Trust, Instruments, and Cross-Cultural Scientific Exchanges
Chinese Debate over the Shape of the Earth, 1600-1800
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4516098 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Pingyi Chu (Institute of History and Philology, Academia Sinica, corresponding author) |
| Year | 1999 |
| Volume | 12 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 385-412 |
| Publication date | 1999-01-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Science in Context (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0269-8897 • E-ISSN: 1474-0664 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1017/s0269889700003501 |
| OpenAlex | W2169522476 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 5 |
| References cited | 13 |
The ArgumentThis paper examines the debate in China over the shape of the earth during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The main arguments are as follows. First, trust plays an important role in knowledge transmission. Second, partial communication between different woridviews is possible. In the case of the debate over the shape of the earth, partial communication was accomplished by the spread of Western astronomical instruments and calculating tools. Third, such alien concepts as the four elements and the experience of navigation did not serve as effective cultural resources to convince Chinese literati of the sphericity of the earth. Fourth, as a result, the legitimacy of the sphericity of the earth had to be reconstructed in an alien environment. The theory of the Chinese origins of Western learning was fabricated within such a context. Fifth, debate over factual knowledge bears social and cultural implications. Thus the debate over the sphericity of the earth involved not only how the phenomenon could be understood but also how the Chinese empire was to be positioned in the new cultural atlas. Finally, the sphericity of the earth eventually became a matter of common sense for the Chinese largely because of the political and cultural transformation of modern China
Aesthetics · Archaeology · Argument (complex analysis) · Biology · Cartography · China · Context (archaeology) · Cultural transmission in animals · Earth (classical element) · Environmental ethics · Epistemology · Evolutionary biology · Figure of the Earth · Geography · Geometry · Legitimacy · Phenomenon · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Sphericity · Chinese history and philosophy · History · History of Science and Medicine · Law · Mathematics · Philosophy
Science and civilization in China
China in the sixteenth century
From Philosophy to Philology
Cosmos and Computation in Early Chinese Mathematical Astronomy
Father Verbiest's Chinese world map (1674)
Calendar Reform Prior to the Arrival of Missionaries at the Ming Court
Ch'ing Scholars' Views of Western Astronomy
Inventing the Flat Earth
A Social History of Truth
Leviathan and the Air-Pump
| Citations per year | 0.24 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2005 - 2024 (20) |
| Highly cited | No |