of the sceptical tradition and Buddhist and Neo-Confucian thought.
Download or read book Teachers of the Inner Chambers written by Dorothy Ko and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 1994 with total page 422 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This pathbreaking work argues that literate gentry women in 17th-century Jiangnan, far from being oppressed or silenced, created a rich culture and meaningful existence within the constraints of the Confucian system. Momentous socioeconomic and intellectual changes in 17th-century Jiangnan provided the stimulus for the flowering of women's culture. The most salient of these changes included a flourishing of commercial publishing, the rise of a reading public, a new emphasis on emotions, the promotion of women's education, and, more generally, the emergence of new definitions of womanhood. The author reconstructs the social, emotional and intellectual worlds of 17th-century women, and in doing so provides a new way to conceptualize China's past, one offering a more realistic and complete understanding of the values of Chinese culture and the functioning of Chinese society.
Download or read book Heavenly Creations Tian Gong Kai Wu written by Song Yingxing and published by DeepLogic. This book was released on with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book "Heavenly Creations" (天工开物, Tian Gong Kai Wu) was first published in 1637 (Ming Chongzhen decade Landmarks), a total of three volumes eighteen, the book is a collection of agriculture, handicrafts, such as machinery, brick , ceramics, sulfur , candle, paper, weapons, gunpowder , textile, dyeing, salt production, coal mining, oil extraction and other production technologies. "Tian Gong Kai Wu" is the first comprehensive work on agriculture and handicraft production in the world. It is a comprehensive scientific and technical work in ancient China. Some people also call it an encyclopedic work. The author is Ming The scientist Song Yingxing . Foreign scholars call it "China's 17th century craft encyclopedia." In the book, the author emphasizes that human beings should coordinate with nature and manpower should be compatible with natural forces. It is the most abundant preserved document in China's scientific and technological history. It focuses more on the handicraft industry and reflects the productivity of China during the last years of the Ming Dynasty.
Download or read book Science in China 1600 1900 written by Yi Kai Ho and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 2015-05-07 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Distinguished historian Benjamin A Elman's collective volume on the history of science in imperial China, brings together over 30 years of historical literature on the subject. With updates to the literature and new material including transcripts of podcasts and translated interview articles, Science in China takes the reader on a journey starting in the early 17th century with the missionary efforts of the Jesuits in China, and ending with the Protestant missions in the 19th century. These two milestone encounters brought Western sciences to local Chinese scholars with great success in shaping modern Chinese science. Elman studies the interaction between Western and Chinese sciences through philological research and evidence, and treats the two encounters not as separate events but as a continuum of creative exchange of scientific knowledge and discourse. Contents:Introduction — From Value to Fact: The Emergence of Phonology as a Precise Discipline in Late Imperial China Native Traditions of Natural Studies during the Ming–Qing Transition, 1600–1800Some Comparative Issues — Ming–Qing Border Defense and Jesuit Learning in Late Imperial ChinaThe Jesuit Role as "Technical Experts" in "High Qing" Western Learning and Evidential Research in the 18th Century The China Prize Essay Contest and the Late Qing Promotion of Modern ScienceThe Great Reversal: The "Rise of Japan" and the "Fall of China" after 1895Rethinking the 20th-Century Denigration of Traditional Chinese Science and Medicine in the 21st Century Readership: Undergraduates and researchers in history of science, Chinese history, history of Chinese science, philology, and history of East Asia and East Asian science. Key Features:Comprehensive volume on all writings of renown East Asian historian Benjamin A Elman on the history of science in imperial ChinaNew material and previously published works updated with contemporary research findingsKeywords:History of Science;Chinese History;Science in China;1600–1900;History;China
Download or read book The Shorter Science and Civilisation in China Volume 5 written by Joseph Needham and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1978 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This fifth volume abridgement of Joseph Needham's monumental work is concerned with the staggering civil engineering feats made in early and medieval China.
Download or read book Science and Civilisation in China Volume 5 Chemistry and Chemical Technology Part 3 Spagyrical Discovery and Invention Historical Survey from Cinnabar Elixirs to Synthetic Insulin written by Joseph Needham and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1976-05-13 with total page 516 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The fifth volume of Dr Needham's immense undertaking, like the fourth, is subdivided into parts for ease of presentation and assimilation, each part bound and published separately. The volume as a whole covers the subjects of alchemy, early chemistry, and chemical technology (which includes military invention, especially gunpowder; paper and printing; textiles; mining and metallurgy; the salt industry; and ceramics).
Download or read book Tien kung kai wu written by Yingxing Song and published by . This book was released on 1980 with total page 487 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Lost Colony written by Tonio Andrade and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2013-08-04 with total page 447 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How a Chinese pirate defeated European colonialists and won Taiwan during the seventeenth century During the seventeenth century, Holland created the world's most dynamic colonial empire, outcompeting the British and capturing Spanish and Portuguese colonies. Yet, in the Sino-Dutch War—Europe's first war with China—the Dutch met their match in a colorful Chinese warlord named Koxinga. Part samurai, part pirate, he led his generals to victory over the Dutch and captured one of their largest and richest colonies—Taiwan. How did he do it? Examining the strengths and weaknesses of European and Chinese military techniques during the period, Lost Colony provides a balanced new perspective on long-held assumptions about Western power, Chinese might, and the nature of war. It has traditionally been asserted that Europeans of the era possessed more advanced science, technology, and political structures than their Eastern counterparts, but historians have recently contested this view, arguing that many parts of Asia developed on pace with Europe until 1800. While Lost Colony shows that the Dutch did indeed possess a technological edge thanks to the Renaissance fort and the broadside sailing ship, that edge was neutralized by the formidable Chinese military leadership. Thanks to a rich heritage of ancient war wisdom, Koxinga and his generals outfoxed the Dutch at every turn. Exploring a period when the military balance between Europe and China was closer than at any other point in modern history, Lost Colony reassesses an important chapter in world history and offers valuable and surprising lessons for contemporary times.
