East Asian Science, Technology, and Medicine (EASTM - Universität Tübingen)

Brunozzi, Philippe

Reviews                                                                                                 83 
 
Paul U. Unschuld (ed.), Bioethik: Chinesische Texte zu Stammzellenforschung, 
Sterbehilfe und AIDS, Münster: Lit Verlag (Berliner China-Hefte), 2009, 
160 pp. 
Philippe Brunozzi 
[Philippe Brunozzi is a research assistant at the philosophy department of the 
University of Kassel. He received his Ph.D. in Chinese studies from the University 
of Trier. His interests are in Western and Chinese moral and legal philosophy. Of 
special interest is human rights theory, value pluralism, moral conflict and 
practical reason. Contact: brunozzi@uni-kassel.de] 
The volume Bioethik: Chinesische Texte zu Stammzellenforschung, Sterbehilfe 
und AIDS, edited by Prof. Dr. Paul U. Unschuld, gathers translations of 
recent Chinese articles all thematically focussed on bioethics. In doing so 
the editor tries to provide a first insight into current Chinese bioethical 
discourse. 
One of the most salient features of the collection is the wide range of 
topics and problems addressed by the essays. The first two contributions, 
which discuss bioethics from a more comprehensive perspective and thus 
are of an introductory nature, are followed by articles highlighting topics 
such as assisted reproduction, stem cell research, HIV/AIDS, informed 
consent, drug testing and euthanasia. A second notable feature of the 
volume is the particular background of the authors. Mainly active in 
hospitals or as scientists in medical and public health research institutions, 
their training and specific concerns have a considerable bearing on the 
methodology and content of the articles. The authors approach bioethical 
issues primarily from sociological and medico-technical perspectives, 
thereby confining themselves to raising public awareness of particular 
problems and outlining corresponding solutions.  
These two features mean, first of all, that the majority of the articles do 
not pursue a philosophically orientated systematic approach, but remain 
the expression of a distinct form of social engagement. Secondly, and 
related to this point, the particular background of the authors means that 
the normative frameworks which they occasionally invoke as well as their 
foundations are not explicitly spelled out. They are merely hinted at in an 
allusive way. 
Concerning the first consequence, one has to stress that the social 
engagement is mostly addressed in quite general terms. Zhang Beichuan’s 
contribution, for example, constitutes an overview of the relationship 
between homosexuality and HIV/AIDS, in which the proposals for 
solutions do not go very far beyond the highly unspecific advice to enhance 
the development of science and foster compassion. One has reason to 
84                                                                                        EASTM 37 (2013)/2014 
 
doubt that such measures alone will finally remove the taboos and 
exclusions affecting the lives of Chinese homosexuals. Along the same lines, 
Liang Hongfeng depicts in an almost journalistic style the situation of the 
drug-tester in the PRC. Though providing the reader with detailed and 
useful information, the author misses the opportunity to present, besides 
the recommendation to complete and further elaborate drug-testing laws, a 
clearly-defined way out of the existing challenges. Others, fortunately, 
engage in a more concrete solution-oriented debate. Li Shibao, for instance, 
comes up with suggestions regarding the general situation of HIV-infected 
persons, and deploys a catalogue of possible measures to avoid the 
exclusion of the patients, ranging from a “strategy of tolerance” to pre-
vention activities in the prostitution environment. 
With regard to the second consequence, Weng Jianping, for instance, 
refers to principles that might serve as an orientation for future euthanasia 
laws. He mentions in this context the principle of free choice, the idea of a 
transparent procedure everybody has to comply with, as well as the 
allocation of a certain period of consideration for those concerned. How the 
author came up with these principles, however, and how they are related 
to each other remains unclear. Since the foundations of this account are not 
clearly presented, one is tempted to question whether the list of principles 
is complete or in need of improvement.  
Particularly interesting in this context are those essays which consult 
original Chinese sources in dealing with the normative aspects of bioethical 
issues. Wang Yanguang, a philosopher, presents a “strategy of tolerance” 
(p. 99) which should frame the way HIV/AIDS patients are to be treated. 
She distinguishes this ‘strategy’ from the western conception of tolerance, 
which, according her, merely implies a distant bearing of differences. In the 
Chinese understanding, on the contrary, tolerance implies an active 
devotion to the other person. Wang tries to generate from this basis 
different measures to support HIV/AIDS patients in general and drug-
addicted and homosexual AIDS patients in particular. These measures are, 
however, so self-evident that one doubts whether a Chinese version of 
tolerance is able to give rise to any theoretical innovation. The systematic 
role of the Chinese conception of tolerance is thus left in a highly under-
determined shape. 
In approaching public health problems Chen Xiaoyang and Yang 
Tongwei for their part resort to Confucian ethics, and above all to the idea 
of humane government. Although the overall quality of the Chinese public 
health system is improving, the authors diagnose striking short-comings in 
the just distribution of medicare. The conception of humane government 
implies that politically responsible persons intervene in a regulatory 
manner in the existing injustices in order to establish an harmonious 
society. To be effective every humane government has to rely on agents 
Reviews                                                                                                 85 
 
