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information and incorporates a staggering quantity of newly discovered material: I am referring, of course, to Joseph Needham's Science and Ciuilisation in China. The first volume was publishe d in ry54 and by now there are about fifteen volumes and parts of volumes, separately bound. Much of the work of Needham and his collaborators is concerned with what is now called technology for it is in this area that the Chinese especially excelled. Among its topics I mention astronomical instruments, cartograph¡ mechanical, civil and nautical engineering, paper and printing, textiles, metallurgy and ceramics. But there is also a great deal that would now be regarded as pure science: mathematics, astronomy, geology, physics, botan¡ and zoology. Intermediate topics range from medicine to alchem¡ including disciplines for which English lacks the appropriate terms unless we create neologisms such as "acupuncture". In the short time at my disposal I cannot give you much of an idea of this enormous wealth of material. I recommend that you take a look or another look at some of these volumes. \Øhat I can do is quote what eminent historians of science have had to say about them - for example, D.J.de Solla Price lr97rt r7-r9): In my estimation, the essential contribution made thus far by six volumes of Science and Ciuilisation in China lies in the systematization and presentation in English translation or summary of the substantive content of the otherwise ill-digested bulk of Chinese scientific and technical literature. Here we have the raw material on which generations of later scholarship can be founded. Here at last we have some map to tell us where to look, and some indication at least of what we shall find. (...) Even a casual browsing through any single
tome is enough to break the stereotype that most lØesterners will have formed about Chinese science and technology. It is not â matter of peasantfarmer and mandarin-scholar. -What emerges is certainly a culture with technicalities just as complex
as
our own, science just
as
deep, philosophy and
experience in manipulating and transforming nature just as indissolubly
bound together. Often, much the same sequence is followed in the discoveries
from both traditions; sometimes one leads, sometimes the other. There can no doubt that Chinese science and technology have been just as inventive, just
as good,
just
as bad, as the science
and technology ofthe ancient and
medieval tVest.
FABULOUS
NO LONGER
r7
be