Year: 2015

Lectures on the General History of Science 10: The Mechanics Revolution [Class Discussion the Week After Next]

History of Science & Technology2015.05.07
Lectures on the General History of Science 10: The Mechanics Revolution [Class Discussion the Week After Next]
Today the Department of Astronomy has an important lecture, and the astronomy students all took leave together, so that attendance in class fell to a new low; in the second period, only 3 people were left…… Although I do not require attendance every time, such a dismal turnout is still rather depressing. It seems I need to think of some way around it. There was a similar phenomenon when I used to take Professor Wu’s class: once the semester had entered its latter half and reached the stage of the Scientific Revolution, attendance actually dropped by quite a lot. Perhaps after half a semester of classes everyone was simply exhausted,…
course Aristotle Scientific Revolution Copernicus
阅读全文

2015年5月7日
Lecture Notes on the General History of Science 9: The Copernican Revolution

History of Science & Technology2015.04.30
Lecture Notes on the General History of Science 9: The Copernican Revolution
Last time we talked about printing as the technological environment of the Scientific Revolution. Starting from this lesson, we will formally enter the period of the Scientific Revolution. Last time we mentioned that, when talking about the Scientific Revolution, we must at least distinguish three lines of development: first, astronomy; second, physics. These two lines converge in Newton, and can together be called the tradition of the mathematical sciences; this also constitutes the so-called “main line” of the Scientific Revolution in the usual sense. The third is alchemy and magic. This line stretches back farther than Copernicus and Newton; although its emblematic result is the rise of chemistry, its significance…
history of science philosophy of science course Scientific Revolution
阅读全文

2015年4月30日
Lectures on the General History of Science 8: Printing and the Scientific Revolution

History of Science & Technology2015.04.23
Lectures on the General History of Science 8: Printing and the Scientific Revolution
Last class I talked about medieval science. We discussed the emergence of the “university,” and the conceptual preconditions that Christian theology may have provided for modern science. But I have not yet given a concrete introduction to the theoretical creativity of medieval scholastic philosophers. I had originally considered giving a comprehensive account of the specific contents of medieval science in this class as well, but after weighing it up, I decided not to devote a single lecture to it. The main contributions of medieval science were concentrated in natural philosophy and in the clarification of certain concepts; they are relatively speculative in character, and if treated in a separate class…
course Aristotle Scientific Revolution natural history
阅读全文

2015年4月23日
Lecture Notes on the General History of Science 7: The Middle Ages and Christian Science

History of Science & Technology2015.04.17
Lecture Notes on the General History of Science 7: The Middle Ages and Christian Science
After finishing with the Arabs and China, let us return to the West and talk about medieval science. As for the Middle Ages, I was wondering whether I should spend two classes on them, because traditionally this period has been rather neglected; people probably know very little about it, yet in fact it is extremely important. To discuss why modern science did not arise in the Arab world or in China, on the one hand we have to talk about what was lacking in Arab and Chinese civilization, and on the other hand we must also make clear what medieval Europe actually had. In this lecture we will mainly talk…
history of science scholarship course education
阅读全文

2015年4月17日
Lecture Notes on the General History of Science 6: Special Topics in the History of Chinese Science

History of Science & Technology2015.04.09
Lecture Notes on the General History of Science 6: Special Topics in the History of Chinese Science
This time we are treating the history of Chinese science as a special topic. This subject does not lie within the lineage of Western science, so it is relatively difficult to discuss: there is a great deal of material on the history of Chinese science, but it is itself very scattered, and it is hard to summarize or to筛选 out what counts as core content. So this class may also be relatively free-ranging; what I mainly select are some points that can be set in contrast with the formation of Western science. We know that ancient China achieved a great many scientific accomplishments. Our primary and secondary education, as well…
China history of science course Scientific Revolution
阅读全文

2015年4月9日
Lectures on the General History of Science 5: Roman and Arabic Science

History of Science & Technology2015.04.03
Lectures on the General History of Science 5: Roman and Arabic Science
Last class we talked about Hellenistic science, represented by Ptolemaic astronomy; Western classical science reached its peak in the Hellenistic period. The next peak would have to wait until the Scientific Revolution of the 16th and 17th centuries, from Copernicus to Newton. The period in between is relatively less exciting, but our general history course cannot very well skip over it, and this period is also one we are comparatively unfamiliar with. Before the Scientific Revolution, we must at least discuss three strands: first, the Arabs; second, China; third, Christian Europe. The Arabs took up the torch of Greek science and also made distinctive contributions, laying the groundwork for Europe’s…
science history of science course Aristotle
阅读全文

2015年4月3日
Lectures on the General History of Science 4: Hellenistic Science

History of Science & Technology2015.03.27
Lectures on the General History of Science 4: Hellenistic Science
Last class we talked about ancient Greece as the birthplace of science. The key word of Greek learning is “freedom,” and this freedom has several layers of meaning. As for things, free things are natural things, as distinct from artificial things; natural things provide their own causes, so the discipline that seeks causes within things themselves is natural philosophy. As for human beings, freedom stands opposed to utility, and free persons stand opposed to slaves; one should pursue excellence rather than chase immediate material gain. As for learning, free learning stands opposed to imitation and authority; mathematics is the paradigm of free learning, because knowledge displays itself, without relying on…
philosophy science course Aristotle
阅读全文

2015年3月27日
Lectures on the General History of Science 3: The Classical Greek Period [Classroom Changed Starting Next Week]

History of Science & Technology2015.03.18
Lectures on the General History of Science 3: The Classical Greek Period [Classroom Changed Starting Next Week]
下 week starting next week, the “History of Science” class will move to Jiao Ba 306 In the last class, we went from primitive humans to the four great ancient civilizations. We mentioned that human history is, in a sense, the history of technology; no human culture is cut off from technology. Where there is technology, there is also “knowledge,” and every culture passes on its own knowledge. By the time we get to the ancient civilizations of Babylonia and Egypt, people’s knowledge and skills had already reached a very high level. But I still regard ancient Greece as the origin of “science.” That is to say, the “science”…
culture scholarship freedom history
阅读全文

2015年3月18日
Lecture Notes on the General History of Science 2: The Prehistory of Science

History of Science & Technology2015.03.12
Lecture Notes on the General History of Science 2: The Prehistory of Science
In the last class we mentioned the historiography of the history of science, including different historiographical strategies such as intellectual history and social history. We cannot take science as a ready-made, fixed standard and sit in judgment on history from the lofty vantage point of modern people. We need historical consciousness, and we should try to return to historical contexts in order to understand how things developed. The concept of “science” itself is not ready-made and fixed either; in different perspectives and different contexts, it has different meanings. Every historiographical strategy for the history of science embodies some understanding of what science is. For example, intellectual history tends to see…
history of science philosophy of science course civilization
阅读全文

2015年3月12日
Lecture Notes on the General History of Science (Introduction)

History of Science & Technology2015.03.04
Lecture Notes on the General History of Science (Introduction)
Course Arrangement Spring 2015 semester, Wednesday evening18:00-19:40, room Shengsiclass now moved to Jiaoba 306. Course requirements: no memorization, no calculations, and no particular background knowledge is required of students; only free reading and independent thinking are expected. Assessment requirements: Class attendance and discussion performance: 20%; (basically free points; active questioning and participation in discussion earn bonus points) Reading report: 30%; (choose from the recommended reading list, or choose other related books you personally like; choosing a good book earns bonus points, choosing a bad book loses points.) Final short paper: 50% (the topic is of your own choosing; it can also be completed on the basis of the…
history of science freedom course Aristotle
阅读全文

2015年3月4日