Why didn't the Chinese get modern science and technology?
John McCarthy
In search of information, I read the first volume of Ronan and Needham
_The Shorter Science and Civilization in China_, Temple's _The Genius
of China_ and the _Britannica_ article on China (looking for a standard
view).
The _Britannica_ article with chapters on all the dynasties and their
wars had nothing on science and technology. For each dynasty there
were sections on religion, art, philosophy and literature, but nothing
on either science or technology. One can see why Needham wrote "like
a missionary lecturing to cannibals". The standard historians seem to
be ignorant of science and technology - and perhaps even proud of it.
Temple recounts scores of discoveries made in China many centuries
before Europe. A few things seem over-interpreted, but I was
convinced that it was mainly correct. The first volume of "The
Shorter ... " is mainly about philosophy with arguments that some of
the philosophers were proto-scientific. I didn't find the
proto-scientific part convincing.
Here are my conjectures about why Chinese science and technology
didn't become modern.
1. The science was mixed with magic - probably much more than in
Europe. A modern reader can pick the science out of the magic, but
very likely a Chinese in a subsequent century wouldn't have seen the
scientific bits amidst the nonsense.
2. The technology wasn't part of an adequate economic system. This is
illustrated by an account in Temple of the invention of an improved
pump for irrigation. The account says that the emperor ordered some
lord to make a large number for irrigation along some waterway. This
couldn't create a pump manufacturing business. The lord would make
however many pumps could be made by the resources he devoted to it,
and that would be that. There was no indication of a business being
created that could expand from the profits of selling the pumps.
Temple also describes early Chinese steel making and early Chinese use
of natural gas. He shows a photograph of a recent natural gas well
with bamboo pipes leading from it - obviously not capable of
transmitting large amounts of gas. Why was the steel the Chinese knew
how to make not used in pipelines? Again the answer seems to be the
lack of an adequate economic system - capitalism or even something
more primitive.
There is no indication that the many fragments of technology Temple
cites were ever part of an integrated whole that was culturally
transmitted to posterity. Indeed Temple mentions that the Chinese
were impressed by the number of digits of pi Europeans had computed
when Chinese had computed more digits centuries earlier.
Temple ascribes the decimal system to the Chinese and also the
invention of zero. However, the Chinese continued until recently to
use a decimal system that doesn't use zero. Incidentally, one of the
illustrations of Chinese mathematics shows different characters for
many of the digits than are used in China and Japan today. It would
be interesting to know if a variety of notations for numbers persisted
in China. I would take it as one more bit evidence that the Chinese
didn't integrate what they knew.
Temple mentions nothing about the inclusion of scientific knowledge in
education or in the famous examinations.
--
John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
http://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/progress/
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
Joseph C Wang
In article <5dma4e$s...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>,
John McCarthy <j...@CS.Stanford.EDU> wrote:
>The _Britannica_ article with chapters on all the dynasties and their
>wars had nothing on science and technology.
This probably says more about the pitfalls of using the _Encyclopedia
Britanica_ as a standard reference than anything else.
>Here are my conjectures about why Chinese science and technology
>didn't become modern.
You need to define what exactly "modern science and technology" is.
If the question is why China did not develop an indigenous industrial
revolution, the answer is why should it have been expected to? An
indigenous industrial revolution occurred in only one part of the
world (19th century England) and diffused from there.
Some of your exaplanations don't work, because there was a
"commericial revolution" in China in the 16th and 17th centuries.
One other thing that should be pointed out is that Chinese history
doesn't abruptly stop in the 19th century. The question "Why didn't
the Chinese get modern science and technology" needs to be qualified
because the Chinese are currently getting modern science and
technology. Indeed, the "mythology of science" is probably much
stronger in China today than in the West.
>Temple ascribes the decimal system to the Chinese and also the
>invention of zero. However, the Chinese continued until recently to
>use a decimal system that doesn't use zero.
The Chinese number system doesn't use zero as a placeholder because it
doesn't need to. 5,023 can be expressed as five thousand and two tens
and three.
>Incidentally, one of the
>illustrations of Chinese mathematics shows different characters for
>many of the digits than are used in China and Japan today.
There are two forms of digits in use. One form is the "ordinary
digits." The other form is the "accounting digits." The ordinary
digits are much easier to write and are the ones that you normally
use. The trouble with ordinary digits is that you could modify them
(i.e. add a veritical stroke to a one and it becomes a ten) and so for
bookkeeping and other business uses, there is another set of digits
that are harder to write, but also harder to modify.
>Temple mentions nothing about the inclusion of scientific knowledge in
>education or in the famous examinations.
It wasn't included.
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Joseph Wang Globewide Network Academy
j...@mit.edu Thousands of distance education courses and programs
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Paul J. Gans
John McCarthy (j...@Steam.stanford.edu) wrote:
: In search of information, I read the first volume of Ronan and Needham
: _The Shorter Science and Civilization in China_, Temple's _The Genius
: of China_ and the _Britannica_ article on China (looking for a standard
: view).
: The _Britannica_ article with chapters on all the dynasties and their
: wars had nothing on science and technology. For each dynasty there
: were sections on religion, art, philosophy and literature, but nothing
: on either science or technology. One can see why Needham wrote "like
: a missionary lecturing to cannibals". The standard historians seem to
: be ignorant of science and technology - and perhaps even proud of it.
[deletions]
This situation is slowly being rectified. A current useful
book about european medieval technology ( _Cathedral, Forge,
and Waterwheel_, by Geis and Geis) contains a fair amount of
material on importations from China and India.
One reason why the situation is so bad is that sources are really
not much available. Literary descriptions are often not accurate
since the literatti were usually non-technical; artistic representations
are often bad for the same reasons; and the technical material
itself was often a closely-guarded secret.
----- Paul J. Gans [ga...@scholar.chem.nyu.edu]
Joseph Askew
Paul J. Gans (ga...@SCHOLAR.CHEM.NYU.EDU) wrote:
: : The _Britannica_ article with chapters on all the dynasties and their
: : wars had nothing on science and technology. For each dynasty there
: : were sections on religion, art, philosophy and literature, but nothing
: : on either science or technology. One can see why Needham wrote "like
: : a missionary lecturing to cannibals". The standard historians seem to
: : be ignorant of science and technology - and perhaps even proud of it.
It isn't just science and technology. It is amazing how poor basic
economic understanding is among East Asian scholars. Probably all
fields really.
: This situation is slowly being rectified. A current useful
: book about european medieval technology ( _Cathedral, Forge,
: and Waterwheel_, by Geis and Geis) contains a fair amount of
: material on importations from China and India.
It is only useful because it is so isolated. I don't care much
for it myself and it relies mostly on Needham. More of a rehash
of his work than anything new. Still beggars can't be chosers
I suppose.
: One reason why the situation is so bad is that sources are really
: not much available. Literary descriptions are often not accurate
: since the literatti were usually non-technical; artistic representations
: are often bad for the same reasons; and the technical material
: itself was often a closely-guarded secret.
There is *never* any problem with Chinese sources. The problem is
that Chinese is one of the few fields where leading scholars do not
need, and usually do not have, competance in the relevant language.
Fairbank, who was the leading China scholar since the war, was open
about the problems he had speaking to ordinary Chinese people. It is
rumoured that Jonathan Spense, who is in the lead for Fairbank's role,
doesn't speak Chinese either. Whether either could read is an issue
I couldn't comment on but Fairbank remained heavily reliant on Morse,
other English language sources and his students for a long time. His
"China : A New History" is remarkably light on Chinese sources. One
of the best books on Qing China by Susan Naquin and Evelyn Rawski
(Chinese Society in the Eighteen Century) contains the statement that
they were asked to produce a chapter in the Cambridge History but
were worried that there wasn't enough *secondary* material even for
a chapter. This implies, at least to me, that they had problems with
the primary material. The literatti were not "non-technical". A good
Chinese education was supposed to produce people capable of doing any
sort of task. Canal building is a good example of works traditionally
carried out well by literatti. It is amazing how well they were able
to do without proper engineering backgrounds as well. The literature
is full of technical and semi-technical works. They just aren't that
important and the number of people competant to work with them is very
small. The field is small and there are more important issues. It is,
in my opinion, only the Marxist background of Needham that made him
so interested in science and technology.
Joseph
--
"Blessed are the Peacemakers, for they shall inherit the Earth"
- President Bill Clinton
Joseph C Wang
In article <5dsrcu$e...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>,
Joseph Askew <jas...@yoyo.cc.monash.edu.au> wrote:
>: One reason why the situation is so bad is that sources are really
>: not much available. Literary descriptions are often not accurate
>: since the literatti were usually non-technical; artistic representations
>: are often bad for the same reasons; and the technical material
>: itself was often a closely-guarded secret.
>
>There is *never* any problem with Chinese sources. The problem is
>that Chinese is one of the few fields where leading scholars do not
>need, and usually do not have, competance in the relevant language.
Agreed. There is a *HUGE* amount of archival and technical material
from the Qing dynasty that no one has analyzed, and when people have
analyzed it, it's generally overturned some cherished historical
myths.
For example, there is the myth that the traditional Chinese
bureaucracy relied on solely moral suasion rather than legal codes.
Recent scholarship reveals that this is total non-sense. The Chinese
bureaucracy had a very well-developed and complex system of
administrative law, it's just that few modern historians had bothered
to read the law books. (Look up Thomas Metzger)
Also, Sun Yat-Sen's role in 1911 revolution was radically altered in
the 1960's, when people began looking at Chinese language documentary
material. These documents showed the crucial role that the
conservative gentry elite played in the revolution, and that Dr. Sun
was largely a marginal figure.
There is also a large body of "how-to" technical books that has
largely been ignored. "How to manage canal works" "How to triple crop
fields" "How to raise a militia" "How to be a district magistrate"
There are still things that are very unclear. For example, we really
don't know much about what the bureaucracy or the imperial court
really thought about the events that were going around them in the
19th century. There is also a lot about Chinese social and
intellectual history that we don't have a clue about.
>Whether either could read is an issue
And whats more. Almost all of the documentary material is written in
classical Chinese. What's more, a bureaucracy is a bureaucracy and so
government memos are written in the special language government memos
everywhere are written in.
>The literatti were not "non-technical". A good
>Chinese education was supposed to produce people capable of doing any
>sort of task. Canal building is a good example of works traditionally
>carried out well by literatti. It is amazing how well they were able
>to do without proper engineering backgrounds as well.
Actually, one has to distinguish between the managers of the canal
works and the actual artisans that maintained it.
nuk...@worldnet.att.net
John McCarthy wrote:
>
> In search of information, I read the first volume of Ronan and Needham
> _The Shorter Science and Civilization in China_, Temple's _The Genius
> of China_ and the _Britannica_ article on China (looking for a standard
> view).
>
> wars had nothing on science and technology. For each dynasty there
> were sections on religion, art, philosophy and literature, but nothing
> on either science or technology. One can see why Needham wrote "like
> a missionary lecturing to cannibals". The standard historians seem to
> be ignorant of science and technology - and perhaps even proud of it.
>
> before Europe. A few things seem over-interpreted, but I was
> convinced that it was mainly correct. The first volume of "The
> Shorter ... " is mainly about philosophy with arguments that some of
> the philosophers were proto-scientific. I didn't find the
> proto-scientific part convincing.
>
> didn't become modern.
/snippage/
Attitude, cultural and philosophical. It wasn't confined to the
Chinese, look at the process which happened to Galileo when science
conflicted with maintaining power and order. A more modern model
would be the number of inventions that Americans 'discovered' in
the 60's and 70's, but exploited by the Japanese in the commercial
market. The American narrow quick return on investment captialistic
attitude and open market environment gave the Japanese an opportunity
to use the technology for their gain.
Robert J. Girouard
> Attitude, cultural and philosophical. It wasn't confined to the
> Chinese, look at the process which happened to Galileo when science
> conflicted with maintaining power and order. A more modern model
> would be the number of inventions that Americans 'discovered' in
> the 60's and 70's, but exploited by the Japanese in the commercial
> market. The American narrow quick return on investment captialistic
> attitude and open market environment gave the Japanese an opportunity
> to use the technology for their gain.
A quick-return attitude by American companies had something to do with the
ease with which Japanese companies appropriated foreign technology. A
more important factor, though, was the active technology importation
strategy put in place by the Japanese government. The government acted as
a single negotiator for foreign patent licenses, and then diffused them at
low cost to Japanese firms through trade associations (the steel industry
provides the best example of this). The government also offered tax
breaks for Japanese expenditures on foreign licenses, and encouraged U.S.
and European firms to sell technology licenses to Japanese partners in
lieu of actual direct investment and marketing.
The history of technology shows us that this kind of of "catch up"
strategy works fine when a countries' national innovation systems are at a
"low value added" stage. As the U.S. and Japan moved to a mature economy
profile, it became less practical.
R.D. Coons
On 15 Feb 1997 20:57:45 -0800, nuk...@worldnet.att.net wrote:
>John McCarthy wrote:
>>
>> In search of information, I read the first volume of Ronan and Needham
>> _The Shorter Science and Civilization in China_, Temple's _The Genius
>> of China_ and the _Britannica_ article on China (looking for a standard
>> view).
>>
[cuts]
>> Here are my conjectures about why Chinese science and technology
>> didn't become modern.
>
>/snippage/
>
>
>Attitude, cultural and philosophical. It wasn't confined to the
>Chinese, look at the process which happened to Galileo when science
>conflicted with maintaining power and order. A more modern model
>would be the number of inventions that Americans 'discovered' in
>the 60's and 70's, but exploited by the Japanese in the commercial
>market. The American narrow quick return on investment captialistic
>attitude and open market environment gave the Japanese an opportunity
>to use the technology for their gain.
>
The issue is obviously perplexing, since China's technological
accomplishments, by all accounts, surpassed those of the West prior to
the Scientific Revolution.
There is an interesting argument that attributes Western science to
the effect of the alphabet on the consciousness of its users. In
brief, an alphabetic system of writing, in contrast to ideographic
systems, tends to encourage abstract thought and classification,
whereas the latter, with its concrete symbols, inhibits it.
The crucial distinction is between an alphabet in which each unit
bears no meaning whatever, and therefore encourages one to look behind
the literally meaningless letters on the page and comprehend the
concept to which they collectively point, and a ideographic writing
system (like that of China) in which the units actually display (or
concretely embody) their meaning in their physical shapes. The latter,
so the argument runs, is less conducive to the abstract thought and
the systematic classification of different phenomena that a scientific
revolution demands.
The argument is made in Robert K. Logan, *The Alphabet Effect* (New
York: William Morrow, 1986) and, in a much more complex form, in a
series of studies by Eric Havelock on the effects of alphabetic
literacy: eg. *A Preface to Plato* (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 1963); *The Literate Revolution in Greece and Its Cultural
Consequences* (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982). The
latter is a collection of Havelock's articles.
You might also consider Yu-lan Fang, "Why China Has No Science," *The
International Journal of Ethics* 32 (1922).
Joseph C Wang
In article <5fk63p$b...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>,
R.D. Coons <rco...@netcom.ca> wrote:
>The crucial distinction is between an alphabet in which each unit
>bears no meaning whatever, and therefore encourages one to look behind
>the literally meaningless letters on the page and comprehend the
>concept to which they collectively point, and a ideographic writing
>system (like that of China) in which the units actually display (or
>concretely embody) their meaning in their physical shapes. The latter,
>so the argument runs, is less conducive to the abstract thought and
>the systematic classification of different phenomena that a scientific
>revolution demands.
The trouble with this notion is that it fails to account for the
success that China today has at science and technology. One would
expect, if this theory were true, that Chinese today would have
difficulty with science and technology, and this does not seem to be
the case. In fact, the mythologization of science is higher in China
than in the West right now.
Also the premise is wrong. Chinese characters are not "picture
writing." It's only a very small minority of characters whose form
has any relationship to their meaning. The vast majority of
characters were developed by analogizing their sound to other
characters. But since the sounds have changed over several thousand
years, this analogization is of limited usefullness.
>The argument is made in Robert K. Logan, *The Alphabet Effect* (New
>York: William Morrow, 1986) and, in a much more complex form, in a
>series of studies by Eric Havelock on the effects of alphabetic
>literacy: eg. *A Preface to Plato* (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
>Press, 1963); *The Literate Revolution in Greece and Its Cultural
>Consequences* (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982). The
>latter is a collection of Havelock's articles.
I wonder if anyone of these people actually can read Chinese. It's
difficult for me to imagine a Chinese reader making this assertion.
Joseph Askew
R.D. Coons (rco...@netcom.ca) wrote:
: There is an interesting argument that attributes Western science to
: the effect of the alphabet on the consciousness of its users. In
: brief, an alphabetic system of writing, in contrast to ideographic
: systems, tends to encourage abstract thought and classification,
: whereas the latter, with its concrete symbols, inhibits it.
Unfortunately this cannot explain why other alphabet using groups
did not develop science (such as the Arabs, the Indians, the Greeks
and Romans etc etc), nor why for most of the last 2000 years the
Chinese have been further ahead than anyone else. I do not accept
that the Chinese have ever shown the slightest problem with abstract
thought let alone classification. Especially the latter. With a long
and powerful bureaucratic tradition the Chinese love to classify all
: The crucial distinction is between an alphabet in which each unit
: bears no meaning whatever, and therefore encourages one to look behind
: the literally meaningless letters on the page and comprehend the
: concept to which they collectively point, and a ideographic writing
: system (like that of China) in which the units actually display (or
: concretely embody) their meaning in their physical shapes.
Chinese units do not display or concretely embody meaning in their
physical shapes. At least not as you mean. Some Chinese characters
are derived from drawings of the object they represent. The one for
"horse" for example. But it takes a great deal of imagination to see
that horse. It is about as abstract as the English word. Beyond that
some 70% of Chinese characters are made up of two parts. A radical
which indicates the class of object to which the word belongs and a
second part to indicate the sound of the word. There is no attempt to
display the meaning in the physical shape. I don't see this as less
abstract than English or any other alphabetical language.
: The latter,
: so the argument runs, is less conducive to the abstract thought and
: the systematic classification of different phenomena that a scientific
: revolution demands.
Another argument runs that the Chinese are incapable ofany real
civilisation because abstract thought can only be performed to any
great extent by White races. I'm not comparing your argument to
this but at least think about it. I once had the chance to buy a
re-print of a 1920's American text on Chinese history which did in
fact state as much and claim that Chinese civilisation was founded
by blond blue eyed people and nothing has changed since because the
Aryan core foolishly intermarried and miscegenation caused stagnation.
I didn't bother, a decision I have always regrette.
: You might also consider Yu-lan Fang, "Why China Has No Science," *The
: International Journal of Ethics* 32 (1922).
But then I probably wouldn't want to.
Joseph C Wang
In article <5fnm5g$f...@gazette.bcm.tmc.edu>,
Joseph Askew <jas...@yoyo.cc.monash.edu.au> wrote:
>Unfortunately this cannot explain why other alphabet using groups
>did not develop science (such as the Arabs, the Indians, the Greeks
>and Romans etc etc), nor why for most of the last 2000 years the
>Chinese have been further ahead than anyone else.
