标签：history of science

If Scholars Don’t Use AI, That Counts as Academic Corruption

AI & Scholarship2026.05.09
If Scholars Don’t Use AI, That Counts as Academic Corruption
AI’s New Advances At the end of last year, at someone’s request, I wrote a piece, Will AI Restructure the History of Science?. That happened to coincide with the release of gemini 3.0, and I thought it marked a watershed, the point at which AI moved from the level of a student to the level of a professional researcher. Less than half a year later, the AI tool landscape has once again shifted dramatically; gemini long ago ceased to be leading, and claude and chatgpt have reclaimed the lead in capability. More importantly, claude’s cowork and chatgpt’s codex have both undergone qualitative leaps forward too (perhaps spurred on by openclaw),…
technology history of science scholarship freedom
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2026年5月9日
Will AI Restructure the History of Science?

AI & Scholarship2026.03.24
Will AI Restructure the History of Science?
Published in Xinrui Weekly, issue 162; the original draft is posted here. 1 AI accelerates iteration: from assistant to master I received this commissioned piece in September, but I procrastinated until December to write it. Yet that delay also meant I waited for the November 18 release of Gemini 3.0, a milestone that marks the restructuring of academic research by AI as having entered the present continuous tense. It is not that Gemini 3.0 overturned my previous views; rather, many of the “AI will…” statements I had discussed before now have to be rewritten as “AI can already…”. The previous major milestone was probably at the beginning of 2025, when…
philosophy history of science scholarship history
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2026年3月24日
The Media Matrix and the Livestream Preview

Site Matters2025.10.13
The Media Matrix and the Livestream Preview
Lately I’ve been getting ready to run my own social media a bit, for example by starting interactive livestreams. Here I’m gathering my related accounts in one place (updated at any time), and welcome everyone to follow along. Personal blog homepage yilinhut.net The personal blog I’ve been writing since 2005 and updating fairly often (or occasionally); I try to post all my articles there whenever possible. Huawendao cn.style A personal commercial website I recently launched (Singapore), supporting paid commissioned writing and paid consultations; in the future I’ll also put some cultural souvenirs up for sale. Tianyu ARTECH tianyu.art A tech-and-art studio co-founded with Shen Cong (Hong Kong), maintained by Shen…
philosophy history of science blog website
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2025年10月13日
How Science Museums in China Can Innovate by Bringing Forth the New

Culture & Public Commentary2025.09.12
How Science Museums in China Can Innovate by Bringing Forth the New
Published in Science Times (2025-08-28, p. 3, general), with the title changed to “The first users of science museums should not be teenagers, but scholars” In this summer vacation, which is about to end, science museums have joined the ranks of the many must-check-in tourist destinations. For parents, if they want their children to take part in some edutainment-oriented activities, science museums are obviously one of the best choices. In recent years, our country has continuously increased investment in science museum construction. According to Xinhua News Agency, the number of science museums open free of charge in China increased from 92 in 2015 to 409 in 2024, with an average…
China history of science science scholarship
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2025年9月12日
Museums in a Changing Society

Culture & Public Commentary2025.05.19
Museums in a Changing Society
An assignment from 中国科学报; the WeChat article was retitled “Where Are Museums, Born Out of the ‘Temple of the Muses’ and the ‘Cabinet of Curiosities,’ Heading in the Digital Age?” It should have been polished, so I am posting the original draft here. What is a “museum”? If we trace the history back, the concept of the museum and the social role it plays have never been fixed; they have continuously changed along with society. This was true in the past, and it is even more true in the future: in this rapidly changing society, museums are giving rise to new meanings. The word museum comes from Alexandria in the…
culture history of science history Aristotle
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2025年5月19日
Cultivating a Cultural Atmosphere That Pursues Novelty and Interest — A Review of Why Greatness Cannot Be Planned

AI & the Future of Technology2023.11.16
Cultivating a Cultural Atmosphere That Pursues Novelty and Interest — A Review of Why Greatness Cannot Be Planned
This article was published in China Economic Times (Yujian Sixiang, September 18, 2023) Recently, two scientists from OpenAI published a book called Why Greatness Cannot Be Planned, attempting to argue that great technological innovations are often not the result of prior planning. In fact, Chinese tradition also has similar wisdom. For example, Daoism says, “do nothing, and yet nothing will remain undone”; Buddhism speaks of “no attachment, no form”; and there is the common saying, “If you set your heart on planting flowers, the flowers may not bloom; but if you casually stick a willow branch in the ground, it may grow into shade.” All of these mean something similar….
technology China history of science book reading
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2023年11月16日
What Is Technology? (Transcript of the 25th Session of the Jishi Lecture Series)

AI & the Future of Technology2023.08.17
What Is Technology? (Transcript of the 25th Session of the Jishi Lecture Series)
In June I gave a long lecture for Ji-shi Capital, and recently they finished the transcription and released it in three installments. The text was transcribed by them; I went through it, but there may still be a few scattered errors. I’m posting the complete collected version here for the record. The original texts of the three installments can be found here: Why is our education devoted to producing copies?; Where does technology come from? Looking at Watt’s steam engine to see our misunderstanding of technology; If the AI revolution is similar to the Industrial Revolution, we will face a very terrifying situation. In fact, the three installments correspond to…
technology history of science history of technology AI
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2023年8月17日
Treating People as People: An Introduction to Wiener’s The Human Use of Human Beings

AI & Scholarship2023.05.05
Treating People as People: An Introduction to Wiener’s The Human Use of Human Beings
This is the introductory reading I prepared for the Mediasphere Alliance. The transcript was roughly organized by Feng Guangneng and then polished by me, though I tried to preserve the conversational style as much as possible. It has already been posted on the Mediasphere Alliance WeChat public account; here I am reposting the original draft. 1.1 Opening Wu Jingwei: Hello to all our friends online, and to all the book lovers who have long followed the Mediasphere Alliance reading group! Today we are very honored to have Teacher Hu Yilin from our Department of History of Science join us to lead us through Wiener’s very important classic, The Human Use…
history of science book reading history of technology book review
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2023年5月5日
The Structure of the Historiographical Revolution — An Introduction to The Structure of Scientific Revolutions

History of Science & Scholarship2023.03.01
The Structure of the Historiographical Revolution — An Introduction to The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
I’ve recorded another introductory lecture for Chaoxing. The video course should already have been published on Chaoxing, and here I am posting the verbatim script I prepared when recording the program. I Hello everyone, I’m Hu Yilin, a teacher in the Department of History of Science at Tsinghua University. Today I’m giving you an introductory guide to Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. II This book’s influence is enormous. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy puts it this way: “Thomas Kuhn (1922–1996) was one of the most influential philosophers of science of the 20th century (perhaps the most influential). His 1962 book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions is one of…
history of science book reading science philosophy of science
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2023年3月1日
Becoming Citizens Capable of Debate—Commencement Address for the 2022 Department of History of Science Graduation Ceremony

History of Science & Scholarship2022.06.27
Becoming Citizens Capable of Debate—Commencement Address for the 2022 Department of History of Science Graduation Ceremony
I am very honored to speak today on behalf of the teachers of the undergraduate minor in history of science. Building the undergraduate major has always been a priority for us in the Department of History of Science at Tsinghua University. In China as a whole, we were also the first department of history of science to enroll undergraduates. At present we are training a minor; in the future we will also train a major. So, why should undergraduates study history of science? Of course, one purpose is to train future scholars of history of science and strengthen the pool of applicants for our graduate program. But many undergraduate students…
history of science scholarship philosophy of science knowledge
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2022年6月27日