distinguishing themselves by their loyalty, honesty and sense of justice. 
The theoretical explanations of the authors do not, however, go into further 
details. It thus, for instance, remains an open question which conception of 
justice is actually the relevant one for the authors: should the worst-off be 
privileged (maximum) or should the greatest number of patients enjoy the 
maximum benefit (utility)?  
The diversity of topics and their specific perspective on bioethical issues 
of the articles certainly does not allow one to draw a consistent picture of 
current Chinese bioethical discourse. This, however, is not a shortcoming 
of the editor. It rather adds to the charm of this compilation, and mirrors 
the fact that bioethics has to be understood in the Chinese context in a 
fairly broad sense, encompassing very different and not only philosophical 
approaches. In this respect the volume constitutes a very helpful intro-
duction to current Chinese bioethical discourse.  
As mentioned above, some contributions lack a genuinely systematic 
approach, leaving the reader sometimes disappointed. The introduction to 
the volume, which taken as a whole provides a very good first orientation, 
could have pointed out this problem and recommended further primary 
sources that follow a more systematic approach. One such example is Cao 
Gang’s 曹刚 Moral Dilemma and Procedural Justice (Daode wenti yu chengxu 
zhengyi 道德问题与程序正义), which deals in a highly systematic manner 
with moral dilemmas, and discusses amongst other things bioethical issues. 
The Chinese academic world is much more diversified than is sometimes 
assumed, and the levels of quality are far from uniform. This needs to be 
emphasised in order to avoid misunderstandings. 
The translations, on their part, are sound and read well, though one 
might have hoped that the translators would at times have included 
Chinese characters, especially on occasions where it could have been of use 
for the reader familiar with Chinese. 
The volume is all in all a valuable addition to the China-related acade-
mic scene. A continuing updating of articles related to bioethics would be a 
praiseworthy enterprise for the future. The production as well as the 
quality of Chinese academic work is increasing at breath-taking speed. One 
should keep an eye on these developments. 
 


Paul U. Unschuld (ed.), Bioethik: Chinesische Texte zu Stammzellenforschung, Sterbehilfe und AIDS

east.org, admin

 Contents 
 
 
Note from the Editor-in-Chief 9 
 
 
Wang Xiaotong on Right Triangles: Six Problems from 
‘Continuation of Ancient Mathematics’ (Seventh Century AD) 
— TINA SU-LYN LIM AND DONALD B. WAGNER  12 
 
 
Ancient Chinese People’s Knowledge of Macrofungi during the 
Period from 220 to 589  
—LU DI  36 
 
 
Reviews 
 
Roderich Ptak (ed.), Marine Animals in Traditional China—
Meerestiere im traditionellen China 
—reviewed by Hartmut Walravens 69 
 
Annick Horiuchi, Japanese Mathematics in the Edo Period (1600-1868) 
—reviewed by Jiři Hudeček 73 
 
Paul U. Unschuld (ed.), Bioethik: Chinesische Texte zu Stammzellen-
forschung, Sterbehilfe und AIDS 
—reviewed by Philippe Brunozzi 83 
 
Dagmar Schäfer, The Crafting of the 10,000 Things: Knowledge and 
Technology in Seventeenth-century China 
—reviewed by Roslyn Lee Hammers 86 
 
Sigrid Schmalzer, The People’s Peking Man: Popular Science and 
Human Identity in Twentieth Century China 
—reviewed by Iwo Amelung 90 
  
Donald B. Wagner, Science and Civilization in China, Joseph Needham, 
Volume 5, Part 11: Ferrous Metallurgy 
—reviewed by George Bryan Souza 98 
 
Linda Barnes, Needles, Herbs, Gods, and Ghosts: China, Healing and the 
West to 1848 
—reviewed by Carla Nappi 101 
 
Florence С. Hsia, Sojourners in a Strange Land: Jesuits and Their 
Scientific Missions in Late Imperial China 
—reviewed by Zbigniew Wesołowski 104 
 
Roderich Ptak, Birds and Beasts in Chinese Texts and Trade: Lectures 
Related to South China and the Overseas World 
—reviewed by Bin Yang 107 
 
Stephen Skinner (2008). Guide to the Feng Shui Compass: A 
Compendium of Classical Feng Shui. 
—reviewed by Ulrich Theobald 111 
 


Theobald, Ulrich

Reviews                                                                                                 111 
 