Or for that matter why there have been a number of Chinese Noble prize
winners in physics, or why a large number of American science and
engineering graduate programs would collapse without Chinese graduate
students.
The fact that it seems clear that Chinese is not a barrier to doing
science is why there is no support for romanization doay.
>: You might also consider Yu-lan Fang, "Why China Has No Science," *The
>: International Journal of Ethics* 32 (1922).
>
>But then I probably wouldn't want to.
The date of the work is interesting because it comes right in the
middle of the May Fourth movement. In 1919, the fact that German
cocessions in China were transferred to Japan by the Treaty of
Versallies touched off a wave of protest among intellectuals and some
soul searching as to why China was weak. During this time, everything
and anything was proposed as the answer. There is an amusing article
in which it was proposed that China should abandon Chinese and use
Esperanto.
It's interesting that most of the intellectual borrowing within China
occurred in the 1920's and since then China and the West have followed
rather divergent intellectual traditions. In particular, the notions
that "science is the answer" and "nationalism is good," which were
popular in the West in the 1920's have attacked by post-modernism in
the West while they have remained rather strong in China. The
educational philosopher with the most influence in China remains John
Dewey.
One of the interesting consequences of this is that there have some
books in West which try to link Western science and Eastern mysticism
(i.e. the Tao of Physics and the Dancing Wu-li Masters). These have
had absolutely zero impact in China, where people go into science as a
reaction against what they regard as "silly ancient superstition".
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Joseph Wang Globewide Network Academy
j...@mit.edu FREE Distance Education catalog database
http://www.gnacademy.org Thousands of Courses and Programs
Norman Roberts
> The argument is made in Robert K. Logan, *The Alphabet Effect* (New
> York: William Morrow, 1986) and, in a much more complex form, in a
> series of studies by Eric Havelock on the effects of alphabetic
> literacy: eg. *A Preface to Plato* (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
> Press, 1963); *The Literate Revolution in Greece and Its Cultural
> Consequences* (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982). The
> latter is a collection of Havelock's articles.
> You might also consider Yu-lan Fang, "Why China Has No Science," *The
> International Journal of Ethics* 32 (1922).
I've always considered this argument merely an excuse which many
Westerners give for not learning Chinese. The plain fact is that if
you're looking for abstract symbols, etc, Chinese has more than you want
to know about.
The only advantage of an alphabet is that it makes it easy for anybody to
write. Hence we get such nonsense about writing systems repeated in book
after book.
It takes about as long to learn to read and write Chinese as it does to
learn to read and write English.
Most likely the conservative nature of the Chinese ruling class prevented
exploitation of the scientific knowledge and discoveries.
R.D. Coons
On 5 Mar 1997 22:50:07 GMT, jas...@yoyo.cc.monash.edu.au (Joseph
Askew) wrote:
>R.D. Coons (rco...@netcom.ca) wrote:
>
>: There is an interesting argument that attributes Western science to
>: the effect of the alphabet on the consciousness of its users. In
>: brief, an alphabetic system of writing, in contrast to ideographic
>: systems, tends to encourage abstract thought and classification,
>: whereas the latter, with its concrete symbols, inhibits it.
>: The latter, so the argument runs, is less conducive to the abstract thought and
>: the systematic classification of different phenomena that a scientific
>: revolution demands.
>
>Another argument runs that the Chinese are incapable ofany real
>civilisation because abstract thought can only be performed to any
>great extent by White races. I'm not comparing your argument to
>this but at least think about it. I once had the chance to buy a
>re-print of a 1920's American text on Chinese history which did in
>fact state as much and claim that Chinese civilisation was founded
>by blond blue eyed people and nothing has changed since because the
>Aryan core foolishly intermarried and miscegenation caused stagnation.
>I didn't bother, a decision I have always regrette.
If Logan's argument, as you seem to acknowledge, shouldn't be compared
to fanciful theories of genetic superiority, why on earth should I
bother thinking about any similarities? The argument (which, of
course, isn't even mine) bears no resemblance to the racialist straw
man you've constructed.
For what it's worth, Logan is a former student of Marshall McLuhan,
and he assumes (rightly or wrongly) that the medium of any
communication will have a profound effect on its content. Hence his
assumption that differing mechanisms for communicating knowledge (in
this case different systems of writing) will yield significantly
different mental universes. Whether this is true or no, it would be
difficult to imagine a less racialist thesis.
Thanks, nevertheless, for an informative post, notwithstanding its
unfortunate tone. I have greater doubts about the argument than you
evidently suppose.
>
>: You might also consider Yu-lan Fang, "Why China Has No Science," *The
>: International Journal of Ethics* 32 (1922).
>
>But then I probably wouldn't want to.
Not exactly an open-minded perspective.
Keep in mind that there is indeed a real historical problem, which the
earlier posts in this thread discussed. If an alien from another
galaxy had arrived on earth, say, circa 1500, he might reasonably have
selected China, probably the most advanced civilization on earth, as
the place wherein a scientific revolution was most likely to occur.
But our hypothetical alien would have been wrong. Why?
Various historians have traced China's relative backwardness from
around the 18th century onward to the character of its social and
political systems. Fung Yu-Lan, the author of a standard study of
Chinese philosophy, offers a different explantion: he argues (in
brief) that the Chinese had a more perceptual and concrete view of the
world and consequently less inclination to systematize its laws
abstractly. He doesn't, obviously, intend this as a condemnation of
his own country, whose philosophy he devoted his life to studying,
merely as an attempt to explain its differences from the West.
I merely mentioned an alternate explanation based on language. I claim
no real competence in assessing its validity.
********
In my original post I conflated Havelock's and Logan's treatments of
the effect of alphabetic literacy. Here are a few passages from Eric
Havelock's much more subtle treatment of the issue:
"In European [alphabetic] systems of writing, whether Semitic or
Greek, the letter shapes behave phonetically, and their shape is only
incidental to this function.
"Chinese script is logographic, that is, a sign represents a whole
word, not its phonetic components, and by combining signs into larger
units or 'characters' individual words can be 'hyphenated' so to speak
with each other to convey a meaning which each by itself would not
convey. Because of this 'plus' effect, it is tempting to classify the
Chinese system as 'ideographic' as though it was being used to
symbolize thoughts or concepts directly.
"... The three points to be emphasized here however are simply these:
(i) because of the correspondence between signs and spoken words,
taken as wholes, the unwary can be deluded into thinking of the
[Chinese] characters as fully 'phonetic' in the Greek sense and (ii)
into thinking that spoken Chinese and the written characters in which
it is expressed together constitute two aspects of a single language
system; (iii) since a sign represents a whole word, and the character
a combination of whole words, and since the words of any language are
theoretically infinite, it is clear that the Chinese system cannot
meet the requirement of economy in the number of signs, a requirement
which any [alphabetic] system which endeavors to symbolize the
phonemes of a language however approximately can meet. The net result
is that the *average* Chinese, as opposed to the specialist, is
limited in the number and variety of statements he can read easily,
because his ability to accomodate the shapes of a variety of symbols
in his memory is also limited
"... For a literate Chinese to increase his reading vocabulary (using
the term 'literate' in its Chinese but not its European sense)
requires a stringent discipline in, among other things, the
memorization of inscribed shapes . . . [But] the common conventions of
language as encoded in our brain are acoustic, not visual."
>From Eric Havelock, *The Literate Revolution in Greece*, 51-53.
Joseph Askew
Joseph C Wang (j...@athena.mit.edu) wrote:
: >Unfortunately this cannot explain why other alphabet using groups
: >did not develop science (such as the Arabs, the Indians, the Greeks
: >and Romans etc etc), nor why for most of the last 2000 years the
: >Chinese have been further ahead than anyone else.
: Or for that matter why there have been a number of Chinese Noble prize
: winners in physics, or why a large number of American science and
: engineering graduate programs would collapse without Chinese graduate
: students.
Well you could argue that the problem is invention. Once science has
been invented less creative (or capable of abstract thinking) groups
can tag along. I, of course, do not accept this line of thought, but
it is possible to explain away the present Chinese scientists. Myself
I think, going on the seemingly exponential growth of Chinese authored
science articles, the Chinese will dominate science in America in the
near future.
: The fact that it seems clear that Chinese is not a barrier to doing
: science is why there is no support for romanization doay.
Unless of course someone wants to argue that the use of Pinyin in
Mainland schools is enough to teach the basics of abstract thinking.
I wouldn't want to touch this either.
: >: You might also consider Yu-lan Fang, "Why China Has No Science," *The
: >: International Journal of Ethics* 32 (1922).
: >But then I probably wouldn't want to.
: The date of the work is interesting because it comes right in the
: middle of the May Fourth movement. In 1919, the fact that German
: cocessions in China were transferred to Japan by the Treaty of
: Versallies touched off a wave of protest among intellectuals and some
: soul searching as to why China was weak. During this time, everything
: and anything was proposed as the answer. There is an amusing article
: in which it was proposed that China should abandon Chinese and use
: Esperanto.
There was an exact duplicate of this during the Bunmeikaiko period
in Japan when it was proposed English should become the national
language of Japan. When a member of this group went on to found, I
think, Keio University he put the English Department in the Faculty
of Engineering where it has remained since. I think that the impact
of the West had led to some bizarre self-hatred among Chinese people.
Rather like Jewish self-hate in fact. Chinese people, mostly from
the mainland, often talk of all Chinese history being one of cruelty
oppression and dictatorship. I think it is an early symptom of the
growth of a modern economy. After a while perhaps they will be more
sensible. It's rather like Lu Xun's famous comment that when he read
the Classics he found the words "Eat Men" written between the lines.
: It's interesting that most of the intellectual borrowing within China
: occurred in the 1920's and since then China and the West have followed
: rather divergent intellectual traditions. In particular, the notions
: that "science is the answer" and "nationalism is good," which were
: popular in the West in the 1920's have attacked by post-modernism in
: the West while they have remained rather strong in China. The
: educational philosopher with the most influence in China remains John
: Dewey.
I have seen something like this in Taiwan. I think in modern science
there is still massive intellectual borrowing. I expect most Chinese
language translators in Taiwan or China work on science or technology
related works. This has meant that social sciences have lagged. The
main ideas seem culled from the worst works of the 20s and 30s. There
is still "scientific" racism in Taiwan like you do not find anywhere
else on the planet. I wonder if anyone has translated Stephen Jay
Gould into Chinese yet. And of course part of it is less a divergent
intellectual tradition but just that modernisation is still rather
new. Farm houses used to be seen as backward in the West. Now we are
all so far removed from farm life they are cute. Taiwan is just one
generation behind. Farm houses are backward and so get knocked down.
My brother used to live in a house where the very expensive highyl
desirable wooden floor had been covered up in lino in the 50s. He
added significant value to the house just by ripping it up and going
over the floor polishing the beams. Soon Taiwanese yuppies will all
want to buy traditional farm houses too.
: One of the interesting consequences of this is that there have some
: books in West which try to link Western science and Eastern mysticism
: (i.e. the Tao of Physics and the Dancing Wu-li Masters). These have
: had absolutely zero impact in China, where people go into science as a
: reaction against what they regard as "silly ancient superstition".
Especially in China. I have always found books like this rather
silly. So silly they are cute.
Donald Tucker
Joseph C Wang (j...@ATHENA.MIT.EDU) writes:
> In article <5fk63p$b...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>,
> R.D. Coons <rco...@netcom.ca> wrote:
>>system (like that of China) in which the units actually display (or
>>so the argument runs, is less conducive to the abstract thought and
>>the systematic classification of different phenomena that a scientific
>>revolution demands.
>
> success that China today has at science and technology.
Its amazing how widespread the alphabet=scientific thinking fallacy
has spread. It even appears in the recent writing of otherwise
insightful authors, such as James Burke's "Axemaker's Gift"
Donald
Gerard Foley
R.D. Coons (rco...@netcom.ca) wrote:
<snip>
: In my original post I conflated Havelock's and Logan's treatments of
: the effect of alphabetic literacy. Here are a few passages from Eric
: Havelock's much more subtle treatment of the issue:
<snip>
: The net result
: is that the *average* Chinese, as opposed to the specialist, is
: limited in the number and variety of statements he can read easily,
: because his ability to accomodate the shapes of a variety of symbols
: in his memory is also limited
: "... For a literate Chinese to increase his reading vocabulary (using
: the term 'literate' in its Chinese but not its European sense)
: requires a stringent discipline in, among other things, the
: memorization of inscribed shapes . . . [But] the common conventions of
: language as encoded in our brain are acoustic, not visual."
: >From Eric Havelock, *The Literate Revolution in Greece*, 51-53.
But this isn't the way what literate readers of alphabetic languages
read. They do not spell out words from the 24 or 26 or so letters
of their alphabet - they too learn thousands of words which they
recognize as a whole, without scanning the individual word for its
letters. It is true that occasionally an unfamiliar word is partly
intelligible because of a relation that can be recognized between it
and a familiar word, but with no ability at all to read Chinese I
would think that the same kind of guessing is possible with respect
to some unfamiliar characters.
--
Gerry
Joseph C Wang
In article <nroberts-070...@r32p11.onramp.net>,
Norman Roberts <nrob...@hawaii.edu> wrote:
>Most likely the conservative nature of the Chinese ruling class prevented
>exploitation of the scientific knowledge and discoveries.
But China's ruling class weren't particularly conservative or
resistant to change. When confronted by the West, most everyone in
the Qing dynasty agreed that something needed to be done. They
weren't sure what, and what was tried often backfired.
Certainly the Qing dynasty was accused of being conservative and
backward by its opponents, but I think that this accusation is without
much merit. Most of the events that lead to this accusation (such as
the Hundred Days Reform or the Railroad movement) have been taken out
of context.
The fact that Qing dynasty had problem modernizing is because
modernization is a very difficult process, it wasn't due to any lack
of trying.
Joseph C Wang
In article <5fs78q$h...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>,
R.D. Coons <rco...@netcom.ca> wrote:
>For what it's worth, Logan is a former student of Marshall McLuhan,
>and he assumes (rightly or wrongly) that the medium of any
>communication will have a profound effect on its content. Hence his
>assumption that differing mechanisms for communicating knowledge (in
>this case different systems of writing) will yield significantly
>different mental universes.
He might know media theory, but it's fairly clear from the passage
below that he knows nothing about how the Chinese language works.
Part of the reason I may be harsh on this thesis is that for someone
who can read Chinese it seems such utter nonsense.
>Keep in mind that there is indeed a real historical problem, which the
>earlier posts in this thread discussed. If an alien from another
>galaxy had arrived on earth, say, circa 1500, he might reasonably have
>selected China, probably the most advanced civilization on earth, as
>the place wherein a scientific revolution was most likely to occur.
>But our hypothetical alien would have been wrong. Why?
Because our hypothetical alien is assuming that human societies have a
natural progression and that an industrial and scientific revolution
is a natural result of high technology. This assumption is so
strongly engrained in people's thinking, largely because of Marx, that
most people don't realize that they are making it or that the evidence
behind that assumption is questionable.
The industrial revolution only started in one place and diffused from
there. Once it happened, then every other society would have to
incorporate industrialization or die, but if you don't take the
Marxist assumption of societal progression, there is no particular
reason to think that the revolution should start in China.
>Various historians have traced China's relative backwardness from
>around the 18th century onward to the character of its social and
>political systems.
The trouble with those historians is that most of them haven't really
studied 18th century Chinese social and political systems. It is
ASSUMED from Marxist and modernist dogma that Chinese social and
political systems inhibited an industrial revolution, but there has
been very little research into how Chinese social and political
systems worked to see if this is the case.
>Fung Yu-Lan, the author of a standard study of
>Chinese philosophy, offers a different explantion: he argues (in
>brief) that the Chinese had a more perceptual and concrete view of the
>world and consequently less inclination to systematize its laws
>abstractly.
But recent work by Thomas Metzger indicates that this is non-sense,
and that in fact the Qing dynasty had an extensive and systematic set
of private and administrative law.
>He doesn't, obviously, intend this as a condemnation of
>his own country, whose philosophy he devoted his life to studying,
>merely as an attempt to explain its differences from the West.
It's not so obvious. What happens in many cases is that current
Chinese will make stringent critiicism of "feudalistic China." IMHO,
in most cases, these criticisms are exaggerated.
>In my original post I conflated Havelock's and Logan's treatments of
>"Chinese script is logographic, that is, a sign represents a whole
>word, not its phonetic components, and by combining signs into larger
>units or 'characters' individual words can be 'hyphenated' so to speak
>with each other to convey a meaning which each by itself would not
>convey.
But it's not so simple. In a lot of cases the combined word has
absolutely nothing to do with word parts. A fairly large fraction of
Chinese words use the characters as phoetic elements.
>The net result
>is that the *average* Chinese, as opposed to the specialist, is
>limited in the number and variety of statements he can read easily,
>because his ability to accomodate the shapes of a variety of symbols
>in his memory is also limited
Chinese speaking regions have a literacy rate of at least 80% and mass
circulation newspapers which aren't very different from newspapers in
the west. There are two mistakes here...
1) First of all, you need do know any about 2000-5000 characters in
order to be able have a working knowledge of the language.
I have some books in Chinese about Quantum mechanics and the algebraic
theory of Banch spaces. What is significant is that they don't
contain any characters that aren't used in general speech. Scientific
and technical terms are NOT created using new characters but rather by
combining old ones.
2) You don't need remember the characters as individual shapes. Most
characters are composed of a few regular elements.
>"... For a literate Chinese to increase his reading vocabulary (using
>the term 'literate' in its Chinese but not its European sense)
>requires a stringent discipline in, among other things, the
>memorization of inscribed shapes . . .
But this simply not the case.
The mistake here is to think of a Chinese character as a word. A
Chinese character is less of a word than a word part such as "auto-",
"un-", "-morph-", "-ic", "-ism" This is why you can create scientific
and technical terms without new characters. You string them together
just like Western scientists use Greek and Latin roots.
John McCarthy
The people whose opinions I would most like to read on this question
are the 19th century intellectual Chinese advocates of science and
modernization. Their education would have emphasized traditional
Chinese attitudes, and they may have had the clearest ideas of how
these ideas prevented progress.
The fact that the very long Britannica article on Chinese history,
almost a book in itself, didn't mention Chinese science or technology
suggests that current historical scholarship about China, both by
Chinese and by Westerners has lost this 19th century attitude.
Perhaps the attitude that science and technology is important in
Chinese history was pre-empted by the communists, who only had to read
Marx and Lenin (and maybe Lewis Henry Morgan) to know all they needed
to know about technology and history.
Does anyone know any 19th century progressive Chinese writings that
have been tranlated? I have read some of Sun Yat-sen's writings, but
I don't recall anything about science and technology.
John McCarthy
In article <joe-100397...@r30p11.onramp.net> j...@athena.mit.edu (Joseph C Wang) writes:
>
> In article <nroberts-070...@r32p11.onramp.net>,
> Norman Roberts <nrob...@hawaii.edu> wrote:
>
> >Most likely the conservative nature of the Chinese ruling class prevented
> >exploitation of the scientific knowledge and discoveries.
