Name: 中世中国。科学のクラッシュコースの歴史 #8 (Medieval China: Crash Course History of Science #8)
Uploaded: 2021-01-14T07:59:38.000Z
Duration: 12 min 22 s
Description: VoiceTubeの動画で発音を聞きながら英語表現を覚えよう！学べる英語：

Look at this map of China and tell me if,
from what we've learned so far, you can

tell me about the Chinese civilization. Yep,
rivers, big ones… and from them ran the

bureaucracy and technology necessary for controlling
water.

Like Egypt, Sumer, and Mesoamerica, ancient
China represents a hydraulic civilization—one

that maintained its population by diverting
rivers to aid in irrigation—and one that

developed writing thousands of years ago.

In fact, there is an unbroken Chinese literary
and scientific tradition from this time on—not

true of Egypt, Sumer, or Mesoamerica.
And from writing, Chinese scholars naturally

developed a critical invention in knowledge
transmission and state control: you know it,

you probably hate it, the standardized test.
Today, we're going to focus on the time

of the Northern and Southern Song Dynasties,
a time of great technical innovation. But,

before we get to the Song, let's take a
tour through the ages and explore key elements

From the beginning, science in China was a
product of the state. The very first Chinese

dynasty, the Xia, supported astronomical
research to create more accurate calendars.

Later, between 400 and 0 BCE, Chinese scholars
measured the length of the solar year to 365.25

days, predicted eclipses, recorded supernovas
and sunspots, founded a Bureau of Astronomy,

and even determined the 26,000-year cycle
of the precession of equinoxes!

Alongside this research, Chinese culture developed
a grand model of the cosmos: in an infinite,

empty space—enclosed by the great celestial
sphere—celestial bodies float around, directed

by a h“hard wind.”
This mysterious force explained how the stars

and planets moved around.
The earth sits, still, at the center of the

system. On the earth, in a zone between the
four points of the compass, stretches the

Middle Kingdom—China. The cosmos revolved
around not just earth, but China itself.

And in the symbolic center of China stands
the Son of Heaven—the emperor.

The ancient Chinese states, like others governing
large populations, developed complex ideas

about human society.
The most prominent early Chinese thinker was

Confucius, whose philosophy emphasized the
importance of tradition, etiquette, respect

for elders, and for the patriarchy.
Confucianism's focus on an orderly human

world conflicted both with Buddhism's transcendental
orientation toward a reality beyond this one,

and the proto-scientism of Mohism
and Legalism, which were contemporary schools

of thought that privileged rational laws.
Despite competition from these other schools,

Confucianism influenced a lot of later thought.
The official state ideology of the Song was

neo-Confucianism.
China was first unified in 221 BCE, in the

Qin Dynasty. But it was the succeeding
Han Dynasty that instituted an imperial university

and the state examinations, also called the
civil service or imperial examinations.

The state exams, which were open only to men,
were a way of ensuring that the central administration

had enough trained civil servants to oversee
the collection of taxes and building of roads,

maintain a large standing army, and roll out
agricultural reforms.

For the examinees, it also meant a chance
to jump from a lower class to a higher one.

Passage of even the first level of exams led
to exemption from corvée labor,

which was part-time unpaid work for the state.
Science, however, did not figure much into

these state examinations. The exams mostly
tested memorization and recitation from the

important government and Confucian texts.
These shaped the values of the country: examinees

were well-rounded and shared a common culture
focused on law and order.

So while the Chinese state did support research,
especially on topics such as agriculture,

meteorology, and astrology, and while there
was a large state system for educating people

and getting things done, these two threads
never quite entwined as they did at the Museum

of Alexandria or the House of Wisdom in Baghdad.
This brings us to the Song Dynasties.

The Song state produced a lot of infrastructural
and social change across China, starting with

the key to everyone's heart, their stomachs.
During the eighth century, rice cultivation

took off in southern China and the Yangzi
Basin.

Then, in 1012, the Song state introduced new
early-ripening and winter-ripening rice from

the Champa kingdom in what is now Vietnam
that allowed rice to be produced faster with

less water
The Song state reclaimed ricefield plow and

paddle chain water-lifting devices.
These agricultural changes led to the growth

of a leisured middle class, increased trade,
and a growth in manufacturing.

Within a century, urbanization skyrocketed:
urban population reached twenty percent of

the total even as population jumped from fifty
million to one hundred and fifteen million.

And we moderns know what hegemonic powers
want, right?

In medieval China's case, this meant the
highly centralized mandarinate, a term referencing

Mandarin, the dialect of Chinese employed
in the imperial court.

The bureaucrats who oversaw the imperial exams
became known as “mandarins.” The mandarinate

provided social stability and, thanks to the
exams, some insulation against corruption.

Systematic knowledge production in abstract
natural philosophy was never unified. But

Chinese technē was another story.
Whereas scholars had high status, craftspeople

had low status. The state controlled most
industries, and the state was responsible

for programmatic improvements.
The list of Chinese “firsts” or true technical

inventions is so long that it could be its
own episode.

The wheelbarrow, silk production, earthquake
monitors, lacquer, gunpowder, the crossbow,

porcelain, umbrellas, fishing reels, suspension
bridges, and paper money.

As fascinating as this list is, it's of
somewhat limited analytic value, because it

doesn't tell us anything about the social
and political context of technological invention.

What are the characteristics of a given society
that lead to new ideas? Does the state help

or hinder this work? Let's look at some
examples.

Sometimes a practical invention led to new
scientific knowledge after the fact. For example,

the Chinese had tinkered with magnetic compasses
since 300 BCE, but the concept of attraction

to the North Pole was not understood for another
two hundred years.

Other times, cultural desires drive lots of
little iterations that lead to major breakthroughs.

For instance, Chinese artisans made paper
since the second century CE, although it may

have been developed even earlier.
And by 700, the Chinese also made use of a

printing press involving carved wood blocks.
In fact, the first Song emperor ordered the

printing of a compilation of Buddhist scripture
that included 130,000 two-page wood blocks

in 5048 volumes!
But printing really took off in 1040, when

Song artisans introduced the first movable-type
printing presses using wood and, later, ceramic

characters. These helped standardize writing
and unify Song culture.

Finally, sometimes the state would directly
support the creation of new knowledge.

Sponsored by the state, Chinese artisans created
complex astronomical clocks and orreries,

or mechanical models of the heavens.
During the Song Dynasty, civil servant Su

Song refined these techniques to construct
a gigantic machine that would replicate planetary

movements and allow the government to correct
the official calendar.

Alchemy—or a systematic investigation of
“what is stuff?”—also took off with

state support, starting in the Han dynasty.
Thanks to this work, the Chinese had gunpowder

as of the mid-ninth century. But it took until
roughly the twelfth century, under the Song,

to perfect the military application of such
a volatile substance.

But as fascinating as medieval gunsmithing
is, the real achievements of Chinese technology

were in infrastructure.
This includes everything from taking raw ore

and making it into usable iron, to moving
vast quantities of water around.

字幕リスト動画再生

中世中国。科学のクラッシュコースの歴史 #8 (Medieval China: Crash Course History of Science #8)

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