Stephen Skinner, Guide to the Feng Shui Compass: A Compendium of Classical 
Feng Shui, Singapore: Golden Hoard, 2008, 448 pp.  
Ulrich Theobald 
[Ulrich Theobald, Ph.D. (2009), is a lecturer for Chinese history and classical 
Chinese at Tübingen University. He has published on military labour, border 
peoples and Chinese empresses. His newest publication is a book on War Finance 
and Logistics in Late Imperial China: A Study of the Second Jinchuan War 
(1771-1776) (Brill, 2013). The traditional literature section of his online 
encyclopaedia chinaknowledge.de comprises bibliographic descriptions of a large 
number of traditional Chinese books on science and technology. Contact: 
ulrich.theobald@uni-tuebingen.de] 
Stephen Skinner is probably the most important Western scholar taking the 
science of Fengshui seriously. In the past few decades he has made 
important contributions to clarifying the rather vague image from which 
Fengshui suffers in the West. He is publisher of virtually a whole library of 
books on many aspects of the field of “geomancy”, as Fengshui is often 
wrongly translated. His book on the Fengshui compass (luopan 羅盤, or, in 
older terms shipan 式盤) is a substantial addition to his oeuvre.  
The Guide to the Feng Shui Compass offers a detailed description of all the 
many rings of luopan compasses, of both the major schools (the San He 三合 
and San Yuan 三元 schools), and in respect to changes over time. Skinner 
undertakes an in-depth study on the relation between these rings and the 
most important phenomenon to which they are linked, namely the 
astronomical constellations. One of Skinner’s important conclusions is that 
the Chinese were able to use a minimal set of symbols and figures (an 
“alphabet” of c. 70 characters, p. 397) to identify very different aspects of 
time and space. These are basically the eight trigrams (ba gua 八卦), the 
sixty-four hexagrams (or a selection of them), the ten Celestial Stems 
(tiangan 天干) and twelve Terrestrial Branches (dizhi 地支), and the five 
Processes or “Elements” (wu xing 五行). With only these five sets the many 
different aspects or objects important in the art of Fengshui can be sited, 
like the Jupiter stations, the provincial divisions, the “monthly generals”, 
the “mini-seasons” (jieqi 節氣, otherwise called solar terms), and the lunar 
mansions.  
The book begins with a definition of the term fengshui 風水 (literally 
“winds and waters”) and the reception of this discipline among modern 
scholars East and West. He then briefly explains a handful of crucial terms 
(like qi 氣, xue 穴, sha 砂, and xiang 向). The term xiang “facing direction of a 
building” is important for the use of the compass. In this context, qi is 
energy (Stephen L. Field, 1998, www.fengshuigate.com, therefore translates 
112                                                                                        EASTM 37 (2013)/2014 
 
fengshui as “qimancy”), sha are scattered mountains in the vicinity, and xue 
nodes of energy. Skinner then describes several types of luopan compasses, 
their rings and groups of rings (“plates”) and their meaning. The chapter 
“Structure of the Luo P’an” is particularly helpful to understand its general 
meaning and application. This is not the case for the very technical 
chapters about the individual San He and San Yuan rings. The large 
amount of rings makes it very difficult for a layperson to grasp their 
purpose, and Skinner only gives very brief explanations about their 
function (for instance, pp. 283, 299, 375). Instead of repeating several times 
that the magnetic pole has changed over the last 1,500 years, or showing 
the same ring once in white here, and again in black there (e.g. pp. 265, 286-
287, 304-306), he might have been better to give an example of the concrete 
application of the luopan to demonstrate how the rings are used in practice. 
Yet, in its present shape, the book seems somewhat heterogeneous, with 
very basic information in the first two hundred pages, written in a smooth 
way that makes the essence of the topic easily understandable, and a highly 
technical part with an endless amount of detail, the meaning of which for 
practical application is not really made clear. On the other hand, the 
intricacy of the rings and their use shows that Fengshui can only be learnt 
in combination with long-term practice, and not from a book. The second 
part of the Guide to the Feng Shui Compass can therefore be seen as a 
handbook for the apprentice of Fengshui, with recommendations where 
and how to purchase appropriate luopan (pp. 90-96).  
In his introduction to the topic Stephen Skinner takes up the cudgels on 
behalf of the scientific character of Fengshui, and defends it, for instance, 
against the éminence grise Joseph Needham who classifies it as a pseudo-
science (1956, Science and Civilisation in China, vol. 2, pp. 346, 359-363). The 
most important argument employed by Skinner to support his “genuine-
science” thesis is the use of the magnetic compass as the central part (the 
“Heaven Pool”, tianchi 天池) of the Fengshui compass. In this context he 
lays stress on the changing nature of the magnetic pole of the earth, which 
caused the creation of a new Heaven Plate after the Song period. Another, 
less explicit, argument is that a lot of rings are used to match up with 
astronomical constellations, which is, without doubt, scientific, in so far as 
stars and their positions in the celestial globe over time are real facts. Yet 
when it comes to the microcosm, and the landscape around a certain 
building, the arguments of hidden dragons and energy congregations (xue) 
are less convincing, not to speak of the relevance of the owner’s birthday 
for the auspiciousness of the site his house is to be built upon. I think that 
the art of Fengshui does not need any such a kind of perfunctory defence 
against “unscholarliness”. Skinner has proven that the Fengshui compass is 
such a complex instrument that it is not justified to brush aside Fengshui as 
pure superstition. It is probably this complexity that makes the scholarly 
Reviews                                                                                                 113 
 