>
> But China's ruling class weren't particularly conservative or
> resistant to change. When confronted by the West, most everyone in
> the Qing dynasty agreed that something needed to be done. They
> weren't sure what, and what was tried often backfired.
>
> Certainly the Qing dynasty was accused of being conservative and
> backward by its opponents, but I think that this accusation is without
> much merit. Most of the events that lead to this accusation (such as
> the Hundred Days Reform or the Railroad movement) have been taken out
> of context.
>
> The fact that Qing dynasty had problem modernizing is because
> modernization is a very difficult process, it wasn't due to any lack
> of trying.
Would Joseph Wang post some information about modernizing efforts of
the Qing Dynasty? What about the statement I read somewhere about an
explicit decision (in the 1840s?) not to adopt railroads or the
telegraph?
Joseph C Wang
In article <5g1kno$j...@shell3.ba.best.com>,
John McCarthy <j...@CS.Stanford.EDU> wrote:
>Would Joseph Wang post some information about modernizing efforts of
>the Qing Dynasty? What about the statement I read somewhere about an
>explicit decision (in the 1840s?) not to adopt railroads or the
>telegraph?
That statement you read was probably more of an urban legend than
anything else.
Between the 1840's and the 1860's, there were few efforts at
modernization. This was less out of a desire to avoid modernization
than because the Qing dynasty had four major rebellions to worry
about. One of the consequences of these rebellions was to point out
the ineffectiveness of the Qing armed forces and lead to the creation
of gentry-led militia groups. The consequence of this to later
history was that the Qing had very little power to force change
throughout the rest of the 19th century.
After the major rebellions were put down, the Qing dynasty tried the
"Self-Stregthening Movement." The idea was that the Qing dynasty
would try to graft Western industry and science onto Qing
institutions. Factories were build under government supervision. An
army and navy was raised. Ultimately things didn't work out. You had
massive amounts of corruption, a lot of "white elephant" projects.
The third phase occurred after the defeat of the Sino-Japanese War.
During this phase, Western institutions were added, the Confucian
examinations were abolished, and people began talking about a National
Assmebly. At this point, the Qing dynasty collapsed, largely because
so much power had fallen out of its hands, and largely because
nationalism had made their non-Han Chinese origins an issue.
One thing that occurs to me in looking at the Self-Strengthening
movement is that a lot of the problems that the Qing dynasty had (i.e.
massive corruption) seemed to be similar to the problems that
post-WWII third world developing countries had. A lot of other
problems was because the Qing dynasty was "weak." The traditional
Confucian bureaucracy was (intentionally) tiny and didn't have the
human resources to manage the huge organizations which are typical of
industrialized societies. Efforts to graft modern institutions onto
the Confucian bureaucacy causes power and prestige to flow from the
traditional bureacracy. Ultimately the Qing dynasty collapsed, and
this caused things to really fall apart.
Dave
In article <5fk63p$b...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>, rco...@netcom.ca (R.D.
Coons) wrote:
(( cuts ))
>The issue is obviously perplexing, since China's technological
>accomplishments, by all accounts, surpassed those of the West prior to
>the Scientific Revolution.
My opinion is simply that the advance of science in the West, like many
other things is attributable to the lack of a unified government and the
greater freedom of individuals. Any system, it seems to me, which relies
on some central authority for development of education and, in fact,
commerce would have a tendency to stagnate. Science is only, as I
understand, a series of steps which has the aim at arriving at the truth
of a particular physical situation which can be observed with the senses
we have. Put another way it is the art of knowing something objectively.
Governments have always regarded the truth as their responsibility though,
and what can be proved might be radically different from that view.
Personally, I think this is the reason the Arabic, Chinese, Indian and
Japanese cultures all fell behind the technological achievements of the
West. As governements generally become more powerful, what science would
reveal often can diametrically oppose the policy of the government, so
scientists and science is surpressed. Gallileo fell victim to this, and
his fate might well have ended science in the West, except that there were
many other jurisdictions which had reason to defy Papal edicts so others
continued the studies he started, and other parts of Europe benefitted
from this.
>There is an interesting argument that attributes Western science to
>the effect of the alphabet on the consciousness of its users. In
>brief, an alphabetic system of writing, in contrast to ideographic
>systems, tends to encourage abstract thought and classification,
>whereas the latter, with its concrete symbols, inhibits it.
I cannot see the difference between the abstract thought necessary to use
an ideographic, syllabic or alphabetic system for writing. If anything,
if I understand it correctly, one must really keep ones wits if one is to
read Egyptian hyroglyphics (sp) where a symbol might represent what it is
a picture of, the sound of a syllable in a longer word, or even the sound
of a consonant.
I read somewhere (please, please don't make me look it up) that at the
Tennis Court at the beginning of the French Revolution no one took notes,
but many of the people memorized what occurred. This would not be the
manner that a fully developed literate society recorded what went on
during so important an event. I would advance that this was the exact
period when science was being developed and the technology of the West was
beginning to outstrip surrounding civilizations.
(( cuts ))
Joseph C Wang
In article <jmc-100397...@r30p11.onramp.net>,
John McCarthy <j...@Steam.stanford.edu> wrote:
>The people whose opinions I would most like to read on this question
>are the 19th century intellectual Chinese advocates of science and
>modernization. Their education would have emphasized traditional
>Chinese attitudes, and they may have had the clearest ideas of how
>these ideas prevented progress.
The trouble is that by assuming that you can classify people into
"pro-science/modernization" (good guys) and
"anti-science/modernization" (bad guys) as much of the historical
scholarship does, you miss a lot of what is going on. For example a
lot of the scholars who supported Kang You-Wei in the Hundred Days
Reform were virulently anti-Western and anti-science a few years
earlier.
Also some other things that you have to be careful of....
1) The intellectuals that you talk about had an idealized and in my
mind unrealistic notion of what science and modernization was.
2) You have to be very careful not to lump together a lot of unrelated
ideas under the rubric of "traditional Chinese attitudes." A lot of
historical studies ASSUME that things didn't change in China for
several thousand years. This isn't the case, and if you find out how
19th-century China worked that may tell you nothing about 12th-century
China.
For example, one thing very new that happened in the 19th century was
that population growth and initial prosperity caused a massive
overproduction of people trained in the classics. People who spent
their lives studying for a government job found it out of reach, and
this led to a considerable amount of bitterness and griping at the
government.
>Chinese and by Westerners has lost this 19th century attitude.
>Perhaps the attitude that science and technology is important in
>Chinese history was pre-empted by the communists, who only had to read
>Marx and Lenin (and maybe Lewis Henry Morgan) to know all they needed
>to know about technology and history.
There is a strange love-hate relationship that the Marxists have with
imperial China. On the one hand, everything from that time is
feudalistic and therefore bad and backward. On the other hand,
Chinese Communists assert that you can proto-science and
proto-captialism in this period.
>Does anyone know any 19th century progressive Chinese writings that
>have been tranlated? I have read some of Sun Yat-sen's writings, but
>I don't recall anything about science and technology.
You might start with the bibliography of Fredric Wakeman's "The Fall
of Imperial China" or do a search of anything by Thomas Metzger or
Jonathan Spence.
One thing that you should be careful not to do is to immediately try
to divide people up into progressive good guys and regressive bad
guys. This will lead you astray.
Joseph Askew
Gerard Foley (gfo...@freenet.columbus.oh.us) wrote:
: But this isn't the way what literate readers of alphabetic languages
: read. They do not spell out words from the 24 or 26 or so letters
: of their alphabet - they too learn thousands of words which they
: recognize as a whole, without scanning the individual word for its
: letters. It is true that occasionally an unfamiliar word is partly
: intelligible because of a relation that can be recognized between it
: and a familiar word, but with no ability at all to read Chinese I
: would think that the same kind of guessing is possible with respect
: to some unfamiliar characters.
Because the last Chinese dynasty was non-Chinese we have some very
good evidence about learning Chinese. Manchu was, and may still be
if there are any literate Manchus left, an alphabetic system. But
as time went on Manchus took up Chinese and forgot their Manchu. So
some early Emperors made an effort to preserve Manchu culture. Prizes
were given for Manchus who could speak or write Manchu under Qianlong.
But we have some of their textbooks which show that the Manchus were
learning Manchu as if it were Chinese in this way. Not the alphabet
and each letter, but all the latters put togetherm divorced from its
sound, as if it were a character. So they leanrt to read Manchu as a
whole, without scanning for letters. Who says alphabets are better?
John McCarthy
Thanks, Joe, for your views on the Qing. Does anyone else have
something to add?
Joseph Askew
R.D. Coons (rco...@netcom.ca) wrote:
: >Another argument runs that the Chinese are incapable ofany real
: >civilisation because abstract thought can only be performed to any
: >great extent by White races. I'm not comparing your argument to
: >this but at least think about it. I once had the chance to buy a
: >re-print of a 1920's American text on Chinese history which did in
: >fact state as much and claim that Chinese civilisation was founded
: >by blond blue eyed people and nothing has changed since because the
: >Aryan core foolishly intermarried and miscegenation caused stagnation.
: >I didn't bother, a decision I have always regrette.
: If Logan's argument, as you seem to acknowledge, shouldn't be compared
: to fanciful theories of genetic superiority, why on earth should I
: bother thinking about any similarities?
I don't think I do acknowledge that.
: The argument (which, of
: course, isn't even mine) bears no resemblance to the racialist straw
: man you've constructed.
It is not the same but it does bear some resemblance. For a start
it is a determinist argument. Whether you argue for racial deter-
minism or cultural determinism you are still a determinist. Not the
same but still one of a family. The problem, as far as I can see,
is making bad arguments which remove any real space for human beings.
: For what it's worth, Logan is a former student of Marshall McLuhan,
: and he assumes (rightly or wrongly) that the medium of any
: communication will have a profound effect on its content.
I didn't think he spoke, read, wrote Chinese, had been to China
or knew any Chinese people myself. So Logan is a communication
determinist. There is a world of difference between the rather
banal statement that the medium will affect content and the one
that Chinese people are incapable of abstract thought.
: Hence his
: assumption that differing mechanisms for communicating knowledge (in
: this case different systems of writing) will yield significantly
: different mental universes. Whether this is true or no, it would be
: difficult to imagine a less racialist thesis.
I did not say it was a racist thesis, but frankly yes I could.
Without any trouble at all. Cultural supremists are no less
objectionable, or not much at any rate, than racial ones. Maybe
if the facts bore them out it wouldn't be too bad.
: Not exactly an open-minded perspective.
I'm renown for many things. I've yet to be accused of being
open minded.
: Keep in mind that there is indeed a real historical problem, which the
: earlier posts in this thread discussed. If an alien from another
: galaxy had arrived on earth, say, circa 1500, he might reasonably have
: selected China, probably the most advanced civilization on earth, as
: the place wherein a scientific revolution was most likely to occur.
: But our hypothetical alien would have been wrong. Why?
I am deeply aware that this is a real historical problem. I am not
sure why. I know why most other people are wrong, but it is hard to
come up with a good reason to explain it. I have come up with manty
over the years and I'm getting pretty good at it. In fact I'm so
good that as an intellectual exercise I could probably make a good
enough argument based on any one Chinese cultural artifact you cared
to name. I have done so with bound feet before. I think it was a neat
argument myself. If pressed I would say that China "failed" because
it was too modern. Science depends on funding. Funding depends on the
existence of a capitalist class interested in long term investments.
Which means a lot of other things as well, but one of which is the
exclusion of the capitalists from other means of making money. In my
opinion people prefer to seek wealth and honour through socially
acceptable ways. Only when excluded from these normal channels of
advancement do people take up being rich as a substitute. So the more
advanced sector of most European economies was dominated by minorities
excluded from government preferment and the honour system. Jews are
the best example, but also Old Believers in Russia, Protestants in
France, the OS Chinese in SouthEast Asia and above all the Dissenters
in Britain. The Industrial Revolution was in large part the work of
Quakers who were excluded from the normal channels of advancement in
Britain. They could not join the Army, the Church, go to University,
get elected, or even appear at Court. So they made money instead. As
China did not have these sorts of barriers the children of merchanrs
wanted to become officials instead and so did. No long term interest.
I mean to make a proper argument one day, but I think I have a much
better case than does Logan.
: Various historians have traced China's relative backwardness from
: around the 18th century onward to the character of its social and
: political systems.
Which strikes me as a tautology really.
: Fung Yu-Lan, the author of a standard study of
: Chinese philosophy, offers a different explantion: he argues (in
: brief) that the Chinese had a more perceptual and concrete view of the
: world and consequently less inclination to systematize its laws
: abstractly.
Unfortunately he suffers from the fact that China did indeed systematise
its laws abstractly. Such an old fashioned view has not been in favour
for at least 20 years. It relies on the fact that no one wanted to read
all the case books and massive legal documentation. When a few American
academics started to do so they found a very different story. This is
one of the great failings in the traditional view of China, not the
least or the last imo, and has been a great field for a lot of work
since.
: He doesn't, obviously, intend this as a condemnation of
: his own country, whose philosophy he devoted his life to studying,
: merely as an attempt to explain its differences from the West.
I think he quite obviously did intend it as a condemnation.
[Quotation from Havelock]
: "Chinese script is logographic, that is, a sign represents a whole
: word,
This is his first mistake. Chinese is not, despite all the text books
and their claims, monosyllabic. Most words need at least two proper
characters. Chinese, as its modern putonghua form, is no more mono-
syllabic than English.
: not its phonetic components,
As I have pointed out *most* characters are at least half phonetic.
: and by combining signs into larger
: units or 'characters' individual words can be 'hyphenated' so to speak
: with each other to convey a meaning which each by itself would not
: convey.
Not entirely following him here, but I guess I see what he means. A
Chinese character is made up of parts which are sometimes characters
in themselves or are derived from characters. The standard example
would be hao3 (meaning "good") which is made up of a female character
together with a child character. Well a son character to be exact.
: Because of this 'plus' effect, it is tempting to classify the
: Chinese system as 'ideographic' as though it was being used to
: symbolize thoughts or concepts directly.
I fail to see how writing "good" the way the Chinese do conveys more
or less in the way of thoughts or concepts than the way the English
: "... The three points to be emphasized here however are simply these:
: (i) because of the correspondence between signs and spoken words,
: taken as wholes, the unwary can be deluded into thinking of the
: [Chinese] characters as fully 'phonetic' in the Greek sense and (ii)
: into thinking that spoken Chinese and the written characters in which
: it is expressed together constitute two aspects of a single language
: system; (iii) since a sign represents a whole word, and the character
: a combination of whole words, and since the words of any language are
: theoretically infinite, it is clear that the Chinese system cannot
: meet the requirement of economy in the number of signs, a requirement
: which any [alphabetic] system which endeavors to symbolize the
: phonemes of a language however approximately can meet. The net result
: is that the *average* Chinese, as opposed to the specialist, is
: limited in the number and variety of statements he can read easily,
: because his ability to accomodate the shapes of a variety of symbols
: in his memory is also limited
There are so many mistakes here I hardly know where to start. There
is no correspondence between signs and spoken words as such. At least
not the one to one and onto relation he is implying. Modern spoken
Chinese and the written characters do indeed constitute two aspects
of the one language system although he may be thinking of Classical
Chinese which does differ from normal standard Chinese. A sign does
not always represent a whole word. Most words need two or more for
their meaning. This makes traditional Chinese texts hard to read as
they did not use spaces or any form of punctuation. Not all characters
are combinations of other words. Some are, most are not. The number
of words in Chinese is theoretically infinte as new coinings can be
made all the time, indeed it is easier in Chinese than in English as
English has traditionally relied on Latin, Greek and French (or these
days nonsense babbled by geeks and weirdos) while Chinese, like
German, just sticks a few characters together. It is easy to say
ICBM in Chinese. I am not sure what he means by economy of signs,
but I'm fairly sure I disagree with it. As for the average Chinese
person, it is true that those who suffer from limited literacy will
have trouble reading some texts. But those who are fully literate
will have little trouble. Those who have some literacy will have no
more trouble working out most new characters than someone would in
English. Perhaps less. For instance someone who had never seen the
character for "copper" and came across it would know it was a metal
type object pronounced "tong". Chinese has just one of these.
: "... For a literate Chinese to increase his reading vocabulary (using
: the term 'literate' in its Chinese but not its European sense)
: requires a stringent discipline in, among other things, the
: memorization of inscribed shapes . . . [But] the common conventions of
: language as encoded in our brain are acoustic, not visual."
I would be careful about comments concerning conventions. I have had
no trouble learning Chinese characters except I am a very lazy person.
It is easier to remember a Chinese word if you know the character in
my opinion, I can never remember names unless I see it in Chinese. It
is no more difficult to learn to read and write Chinese than it is to
learn English. Maybe easier if you already speak Chinese. Serious
literacy requires at most 5,000 characters because most words are
combinations of the more commonly used ones. The Taiwanese government
has a literacy definition of about 2,500, the Mainland government has
a much smaller one at about 1,000 or less. This is trivial to learn.
To be "fully" literate after 12 years at school someone would have to
learn just over 400 characters a year. English speakers would have to
learn far more than that in terms of new spellings every day.
: >From Eric Havelock, *The Literate Revolution in Greece*, 51-53.
R.D. Coons
On 9 Mar 1997 09:17:59 -0800, gfo...@freenet.columbus.oh.us (Gerard
Foley) wrote:
>R.D. Coons (rco...@netcom.ca) wrote:
><snip>
>
>: The net result
>: is that the *average* Chinese, as opposed to the specialist, is
>: limited in the number and variety of statements he can read easily,
>: because his ability to accomodate the shapes of a variety of symbols
>: in his memory is also limited
>
>: "... For a literate Chinese to increase his reading vocabulary (using
>: the term 'literate' in its Chinese but not its European sense)
>: requires a stringent discipline in, among other things, the
>: memorization of inscribed shapes . . . [But] the common conventions of
>: language as encoded in our brain are acoustic, not visual."
>
>: >From Eric Havelock, *The Literate Revolution in Greece*, 51-53.
>
> But this isn't the way what literate readers of alphabetic languages
>read. They do not spell out words from the 24 or 26 or so letters
>of their alphabet - they too learn thousands of words which they
>recognize as a whole, without scanning the individual word for its
>letters. It is true that occasionally an unfamiliar word is partly
>intelligible because of a relation that can be recognized between it
>and a familiar word, but with no ability at all to read Chinese I
>would think that the same kind of guessing is possible with respect
>to some unfamiliar characters.
This is a contentious subject in current debates about education, viz.
whole-language teaching vs. phonics. Nevertheless, the preponderance
of evidence argues against what you're suggesting. As children we do
initially memorize whole words, but skilled readers (at least of
alphabetic script) by definition have acquired the ability to decode
sound-symbol relationships phonetically.
Joseph Askew
Joseph C Wang (j...@athena.mit.edu) wrote:
: >Most likely the conservative nature of the Chinese ruling class prevented
: >exploitation of the scientific knowledge and discoveries.
: But China's ruling class weren't particularly conservative or
: resistant to change. When confronted by the West, most everyone in
: the Qing dynasty agreed that something needed to be done. They
: weren't sure what, and what was tried often backfired.
