Mind the Gap
Acoustical Answers to Cosmological Concerns in First-Century b.c.e. China
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 9997564 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Noa Hegesh (0000-0002-8584-3300, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2021 |
| Volume | 112 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 645-669 |
| Publication date | 2021-12-02 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Isis (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0021-1753 • E-ISSN: 1545-6994 |
| Publisher | University of Chicago Press (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1086/717069 |
| OpenAlex | W4200509875 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 3 |
| References cited | 16 |
From the mid-third century b.c.e., Chinese experts used the manipulation of sound as a technology to synchronize society with the cosmos. In the Western Han, the polymath Jing Fang 京房 (78–37 b.c.e.) detected an acoustical problem, known in the West as the Pythagorean comma, in the musical system. In the Chinese system, the comma is characterized by a minute but audible discrepancy, a gap between two pitches that should sound identical and that carry the same numerical representation. Jing Fang reduced the comma by designing a model of sixty pitches, superposed onto the calendar. This essay argues that his acoustical endeavors are inseparable from his ultimate goal: to track seasonal change accurately throughout the year and use it in weather prognostications. Sound was the tool he used to measure the yearly flux of qi and interpret what contemporary thinkers had termed the hidden realities and subtle transformations of the cosmos
Acoustics · Archaeology · Art · Art history · China · Fang · Geometry · Literature · Musical · Physics · Politics · Polymath · Pythagorean theorem · Representation (politics) · Sinology · Sound (geography) · Historical Astronomy and Related Studies · History · Law · Mathematics · Philosophy
The Office of Music, c. 114 to 7 B.C
Xun Zi on Ritual and Music
Books of Fate and Popular Culture in Early China
Divination and Prediction in Early China and Ancient Greece
Transforming the Beasts
The Two Early Han i cHing Specialists Called Ching Fang
Cosmos and Computation in Early Chinese Mathematical Astronomy
The "Lushi chunqiu" and the Resolution of Philosophical Dissonance
On the Early Development of Chinese Musical Theory
Ban Gu
Chinese Cyclic Tunings in Late Antiquity
| Unique citing works | 3 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,75 |
| Citation span | 2022 - 2025 (4) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 3 |