type of Fengshui (as opposite to popular “Fengshui”, with its fancy 
decoration of the building interiors) so attractive. The luopan is so complex 
that any astrolabe seems a mere toy in comparison. Just as the term 
“geomancy” is misleading as a translation of the word fengshui (p. 34), it is 
therefore far from adequate to translate it simply as “astrology”, as Derek 
Walters (2005, The Complete Guide to Chinese Astrology) does. 
Traditional Chinese books on Fengshui are not easily found. The most 
convenient is—apart from the ancient core texts Zhaijing 宅經 and Zangshu 
葬書—probably the (Qinding) Xieji bianfang shu (欽定 )協紀辨方書 
(translated by T. F. Aylward, 2007, The Imperial Guide to Feng Shui and 
Chinese Astrology) from the Qing period, that is included in the imperial 
collectaneum Siku quanshu 四庫全書, and the quotations from the early 
Qing encyclopaedia Gujin tushu jicheng 古今圖書集成. Other collectanea 
like Li Guomu’s 李國木 Dili daquan 地理大全, Cheng Wenke’s 程文格 Kanyu 
wu zhong 堪輿五種 or Li Sizong’s 李思總 Kanyu shiyi zhong shu 堪輿十一種
書 (all from the Ming period) are extremely rare. It would therefore be all 
the more interesting to know how to get access to the crucial texts Luojingjie 
羅經解 by Wu Wanggang 吳望崗, Luojingjie ding 羅經解定 by Hu Guozhen 
胡國楨 or Dili bianzheng shu 地理辨正疏 by Zhan Xinyan 張心言, both 
extensively used by Skinner. One might like to know which editions he 
used (modern reprints from Taiwan, or originals?), and in which 
collections the book might be found. Unfortunately, he does not mention 
anything about such matters, and simply providing the date of publication 
does not help much to localize a text. Contrary to Skinner’s statements in 
the bibliography (p. 435), the Fengshui section in the Siku quanshu is called 
Xiangzhai xiangmu 相宅相墓 “Evaluation of dwellings and gravesites”, and 
not Kanyu 堪輿. Most embarrassing for an educated geographer, as Skinner 
is, is the statement that the capital of the Qin and Zhou dynasties (in this 
order!), Chang’an (the modern Xi’an), was located where the River Luo 
pours its waters into the Yellow River (pp. 221, 223). One might also like to 
see a picture of or, at least get an impression of, the use of what Skinner 
calls the “cross hairs” (p. 91) attached to the outer rim of the luopan plate. 
The author stresses that the Western practitioner cannot avoid learning the 
set of characters used on the luopan, like those of the Stems, Branches and 
tri- or hexagrams, but what is the use of calling them an “alphabet”,22 and 
                                                          
22 The idea to call the Celestial Stems and Terrestrial Branches a kind of alphabet 
is indeed not entirely new. Expert of ancient phonology Edward Pulleyblank 
observed that the twenty-two characters of the Stems and Branches had each a 
distinct pronunciation in Old Chinese (W. A. C. H. Dobson would say Early 
Archaic Chinese), and some of them might have been used as “phonograms” for 
numbers with the same or a similar pronunciation, see Edwin G. Pulleyblank, “The 
Ganzhi as Phonograms and their Application to the Calendar”, in: Early China 16 
(1991), pp. 39-80. 
114                                                                                        EASTM 37 (2013)/2014 
 
further to add, by way of a demonstration of how a “Chinese alphabet” 
looks, a picture of a rubbing of an early Zhou period bronze vessel 
inscription (Zhongfang ding 中方鼎, in Yin-Zhou jinwen jicheng 殷周金文集成, 
no. 2785) that has nothing to do with the subject at all (p. 397)? 
In conclusion, it can be said that the Guide to the Feng Shui Compass is 
another important contribution by Stephen Skinner to the demystification 
of Fengshui. One such example is Skinner’s deconstruction of the myth of 
the “magnetic spinning spoon” (p. 137) on the ancient shi plate that was 
created by Wang Zhenduo in 1948, and ever since has been uncritically 
copied, even by Needham (1962, Science and Civilisation in China, vol. 4, part 
1, p. 266, Plate CXIV). Skinner clarifies needle naming (p. 60), the correct 
use of the 365.25 day-degree lunar mansions ring (p. 320), and even makes 
suggestions how to correct the luopan plates to bring them into line with the 
present state of the magnetic declination (pp. 75-78). Skinner shows that 
Fengshui was—and is still—an integral part and product of the Chinese 
concept of the universe, and has developed an extremely elaborate system 
of all-encompassing correlations. Recent trends and research in the West 
have shown that it is not justified to simply condemn acupuncture or 
homoeopathy as non-scientific practices. Even the great forerunners of 
“scientific enlightenment”, like the physician Robert Fludd or the astro-
nomer Johannes Kepler, dedicated a substantial part of their work to 
“unscholarly” methods of epistemology, and interpreted the world in 
terms of analogy (for instance, the ratios of the planetary orbits and musical 
harmonies) instead of the Aristotelian—and Kantian—singulary causa 
efficiens (Rudolf Haase, 1998, Johannes Keplers Weltharmonik). In this sense, 
Skinner’s book on the luopan has made important contributions to the 
rehabilitation of the art of Fengshui. 
 