When the British won the First Opium War they found that the Chinese
had started building a Western-style ship of the line. They had not
yet finished it, but Lin Zexu saw the need. He had also started a
Western style foundry to produce cannon overseen by foreigners. Some
of these were finished before the war was over.
: Certainly the Qing dynasty was accused of being conservative and
: backward by its opponents, but I think that this accusation is without
: much merit. Most of the events that lead to this accusation (such as
: the Hundred Days Reform or the Railroad movement) have been taken out
: of context.
I agree that the accusation is without merit but then I think a
lot of the accusations levied against the Qing are unfounded. You
ought to get out Morse's _International Relations_ and see how
little I agree with.
: The fact that Qing dynasty had problem modernizing is because
: modernization is a very difficult process, it wasn't due to any lack
: of trying.
When I come across these sorts of accusations, with the usual brief
mention of Japan, I ask who started modernising first. Who bought
the first Western naval vessels (ignoring the ship mentioned above)
the Chinese or the Japanese? Who set up the first ship yard? Who
established the first proper weapon foundry? Who set up the first
banks? Which country had the first modern textile mills? The issue
is not between why the Chinese did not modernise and why the Japanese
did, but rather what lead to the failure of modernisation in China
while it did not in Japan? In my opinion the obvious answer is the
presence of Westerners, their aggression and the Unequal Treaties
they imposed on China. After all the first ships were not handed
over to the Chinese, the first shipyard burnt by the French, the
first foundry closed by the British and the Japanese were allowed
to stamp out the opium trrade, regain tarrif autonomy and end the
system of extra-territorial control. China wasn't.
Clayton E. Cramer
Joseph C Wang wrote:
> In article <5g1kno$j...@shell3.ba.best.com>,
> John McCarthy <j...@CS.Stanford.EDU> wrote:
> >Would Joseph Wang post some information about modernizing efforts of
> >the Qing Dynasty? What about the statement I read somewhere about an
> >explicit decision (in the 1840s?) not to adopt railroads or the
> >telegraph?
> That statement you read was probably more of an urban legend than
> anything else.
[moderator note - quoted sig file deleted. Dave]
PBS ran a series about Asia and its interaction with the West a few
years back that one of my professors thought appropriate to show in
class. One of those interviewed for the segment on China was a
professor of Chinese history at one of the Hong Kong universities.
He explained that there were two different factions on the question of
technology as the West and China started to clash in the 1840s-1860s.
One faction, he explained, admitted that while a few guns and such might
be of some value, the real solution was for China to stick to its core
values, and this would provide the inner strength required to beat back
the West. The other faction argued, no, that not only did China need
Western arms technology, it also needed to absorb a significant
component of Western ideas about education, business organization, and
capitalism. The "inner strength" crowd carried the day, and lost the
struggle for Chinese independence. Perhaps this professor they were
interviewing
is wrong, but it's hardly urban legend.
Japan, by the way, seems to have learned from China's failure. It
absorbed more than just Western weapons technology -- it absorbed many
of the cultural ideas of the West as well.
--
Clayton E. Cramer Technical Marketing Manager, Diamond Lane
Communications
email: cra...@dlcc.com web page: http://www.cs.sonoma.edu/~cramerc
Opinions are strictly my own; DLCC doesn't pay me for non-technical
opinions.
R.D. Coons
On Mon, 10 Mar 1997 10:39:18 -0600, j...@athena.mit.edu (Joseph C Wang)
wrote:
>In article <5fs78q$h...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>,
>R.D. Coons <rco...@netcom.ca> wrote:
>
[cuts]
>>Keep in mind that there is indeed a real historical problem, which the
>>earlier posts in this thread discussed. If an alien from another
>>galaxy had arrived on earth, say, circa 1500, he might reasonably have
>>selected China, probably the most advanced civilization on earth, as
>>the place wherein a scientific revolution was most likely to occur.
>>But our hypothetical alien would have been wrong. Why?
>
>Because our hypothetical alien is assuming that human societies have a
>natural progression and that an industrial and scientific revolution
>is a natural result of high technology. This assumption is so
>strongly engrained in people's thinking, largely because of Marx, that
>most people don't realize that they are making it or that the evidence
>behind that assumption is questionable.
>
>The industrial revolution only started in one place and diffused from
>there. Once it happened, then every other society would have to
>incorporate industrialization or die, but if you don't take the
>Marxist assumption of societal progression, there is no particular
>reason to think that the revolution should start in China.
I think you may be speaking of the general idea of progress rather
than Marx's specific version of it. The assumption that human
societies, and even our ideas, move forward along some more or less
predetermined trajectory is not, of course, peculiar to Marx.
In any case, it seems clear that advanced technology is at the very
least a necessary precondition for a scientific revolution, and some
historians have plausibly argued that mundane technological innovation
propels science, rather than scientific discovery (ie. rare flashes of
Newtonian brilliance) propelling technology. Galileo would never have
turned his telescope on the heavens, confirming Copernicus, without
the improvements in lens-grinding (especially the glass lathe) that
made powerful concave lenses possible, and the telescope in turn
encouraged the study of optics and led to the miscroscope, which
itself is a necessary precondition for modern medicine. And so forth.
So granted China's technological superiority, I don't consider it an
indication of unconsciously Marxian assumptions to wonder why modern
science arose in the relatively backward West rather than the more
technologically advanced East. In other words, why did the Scientific
Revolution *not* occur in the country that by all acounts most
satisfied its technological preconditions? That was the point of my
alien visitor analogy.
On the other hand, I agree that beneath our language of "progress,"
"technological advancement," etc there often lurks an assumed theory
of natural, evolutionary progression from the past to the present,
with the normally unstated corollary that each successive stage is an
improvement on what preceded it. I don't share that assumption, but
unless one wishes to coin odd neologisms for the occasion, it's hard
not to use our conventional vocabulary of progress, even with its
dubious premises, when discussing a subject like this.
>
>>Various historians have traced China's relative backwardness from
>>around the 18th century onward to the character of its social and
>>political systems.
>
>The trouble with those historians is that most of them haven't really
>studied 18th century Chinese social and political systems. It is
>ASSUMED from Marxist and modernist dogma that Chinese social and
>political systems inhibited an industrial revolution, but there has
>been very little research into how Chinese social and political
>systems worked to see if this is the case.
And obviously one must avoid the assumption that since science is
(arguably) good, any features of Chinese society or thought that
"inhibited" a scientific revolution are therefore bad, and those
features of Western society that facilitated it good.
For example, China's political decision to withdraw from naval
exploration in 15th century, despite her manifestly superior
ship-building technology, suggests a more reclusive view of the world
than, say, that of the Portuguese under Henry the Navigator. And the
European impulse for exploration can be convincingly linked to a
similar impulse to investigate natural laws, both involving, in
different ways, a desire to subdue the earth (as enjoined in the OT)
by understanding it more fully. Yet the Portuguese voyages of
exploration, and many of those that followed, were also voyages of
exploitation and enslavement. Arguably, then, Western science and this
specific case of Western brutality sprang from a common world view,
and Chinese reclusiveness turns out, in ethical terms at least, to be
a virtue rather than a cultural deficiency. An "exploration is good,
reclusiveness bad" approach cannot accomodate this kind of ambiguity.
>>Fung Yu-Lan, the author of a standard study of
>>Chinese philosophy, offers a different explantion: he argues (in
>>brief) that the Chinese had a more perceptual and concrete view of the
>>world and consequently less inclination to systematize its laws
>>abstractly.
>
>But recent work by Thomas Metzger indicates that this is non-sense,
>and that in fact the Qing dynasty had an extensive and systematic set
>of private and administrative law.
My knowledge here is pretty much limited to Dr. Fung's article and
the abridged English version of his *History of Chinese Philosophy*;
but I should think that you're confusing scientific laws that describe
physical phenomena with juridical law and bureaucratic procedures. Law
and science arguably might be associated, but science is qualitatively
different from legal rules. Sophisticated administrative law and
philosophic or scientific abstraction don't necessarily coincide.
The claim that China was, for whatever reason, less inclined than the
West to systematize phenomena according to abstract scientific
principles seems almost self-evidently true, at least to my eyes. The
problem lies not in that *fact* but in arriving at an explanation for
it.
Regarding the alphabet argument, I'll have to defer to your much
greater knowledge of the subject.
I should point out, however, that you've now dismissed every
alternative that I can think of: differing social and political
structures, differing philosophical attitudes, and (probably
correctly) differing scripts.
Joseph Askew
John McCarthy (j...@Steam.stanford.edu) wrote:
: The people whose opinions I would most like to read on this question
: are the 19th century intellectual Chinese advocates of science and
: modernization. Their education would have emphasized traditional
: Chinese attitudes, and they may have had the clearest ideas of how
: these ideas prevented progress.
The problem with this is that you too seem to imply that traditional
Confucian attitudes prevented "progress". Why do you think that is so?
From what I can tell of the attitudes of the Self-Strengthening group
is that they did not see traditional Chinese attitudes as any sort of
impediment to what you call progress. It wasn't until the May Fourth
movement and the Communist Party that such ideas became common. I'ld
also stress that the use of words like "modernization" are questionable.
In 1842 uin many ways China was considerably more "modern" than most of
the West. Depending on how you define modern. Particularly in terms of
administration the West "modernised" by copying China.
: The fact that the very long Britannica article on Chinese history,
: almost a book in itself, didn't mention Chinese science or technology
: suggests that current historical scholarship about China, both by
: Chinese and by Westerners has lost this 19th century attitude.
Does it? Perhaps it is just that the writers of the Britannica are
not well versed in science or don't care.
: Does anyone know any 19th century progressive Chinese writings that
: have been tranlated? I have read some of Sun Yat-sen's writings, but
: I don't recall anything about science and technology.
Sun Yatsen is hardly the model of a modern Chinese progressive. I
know that works have been done *on* nineteenth century "progressives"
but I don't know any by them just off hand. I'll look around and see
what has been done if you like. I have a bibliography somewhere.
Just off hand, looking at what I have, the most famous work you seem
to be interested in would be Feng Kuei-fen's Protest from the Chiao-pin
Studio (Chiao pin lu k'ang i) written about 1860. I don't know if any
English version has been produced but that's his name in Wade Giles.
There is also the later work of Chang Chih-tung, in particular his
Exhortation to Learning (Ch'uan hsueh p'ien) published in 1898. Again
I know of no English translation but there might be one. The secondary
material is much larger, but most of it produced before 1970 or so
which makes it of little worth.
R.D. Coons
On Mon, 10 Mar 1997 10:39:18 -0600, j...@athena.mit.edu (Joseph C Wang)
wrote:
>In article <5fs78q$h...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>,
>R.D. Coons <rco...@netcom.ca> wrote:
>
[cuts]
>>Keep in mind that there is indeed a real historical problem, which the
>>earlier posts in this thread discussed. If an alien from another
>>galaxy had arrived on earth, say, circa 1500, he might reasonably have
>>selected China, probably the most advanced civilization on earth, as
>>the place wherein a scientific revolution was most likely to occur.
>>But our hypothetical alien would have been wrong. Why?
>
>Because our hypothetical alien is assuming that human societies have a
>natural progression and that an industrial and scientific revolution
>is a natural result of high technology. This assumption is so
>strongly engrained in people's thinking, largely because of Marx, that
>most people don't realize that they are making it or that the evidence
>behind that assumption is questionable.
>
>The industrial revolution only started in one place and diffused from
>there. Once it happened, then every other society would have to
>incorporate industrialization or die, but if you don't take the
>Marxist assumption of societal progression, there is no particular
>reason to think that the revolution should start in China.
I think you may be speaking of the general idea of progress rather
>
>>Various historians have traced China's relative backwardness from
>>around the 18th century onward to the character of its social and
>>political systems.
>
>The trouble with those historians is that most of them haven't really
>studied 18th century Chinese social and political systems. It is
>ASSUMED from Marxist and modernist dogma that Chinese social and
>political systems inhibited an industrial revolution, but there has
>been very little research into how Chinese social and political
>systems worked to see if this is the case.
And obviously one must avoid the assumption that since science is
(arguably) good, any features of Chinese society or thought that
"inhibited" a scientific revolution are therefore bad, and those
features of Western society that facilitated it good.
For example, China's political decision to withdraw from naval
exploration in 15th century, despite her manifestly superior
ship-building technology, suggests a more reclusive view of the world
than, say, that of the Portuguese under Henry the Navigator. And the
European impulse for exploration can be convincingly linked to a
similar impulse to investigate natural laws, both involving, in
different ways, a desire to subdue the earth (as enjoined in the OT)
by understanding it more fully. Yet the Portuguese voyages of
exploration, and many of those that followed, were also voyages of
exploitation and enslavement. Arguably, then, Western science and this
specific case of Western brutality sprang from a common world view,
and Chinese reclusiveness turns out, in ethical terms at least, to be
a virtue rather than a cultural deficiency. An "exploration is good,
reclusiveness bad" approach cannot accomodate this kind of ambiguity.
>>Fung Yu-Lan, the author of a standard study of
>>Chinese philosophy, offers a different explantion: he argues (in
>>brief) that the Chinese had a more perceptual and concrete view of the
>>world and consequently less inclination to systematize its laws
>>abstractly.
>
>But recent work by Thomas Metzger indicates that this is non-sense,
>and that in fact the Qing dynasty had an extensive and systematic set
>of private and administrative law.
John McCarthy
I read Yu-Lan Fung's article "Why China has no science" in the
International Journal of Ethics (now called just Journal of Ethics)
for April 1922. Fung wrote that the dominant Confucians ideology felt
that it had no need for science, because the proper study of mankind
was man, and that from an internal point of view. This
anti-progressive attitude existed in almost all human societies and
stifled progress where it dominated. This was in most parts of the
world, most of the time. The pro-science camp in Europe was quite
conscious of being revolutionaries and so was the 19th century
pro-science camp in China.
Catholicism stifled science just as vigorously as did Confucianism.
Gerard Foley
R.D. Coons (rco...@netcom.ca) wrote:
: On 9 Mar 1997 09:17:59 -0800, gfo...@freenet.columbus.oh.us (Gerard
: Foley) wrote:
snip
: >
: > But this isn't the way what literate readers of alphabetic languages
: >read. They do not spell out words from the 24 or 26 or so letters
: >of their alphabet - they too learn thousands of words which they
: >recognize as a whole, without scanning the individual word for its
: >letters. It is true that occasionally an unfamiliar word is partly
: >intelligible because of a relation that can be recognized between it
: >and a familiar word, but with no ability at all to read Chinese I
: >would think that the same kind of guessing is possible with respect
: >to some unfamiliar characters.
: This is a contentious subject in current debates about education, viz.
: whole-language teaching vs. phonics. Nevertheless, the preponderance
: of evidence argues against what you're suggesting. As children we do
: initially memorize whole words, but skilled readers (at least of
: alphabetic script) by definition have acquired the ability to decode
: sound-symbol relationships phonetically.
I was not referring to the way in which literate persons learn to
read, but the way in which I believe they do read. I would be
interested in the data which indicates that literate adults read
alphabetically written languages alphabetically. I would probably
also doubt its validity if it exists.
--
Gerry
[Moderator's Note: It is doubtful that further discussion on the topic
is relevant to this newsgroup. -tm]
John McCarthy
Townsend Harris, after whom a New York high school is named, was the
first U.S. Ambassador to Japan. In his memoirs, he describes how
the American, the British and the Dutch? ambassadors all advised the
Japanese to modernize and avoid the fate of China. The Japanese were
not too proud to take advice. The Chinese were.
Todd Michel McComb
In article <5g4464$3...@shell3.ba.best.com>,
R.D. Coons <rco...@netcom.ca> wrote:
>So granted China's technological superiority, I don't consider it an
>indication of unconsciously Marxian assumptions to wonder why modern
>science arose in the relatively backward West rather than the more
>technologically advanced East. In other words, why did the Scientific
>Revolution *not* occur in the country that by all acounts most
>satisfied its technological preconditions? That was the point of my
>alien visitor analogy.
This sounds exactly like the Marxists of several decades back
pondering how the first Communist revolution could happen in backward
Russia rather than advanced England. But, really, no need to be
defensive... I have no idea why some people seem to think that the
failure of Stalinism makes Marx a bad historian.
In modern history, the idea of historical progress is linked strongly
with Marx. While he wasn't the first or only person to discuss
such things, he is the one who painted the scheme most boldly. The
idea that one economic stage follows another of necessity, especially
as one talks of economic history, can hardly be anything but Marxist.
The anti-Marxists are, after all, reacting to Marx -- hence their
name.
>On the other hand, I agree that beneath our language of "progress,"
>"technological advancement," etc there often lurks an assumed theory
>of natural, evolutionary progression from the past to the present,
>with the normally unstated corollary that each successive stage is an
>improvement on what preceded it. I don't share that assumption, but
>unless one wishes to coin odd neologisms for the occasion, it's hard
>not to use our conventional vocabulary of progress, even with its
>dubious premises, when discussing a subject like this.
Honestly, I don't think it is very hard, if one does not believe in it.
If one does not view an industrial revolution as a particularly
desirable thing to do, one does not become so concerned over why
the more "advanced" culture did not initiate it. I still believe
the real question is why the West _did,_ not why China did not, as
the latter seems far more natural to me.
So, I can't help but think that the "conventional vocabulary" is a bit
more than that.
Todd McComb
mcc...@best.com
Joseph C Wang
In article <5g4i9a$l...@gazette.bcm.tmc.edu>,
R.D. Coons <rco...@netcom.ca> wrote:
>So granted China's technological superiority, I don't consider it an
>indication of unconsciously Marxian assumptions to wonder why modern
>science arose in the relatively backward West rather than the more
>technologically advanced East. In other words, why did the Scientific
>Revolution *not* occur in the country that by all acounts most
>satisfied its technological preconditions? That was the point of my
>alien visitor analogy.
One thing that should be pointed out is that there are three separate
revolutions that we are talking about here.
1) The Commericial Revolution
2) The Scientific Revolution
3) The Industrial Revolution
The first did occur in China. The second also occurred but was
directed primarily at increasing crop yields. The third did not.
>For example, China's political decision to withdraw from naval
>exploration in 15th century, despite her manifestly superior
ship-building technology, suggests a more reclusive view of the world
>than, say, that of the Portuguese under Henry the Navigator. And the
>European impulse for exploration can be convincingly linked to a
>similar impulse to investigate natural laws, both involving, in
>different ways, a desire to subdue the earth (as enjoined in the OT)
>by understanding it more fully.
The trouble with such statements is that they generally reveal more
about the preconceptions of the speaker than anything about the
historical situation. There are so many differences between 16th
century China and 16th century Europe that it is easy to say "X was
the reason why China didn't modernize." But there seems to be a lack
of effort to try to critically test these sorts of statements.
For example, if China's lack of exploration in the 1400's caused the
lack of scientific investigation, then how come Spain and Portugal
which led these sorts of explorations become scientific and industrial
backwaters.
In fact, I'm convinced that trying to compare "China" and the "West"
isn't an enlightening way of looking at the problem, since it ignores
that large parts of the West didn't go through industrial and
scientific revolutions.
