Touching Science: An Examination from Several Historical, Philosophical, and Cultural Perspectives

Author: Liu Bing
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2000-03-01
Features: Did our Mohist or Archimedes of ancient Greece discover the principle of leverage first? What is the connection between feminism and the history of science? While we are proudly praising China as the "world" of inventions and discoveries, have we realized that this inherent patriotic sentiment has actually led us into misconceptions in the history of science? — Open this book, and author Liu Bing will take you on a journey to touch the beauty and reality of science. The content of this collection is selected from various essays, articles, and book reviews written by the author since 1990 on the history of science, philosophy of science, and science culture. It is divided into five parts. Part I, which focuses on theoretical research in the history of science, is the author's most dedicated field since the 1990s. The four selected articles here were originally included in his book Clio's View of Science: Preliminary Studies on the Historiography of Science. The other parts are selected from academic journals, conference proceedings, general publications, and newspaper book reviews. They include highly specialized academic papers as well as relatively lighter, essay-like articles. The articles in the "Science and Art" section fall roughly between these two categories. Excerpt: Misconceptions in the History of Science: From Patriotism to China's "World Invention" In recent years, with the improvement of domestic publishing conditions, a large number of science history books of various types have been published. Of course, in-depth research and popularization of the history of science are undoubtedly meaningful endeavors. However, we should also note that the lack of basic theoretical research in the history of science in China has, to some extent, led to misconceptions in the writing and publishing of science history works. The reasons for these misconceptions are often inseparable from the authors' and publishers' shortcomings in understanding the functions of the history of science. Of course, the history of science has multiple functions, and while people may hold differing views on these functions, debates in academia are normal. However, some issues urgently require in-depth discussion. One such issue is that many people, especially in the study and popularization of Chinese science history, have long emphasized its role in promoting patriotism. Generally speaking, science is considered an international discipline. Of course, since science inevitably arises in specific times and places, it is closely linked to the various environments and intellectual traditions of its birthplace. However, at least currently, most Western historians of science rarely regard the educational significance of the history of science in promoting patriotism (in a sense, also nationalism) as the primary goal of scientific research and popularization. In fact, historically, similar views have been popular in other countries, but the results have often led to serious distortions of history. For example, during World War I, due to national rivalries, some French historians of science attributed all significant contributions to scientific development to French scientists while blaming German scientists for all the errors. Similarly, about two decades later, during the Nazi era in Germany, the Nazi scientist Lenard (who had even won the Nobel Prize in Physics) distinguished between the "contributions of Aryans to science" and the "contributions of Jews to science" in his works on the history of science, claiming that all positive contributions to science were made by Aryan scientists. Of course, we can also recall that the Soviet Union once forced many important scientific discoveries to be attributed to historically Russian scientists in its "research on the history of science." It is precisely due to these negative effects that Western theorists of the history of science now classify patriotic (or nationalist) views related to the history of science as "ideological historiography of science" and hold a negative stance toward them. Regarding the study and popularization of Chinese science history, prioritizing the role of promoting patriotism has led to efforts to argue for China's "world invention" in every research, striving to discover that Chinese people had already achieved certain scientific achievements that the West only acquired in modern or contemporary times centuries ago. In many cases, the "world inventions" discovered in this way are even laughably absurd. Moreover, apart from Chinese people, there are indeed a few (or perhaps very few) foreigners who hold similar views. For example, the famous Newtonian laws of motion, which were systematically summarized by Newton in the 18th century, were recently claimed by an American author in a book titled China: A Nation of Inventions and Discoveries—Essentials of the History of Chinese Science and Technology (which has entered the preliminary list of this year's National Book Award, showing its influence in China) to have been proposed by the Chinese in the Mo Jing as early as the 4th or 3rd century BC! In fact, in more mature theories of the history of science, research on such issues has long been conducted. The famous "Whig interpretation of history" refers to the selection and construction of history based on current standards and perspectives. The problem is obvious: when we desperately seek to discover China's "world inventions," the "standards" we refer to—the benchmark that has been surpassed—are precisely the later scientific discoveries of great significance today (such as the Newtonian laws of motion in the previous example). And currently, in the vast majority of professional historians of science in the West, this extreme Whig historical research method has long been criticized and abandoned. Discussing this with overly specialized theoretical terminology may be difficult for a broader audience. However, this can also be explained in simpler terms. Simply put: the past and the present are fundamentally different, and historical research should ideally restore the past as accurately as possible within its original context. However, in the overly zealous pursuit of discovering "inventions," today's perspectives are used to excessively simplify and exaggerate the similarities between discoveries that were originally quite different. In simpler terms, in historical research, should we not follow the primary principle we often talk about—"seeking truth from facts"? Science is, after all, a polysemous term. Of course, we can also say that different forms of "science" existed in history, including historically "Chinese science." But in its most common sense, "science" refers to the "modern science" we still use today. There is no need to elaborate on this—just look at current middle and elementary school textbooks to see where most of the scientific content originates. How many of these are China's "world inventions"?