Science and Civilisation in China: Volume 3, Mathematics and the Sciences of the Heavens and the Earth

Science and Civilisation in China: Volume 3, Mathematics and the Sciences of the Heavens and the Earth PDF

Author: Joseph Needham

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1959

Total Pages: 1146

ISBN-13: 9780521058018

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After two volumes mainly introductory, Dr Needham now embarks upon his systematic study of the development of the natural sciences in China. The Sciences of the Earth follow: geography and cartography, geology, seismology and mineralogy. Dr Needham distinguishes parallel traditions of scientific cartography and religious cosmography in East and West, discussing orbocentric wheel-maps, the origins of the rectangular grid system, sailing charts and relief maps, Chinese survey methods, and the impact of Renaissance cartography on the East. Finally-and here Dr Needham's work has no Western predecessors-there are full accounts of the Chinese contribution to geology and mineralogy.

Science and Civilisation in China: Volume 7, The Social Background, Part 2, General Conclusions and Reflections

Science and Civilisation in China: Volume 7, The Social Background, Part 2, General Conclusions and Reflections PDF

Author: Joseph Needham

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2004-07-22

Total Pages: 344

ISBN-13: 9780521087322

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It would be difficult to overstate the importance of Joseph Needham's Science and Civilisation in China series. For nearly fifty years, Needham and his collaborators have revealed the ideals, concepts and achievements of China's scientific and technological traditions from the earliest times to about 1800 through this great enterprise. During his long working lifetime, Needham kept in draft various essays, some written with collaborators, in which he set out his broad views on the Chinese social and historical context. These essays, edited by one of his closest collaborators, Kenneth Robinson, are contained in the present volume. A reading of this material makes it possible to reconstruct the assumptions and problematics that underpinned and drove the Needham project throughout the nearly one half century during which he was at the helm. The documents gathered here reveal the intellectual foundations of one of the greatest scholarly enterprises of the twentieth century.

Science and Civilisation in China: Volume 5, Chemistry and Chemical Technology, Part 13, Mining

Science and Civilisation in China: Volume 5, Chemistry and Chemical Technology, Part 13, Mining PDF

Author: Peter J. Golas

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1999-02-25

Total Pages: 564

ISBN-13: 9780521580007

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The fifth volume of the late Dr. Needham's immense undertaking covers the subjects of chemistry and chemical technology. This, the thirteenth part of the volume, is the first history of Chinese mining to appear in a Western language. Spanning from the Neolithic period to the present day, it deals with the full range of Chinese mining from copper to mercury, arsenic to coal. The author explores not only the written sources but also the archaeological remains, and observes the traditional techniques still in use. The interrelationship between Chinese mining and its social, economic and political implications is examined. Through these discoveries, the author concludes that these factors were probably more important in determining how mining was carried out than the technological progress itself.

Science and Civilisation in China: Volume 7, The Social Background, Part 1, Language and Logic in Traditional China

Science and Civilisation in China: Volume 7, The Social Background, Part 1, Language and Logic in Traditional China PDF

Author: Joseph Needham

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1998-02-19

Total Pages: 504

ISBN-13: 9780521571432

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Science and Civilisation in China, Volume 7 Part 1 is the first book in the final volume of this unique resource. The Chinese culture is the only culture in the world that has developed systematic logical definitions and reflections on its own and on the basis of a non-Indo-European language. Christoph Harbsmeier discusses the basic features of the classical Chinese language that made it a suitable medium for science in ancient China, discussing in detail a wide range of abstract concepts that are crucial for the development of scientific discourse. There is special emphasis on the conceptual history of logical terminology in ancient China, and on traditional Chinese views on their own language. Finally the book provides an overview of the development of logical reflection in ancient China, first in terms of the forms of arguments that were deployed in ancient Chinese texts, and then in terms of ancient Chinese theoretical concerns with logical matters.

Comparative Essays in Early Greek and Chinese Rational Thinking

Comparative Essays in Early Greek and Chinese Rational Thinking PDF

Author: Jean-Paul Reding

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2017-03-02

Total Pages: 274

ISBN-13: 1351950053

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This collection of essays, by Reding, in the emergent field of Sino-Hellenic studies, explores the neglected inchoative strains of rational thought in ancient China and compares them to similar themes in ancient Greek thought, right at the beginnings of philosophy in both cultures. Reding develops and defends the bold hypothesis that Greek and Chinese rational thinking are one and the same phenomenon. Rather than stressing the extreme differences between these two cultures - as most other writings on these subjects - Reding looks for the parameters that have to be restored to see the similarities. Reding maintains that philosophy is like an unknown continent discovered simultaneously in both China and Greece, but from different starting-points. The book comprises seven essays moving thematically from conceptual analysis, logic and categories to epistemology and ontology, with an incursion in the field of comparative metaphorology. One of the book's main concerns is a systematic examination of the problem of linguistic relativism through many detailed examples.

New World Secrets on Ancient Asian Maps

New World Secrets on Ancient Asian Maps PDF

Author: Charlotte Harris Rees

Publisher: Light Messages Publishing

Published: 2014-07-02

Total Pages: 193

ISBN-13: 1611531098

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Charlotte Harris Rees is an independent researcher, a retired federal employee, and an honors graduate of Columbia International University. She has diligently studied the possibility of very early arrival of Chinese to America. In 2003 Rees and her brother took the Harris Map Collection to the Library of Congress where it remained for three years while being studied. In 2006 she published an abridged version of her father's, The Asiatic Fathers of America: Chinese Discovery and Colonization of Ancient America. Her Secret Maps of the Ancient World came out in 2008. In 2011 she released Chinese Sailed to America Before Columbus: More Secrets from the Dr. Hendon M. Harris, Jr. Map Collection. In 2013 she published Did Ancient chinese Explore America? Her books are listed by World Confederation of Institutes and Libraries for Chinese Overseas Studies.

Astrology and Cosmology in the World’s Religions

Astrology and Cosmology in the World’s Religions PDF

Author: Nicholas Campion

Publisher: NYU Press

Published: 2012-06-11

Total Pages: 285

ISBN-13: 0814708420

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When you think of astrology, you may think of the horoscope section in your local paper, or of Nancy Reagan's consultations with an astrologer in the White House in the 1980s. Yet almost every religion uses some form of astrology: some way of thinking about the sun, moon, stars, and planets and how they hold significance for human lives on earth. Astrology and Cosmology in the World’s Religions offers an accessible overview of the astrologies of the world's religions, placing them into context within theories of how the wider universe came into being and operates. Campion traces beliefs about the heavens among peoples ranging from ancient Egypt and China, to Australia and Polynesia, and India and the Islamic world. Addressing each religion in a separate chapter, Campion outlines how, by observing the celestial bodies, people have engaged with the divine, managed the future, and attempted to understand events here on earth. This fascinating text offers a unique way to delve into comparative religions and will also appeal to those intrigued by New Age topics.