I often wonder why people often ask why China didn't go through a
scientific revolution while few people ask the same question about
Norway.
>Sophisticated administrative law and
>philosophic or scientific abstraction don't necessarily coincide.
>
>The claim that China was, for whatever reason, less inclined than the
>West to systematize phenomena according to abstract scientific
>principles seems almost self-evidently true, at least to my eyes. The
>problem lies not in that *fact* but in arriving at an explanation for
>it.
My response to this "who hard have you looked for this?" Confucian
scholars of the 18th century came up with very abstract systematic
classifications of phenonmon. The difference is that no one ever
decided to use this knowledge to build better machines.
>I should point out, however, that you've now dismissed every
>alternative that I can think of: differing social and political
>structures, differing philosophical attitudes, and (probably
>correctly) differing scripts.
This is because I don't think think that it is neceesary to explain
why China never developed abstract thought structures. The thing to
explain is why no one thought about using these structures to build
better machines.
Dave
In article <5g58g5$k...@shell3.ba.best.com>, j...@athena.mit.edu (Joseph C
Wang) wrote:
(( cuts ))
>One thing that should be pointed out is that there are three separate
>revolutions that we are talking about here.
>1) The Commericial Revolution
>2) The Scientific Revolution
>3) The Industrial Revolution
>The first did occur in China. The second also occurred but was
>directed primarily at increasing crop yields. The third did not.
I'm not convinced that there was anything like the Commercial Revolution,
if that's what you want to call it, in China. True, things changed, if
the sketchy World Histories I have are correct, but they did not change in
the same way, if I understand correctly. China's commerce was controlled
for the most part, not necessarily by the state but by attitudes. Whether
or not it is true, I read over and over in general histories that China
didn't want anything the West had (Japan's position was that they didn't
want anything) except gold, and the West wanted many different types of
manufactured goods, spices etc from China. This meant that, generally,
the West was seeking change from any source, and, if I might venture,
China was convinced that the old methods which had been developed there
were the best and that they would show the way to "good" changes rather
than seeking different things from people who did not understand the Way,
or the Chinese method.
As I understand it, several massive reforms in agriculture were made in
China through the millenia but this was not, as the West experienced it,
an actual scientific revolution. The Scientific Revolution in the West
started out with certain goals in mind, true, but quickly a methodology
developed (The Scientific Method) whereby actual results were followed
down whatever path. The problem with the Chinese method or Way, as I see
it, is that it *is* directed.
In my opinion I think we can find a clue to the differences in the
civilizations and their technological accomplishments by examining
Christopher Columbus. Columbus succeeded not because he had logic on his
side, nor because he had special insight into facts not known to his
contemporaries. Columbus succeeded because he was wrong, demonstratably
wrong. He had to shop all over Europe before he found a monarchy with the
right combination of ignorance, arrogance and capital to finance his
ridiculous expedition. It is difficult to imagine any part of the Chinese
bureaucracy being so ignorant regarding the actual conditions of the world
and wasting money on something similar. Of course, as I understand it,
the Chinese were really restricted to selling hairbrained schemes like
Columbus' to one central authority controlled by these educated
bureaucrats. More than anything, it would be my opinion, that the
exploitation of the vast resources of North and South America over two or
three crucial centuries were responsible for technological explosion in
the West and the vast infusion of capital into Western Europe which made
all the difference, rather than any general aspects of the civilizations
themselves or their populations or their language.
Ironically, then, I think, rather than the 19th century view that Western
Europe was destined to succeed due to genetic or philosophical factors,
the Triumph of the West (if it can be so called) can be attributed mostly
to ignorance and blind, unthinking, luck.
(( cuts ))
>I often wonder why people often ask why China didn't go through a
>scientific revolution while few people ask the same question about
>Norway.
Norway? My, this is rather harsh. There are, as I understand it, as few
as 10,000,000 Norwegians--a small, small fraction of the whole population
of Europe, or, if my recollections of the estimated population of China in
the 18th-19th century is correct, about 1,000th of the size of China.
What is interesting, I think is why you would think it logical to ask the
same question about two countries so different in size, so different in
resources.
Joseph C Wang
In article <5g239t$h...@gazette.bcm.tmc.edu>, Dave <cps...@onramp.net> wrote:
>My opinion is simply that the advance of science in the West, like many
>other things is attributable to the lack of a unified government and the
>greater freedom of individuals. Any system, it seems to me, which relies
>on some central authority for development of education and, in fact,
>commerce would have a tendency to stagnate.
The trouble with this theory with regard to Imperial China is that
there wasn't a central authority for the development of education and
commerece. When people talk about the Chinese bureaucracy, it
conjures up images of vast numbers of officials, but in fact there
were only about 5 officials in each county of about 100,000 people.
These officials were responsible for all governmental functions.
Needless to say, they couldn't do very much and needed the cooperation
of the gentry to get anything done.
The problem was particularly acute in the mid-Qing dynasty as the
populaation mushroomed, but the number of officials stayed constant.
The reason that the number of officials stayed constant was precisely
to prevent an oppressive bureaucracy from forming.
>Governments have always regarded the truth as their responsibility though,
>and what can be proved might be radically different from that view.
I'm think this might apply mainly to 20th century governments. Most
pre-modern governments were less ideological.
>As governements generally become more powerful, what science would
>reveal often can diametrically oppose the policy of the government, so
>scientists and science is surpressed.
Again I think you are assuming that pre-modern governments had much
more power than they really did.
>I read somewhere (please, please don't make me look it up) that at the
>Tennis Court at the beginning of the French Revolution no one took notes,
>but many of the people memorized what occurred. This would not be the
>manner that a fully developed literate society recorded what went on
>during so important an event. I would advance that this was the exact
>period when science was being developed and the technology of the West was
>beginning to outstrip surrounding civilizations.
Someone pointed out that one of the differences between 18th century
China and France is that in France the villages didn't include anyone
literate. In China, there wree enough literate people at the village
level so that the wirtten word had a large influence on popular
culture. There was a booming printing industry in China which churned
out novels, plays, how-to manuals, and religious works.
Dave
In article <5g6v2p$i...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>, j...@athena.mit.edu (Joseph
C Wang) wrote:
(( cuts ))
>The trouble with this theory with regard to Imperial China is that
>there wasn't a central authority for the development of education and
>commerece. When people talk about the Chinese bureaucracy, it
>conjures up images of vast numbers of officials, but in fact there
>were only about 5 officials in each county of about 100,000 people.
>These officials were responsible for all governmental functions.
>Needless to say, they couldn't do very much and needed the cooperation
>of the gentry to get anything done.
As I understand it, this applies to the Imperial government only. The
entire society was feudal. In a given area, there was a family who
controlled everything from production of pottery to types of crops to be
planted, irrigation, etc, and it was these families which the bureaucracy
controlled on behalf of the imperial government.
(( cuts ))
>I'm think this might apply mainly to 20th century governments. Most
>pre-modern governments were less ideological.
Without my books, I cannot cite specific dynasties, but, if I recall there
were book burnings and other ideological acts thoughtout the history of
Imperial China. I don't think it is correct that pre-modern governments
were less ideological at all, as an example one might examine the Incas,
which was an isolated pre-literate society, or look at the deciphered
texts of ancient Crete which seem to be an inventory of everything, or
even the Domesday Book which probably was an inventory of everything and
everyone. I think also many, many other kingdoms, empires and various
organizations in Europe and Asia demanded and got ideological purity far
beyond anything we commonly find today.
(( cuts ))
>Someone pointed out that one of the differences between 18th century
>China and France is that in France the villages didn't include anyone
>literate. In China, there were enough literate people at the village
>level so that the written word had a large influence on popular
>culture. There was a booming printing industry in China which churned
>out novels, plays, how-to manuals, and religious works.
Well, I certainly did not mean to imply that those who gathered at the
Tennis Court were not literate, only that they did not record the
proceedings in a way we would associate with a literate society, today.
R.D. Coons
On 10 Mar 1997 23:12:09 GMT, jas...@yoyo.cc.monash.edu.au (Joseph
Askew) wrote:
[cuts]
>R.D. Coons (rco...@netcom.ca) wrote:
>
>
>: Hence his
>: assumption that differing mechanisms for communicating knowledge (in
>: this case different systems of writing) will yield significantly
>: different mental universes. Whether this is true or no, it would be
>: difficult to imagine a less racialist thesis.
>
>I did not say it was a racist thesis, but frankly yes I could.
>Without any trouble at all. Cultural supremists are no less
>objectionable, or not much at any rate, than racial ones. Maybe
>if the facts bore them out it wouldn't be too bad.
No cultural supremacists have yet intruded themselves into this
discussion.
You have, I must say, a strangely self-referential view of words and
their meanings. If two different things are objectionable to Joseph
Askew, then Joseph Askew can call them by the same name. Hence an
argument that does not attribute cultural differences to race, and
indeed doesn't even mention it, can be called racist because it is
almost as objectionable, in your eyes, as an argument that does.
Or, as an alternate interpretation, if any two historical arguments
are determinist, then their names become interchangeable. Since in
this case one of the names rightly carries such negative connotations,
the error in logic is even more unfortunate.
Of course, I'm assuming here that by "say" you mean "argue plausibly."
If you simply mean "say," then it all makes sense.
[cuts]
>argument myself. If pressed I would say that China "failed" because
>it was too modern. Science depends on funding. Funding depends on the
>existence of a capitalist class interested in long term investments.
>Which means a lot of other things as well, but one of which is the
>exclusion of the capitalists from other means of making money. In my
>opinion people prefer to seek wealth and honour through socially
>acceptable ways. Only when excluded from these normal channels of
>advancement do people take up being rich as a substitute. So the more
>advanced sector of most European economies was dominated by minorities
>excluded from government preferment and the honour system. Jews are
>the best example, but also Old Believers in Russia, Protestants in
>France, the OS Chinese in SouthEast Asia and above all the Dissenters
>in Britain. The Industrial Revolution was in large part the work of
>Quakers who were excluded from the normal channels of advancement in
>Britain. They could not join the Army, the Church, go to University,
>get elected, or even appear at Court. So they made money instead. As
>China did not have these sorts of barriers the children of merchanrs
>wanted to become officials instead and so did. No long term interest.
>I mean to make a proper argument one day, but I think I have a much
>better case than does Logan.
I think this argument, though convincing, concerns industrialization
more than science. The two are plainly connected, but since the
Scientific Revolution in the West preceded both capitalism and
industrialization, I can't see that the differing in-group/out-group
dynamics you describe would resolve the problem.
On the other hand, about three quarters of the early members of the
Royal Society were Puritans. I suspect, though, that this had less to
do with their exclusion from various avenues of personal advancement
and more to do with distinctive Puritan ways of thinking, viz. a
practical devotion to truth, a resistance to orthodox explanations, a
distaste for metaphysics, the greater energy that often characterizes
new movements, and so forth.
The Royal Society, as you perhaps know, received no government funding
and was constantly in debt. Funding is surely less an issue than a
scientific outlook on the world. The origin of the latter, and its
apparent absence in China, is the crucial problem.
>: Fung Yu-Lan, the author of a standard study of
>: Chinese philosophy, offers a different explantion: he argues (in
>: brief) that the Chinese had a more perceptual and concrete view of the
>: world and consequently less inclination to systematize its laws
>: abstractly.
>
>Unfortunately he suffers from the fact that China did indeed systematise
>its laws abstractly. Such an old fashioned view has not been in favour
>for at least 20 years. It relies on the fact that no one wanted to read
>all the case books and massive legal documentation. When a few American
>academics started to do so they found a very different story. This is
>one of the great failings in the traditional view of China, not the
>least or the last imo, and has been a great field for a lot of work
>since.
Sophisticated legal documentation arguably has nothing to do with
science and is at best a tangential issue.
Since two contributors to this thread have misunderstood my summary of
Fung, I should clarify. The antecedent in "systematize its laws" is
not "China" but the"world"; I mean the sort of law one finds in a
physics textbook, which is itself arguably the end result of what may
be a characteristically Western desire to control or dominate nature
by, inter alia, comprehending it. Fung claims that China had a
different attitude toward the external world.
[demolition of Havelock deleted]
I am surpised that Eric Havelock would be guilty of so many errors. He
is a distinguished scholar of the classics, his work has inspired much
of the current research on orality vs literacy, and he has
fundamentally changed our perception of some of the central issues in
early Greek philosophy. Obviously he should not have strayed so far
outside of his area of expertise.
Mary Clare Eros
j...@Steam.stanford.edu (John McCarthy) wrote:
>Townsend Harris, after whom a New York high school is named, was the
>first U.S. Ambassador to Japan. In his memoirs, he describes how
>the American, the British and the Dutch? ambassadors all advised the
>Japanese to modernize and avoid the fate of China. The Japanese were
>not too proud to take advice. The Chinese were.
I think there is a degree of truth to this, but there are also a lot of
other factors. One of the most important is that the Europeans weren't
determined to force their way into Japan. Many Europeans had a
fantastic, inaccurate vision of China as a giant market where, if one
could just get past those annoying bureaucrats, any halfway decent
entrepreneur could coin money hand over fist. Thus, they were determined
to push their way in, even at the cost of gravely weakening the Qing
government, and causing disorder probably not helpful to their sales
efforts.
The fact that the British had decided to finance their Indian possessions
by pushing opium didn't help either, of course.
The chronology is relevant here: By the time Harris arrived in Japan,
China had already been through one opium war (with another to follow
quickly) and was burdened with huge debts to the European powers.
Another factor (IMO) may have been a somewhat paradoxical one. Japan was
not conquered by any European power partly because it was weaker than
China.
Imperialists may have been interested in taking over Japan, but they did
not want anybody else to do it, and (unlike China) Japan was not large or
populous enough to be unconquerable. Thus, the Brits didn't want the
Russians to take over, or the French, and the Japanese were able to play
off one power against the others. This was not possible for the Chinese,
since there was plenty of loot for everybody.
If the Europeans had treated Japan as they did China, Japan would have
been much less successful. Partly the Japanese were lucky, partly they
were clever. Some Japanese were clear-sighted enough to see that
avoiding direct provocations of the Europeans was essential--that
Japanese interests were better protected by delays and low-key wrangling
(e.g., signing somewhat ambiguous agreements to great fanfare and then
fitghting out interpretations) than by direct confrontation. These
people were often assassinated for their pains.
All this said, the Japanese certainly were quicker to adopt foreign ways
than the Chinese were. But implying that the leaders of Japan and of
China were in similar environments is simply wrong.
---
MCE
Robert J. Girouard
In article <5gcqco$m...@shell3.ba.best.com>, Mary Clare Eros
<me...@jacksonkelly.com> wrote:
> I think there is a degree of truth to this, but there are also a lot of
> other factors. One of the most important is that the Europeans weren't
> determined to force their way into Japan. Many Europeans had a
> fantastic, inaccurate vision of China as a giant market where, if one
> could just get past those annoying bureaucrats, any halfway decent
> entrepreneur could coin money hand over fist.
That's basically the case, though the civil war leading to the Meiji
Restoration in Japan did have an imperialist proxy war element -- the
French supplied the Bakufu with arms and technical advisors, while the
British did the same for the Choshu forces. Oddly, the most lasting
legacy of the senior British advisor, a Nagasaki arms merchant named
Thomas Glover, was his introduction of the game of golf to Japan.
Grey
> The problem was particularly acute in the mid-Qing dynasty as the
> populaation mushroomed, but the number of officials stayed constant.
> The reason that the number of officials stayed constant was precisely
> to prevent an oppressive bureaucracy from forming.
>
> >Governments have always regarded the truth as their responsibility though,
> >and what can be proved might be radically different from that view.
>
> I'm think this might apply mainly to 20th century governments. Most
> pre-modern governments were less ideological.
I'm wondering what you mean by this little statement. As I'm not a
scholar, and you probably are I have to ask why you are saying this when
China is commonly believed (amoung us laymen) to have a very refined
ideology, or set of ideologies, having produced at least one commonly
quoted philosopher.
>
> >As governements generally become more powerful, what science would
> >reveal often can diametrically oppose the policy of the government, so
> >scientists and science is surpressed.
>
> Again I think you are assuming that pre-modern governments had much
> more power than they really did.
I once saw a book written argueing that Taxation brought down the Roman
Empire... making the very interesting arguement that the central power
relieving the populous of monetary resources stifled production and
entrepeneurship and motivation. Might this have happened in China?
One other thing... China was amazingly modern very early... So much so
that the HMS Nemesis which cruised up to attack Canton in 1841 was the
first Royal Navy vessel to have water tight compartments... a feature
that Junks had as a matter of course for over 2000 years prior to her
construction.
I have no academic experience with China... I just found this thread very
interesting... I hope you don't mind that I stick my head in.
Grey
http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/Lobby/1750/
Web Manager of #Discuss on IRC
R.D. Coons
[cuts]
>R.D. Coons (rco...@netcom.ca) wrote:
>
>
>: Hence his
>: assumption that differing mechanisms for communicating knowledge (in
>: this case different systems of writing) will yield significantly
>: different mental universes. Whether this is true or no, it would be
>: difficult to imagine a less racialist thesis.
>
>I did not say it was a racist thesis, but frankly yes I could.
>Without any trouble at all. Cultural supremists are no less
>objectionable, or not much at any rate, than racial ones. Maybe
>if the facts bore them out it wouldn't be too bad.
No cultural supremacists have yet intruded themselves into this
discussion.
You have, I must say, a strangely self-referential view of words and
their meanings. If two different things are objectionable to Joseph
Askew, then Joseph Askew can call them by the same name. Hence an
argument that does not attribute cultural differences to race, and
indeed doesn't even mention it, can be called racist because it is
almost as objectionable, in your eyes, as an argument that does.
Or, as an alternate interpretation, if any two historical arguments
are determinist, then their names become interchangeable. Since in
this case one of the names rightly carries such negative connotations,
the error in logic is even more unfortunate.
Of course, I'm assuming here that by "say" you mean "argue plausibly."
If you simply mean "say," then it all makes sense.
[cuts]
>argument myself. If pressed I would say that China "failed" because
>it was too modern. Science depends on funding. Funding depends on the
>existence of a capitalist class interested in long term investments.
>Which means a lot of other things as well, but one of which is the
>exclusion of the capitalists from other means of making money. In my
>opinion people prefer to seek wealth and honour through socially
>acceptable ways. Only when excluded from these normal channels of
>advancement do people take up being rich as a substitute. So the more
>advanced sector of most European economies was dominated by minorities
>excluded from government preferment and the honour system. Jews are
>the best example, but also Old Believers in Russia, Protestants in
>France, the OS Chinese in SouthEast Asia and above all the Dissenters
>in Britain. The Industrial Revolution was in large part the work of
>Quakers who were excluded from the normal channels of advancement in
>Britain. They could not join the Army, the Church, go to University,
>get elected, or even appear at Court. So they made money instead. As
>China did not have these sorts of barriers the children of merchanrs
>wanted to become officials instead and so did. No long term interest.
>I mean to make a proper argument one day, but I think I have a much
>better case than does Logan.
I think this argument, though convincing, concerns industrialization
more than science. The two are plainly connected, but since the
Scientific Revolution in the West preceded both capitalism and
industrialization, I can't see that the differing in-group/out-group
dynamics you describe would resolve the problem.