 
 


Stephen Skinner, Guide to the Feng Shui Compass: A Compendium of Classical Feng Shui

Souza, George Bryan

98                                                                                        EASTM 37 (2013)/2014 
 
Donald B. Wagner, Ferrous Metallurgy, Volume 5, Part 11 of Joseph 
Needham’s Science and Civilisation in China, Cambridge: Cambridge 
University Press, 2008, 512 pp. 
George Bryan Souza 
[George Bryan Souza is an (Adjunct) Associate Professor of History at the 
University of Texas, San Antonio. He was recently a Mercator Guest Professor at 
Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen, Germany, and is the General Editor of 
Brill’s European Expansion and Indigenous Response series. He received his 
Ph.D. from Cambridge University in 1981 and is the author of The Survival of 
Empire: Portuguese Trade and Society in China and the South China Sea, c. 
1630-1754 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984 and 2004). A selection 
of his articles will be published shortly by Ashgate/Varorium, entitled From Local 
to Global: Portuguese and Other Merchants, Commodities, and Commerce 
in Asia, c. 1600 to c. 1850 and a collaborative work with Jeffrey S. Turley, The 
Commentaries of D. García Silva y Figueroa is also scheduled to be published 
by the Hakluyt Society. Contact: georgebryansouza@gmail.com] 
Tracing the development of the iron and steel industry in China from 
earliest times to the mid-twentieth century, this book has been written by a 
scholar and researcher at the Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, University 
of Copenhagen, who is well known for his publications dealing with 
Chinese science, technology, history, archaeology, and language. 
Covering a wide range of economic, geographic, and technical contexts 
that deal comprehensively with China’s ferrous metallurgical past, this is a 
singular and sleek volume that is a welcome addition to the remarkable 
series pioneered by Joseph Needham on science and civilization in China. 
This volume, as suggested by Christopher Cullen (the series’ present 
editor and director of the Needham Research Institute), has been ably 
written by a recognized authority in the field “at a time when the question 
why one should study the technical history of China seems a clear failure 
to appreciate the obvious.” (p. xxviii) 
The author has constructed and presented his arguments in ten chapters. 
The first two provide an introduction and introductory orientation to the 
topic; the subsequent five follow and elucidate the developments and 
accomplishments of the iron and steel industry in China chronologically 
and dynastically from its earliest use through the Han, Tang, Song, and 
Ming periods; the penultimate chapter discusses China’s modern contribu-
tions to siderurgical technology; and the final one offers an epilogue. 
Despite the occasional appearance of detailed summaries of archaeological 
research findings, his arguments and language are clear and precise and 
Reviews                                                                                                 99 
 
the volume contains numerous figures, diagrams and sidebars, which 
enhance its readability and provide additional clarity for the non-specialist 
reader.  
Wagner informs us that iron ore and production was known as early as 
3000 BC, but, since ferrous metallurgical properties and how to control 
them had to be developed by artisans, there was a time delay in iron 
becoming an important metal. The Hittites, who had established them-
selves in eastern Turkey, were among the early exploiters of iron and were 
working the metal by eighteenth century BC. Diffusion of the use of iron 
and the process of making iron began about 1200 BC and it spread widely 
east and west. By the eighth century BC, if not before, it was established in 
northwest China. The “direct method” (the use of ore directly to produce 
solid sponge iron that was subsequently worked to extrude impurities and 
wrought into useful shapes of iron) was common at this point in both East 
and West. It remained the starting point for iron production in the West 
until the fourteenth century. Things were dramatically different in China: 
first, the Chinese learned to melt and pour cast iron into useful shapes by 
the fifth century BC and malleable cast iron was in use in China by the 
third century BC, almost two millennia before Europeans began to cast 
rudimentary cannon balls in the seventeenth century. Furthermore, during 
this period, cast iron implements became widely available in China in 
contrast with Europe where the choice in farm implements was between 
wood and scarce and expensive wrought iron. Second, the Chinese 
produced wrought iron from molten cast iron by removing carbon from 
iron by the first century BC—a process that was by no means simple, since 
furnaces were not available to reach the melting point of pure iron. Chapter 
8 deals with developments in iron making technology in the late Ming 
periods and, based on a treatise written in 1637 by Song Yingxing that 
described two contemporaneous Chinese steelmaking processes: “co-
fusion” (where carbon from molten cast iron is caused to diffuse into 
wrought iron) and “puddling” (where carbon is removed from molten cast 
iron by oxidation causing the iron, at the temperatures involved, to become 
semi-solid). This latter process was the one of choice for making steel in the 
West from the time of its invention by Cort in 1784 to its radical 
improvement by Hall in 1830, until both were eventually and subsequently 
superseded by the Bessemer and Siemens processes. The penultimate 
chapter deals with modern Chinese contributions to global siderurgical 
metallurgy, which offers incisive examinations concerning blast furnaces or 
“indirect smelting” (the production of cast iron in a blast furnace, which is 
decarburized to wrought iron by fining) and discussions about the 
Bessemer and Höganäs processes and whether Chinese ferrous technology 
100                                                                                        EASTM 37 (2013)/2014 
 
