标签：Scientific Revolution

AI Is Sick; Web3 Is the Cure

AI & Scholarship2023.10.27
AI Is Sick; Web3 Is the Cure
Published on Wai Bo San Guan; the original text is posted here. Earlier, I gave the keynote address at the main session of the Ninth Global Blockchain Summit, entitled “Web3 Has the Cure—AI, Dao, and Games.” Because time was limited, I could not really go into it in depth; this article (and the next one) may be taken as an expansion of that talk. Many people believe that AI technology is leading the next industrial revolution, and that we are facing an era-defining transformation that comes once in several centuries, so entrepreneurs will encounter many opportunities and challenges. I fully agree with this judgment, but unlike many optimists, I think…
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2023年10月27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
Confronting “Complexity” — A Review of Big Science

History of Science & Scholarship2022.09.16
Confronting “Complexity” — A Review of Big Science
This article was published in China Science Daily (2022-09-16, Section 3, Books), with the title changed to “Confronting the ‘Complex’ Head-On — A Compound of Science, Capital, and Politics in the Age of Big Science, Scientists Can No Longer ‘Cultivate Themselves Alone’” When we speak of America’s research environment or science policy, the first thing that usually comes to mind is Vannevar Bush’s Science: The Endless Frontier, a report Bush submitted to then-President Roosevelt in 1945. The report emphasized the importance of basic research, arguing that the government should provide funding support for basic scientific research, but must also respect scientists’ independence and autonomy. Bush’s report was indeed far-reaching in…
book reading science freedom book review
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2022年9月16日
From the Altar to the Forum: The Practical Significance of the History of Science (A Review of Modern History of Science)

Culture & Public Commentary2022.01.27
From the Altar to the Forum: The Practical Significance of the History of Science (A Review of Modern History of Science)
This article was published in the April 2021 issue of Book City Magazine. It was a review from last year, but I forgot to repost it then. Since the magazine allows me to republish my own articles on my blog, I might as well put it here too. Making Science—An Over-the-Syllabus Title When Chinese publishers introduce foreign academic works, they often have the habit of changing the title. For example, A Short History of Modern Science: From the Steam Engine to Grebe Courtship, published by the Electronics Industry Press in 2018, had the original title “The Making of Modern Science: The Making of Modern Science: Science, Technology, Medicine and Modernity:…
history of science book reading science history
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2022年1月27日
The Growth History of the Scientific Spirit and the Unity of Personality

History of Science & Scholarship2020.12.19
The Growth History of the Scientific Spirit and the Unity of Personality
Today I was invited to take part in a forum on the spirit of science. Although my theme talk was only five minutes long, I had also prepared some new formulations, which I will lay out here in a fuller way. “The spirit of science” seems to include many dimensions: seeking truth from facts, pursuing truth, solidarity and cooperation, and so on. How should we understand this multiplicity of what is called the “spirit of science”? There are two reasons for this multiplicity. On the one hand, many people are too casual, stuffing every “good” quality into the spirit of science; but on the other hand, this multiplicity does have…
history of science science freedom Scientific Revolution
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2020年12月19日
An Interview with China Discipline Inspection and Supervision News on Questions of Science and Technology

Culture & Public Commentary2020.09.24
An Interview with China Discipline Inspection and Supervision News on Questions of Science and Technology
The published version can be found here: http://www.jjjcb.cn/content/2020-09/24/content_95300.htm There are quite a lot of changes in the published version of my wording, but these changes were also reviewed and approved by me, so I suppose this counts as a necessary compromise. Of course I have my own more independent thoughts, but when dealing with official media, I am also willing to seek common ground while reserving differences, and take the opportunity to pass along a couple of things I want to say. It is quite obvious that the interviewer wanted to locate the cause of the “chokepoint” problem in the weakness of “basic science.” I agree with this point, but…
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2020年9月24日
Course Summary for General History of Technology (Spring 2020)

Teaching & Courses2020.08.06
Course Summary for General History of Technology (Spring 2020)
The History of Technology survey course has now run through its third round. The course summaries for the first year and second year were both quite detailed, so students who want an overview of the course can refer to those earlier installments. This year’s summary will be written a bit more briefly. This year, because of the pandemic, the spring semester was taught entirely online. Since it was my first time doing an online format, I didn’t add any new material; instead I just reheated yesterday’s leftovers, selecting relatively mature parts from the previous two years and teaching them again. With the teaching plan adjusted for next semester, I will…
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2020年8月6日
Review of The Meaning of Science

History of Science & Scholarship2018.10.19
Review of The Meaning of Science
This is a commissioned review. My original title was “The Meaning of Philosophy of Science”; when it was published in the China Science Daily, it was changed to “Thinking at the Edge of Science.” I actually didn’t like either title all that much, so I won’t put a title here. In any case, this is just a review of the book. Commissioned reviews always tend to lean a little toward saying nice things; in fact, this book is just so-so, and I’m not particularly recommending it. Still, what I say in the text below about an introduction to philosophy of science positioned as “non-academic” is worth writing about. Shanghai…
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2018年10月19日
Newtonian Mechanics and Modern Currency

History of Science & Scholarship2018.08.20
Newtonian Mechanics and Modern Currency
On July 16, I was invited to give a short talk at an event organized by Shiliu Blockchain. The original title was “Newtonian Mechanics and Modern Currency.” A couple of days ago, they released the video and a written transcript, retitled “The Hidden Connections Between the Scientific Revolution and Modern Currency.” The manuscript was prepared by them based on my lecture; in fact, before the lecture I had already written my own speaking notes, which of course differ from the actual talk. I’m posting them below for reference. The Affinity with Bitcoin Like many people, I saw news about Bitcoin very early on in the tech media, but I never…
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2018年8月20日
What Kind of Assignment Does the Teacher Hope to See? — Reflections on Assigning the “General History of Technology” Assignment

History of Science & Scholarship2018.05.29
What Kind of Assignment Does the Teacher Hope to See? — Reflections on Assigning the “General History of Technology” Assignment
After this article was posted, the blog inexplicably crashed, and had to be restored several times… The course “A General History of Technology” is about to end. Next week I will write a brief summary; for now, let me talk about the homework issue. The assessment format for this course is rather innovative, consisting of 40% midterm assignments + 60% final exam. As for the midterm assignment, I do not want to see students plagiarizing, or cobbling together a lousy paper and handing it in, so I proposed a flexible either-or scheme: students who are interested in, or capable of, writing a paper may still write a short essay of…
history of science scholarship course Scientific Revolution
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2018年5月29日