On the other hand, about three quarters of the early members of the
Royal Society were Puritans. I suspect, though, that this had less to
do with their exclusion from various avenues of personal advancement
and more to do with distinctive Puritan ways of thinking, viz. a
practical devotion to truth, a resistance to orthodox explanations, a
distaste for metaphysics, the greater energy that often characterizes
new movements, and so forth.
The Royal Society, as you perhaps know, received no government funding
and was constantly in debt. Funding is surely less an issue than a
scientific outlook on the world. The origin of the latter, and its
apparent absence in China, is the crucial problem.
>: Fung Yu-Lan, the author of a standard study of
>: Chinese philosophy, offers a different explantion: he argues (in
>: brief) that the Chinese had a more perceptual and concrete view of the
>: world and consequently less inclination to systematize its laws
>: abstractly.
>
>Unfortunately he suffers from the fact that China did indeed systematise
>its laws abstractly. Such an old fashioned view has not been in favour
>for at least 20 years. It relies on the fact that no one wanted to read
>all the case books and massive legal documentation. When a few American
>academics started to do so they found a very different story. This is
>one of the great failings in the traditional view of China, not the
>least or the last imo, and has been a great field for a lot of work
>since.
Sophisticated legal documentation arguably has nothing to do with
Mary Clare Eros
j...@steam.stanford.edu (John McCarthy) wrote:
>Commodore Perry's 1854 visit used the threat of
>force to open up Japan. The advice of the ambassadors to avoid
>China's fate was given to the Shogunate. In 1868 the revolution to
>restore the Meiji Emperor used anti-foreign slogans, but as soon as
>power was gained, revolutionaries modernized headlong. Incidentally,
>the British shelled one of the Daimyo who fired on a British ship (or
>committed a similar offense).
This is all true, but (IMO) of questionable relevance. When I stated
earlier that the Europeans were "not determined to force their way into
Japan," what I meant was that they were willing to allow time for
negotiations to work, and to accept greater _de jure_ and _de facto_
restrictions from the Japanese than from the Chinese. The record
supports this--the Japanese, for instance, went on _officially_ enforcing
anti-Christian laws until 1868, and retained strong _de facto_ curbs on
missionary activity afterward. The Chinese were not allowed to do the
same.
It is simply indisputable that the western powers treated the Japanese
less harshly than the Chinese. The imperial powers respected Japan's
territorial integrity , though it would have been quite feasible for them
to carve out Hong Kong-style enclaves. Nor did they make extortionate
financial demands, though they easily could have. The bombardment of the
Satsuma fort (referred to by Mr. McCarthy) is a case in point. It was
not followed by the torching of a Japanese palace, or by an armed
invasion of Kyoto or Edo. This restraint prevailed despite undeniable
provocations by individual Japanese including the murder of Europeans and
of Japanese who served them and the destruction of buildings identified
with the foreigners.
It may also be relevant to point out that Harris (and even Perry) were
far from the first Westerners to advise the Japanese to modernize
quickly. The King of the Netherlands sent a letter to the Shogun
offering precisely the same advice in 1844. It was not taken.
In addition to the factors I pointed out in a previous post (skillful
Japanese diplomacy, lack of a "Japan as El Dorado" ideology in Europe,
mutual fear among the Europeans lest another nation colonize Japan) I
think may be added the paucity of European speakers of Japanese. Most of
the commissioners to Japan had to retain Japanese interpreters, who often
conveniently mistranslated and revealed useful information to the
Japanese government. And the Europeans who first became proficient in
the Japanese language tended (with, of course, some exceptions) to be
pro-Japanese in outlook. This was emphatically not the case in China;
lots of people who detested the Qing government could speak good Chinese.
To sum up: there were a lot of reasons besides a lack of foolish pride
on the part of the Japanese that led to Japan's modernizing more rapidly
than China did. The Japnese used their opportunities better than the
Chinese did, but they also had opportunities that the Chinese did not.
---
MCE
"The phrase 'history teaches,' encountered in argument, usually portends
bad history and worse logic." --Bernard Brodie
John McCarthy
I wonder if there is evidence that the better treatment of the
Japanese than of the Chinese was partly a result of moral progress,
i.e. a view that the Chinese had been treated wrongly. One could
argue that the Chinese weren't treated as badly as the Indians.
By the time of of the Russo-Japanese War in 1904, advanced opinion in
the West was rooting for the Japanese. Tsarism was very unpopular.
Robert J. Girouard
In article <5guk5r$o...@shell3.ba.best.com>, John McCarthy
<j...@steam.stanford.edu> wrote:
> By the time of of the Russo-Japanese War in 1904, advanced opinion in
> the West was rooting for the Japanese. Tsarism was very unpopular.
Japan very skilfully cultivated this Western opinion. Japan adopted a
constitutional order based on the Prussian model in the late 1880s, as
well as (in Tetsuo Najita's words) a "comprehensive and predictable legal
system" and a "modern banking and investment structure." Japan also
learned in the 1890s to effectively express its international aims in the
language of Great Power diplomacy, while the Chinese Government's edicts
remained incomprehensively archaic to Western governments. Compare the
Chinese and Japanese declarations of hostilities opening the war of
1894-1895:
Japan -- "...It has always been our pleasure to instruct our Minister of
State to labor for the promotion of friendly relations with our Treaty
Powers. We are gratified to know that the relations of our Empire with
these Powers have yearly increased in good will and friendship. Under the
circumstances, we were unprepared for such a conspicuous want of amity and
of good faith as has been manifested by China in her conduct towards this
country in connection with the Korean affair..."
China -- "...we have always followed the paths of philanthropy and perfect
justice throughout the whole complications, while the Wojen ('dwarf
barbarian pirates'), on the other hand, have broken all the laws of
nations and treaties which it passes our patience to bear with...We exhort
our generals to refrain from the least laxity in obeying our commands in
order to avoid severe punishment at our hands. Let all know this edict as
if expressed to themselves individually. Respect this!"
During the Boxer Rebellion of 1900, European governments were impressed by
the efficiency and tactical skill of the Japanese military, which supplied
the largest contingent of troops to the expedition.
Finally Japan exercised skillful diplomacy (and played on the lingering
effects of the Far Eastern Crisis of 1897) to secure a naval treaty with
Britain in 1902. This assured the end of Western treaty ports in Japan,
allowed Japan to establish a tariff system, and, most importantly, enabled
Japan to pursue its military aims in Northeast Asia -- and a war with
Russia in 1904 -- without the fear of a multi-power intervention.
Certainly the Japanese political and economic order of the late Meiji
period was far from "modern," but it presents one of the greatest
diplomatic and public relations coups of the past hundred years.
Clayton E. Cramer
Mary Clare Eros wrote:
> To sum up: there were a lot of reasons besides a lack of foolish pride
> on the part of the Japanese that led to Japan's modernizing more rapidly
> than China did. The Japnese used their opportunities better than the
> Chinese did, but they also had opportunities that the Chinese did not.
> MCE
I would agree that there were lots of reasons, but I don't think that
anyone has used the phrase "foolish pride" to describe why the Chinese
resisted modernization (if they did -- some people feel differently).
The desire to maintain a certain culture is very strong almost every-
where, and I think most people have a great deal of sympathy for the
Chinese position with respect to modernization.
But just because we have sympathy for the desire to avoid abandoning
their native culture doesn't mean that we can't recognize that cultural
abandonment at the margins is sometimes necessary to maintain the rest
of your culture. Japan did that quite successfully; the argument that
some advance is that China did it too late to be useful.
Lars Arnestam
Mary Clare Eros wrote:
>
long cut...
The bombardment of the
> Satsuma fort (referred to by Mr. McCarthy) is a case in point. It was
> not followed by the torching of a Japanese palace, or by an armed
> invasion of Kyoto or Edo. This restraint prevailed despite undeniable
> provocations by individual Japanese including the murder of Europeans and
> of Japanese who served them and the destruction of buildings identified
> with the foreigners.
>
another long cut...
> MCE
> "The phrase 'history teaches,' encountered in argument, usually portends
> bad history and worse logic." --Bernard Brodie
I have also noted the different treatment of the Japanese as compared to
the Chinese (or other non European people). I think that an important
reason for this may have been that the Europeans/Americans were
impressed by the Japanese character and code of conduct.
I have at home a very interesting description by a British diplomat of
the execution of the Japanese officer who was responsible for the
massacre of Europeans (including women and children) referred to above.
(I don't remember the source, but I can get it if you wish me.) The
background was that the European powers had demanded his execution and
the Japanese government had ceded to this demand. The means of
execution was to be ritual suicide (seppukku), and representatives of
the European embassies were invited to serve as witnesses of this.
The British author is very visibly shaken by the solemnity of the
ceremony and the stoical calmness with which the condemned man slits his
belly open. He ends his narrative with the words: " An inert heap was
all that remained of what had only moments before been a brave,
chivalrous man - it was disgusting". I very much doubt that a British
diplomat would have used those words about a Chinese or a Zulu warrior
who was responsible for the massacre of European women and children.
Lars Arnestam
John McCarthy
"Clayton E. Cramer" <cra...@dlcc.com> writes:
>
>
>
> Mary Clare Eros wrote:
> > To sum up: there were a lot of reasons besides a lack of foolish pride
> > on the part of the Japanese that led to Japan's modernizing more rapidly
> > than China did. The Japnese used their opportunities better than the
> > Chinese did, but they also had opportunities that the Chinese did not.
>
> > MCE
>
> I would agree that there were lots of reasons, but I don't think that
> anyone has used the phrase "foolish pride" to describe why the Chinese
> resisted modernization (if they did -- some people feel differently).
> The desire to maintain a certain culture is very strong almost every-
> where, and I think most people have a great deal of sympathy for the
> Chinese position with respect to modernization.
>
> But just because we have sympathy for the desire to avoid abandoning
> their native culture doesn't mean that we can't recognize that cultural
> abandonment at the margins is sometimes necessary to maintain the rest
> of your culture. Japan did that quite successfully; the argument that
> some advance is that China did it too late to be useful.
When the rulers refer to "abandoning their native culture", the
reference may have a substantial component of "abandoning their
rule". Westernization of China always carried with it changes in the
power and wealth relationships within China. The same relation
between maintaining the culture and maintaining rule by the nobility
held in Europe.
Mary Clare Eros
John McCarthy <j...@steam.stanford.edu> wrote:
>I wonder if there is evidence that the better treatment of the
>Japanese than of the Chinese was partly a result of moral progress,
>i.e. a view that the Chinese had been treated wrongly. One could
>argue that the Chinese weren't treated as badly as the Indians.
>
I think there is something to this idea; there certainly was a reaction
(especially in the UK) against some aspects of European China policy,
particularly opium dealing. However, the people who felt most strongly
about this tended to be missionaries, who were often cool to Japan on
religious grounds.
European imperial expansion was to take off beginning around 1870 (the
"New Imperialism"), so clearly the changes of opinion in Europe were at
best a temporary protection for Japan.
I don't think the case of India can really be compared to China or Japan.
The initial European advances into India were much more related to
European great-power rivalries than was the case in China. And the fact
that India was not even close to unified further confuses the issue.
>By the time of of the Russo-Japanese War in 1904, advanced opinion in
>the West was rooting for the Japanese. Tsarism was very unpopular.
>
Yes indeed. The "Gallant Little Japs," as the typical British phrase
went, had concluded an alliance with the UK in 1902--an astounding
achievement. (One Japanese humorist compared the treaty to "a marriage
between the Moon Goddess and a mud turtle.") Japan was seen as being
part of the wave of the future, in contrast with the primitive and clumsy
Russians.
---
MCE
Joseph Askew
John McCarthy (j...@steam.stanford.edu) wrote:
: I wonder if there is evidence that the better treatment of the
: Japanese than of the Chinese was partly a result of moral progress,
: i.e. a view that the Chinese had been treated wrongly. One could
: argue that the Chinese weren't treated as badly as the Indians.
Why would bad treatment of the Chinese lead to better treatment of
the Japanese? After all they were the same people. The British and
American diplomats who forced the Chinese to legalise the import of
opium in 1858 and 1860 were the same people who forced Unequal Treaties
on the Japanese. If the British and Americans felt bad about these
Treaties why was it they let the Japanese re-negotiate before 1900 but
not the Chinese until 1943? Even when the Chine4se had "modernised" to
the same extent. If people felt the Chinse had been treated badly (not
a popular or common opinion until the 70s except on the issue of opium)
why not allow the Chinese to continue to prohibt a dangerous and highly
addictiver narcotic?
: By the time of of the Russo-Japanese War in 1904, advanced opinion in
: the West was rooting for the Japanese. Tsarism was very unpopular.
Odd then that American diplomacy should have consisted of trying to
keep the Japanese out of Russian spheres of interest./
Joseph C Wang
In article <5h1ops$h...@gazette.bcm.tmc.edu>,
Clayton E. Cramer <cra...@dlcc.com> wrote:
>The desire to maintain a certain culture is very strong almost every-
>where, and I think most people have a great deal of sympathy for the
>Chinese position with respect to modernization.
One thing that does become obvious though is that what constitutes a
"culture" is very slippery. I had an e-mail exchange with someone in
which he talked about the virtues of Western culture, and I pointed
out that Communism, Fascism and other things were part of the West.
Of course, he doesn't include those things in his definition of
"Western culture," and there isn't anything wrong with selecting or
rejecting things to form a notion of a culture, so long as you realize
that you are doing it.
The problem is that once you realize that "cultures are constructed,"
then the notion that "China could not modernize because of its
culture" becomes completely meaningless. If you have the flexibility
to pick and choose what you consider to be "your culture" then you can
pick or choose anything you want in order to make that statement that
I just made true or untrue.
>But just because we have sympathy for the desire to avoid abandoning
>their native culture doesn't mean that we can't recognize that cultural
>abandonment at the margins is sometimes necessary to maintain the rest
>of your culture.
But if you want to make the statement that the Qing refused to
modernize because of their culture, you can going to have to establish
what the Qing dynasty perceived to be at the "margin" and what they
perceived to be at the "core."
Robert J. Girouard
In article <5h4oge$r...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>,
jas...@yoyo.cc.monash.edu.au (Joseph Askew) wrote:
> : By the time of of the Russo-Japanese War in 1904, advanced opinion in
> : the West was rooting for the Japanese. Tsarism was very unpopular.
>
> Odd then that American diplomacy should have consisted of trying to
> keep the Japanese out of Russian spheres of interest./
The Treaty of Portsmouth (Sept., 1905) ending the Russo-Japanese War was
mediated by the U.S. President, Theodore Roosevelt. Standard opinion among
historians holds that Roosevelt deliberately skewed the treaty in favor of
the Japanese.
Joseph Askew
John McCarthy (j...@steam.stanford.edu) wrote:
: When the rulers refer to "abandoning their native culture", the
: reference may have a substantial component of "abandoning their
: rule". Westernization of China always carried with it changes in the
: power and wealth relationships within China. The same relation
: between maintaining the culture and maintaining rule by the nobility
: held in Europe.
The culture argument is, I think, spurious. Traditional (or rather
Late Imperial) Chinese culture is no more or less modern than any
other culture you might like to point to (late 20th Century America
for example). Indeed it was probably more "modern" (I would like to
see someone define that term for me in any rational way that excludes
the obvious "Whatever America does is modern") than British or even
American cultures at the same time. However I do think yuo have a point.
Qing China was rulked by Manchus. Who were very sensitive to things
that might upset their power base. Such as democracy for instance. Any
democratic system in China would onlu lead to the Manchus being totally
displaced and reduced to a small impoverished minority within China. It
is notorious that the people in favour of self strenmgthening (what Mr
Clayton might call abandoning their culture) were Han Chinese. Almost
to a man. Those opposed were Manchus. Just as those who wanted to take
an extremely hard line against the opium trade and the British invasions
were invariably Chinese. The appeasers were almost entirely Manchu. One
obvious reason for this is that a long war with the West would mean the
mobilisation and arming of the Chinese population. Instead of risking
the Manchu (actually Bannerman) monopoly on military force the Qing
authorities decided to compromise. Disbanding the spotaneously organised
Cantonese militia groups. As it was it took until the Taiping rebellion
until the Mqanchus were forced to share their military monopoly and
although it took a while they were right in their instincts because
these forces were the ones which forced the Qing off the throne and
brought about the 1911 Revolution. The difference between China and
Japan, aside from foreign aggression, was that China was not ruled by
Chinese people. Had it been it is unlikely China would have lost the
First Opium War or that Self Stregthening advocates would have bneen
so thoroughly excluded from power.
Joseph
Gerard Foley
Robert J. Girouard (giro...@washdc.mindspring.com) wrote:
[snip]
: The Treaty of Portsmouth (Sept., 1905) ending the Russo-Japanese War was
: mediated by the U.S. President, Theodore Roosevelt. Standard opinion among
: historians holds that Roosevelt deliberately skewed the treaty in favor of
: the Japanese.
But the Russians didn't have much left to fight with.
--
Gerry
John McCarthy
Joseph Askew includes
The culture argument is, I think, spurious. Traditional (or
rather Late Imperial) Chinese culture is no more or less
modern than any other culture you might like to point to
(late 20th Century America for example). Indeed it was
probably more "modern" (I would like to see someone define
that term for me in any rational way that excludes the
obvious "Whatever America does is modern") than British or
even American cultures at the same time.
"All men are created equal" is modern. Representative democracy
is modern. Capitalism, complete with corporations and stock
markets, is modern. Communism, although a bad idea, is modern.
Science, as the main way of finding out about the world, is
modern. In these senses, the Qing were not modern, and China
today is modernizing.
Does Joseph Askew see any chance of China going back to its old
political culture - either the warlord version or the
bureaucratic rule with bureaucrats selected according to their
success in examinations in the Chinese classics?
Peter Metcalfe
Mary Clare Eros <me...@jacksonkelly.com> writes:
> I don't think the case of India can really be compared to China or Japan.
> The initial European advances into India were much more related to
> European great-power rivalries than was the case in China. And the fact
> that India was not even close to unified further confuses the issue.
Why is India under the rule of the Mughals not considered to be
'close to unified' in your opinion whereas China under the Manchus
is?
--Peter Metcalfe
Clayton E. Cramer
Because what we now call India, or what the British Empire called
India, was not united under the Mughals. They controlled a big
part (the biggest part?) of "India," but certainly not all of it,
by any means.
Joseph C Wang
In article <5hah3m$5...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>,
John McCarthy <j...@steam.stanford.edu> wrote:
>"All men are created equal" is modern. Representative democracy
>is modern. Capitalism, complete with corporations and stock
>markets, is modern. Communism, although a bad idea, is modern.
>Science, as the main way of finding out about the world, is
>modern. In these senses, the Qing were not modern, and China
>today is modernizing.
The trouble is that you end up with a tauntology. Among the ideas
that you listed (communism and capitalism), the only real thing that
they have in common is that they are found in industrial societies.
So what you end up saying is that the Qing dynasty was unable to
develop an industrial society because they didn't develop an
industrial society. Which isn't saying anything.