may have had earlier connections or not with similar metallurgical 
technological developments in Europe. 
I only have two minor reservations about this volume. The first is that I 
detect or opine that to insure the high-level and outstanding quality of the 
individual volumes in and pending production in the Science and 
Civilisation in China series’ franchise, manuscripts by outstanding authori-
tative author’s, as in this case, appear to face unusually rigorous organiza-
tional and formatting constraints. Obviously, this insures the high-standard 
and quality of an individual volume to the collective work. But, it appears 
to limit an individual author’s creative presentation of results. The second 
reservation is specific to this volume. I observe that either by the choice of 
the author or editor, Chapter 2 (Introductory orientations: the traditional 
Chinese iron industry in recent centuries) advances—well beyond mere 
synthesis—all of the major points that are to be found in the next eight 
chronologically organized chapters. I found that this produced a somewhat 
stilted outcome in reading and following the arguments found in this 
admirable work. When reading a chapter after Chapter 2, I found myself 
being forced to return to the section in that chapter that synthesized a 
process or technology that was being referred to in the chapter that I was 
reading. 
Placing these minor reservations aside, Donald Wagner’s Ferrous 
Metallurgy is a highly creditworthy addition to the remarkable Science and 
Civilisation in China series and it is a comprehensive and scholarly treatise 
on Chinese ferrous metallurgy that should be read and consulted by both 
scholars and general readers. 
 
 
 


Donald B. Wagner, Ferrous Metallurgy, Volume 5, Part 11 of Joseph Needham’s Science and Civilisation in China

Vogel, Hans-Ulrich

Note of the Editor-in-Chief

Amelung, Iwo

Sigrid Schmalzer, The People’s Peking Man: Popular Science and Human Identity in Twentieth Century China

Hudeček, Jiří

Annick Horiuchi, Japanese Mathematics in the Edo Period (1600-1868)

Walravens, Hartmut

Reviews                                                                                                                  69 
 
REVIEWS 
 
Roderich Ptak (ed.), Marine Animals in Traditional China—Meerestiere im 
traditionellen China, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz (Maritime Asia; 21), 2011, 
154 pp. 
Hartmut Walravens 
[Hartmut Walravens was one of the directors of the Berlin State Library, until his 
retirement in 2009. He took his Ph.D. at Cologne University in 1970. He has 
published widely in the fields of Chinese, Japanese, and Manchu Studies. He is 
currently working on the history of citrus fruits as well as the lychee in China. 
Contact: hwalravens@gmx.net] 
The present volume is a kind of follow-up to the proceedings of a 2008 
München symposium that dealt with the cultural history of animals in 
traditional China, published in 2009 under the title of Tiere im alten China. 
Studien zur Kulturgeschichte. The range of topics is now narrower, but again 
the basis of the papers is the description of the respective animals in 
traditional Chinese literature. Almost needless to say the cultural aspect is 
again predominant, even if other facets are not neglected. Usually the 
Chinese texts do not allow the identification of individual species, but more 
often than not are pointers to genera, or even families. 
The editor gives a summary of the five papers presented in his intro-
duction. Then follow plates, several in full colour, the papers themselves 
with Chinese characters included, and last but not least an index (pp. 145-
154!), a feature which has become less common nowadays with volumes of 
proceedings and therefore deserves special mention and praise. 
The first paper, by Ralph Kauz and Beate Mittmann, is “Zum 
Pfeilschwanzkrebs (Tachypleus tridentatus) in der chinesischen Literatur, 
Medizin und Küche“. The horseshoe crab, sometimes called a living fossil 
as it has not changed much since the Jurassic period (as can be seen from a 
find in Solnhofen), belongs not to the Crustacea, as the English name might 
indicate, but to the Chelicerata, and is thus related to spiders. They live in 
shallow ocean waters, as scavengers. Their blue blood reacts to bacteria or 
their endotoxines by immediate coagulation, and this led to the 
development of the limulus test to check drugs for contaminations. So far 
the horseshoe crab has received little attention from the point of view of 
cultural history. It is briefly treated in Biology of the Horseshoe Crab, ed. by 
Sekiguchi Koichi (Tokyo: Science House 1988, 1-9); its first extant 
description seems to be found in the well-known Chinese materia medica 
Jingshi zhenglei Daguan bencao 經史證類大觀本草 of 1108. In Japan Naka-
70                                                                                        EASTM 37 (2013)/2014 
 
