“Natural History” Should Be Translated as “Natural History”
Natural history is generally translated as “博物学” (bowuxue, “studies of things”). In the Western tradition, natural history stands in opposition to natural philosophy, representing a way of studying nature that emphasizes observation, recording, and classification rather than reasoning or experiment. In the Chinese tradition, by contrast, though we lack a tradition of natural philosophy, we do have a developed tradition of “博物学.” But did ancient China really have a so-called tradition of bowuxue corresponding to Western natural history? Is it really appropriate to translate natural history as bowuxue? I have always been skeptical. In this article, I will revisit this translation, trace the similarities and differences between Chinese and Western…
阅读全文