Part of the problem in discussing modernity is that the West was the
first part of the world to develop an industrial society. Because
there have been few other examples of modernization, its not clear
what factors aid industrialization and what factors don't.
It's not sufficient to say that the Qing dynasty did not modern
because of its culture. To say anything meaningful, you have to
identify exactly what elements helped and hindered modernization.
Also, you have to be aware that there may be more than one path to
modernity. To give an example, most Chinese companies in southeast
Asia are closely held family owned corporations which depend on
personal contacts for protection more than impersonal legal codes.
>Does Joseph Askew see any chance of China going back to its old
>political culture - either the warlord version or the
>bureaucratic rule with bureaucrats selected according to their
>success in examinations in the Chinese classics?
Actually, I do see a reasonable chance of China being run by
bureaucrats who have some training in the Chinese classics.
But this is setting up a false dichotomy. It's likely that China will
evolve into something unlike the Qing dynasty, yet eqully unlike the
West.
Clayton E. Cramer
> : Because what we now call India, or what the British Empire called
> : India, was not united under the Mughals. They controlled a big
> : part (the biggest part?) of "India," but certainly not all of it,
> : by any means.
>
> the Mughals save for Goa, the Polygats of the southern tip and the
> myriad foreign enclaves. It was in a state of severe unrest due to
> Aurangzib's policies with the Jats and the Marathas in varying stages
> of revolt.
The maps I've seen of India show that the Mughals had only a part of
India. Those "myriad foreign enclaves" must have included a very large
part of India.
Peter Metcalfe
::
:: : I don't think the case of India can really be compared to China or Japan.
:: : The initial European advances into India were much more related to
:: : European great-power rivalries than was the case in China. And the fact
:: : that India was not even close to unified further confuses the issue.
::
:: Why is India under the rule of the Mughals not considered to be
:: 'close to unified' in your opinion whereas China under the Manchus
:: is?
: India, was not united under the Mughals. They controlled a big
: part (the biggest part?) of "India," but certainly not all of it,
: by any means.
At the time of Aurangzib's death in 1707, All India was controlled by
the Mughals save for Goa, the Polygats of the southern tip and the
myriad foreign enclaves. It was in a state of severe unrest due to
Aurangzib's policies with the Jats and the Marathas in varying stages
of revolt.
Yet the Chinese unified under Manchus also had severe revolts (such
as the T'ai Ping (sp?)) which were just as bloody. So to classify
India as not close to unified because of the severe political problems
faced by the Mughals whereas the Manchus faced problems of similar
proportions seems to be a inconsistant distinction on the face of it
IMO.
--Peter Metcalfe
John McCarthy
1. I like Wang's portmanteau word "tauntology". It applies to much
that goes on in newsgroups.
2. As economic systems, communism and capitalism both reject feudalism
with its hereditary economic positions. Politically communism needs
to be compared with democracy. Both start with the idea of popular
rule; its just that communism didn't work out that way anywhere in the
world.
3. Indeed we don't have as many examples of modernization as we would
like to form a theory of it.
4. I suspect the Ch'ing would have modernized eventually.
5. There is indeed more than one path to modernization. In some
countries socialism was a transitional stage between feudalism and
capitalism.
6. I can't see China abandoning science, technology or capitalism, and
just about all educated opinion outside the Communist Party (and much
within the Party) sees a need for political democracy.
Greg McPherson
Can I take this question into another direction?
It might have been the original point of the thread, I didn't see the
start of it.
We hear about how advance the Chinese culture was. About how there was a
time when it's technology was ahead of Europe's. I've also read this
about the early Arab culture.
Why do cultures stop advancing technologically?
Why, if they were so advance didnt China develop steam engines and rifles
and so forth a hundred years before Europeans and go out and invade them?
We seem to be living in times now when technology is God. We aggressively
chase it. What social changes could happen that would bring this to a
stop?
greg
Ditt brukernavn
gmcph...@rmit.EDU.AU (Greg McPherson) wrote:
>Why do cultures stop advancing technologically?
>Why, if they were so advance didnt China develop steam engines and rifles
>and so forth a hundred years before Europeans and go out and invade them?
Whatever has invading other countries to do with being advanced???
Joseph C Wang
In article <jmc-270397...@r30p30.onramp.net>,
John McCarthy <j...@steam.stanford.edu> wrote:
>2. As economic systems, communism and capitalism both reject feudalism
>with its hereditary economic positions. Politically communism needs
>to be compared with democracy. Both start with the idea of popular
>rule; its just that communism didn't work out that way anywhere in the
>world.
But Confucianism also rejects the notion of hereditary economic
positions and claims that the ability to rule depends on popular
support. Marxist Chinese historians call the imperial period
"feudalistic" but in order to do that they have to invent the notion
of "centralized bureaucratic feudalism" which to me seems to be a
contradiction in terms.
What I've found is that even among non-Marxist historians, certain
things are assumed about Imperial China in order to fit to a notion of
how history should work, and there isn't a strong effort to see if
those assumptions work out. Since industrialization in Europe
resulted in the breakdown of a rigid class structure, people assume
that industrialization in China ought to have the same effect, without
questioning whether there was a rigid class structure to begin with
(and there wasn't).
>5. There is indeed more than one path to modernization. In some
>countries socialism was a transitional stage between feudalism and
>capitalism.
But what makes you think that you can divide history in this way? I
don't see how one can characterize Qing China as "fedualistic"
without devoiding the word of any meaning.
Personally, I divide societies into "agricultural," "industrial," and
"post-industrial." These terms describe societies without making
assumptions about how they should behave.
>6. I can't see China abandoning science, technology or capitalism, and
>just about all educated opinion outside the Communist Party (and much
>within the Party) sees a need for political democracy.
But the notion of "modernism" also is bound up wtih the notion of
"secularism" and that doesn't seem to be happening in East Asia or in
the rest of the world for that matter.
Also be VERY careful with the notion of democracy. In a Chinese
context, democracy means something completely different than in a
Western one. In particular, when Chinese intellectuals use the term,
generally they are thinking about a system that mobilizes the energy
of the masses toward national goals, rather than a system with
procedures that limit state power through agreed upon rights. In the
West, people who label themselves democrats generally distrust
nationalism and collective movements, while in China, the term
democracy has a very strong nationalistic and collectivist connotation
to it.
Within the CCP, most people are conceiving the future of China as a
large Singapore. I don't know if this is workable, and the civil
liberatarian in me hopes it isn't workable, but it is possible that
you could end up with an industrial society which is rather unfriendly
toward a political opposition. If you use terms like "industrial"
then you can at least consider this possibility and discuss its
feasibility. If you use terms like "modern" then you basically are
defining the question out of existence.
D7 Singh
> I don't think the case of India can really be compared to China or
Japan.
> The initial European advances into India were much more related to
> European great-power rivalries than was the case in China. And the fact
> that India was not even close to unified further confuses the issue.
Why is India under the rule of the Mughals not considered to be
'close to unified' in your opinion whereas China under the Manchus
is?
-Peter Metcalfe
India was united under the Mughals only upto the Mughal ruler Shah Jehan.
Aurangzeb, his son, was an Islamic fundamentalist and started the
persecution of the Hindus and the Sikhs which resulted in internal
warfare. This eventually resulted in separate Hindu kingdoms (the
Marathas) and the formation of Sikh kingdoms in the north west. The
southern kingdoms started revolting as well. It was under these
precarious conditions that the British finally stepped in. The Maharajas
and the Mughal rulers used the British and other European traders to
supply them with weapons against one another. Eventually disaffected
Indians joined the British as the members of the British Sepoy army and
waged wars against the divided Indian rulers themselves which eventually
allowed the British to take over India.
Nidhi
"Wise men do not grieve for the dead or for the living.
Never was there a time when I was not, nor thou, nor these lord of men, nor will there ever be a time hereafter when we shall cease to be." Bhagwad Gita.
John McCarthy
Joseph Wang includes:
>6. I can't see China abandoning science, technology or capitalism, and
>just about all educated opinion outside the Communist Party (and much
>within the Party) sees a need for political democracy.
But the notion of "modernism" also is bound up wtih the notion of
"secularism" and that doesn't seem to be happening in East Asia or in
the rest of the world for that matter.
Also be VERY careful with the notion of democracy. In a
Chinese context, democracy means something completely
different than in a Western one. In particular, when
Chinese intellectuals use the term, generally they are
thinking about a system that mobilizes the energy of the
masses toward national goals, rather than a system with
procedures that limit state power through agreed upon
rights. In the West, people who label themselves democrats
generally distrust nationalism and collective movements,
while in China, the term democracy has a very strong
nationalistic and collectivist connotation to it.
I have seen the proposition that "democracy" to the Chinese
doesn't mean freedom of speech and allows suppression of
political opposition. I don't believe it.
1. The democracy movement in China with the posters on Democracy
Wall and the Tien Anmen Square demonstrations surely meant
democracy in the Western sense. That was the Statue of Liberty
in the Square, not a statue of Confucius.
2. The democratic movements in Taiwan and Hong Kong all demanded
democracy in the Western sense.
3. So have democrats in other oriental countries.
Western apologists for communism in the Soviet Union have all
claimed that the peoples of these countries didn't want democracy
in the Western sense. In each case this proposition has been
refuted when people had a choice.
That the autocrats had the support of the people is a false
reading of history.
--
Gerard Foley
Ditt brukernavn (bruke...@telepost.no) wrote:
: gmcph...@rmit.EDU.AU (Greg McPherson) wrote:
Now I think we may be getting somewhere. The west "advanced" by contacts
among the nations, manifested in military progress and aggressiveness.
I think we do confuse failure to be aggressive with backwardness.
The problem with China may have been exactly that they did not
cultivate aggression.
When I was younger, in the thirties, I generalized that "All nationalities
felt superior to the others, but the Germans cared about the others not
agreeing with them. The French, British, etc, just attributed the
failure to concede their superiority to the very inferiority that the
other nationalities suffered from."
The Chinese certainly did not think the Europeans had much besides
opium to give them!
--
Gerry
Joseph Askew
Joseph C Wang (j...@athena.mit.edu) wrote:
: >"All men are created equal" is modern. Representative democracy
: >is modern. Capitalism, complete with corporations and stock
: >markets, is modern. Communism, although a bad idea, is modern.
: >Science, as the main way of finding out about the world, is
: >modern. In these senses, the Qing were not modern, and China
: >today is modernizing.
: The trouble is that you end up with a tauntology. Among the ideas
: that you listed (communism and capitalism), the only real thing that
: they have in common is that they are found in industrial societies.
The Professor's article has failed to turn up here yet (although it
has reached my Adelaide site) so I'll try to reply to both here.
Mostly what I have to say concerns the previous post rather than
Joseph Wang's. My problem is less that it is a tautology but that
it does exactly whta I object you. It lists things Americans do as
modern. Among others. This is just what the first Anglophones did
in the nineteenth century as well except of course they had a very
different list. China allowed polygamy and divorce for instance.
Britain did not. Thus monogamy and no (or difficult) divorce was
held up as a sign of modernity. It is a clever way of defining
things but of limited use. If you claim that "all men are equal"
is a modern concept then Qing China has as much right to be counted
as modern in 1833 as Britian or America did. Neither of which were
willing at that time to admit all White men were equal let alone
anyone else. Capitalism was hardly as we know it today either. At
the time people were still jailed for debt and even limited liabily
was more of a curiousity than a commonplace. So who in 1833 was
modern?
The big step forward in "modernity", I think and I expect most
people would agree, is the French Revolution. It may have put
forward the idea that all men are equal. It may have even acted
on it to some extent. But capitalism as we know it did not have
much of a look in, nor did communism. If you look at France under
Napoleon there is little in the way of democracy and you have in
fact a state that looks remarkably like some periods in Chinese
history only militarily aggressive and surrounded by powerful
neighbours. Was Napoleonic France modern?
: So what you end up saying is that the Qing dynasty was unable to
: develop an industrial society because they didn't develop an
: industrial society. Which isn't saying anything.
It also lacks any philosphical coherence. Just a list of things
Americans do is no way to define what we mean bymodern. Is, to
take an obvious example, modern Islamic Fundamentalism modern or
a throw back to the fourteenth century? I happen to think it is
modern even if it does not admit all men are equal or show many
signs of giving a damn about capitalism. All we can say is that
Americans are not Moslem Fundamentalists. Is Pat Robertson modern
then? The Communist at least looked for "shoots of capitalism" in
late Imperial China and found them needless to say.
: Part of the problem in discussing modernity is that the West was the
: first part of the world to develop an industrial society. Because
: there have been few other examples of modernization, its not clear
: what factors aid industrialization and what factors don't.
I'm not sure that is true so much as it is hard to see which are
pre-requisites. Not quite the same thing. The Founding Fathers did
in fact condemn people who made excessive profits. Not the sort of
thing to aid industrialisation but not enough to prevent it either.
The early Japanese modernisers played with Christianity and English
as these were the obvious signs of modern Western nations. They
also adopted a national Church in State Shinto (an invention which
did not exist before then), and a policy of Imperial expansion.
Did these help modernise Japan? They managed fine without English
or Christianity so these don't look to be pre-requisites. They have
done fine without an official religion so that looks OK too. It is
certainly a fact that since 1945 they have done well without any
sort of Empire either althouh I think their China aggression was
a huge help to their industrialisation (the "reparations" they
screwed out of the Chinese put Japan on the Gold Standard for
instance). Yet Christianity especially has *always* been cited as
something a modern Nation needed. Especially Protestantism. Still
is today. Is it necessary? Is it modern?
: >Does Joseph Askew see any chance of China going back to its old
: >political culture - either the warlord version or the
: >bureaucratic rule with bureaucrats selected according to their
: >success in examinations in the Chinese classics?
Warlords are a rare but not unusual feature of Chinese history. They
have appeared more than once and no doubt will do so again. As they
will in America or any other country isolated from powerful nearby
nations. I don't see it happening any time soon. Bureaucratic rule
by bureaucrats selected by exam I see occuring again simply because
it is the way most nations are ruled. The French, in my opinion,
picked up the Chinse model wholesale and have spread it all over
the world. In most countries, whatever group of people are in power,
people are ruled by bureaucrats selected by Exam. America is the
major exception having only partially adopted the British version
of the Chinese model, and the British model was only partial anyway.
In China the exams may or may not be on traditional Classics. Not
I expect. But then the Classics have not been the only examination
material anyway. They may, like Japan, be in law and economics from
a major University or two. Ironically "modern" Japan resembles the
old Traditional China more than traditional Japan does for just
this reason. Thy may not. But China will go on being governed, as
France will, in the traditional way - by bureaucrats selected by
competitive exam. Communism represents a step backward that will
pass in the end.
: Actually, I do see a reasonable chance of China being run by
: bureaucrats who have some training in the Chinese classics.
Especially given the new stress the CCP is putting on spirtual
civilisation and even Lee Kwan Yew talks of Confucian values.
I expect a training in the law to be more likely though. As in
France.
Dharmadeva
It has a lot to do with food needs:
The main problem in China is that despite considerable agricultural
progress, China has not been able to feed its huge population. Moreover,
in China there is not even sufficient land to accommodate its huge
population - and it s population is continually increasing. In the
industrial sphere, China has already exhausted most of its natural
resources. It hopes to preserve its remaining scant resources for
industrial development, thus preventing a dark future.
There are three main economic problems in China.
First, China must supply food to its increasing population through
agricultural development.
Secondly, the percentage of the population employed in agriculture is too
high.
And thirdly, employment must be provided to the nonagricultural sector of
the economy. Thirdly, employment must be provided to the non-agricultural
sector of the economy through industrial expansion.
Because none of these problems could be solved immediately, China under
Mao-Tse-Tung adopted a policy of grabbing land from neighbouring states.
Behind the recent [1963] Chinese attacks in Tibet, India and the USSR was
an insatiable hunger for land. This is a very ingenious plan for agrarian
revolution! [China has only 11% arable land whereas India has 89% arable
land.] The agricultural problems in India are of a different nature.
there is ample scope for agricultural development and industrial
revolution in India. India suffers economic hardships today because its
economic potential was not properly harnessed.
PR Sarkar
Dharmadeva
----------
'The main characteristic of PROUT-based
socioeconomic movements is that they aim
to guarantee the comprehensive,
multifarious liberation of humanity.'
P R Sarkar
http://www.kaapeli.fi:81/~samps/newren/
PROgressive Utilisation Theory
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John McCarthy
Joseph Askew quotes my
: >"All men are created equal" is modern. Representative democracy
: >is modern. Capitalism, complete with corporations and stock
: >markets, is modern. Communism, although a bad idea, is modern.
: >Science, as the main way of finding out about the world, is
: >modern. In these senses, the Qing were not modern, and China
: >today is modernizing.
He then writes
It also lacks any philosphical coherence. Just a list of
things Americans do is no way to define what we mean
by modern.
I wasn't striving for "philsophical coherence", whatever that
might be.
However, the above-mentioned practices and institutions cannot be
described today as "just a list of things Americans do".
Every one of them is practiced and being extended in most of the
world. The most consistent claim to do otherwise is in a few
Islamic nations, but after a burst of fanaticism they are returning
gradually to modernism. So is China - after its burst of a
modern fanaticism.
He then discusses the question of who learned what from whom.
That seems to me to be irrelevant.
Joseph Askew
John McCarthy (j...@steam.stanford.edu) wrote:
: 2. As economic systems, communism and capitalism both reject feudalism
: with its hereditary economic positions. Politically communism needs
: to be compared with democracy. Both start with the idea of popular
: rule; its just that communism didn't work out that way anywhere in the
: world.
Do they? Communism perhaps although North Korea and Romania provide
counter-examples. But it depends what you mean by hereditary economic
positions. Jardine Matheson, to take one example, is a company that
has remained mostly within the one large extended family for the last
150 years or so. The present owners did not "earn" their position,
they inherited it. Without rights to own and pass on possesions the
modern world would be very different. Even with high enough death
duties it would be a different culture. If you mean politica/ruling
hereditary positions then China was in the same basket as Communism
and Capitalism. With the exception of the ruling family.
: 3. Indeed we don't have as many examples of modernization as we would
: like to form a theory of it.
Which is a problem. We can pick any factor and make a good case for
it. I like to do so with foot binding myself. It isn't as bad as
many prominent theories.
: 4. I suspect the Ch'ing would have modernized eventually.
In the sense of a Westernised democracy with nuclear weapons?
I don't myself. The West is the exception, and it is exceptional.
: 5. There is indeed more than one path to modernization. In some
: countries socialism was a transitional stage between feudalism and
: capitalism.
But not in China. Which hasn't been feudal since 220 BC. I like
the Communist theorist who had to claim that for the last 2000
years China has been in a transition stage between feudalism and
Capitalism. I call that special pleading.
: 6. I can't see China abandoning science, technology or capitalism, and
: just about all educated opinion outside the Communist Party (and much
: within the Party) sees a need for political democracy.
Does it? Not in the Western sense. Not among the educated Chinese
people I know. Some of them want it, but then not all of them either.
Which is not to say they want Communism.