mura Tekisai (1666) described and illustrated the animal in his Kimmô zui 
訓蒙圖彙 , an illustration which Engelbert Kaempfer copied into his 
Geschichte und Beschreibung von Japan (Lemgo 1777–79, 157–158, pl. 13, fig. 8). 
The first mention of the horseshoe crab seems to be in Liu Kui’s 劉逵 notes 
on Zuo Si’s 左思 (c. 250-c. 305 AD) Wudu fu 吳都賦 (Rhapsody on the 
capital of Wu).  
As the Chinese name hou 鱟 is written with the fish radical, people 
sometimes believed the animal to be a kind of fish, which led to a rather 
fanciful illustration in the “encyclopedia” (leishu) Sancai tuhui 三才圖會 of 
1608. The most common literary topos connected with the horseshoe crab is 
derived from the fact that during the mating season the male connects with 
the female often for a long time, and they move in tandem. Thus hou has 
become a synonym for lasting marriages. 
As to the medical uses of the horseshoe crab, the authors give the text 
and a translation of Li Shizhen’s description in his Bencao gangmu 本草綱目. 
The culinary value of the animal is limited. As it has little meat it is mainly 
eaten by poor people, or used as a seasoning paste. 
The second paper, by Chiara Bocci, is “On the Hetun (Pufferfish) in 
Ancient China: Too Delicious for Words” (pp. 21-61). This fish, in the West 
better known under its Japanese name fugu, contains a very strong poison 
(tetrodotoxin, much more effective than potassium cyanide) for which no 
antidote is known so far. The author aptly uses a motto by the Song poet 
Mei Yaochen 梅堯臣 (1002-1060): “... But in this fish, though so delicious, 
unlimited danger lies concealed.” Some European travellers, like Pehr 
Osbeck, were delighted to see the fish (German ed. Rostock 1765, 294–295): 
“Kai-po-y ist einer der schönsten Fische, die ich je gesehen habe, aber so 
giftig, daß ein Mensch, der davon isset, in 2 Stunden des Todes seyn kann 
[...].” The author deals with the popularity of the fish as luxury food, the 
mortality rate of the customers, and describes the fish and explains the 
modern taxonomy. Not all puffers are toxic, and were therefore banned in 
China for consumption. In the meantime several species are farmed, but 
apparently these are not toxic, probably owing to the different diet. The 
ancient nomenclature of the hetun 河豚 (literally “river pig”) is confusing 
and leads to many questions. Apparently the earliest mention of the hetun, 
under the name of houtai 鯸鮐, is in the already cited notes by Liu Kui on 
the Wudu fu. It seems to be mentioned in quite a number of further sources, 
e.g. in Wang Chong’s 王充 works, where Alfred Forke was apparently 
misled in his translation (he translated dolphin, also called haitun 海豚). A 
very interesting section is on the pufferfish in Song poetry. Mei Yaochen 
and his circle (including Ouyang Xiu 歐陽修) were especially interested in 
the puffer, but also Fan Chengda 范成大 (1126-1193) contributed a “Lament 
Reviews                                                                                                 71 
 
on the pufferfish” (hetun tan 河豚歎). In later times we find Bada Shanren 
八大山人 (1626–1705) and Lu Xun 魯迅 among the aficionados. By the way, 
the author speaks of the alleged delicious taste of the fish, so we are left in 
the dark as to whether a scientifically trained palate would confirm the 
gourmets’ statement. 
This paper is followed by Marc Nürnberger’s “Vom Krähenmeuchler und 
anderen Coleoidea: Erwähnungen von Tintenfischen in alten chinesischen 
Texten (Han bis Ming)” (pp. 63-92). The author starts, after some 
introductory musings based on Wang Yi’s 王逸 comparison of a hedgehog 
and a squid, with the systematics and taxonomy of squids of which still a 
large number of genera and species are extant, even if in no way 
comparable to the about 10,000 fossil species. There are plenty of older 
names for these animals, like wuzei 烏賊, zhangju 章舉 and rouyu 柔魚; also 
the general term moyu 墨魚 exists. Some names appear as variants (differ-
ent radicals to a character), and, as the author translates the historical and 
literary explanations, it seems that people tried to make some sense of the 
names and offered their own stories. The Shuowen jiezi 說文解字 gives wuzei 
鰞鰂 as the name of a “fish” that experienced a slight popular transfor-
mation and became wuzei, “crow’s assassin”, confirmed by a suitable 
anecdote, and at any rate an imaginative explanation. Descriptions and 
anecdotes by Lin Rirui 林日瑞 (1586-1643), Feng Shike 馮時可 (jinshi 1571), 
Duan Chenshi 段成式 (d. 863) are given. Squid was not popular in Chinese 
materia medica, therefore there is not much information in Li Shizhen’s 
Bencao gangmu. Squid was mainly eaten, and some authors waxed lyrical 
about it, like Mei Yaochen, while others, e.g. Han Yu 韓愈 exiled to the 
South, found it difficult to do justice to this delicacy. The author translates 
and discusses several poems in honour of the wuze, e.g. by Yue Ke 岳珂 
(1183-1234), grandson of the famous general Yue Fei 岳飛 and Jiang Teli 姜
特立 (twelfth century). The squid also became a literary topos. Its method of 
hiding often using its ink and then preying on harmless other animals 
made it a simile for persons insidiously attacking the unaware. On the 
other hand, it also showed that exactly by hiding (i.e. by ejecting its ink) it 
attracted the attention of fishermen, and was thus easily detected and 
caught. The paper covers a wide range of literary and cultural details and 
makes good reading. 
“Whales in Ancient China”, by James M. Hargett (pp. 93-119), has a 
mainly literary focus. The paper faces a special challenge: In historical 
times the Chinese hardly ever had an opportunity to see whales; whales 
were not hunted, or eaten and while a few fishermen especially on the 
South China coast may have been familiar with whales they were not the 
people to write about them. Nevertheless jing 鯨 or simply dayu 大魚 
72                                                                                        EASTM 37 (2013)/2014 
 