Joseph C Wang
In article <5hkjo4$4...@shell3.ba.best.com>,
John McCarthy <j...@steam.stanford.edu> wrote:
>However, the above-mentioned practices and institutions cannot be
>described today as "just a list of things Americans do".
>Every one of them is practiced and being extended in most of the
>world. The most consistent claim to do otherwise is in a few
>Islamic nations, but after a burst of fanaticism they are returning
>gradually to modernism.
I don't see any sign of that. There is a bit of disillusionment with
the Islamic revolution in Iran, but there isn't any large push to
reverse it. Elsewhere, Islamists have a lot of popular support, and
it's only some fairly repressive measures that are keeping them out of
power in Algeria. Saudi Arabia and most of the Gulf are nothing
resembling modernist.
Speaking of Algeria, one thing that amazes me is how people in the
West are so willing to forget notions of civil liberties or notions of
popular sovereignty if the "wrong" people win.
>So is China - after its burst of a modern fanaticism.
I must confess to being a "neo-traditionalist" who doesn't find the
division between modernism and fanaticism to be satisfactory. The
Cultural Revolution is to me a perfect example of fanatical modernism
gone awry.
Peter Metcalfe
:: the Mughals save for Goa, the Polygats of the southern tip and the
:: myriad foreign enclaves. It was in a state of severe unrest due to
:: Aurangzib's policies with the Jats and the Marathas in varying stages
:: of revolt.
: The maps I've seen of India show that the Mughals had only a part of
: India. Those "myriad foreign enclaves" must have included a very large
: part of India.
The largest foreign enclave at the end of the seventeeth century
was Goa. All I can surmise about the discrepancy in how much the
Mughals controlled is that you are looking at maps which treat the
places like the Marathas as independant powers (which may be true
depending on the date).
--Peter Metcalfe
Joseph Askew
Dharmadeva (u96...@student.canberra.edu.au) wrote:
: It has a lot to do with food needs:
What does? A lack of food provides an incentive for investment and
improvement.
: The main problem in China is that despite considerable agricultural
: progress, China has not been able to feed its huge population. Moreover,
Who has been feeding China then? China has been an irregular grain
purchaser on the world market, but by and large China can and does
feed itself. It has even been a food exporter over the years.
: in China there is not even sufficient land to accommodate its huge
: population - and it s population is continually increasing
This is absurd. China might be densely populated in some regions,
but it is not overly so.
:. In the
: industrial sphere, China has already exhausted most of its natural
: resources.
Rubbish. China has vast untapped resources. Huge oil finds have
been made over the last five years or so. Vast mineral deposits
are as yet untouched. Not to mentino human resources.
: It hopes to preserve its remaining scant resources for
: industrial development, thus preventing a dark future.
Yeah yeah yeah. Heard all this before. Besides the propaganda
is there anything relevant to this thread here?
: There are three main economic problems in China.
: First, China must supply food to its increasing population through
: agricultural development.
Or industrial development which will provide funds for imports. As
it is China has been able to keep pace with its population and now
the Chinese population eats better than ever before in modern times.
: Secondly, the percentage of the population employed in agriculture is too
: high.
Compared to what? It is like a man's legs being too long. As long a
enough food is produced the right percentage of the population is
in agriculture.
: And thirdly, employment must be provided to the nonagricultural sector of
: the economy. Thirdly, employment must be provided to the non-agricultural
: sector of the economy through industrial expansion.
Industrial growth is *waaay* outpacing population growth. There is
no sign that there will be a shortage of jobs any time soon. THe
problems come with the obsolete State sector. Nothing else.
: Because none of these problems could be solved immediately, China under
: Mao-Tse-Tung adopted a policy of grabbing land from neighbouring states.
What pieces of land from any neighbouring country did Mao grab? Tibet
has been Chinese since 1719 or so. On the border with Vietnam, with
Russia, with Kazahkstan, the Chinese have less than they did in 1840.
Even Tibet, for which a bad case of grabbing can be made, agriculture
is marginal and Chinese people who live there by and large don't farm.
They trade, they mine and they serve in the Army. Little else.
: Behind the recent [1963] Chinese attacks in Tibet, India and the USSR was
: an insatiable hunger for land.
China did not attack Tibet in 1963. Tibet is part of China. China did
not take any land from India after India started the border conflict.
China took nothing from the USSR despite the fact that the USSR and
now Russia occupied large areas of land China has a good historical
claim to.
Even if they had taken land from India the part they fought over is
and was unfarmable.
: This is a very ingenious plan for agrarian
: revolution! [China has only 11% arable land whereas India has 89% arable
: land.] The agricultural problems in India are of a different nature.
What plan?
: there is ample scope for agricultural development and industrial
: revolution in India. India suffers economic hardships today because its
: economic potential was not properly harnessed.
As does China. Big deal.
: PROgressive Utilisation Theory
: People's News Agency
: is a free news, views, analysis and literature
: service for the progressive minded.
Oh yeah. All is clear now.
Joseph C Wang
In article <1997Mar30.210137@cantva>,
Peter Metcalfe <P.Met...@student.canterbury.ac.nz> wrote:
>The largest foreign enclave at the end of the seventeeth century
>was Goa. All I can surmise about the discrepancy in how much the
>Mughals controlled is that you are looking at maps which treat the
>places like the Marathas as independant powers (which may be true
>depending on the date).
I suspect that part of the difference is that most of the rebellions
in China were aimed at overthrowing the Qing and substituting a new
government rather than on establishing a separate state. One of the
consequences of this is that the European powers were much less
willing to support these rebeliions since they worried that if the
rebellion succeeded, the new government would cancel the privileges
they had forced from the Qing. Also, the rebellions themselves were
not interested in making concessions to the foreign powers since that
would have meant less power for them had the rebellion succeeded.
Also, how well integrated was the Mughal empire? One of the things
that held China together was a notion of a common (and superior)
cultural heritage. This meant that when China was challenged, the
country came together rather than came apart. Was this notion strong
in Mughal India? Also, how well were the Mughals assimilated? By the
early 1800's, the Manchus were very well assimilated, and the issue of
their "foreign" origins was not much of an issue until the late
nineteenth century. In particular, the gentry elites supported the
Qing dynasty up to the end, and it was the loss of support from them
that killed the Qing.
Joseph C Wang
In article <5hiaoq$q...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>,
Dharmadeva <u96...@student.canberra.edu.au> wrote:
>The main problem in China is that despite considerable agricultural
>progress, China has not been able to feed its huge population. Moreover,
The population of China is supportable by its current agriculture.
China has been moving to import more food recently in response to an
increasing standard of living, but those imports are supportable by
exports of goods.
>In the
>industrial sphere, China has already exhausted most of its natural
>resources.
I don't remember the figures, but I believe that China still has the
coal to support it for several centuries.
>Because none of these problems could be solved immediately, China under
>Mao-Tse-Tung adopted a policy of grabbing land from neighbouring states.
This doesn't make any sense. Most of the regions which China has had
conflicts over are hardly suitable for any sort of intensive
agriculture. Also, why fight when you can buy? With foreign
exchange, China can get food sources from places it could never put an
army (like Kansas).
Clayton E. Cramer
Joseph Askew wrote:
>
> Dharmadeva (u96...@student.canberra.edu.au) wrote:
> : The main problem in China is that despite considerable agricultural
> : progress, China has not been able to feed its huge population. Moreover,
>
> purchaser on the world market, but by and large China can and does
> feed itself. It has even been a food exporter over the years.
In some years, no one. Famines with deaths numbering in the millions
have been a problem for a couple of centuries in China. There was one
in the early 1960s that caused something like 25 million deaths? The
19th century famines were usually associated with some sort of political
chaos also.
Joseph C Wang
In article <5hovea$3...@shell3.ba.best.com>,
Clayton E. Cramer <cra...@dlcc.com> wrote:
>In some years, no one. Famines with deaths numbering in the millions
>have been a problem for a couple of centuries in China. There was one
>in the early 1960s that caused something like 25 million deaths? The
>19th century famines were usually associated with some sort of political
>chaos also.
But in all the cases that I can think of, Chinese famines have been
triggered by political mismanagement and gross incompetence rather
than by environmental factors. China has more than enough arable land
to feed itself. The problem is that sometimes politics prevents it
from doing so.
John McCarthy
Joseph Wang includes:
I must confess to being a "neo-traditionalist" who doesn't
find the division between modernism and fanaticism to be
satisfactory. The Cultural Revolution is to me a perfect
example of fanatical modernism gone awry.
I included Marxism in all its variants among modern ideas, so
apart from his claim of perfection, I agree with Joseph Wang
about this. Well, let me pick a nit. "fanatical modernism" is
inaccurate, because it suggests that Mao had the same ideas as
Jefferson, only a more intense version.
Joseph Askew
John McCarthy (j...@steam.stanford.edu) wrote:
: I included Marxism in all its variants among modern ideas, so
: apart from his claim of perfection, I agree with Joseph Wang
: about this. Well, let me pick a nit. "fanatical modernism" is
: inaccurate, because it suggests that Mao had the same ideas as
: Jefferson, only a more intense version.
Are you really claiming that any idea Jefferson had was modern and
that his thought forms the basis of modernism? I will avoid all the
cheapest shots involving slavery (except to point out that Jefferson
proposed a Bill punihsing miscengenation that was so extreme that
Virginia did not pass it. It did get through but only after it was
made more moderate), and ask about his views on farming. It is part
of being modern to think that the best state is one rather like
China - consisting of many small farmers who all own their own land?
What is it about Jefferson's views on minimal government, shared by
not one government presently in power anywhere in the world or any
major oppositionm party I can think of, that make them so seminal?
Jefferson, in my opinion, has less influence on the modern world than
Mao. Which is saying a lot. At least real influence. Jefferson is
rather like Christ, much worshipped, mostly ignored.
Joseph Askew
John McCarthy (j...@steam.stanford.edu) wrote:
: : >"All men are created equal" is modern. Representative democracy
: : >is modern. Capitalism, complete with corporations and stock
: : >markets, is modern. Communism, although a bad idea, is modern.
: : >Science, as the main way of finding out about the world, is
: : >modern. In these senses, the Qing were not modern, and China
: : >today is modernizing.
: He then writes
: It also lacks any philosphical coherence. Just a list of
: things Americans do is no way to define what we mean
: by modern.
: I wasn't striving for "philsophical coherence", whatever that
: might be.
I did notice. Despite the fact that I asked for more than just a
list of things Americans did. Most discussions about "modernism"
tend to assume history is moving in some direction towards some
goal. This is as true of Whig historians as it is of Marxists.
These two groups have an underlying ideological or philosophical
basis for their views as poor as they might be. I assume you have
one too only what it is escapes me for the moment.
: However, the above-mentioned practices and institutions cannot be
: described today as "just a list of things Americans do".
Nor did I. I merely pointed out you have not explained what you
mean by terms like "modernising" or even "modern", you have just
provided a list of a bunch of things Americans do. As I have not
done what you say I have the relevance escapes me.
: Every one of them is practiced and being extended in most of the
: world.
That is true. Colonial rule once extend over most of the world. And
so at one point it would have been fair to say that being "modern"
meant being ruled by White people. It doesn't make colonial rule in
any way modern and in fact most of the world now gets by fine without
it. This is the problem of just providing a list of things Americans
do and not providing some sort of coherent intellectual basis for why
any institution or ideology ought or ought not be considered modern.
You can pick any American phenomena and claim it is practiced and being
extended over most of the world. Macdonald's for instance. Pretty much
everywhere has a Maccas and the chain is spreading. THus to be modern
is to have a Macdonald's near by. Qing China did not have any therefore
it was not modern. A perfectly logical argument if you assume that just
because Americans do something (and others follow) it is by definition
modern.
: The most consistent claim to do otherwise is in a few
: Islamic nations, but after a burst of fanaticism they are returning
: gradually to modernism.
So your definition of modernism is blind copying of America? I would
think by any sensible definition Iran is more modern than Saudi Arabia
and yet many of the institutions you mention are few and far between
in Iran. Slightly more common in Saudi Arabia. Especially Macdonald's.
: So is China - after its burst of a
: modern fanaticism.
Yet much of the "fanaticism" (I assume you don't mean mere dislike
of the United States) in modern China has been with the intent of
modernising China and destroying traditional practices. The Four
Olds is a famous campaign launched by Mao in the Cultural Revolution.
Aimed at modernising China by destroying every vestige of the past.
Your criticism here seems inaccurate and pre-determined by the fact
that at that time Mao also did not like the United States. China is
now more friendly and positive towards its past and its traditional
culture than any time since 1949. Why is it that you think it is now
modernising when before you think it wasn't?
: He then discusses the question of who learned what from whom.
: That seems to me to be irrelevant.
Given you seem to have missed the subtle point I was making I
guess it was.
Joseph Askew
Clayton E. Cramer (cra...@dlcc.com) wrote:
: > Who has been feeding China then? China has been an irregular grain
: > purchaser on the world market, but by and large China can and does
: > feed itself. It has even been a food exporter over the years.
: In some years, no one. Famines with deaths numbering in the millions
: have been a problem for a couple of centuries in China. There was one
: in the early 1960s that caused something like 25 million deaths? The
: 19th century famines were usually associated with some sort of political
: chaos also.
The Great Leap Forward caused at least 25 million deaths but it
was in the fifties. It may have caused 40 million but probably
not quite that high (or even more. It is an interesting issue.
All the figures are from the Communist Party. Which claims the
fourty million figure. But as all Communist figures are almost
always lies the issue is whether at the time they wanted to make
Mao look bad (which is my opinion) in which case the figure is
going to be too high, or good, in which case it is too low. As
there is no way of really knowing your guess is as good as mine).
But this was caused by incompetance and stupidity, not a failure
in the crop. China has always had famines when stability and law
and order have broken down. More maybe law and order break down
when there are famines. Either way most of the time China does
feed itself and always has.
My favourite CCP lie is that the Japanese killed 300,000 people
at Nanjing. No doubt the Japanese killed a lot and to be in any
way associated with Japanese Massacre Revisionists is distasteful,
but the Nationalist census for Nanjing just before the Massacre
puts thr population at about 200,000. Neat huh?
Joseph Askew
Joseph C Wang (j...@athena.mit.edu) wrote:
: I suspect that part of the difference is that most of the rebellions
: in China were aimed at overthrowing the Qing and substituting a new
: government rather than on establishing a separate state. One of the
: consequences of this is that the European powers were much less
: willing to support these rebeliions since they worried that if the
: rebellion succeeded, the new government would cancel the privileges
: they had forced from the Qing. Also, the rebellions themselves were
: not interested in making concessions to the foreign powers since that
: would have meant less power for them had the rebellion succeeded.
If I might quibble a little, the Miao, the Muslims of Gansu, Xinjiang
and Yunnan were not aiming at replacing the Qing. They wanted a new
state or two. The Nian just wanted to plunder. The periodic rebellions
on Taiwan were aimed at killing other Chinese people by and large with
no specific animus against the Qing government (except as in so far as
they prevented the rebels from killing other people). The Taiping, by
far and away the largest group, wanted to replace the Qing but they
were strongly opposed to opium and keen to stamp it out. Thus the Brits
and Americans supported the Qing even as they stabbed them in the back.
The brother of Lord Elgin even spelled it out by saying the British were
best served by a weak alien Manchu regime than any Chinese one. The only
otehr group I can think of offhand (and I'm sure I've forgotten someone)
were the Boxers who were initially decidedly antiQing but who eventually
decided the foreigners were worse than the Qing as so sided with the
Qing
government.
: nineteenth century. In particular, the gentry elites supported the
: Qing dynasty up to the end, and it was the loss of support from them
: that killed the Qing.
Serves them right for abolishing the Exams. After all if you have
spent years studying for them and then they are gone you are going
to be pissed. I seem to remember they were abolished in 1907/. 1911
the Qing are thrown out. Don't mess with intellectuals I say.
James W. Meritt
I believe that there might be a bit of a definition problem here.
1. What do you mean by "modern"? North America late 20th century? Amazon
backwater early 20th (I talked with a missionary)? Italy second century?
2. There appears to be a confusion between "science", "technology" and
"engineering". There is a plentitude of indicators that the chinese had the
knowledge. Perhaps you mean "technology"?
3. What "Chinese"? The emperors? Warlords? Peasants? 3000 years ago? It
is rather difficult to form an informed posting when you may be referring to
any or all or one third to one half of all our species to ever live on
earth...
--
James W. Meritt
The opinions expressed above are my own. The fact simply
are and belong to none.
Clayton E. Cramer
Joseph Askew wrote:
> My favourite CCP lie is that the Japanese killed 300,000 people
> at Nanjing. No doubt the Japanese killed a lot and to be in any
> way associated with Japanese Massacre Revisionists is distasteful,
> but the Nationalist census for Nanjing just before the Massacre
> puts thr population at about 200,000. Neat huh?
[moderator note - quoted sig file deleted. Dave]
The numbers that I am used to seeing for Nanjing is about 100,000
murdered. I would point out, however, that the population may well
have increased from census to battle as a result of refugees fleeing
into the city.
Donald Phillipson
Anent something else Joseph Askew (jas...@yoyo.cc.monash.edu.au) writes:
>
> The Great Leap Forward caused at least 25 million deaths but it
> was in the fifties. It may have caused 40 million but probably
> not quite that high (or even more. It is an interesting issue.
> All the figures are from the Communist Party. Which claims the
> fourty million figure. But as all Communist figures are almost
> always lies the issue is. . .
>
> My favourite CCP lie is that the Japanese killed 300,000 people
> at Nanjing. No doubt the Japanese killed a lot and to be in any
> way associated with Japanese Massacre Revisionists is distasteful,
> but the Nationalist census for Nanjing just before the Massacre
> puts thr population at about 200,000. Neat huh?
This requires amplification. Is the "CCP lie" the massacre or the
total number? American witnesses and contemporary Japanese
scholars seem to agree this was the worst atrocity of the
20th century committed by combat troops against non-combatants
in the first days after a battle.
What Americans in Nanking reported was (1) the city was filled with
Chinese refugees from the advancing Japanese army (so the obvious
irrelevance of any peacetime census impugns the person who adduces it) and
(2) most able-bodied people fled the city after the Japanese victory, so
that whatever their total a disproportionate number of those left behind
were wounded troups, the sick and aged, and mothers with young children.
This extra information does not explain what the "CCP lie" is supposed to
be.
--
| Donald Phillipson, 4180 Boundary Road, Carlsbad Springs, |
| Ontario, Canada, K0A 1K0, tel. 613 822 0734 |
Rich Rostrom
(jas...@yoyo.cc.monash.edu.au) writes:
> My favourite CCP lie is that the Japanese killed 300,000 people
> at Nanjing. No doubt the Japanese killed a lot and to be in any
> way associated with Japanese Massacre Revisionists is distasteful,
> but the Nationalist census for Nanjing just before the Massacre
> puts thr population at about 200,000. Neat huh?
Says who? My 1944 Rand McNally Atlas gives a figure of 726,711.
--
Rich Rostrom | You could have hit him over the head with it and he
| wouldn't have minded. He never did mind being hit
R-Rostrom@ | with small things like guns and axe handles.
bgu.edu | - Ellis Parker Butler, "That Pup of Murchison's"