occurs in traditional texts, but these terms may refer to any sea monster, or 
big fish. The author examines the etymology of jing and finds that the 
character is not listed in the authoritative Shuowen jiezi (where another 
word is given for “big fish”); he notices a negative connotation for the 
word owing to the fact that already in the Zuo zhuan 左轉 it is used in a 
figurative sense, e.g. as “great criminals”, “unprincipled people” who, as 
sea monsters would swallow whole boats, might “swallow” the whole 
country. Dead whales which were occasionally washed ashore were con-
sidered bad omina. There has been some speculation about a stone whale 
which the First Emperor of China put in his palace lake. Was it to subdue 
and control the marine forces? The author devotes his attention also to 
huge waves, “whale waves”, and to ambergris, “dragon spittle” (which 
was not readily recognized as the product of the sperm whale). It was 
apparently due to the Arabs that the Chinese noticed it. 
The last paper, by Roderich Ptak, “Riesenmuscheln: Notizen zur 
Bezeichnung chequ” (pp. 121-144) deals with giant clams. Early references, 
usually dabei 大貝 and/or chequ 硨磲, leave us in the dark as to the exact 
meaning—is it a stone (like jade), is it something from the ocean, or 
perhaps from Persia, Byzantium, or just the South China Sea. It must have 
designated something precious, anyhow. Only in Song sources and later 
are chequ defined as giant clams, and thus the later literature like the Bencao 
gangmu follows suit. While it is difficult, not to say impossible, to 
distinguish between species, the largest clam, Tridacna gigas is the 
exception—because of its large size it cannot be mistaken. 
This volume was a pleasure to review—very interesting subject matter, 
careful work, good results and a nicely produced volume (as mentioned, 
with index!). It is rare that the border zone of sinology and biology is so 
well covered. In contrast, the reviewer remembers a recent publication with 
the promising subject of British naturalists in China in the nineteenth 
century: It turned out that a large part of the people treated were not 
British at all, that many of the quotes of the heroes’ activities were 
(understandably) just about bad roads, and the tribulations of the travel, 
and the difficulty of scientific work, and there were few pages without the 
term “imperialism” flashing. It remained without a convincing explanation 
why all these (amateur) scientists represented imperialism after it was 
confirmed that almost hundred per cent of them rode their hobby horses—
natural history research was not their professional mission. The scholarly 
result of that formidable study was meagre. 
 


Roderich Ptak (ed.), Marine Animals in Traditional China—Meerestiere im traditionellen China

Hammers, Roslyn Lee

86                                                                                        EASTM 37 (2013)/2014 
 
Dagmar Schäfer, The Crafting of the 10,000 Things: Knowledge and Technology 
in Seventeenth-century China, Chicago, London: The University of 
Chicago Press, 2011, 352 pp.  
Roslyn Lee Hammers 
[Roslyn Lee Hammers is an Associate Professor in the Fine Arts Department at the 
University of Hong Kong. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Michigan 
in 2002, and her area of research includes the depiction of labor and technology in 
the visual culture of China. In 2011 her book entitled Pictures of Tilling and 
Weaving: Art, Labor, and Technology in Song and Yuan China was 
published. Currently she is working on a manuscript that addresses Qing-era 
“Pictures of Procedures,” imagery that sequentially frames the representations of 
technology in the production of various commodities. Contact: rhammers@hku.hk] 
On page 131 of the book The Crafting of the 10,000 things: Knowledge and 
Technology in Seventeenth-century China, the author Dagmar Schäfer has 
asserted, “Knowledge contents are only one topic of discussion in the 
Chinese history of scientific and technological knowledge. A systematic 
approach addressing the changing rhetoric of knowledge-making in 
Chinese literature on subjects such as nature and material inventiveness, 
practices of observation and experiment is still in the nascent stage.” In this 
claim, I believe, Schäfer lays bare one of the goals of her scholarship. She 
wishes nothing less than to sweep away the older approaches to the history 
of science which (with noteworthy exceptions) inevitably affirm the 
primacy of Enlightenment-based histories of modern science that are 
buttressed by claims to absolute truth. In this publication Schäfer has 
established a more nuanced and sensitive method to discuss the intellectual 
environment central to the formation of knowledge, the strategies 
deployed by various agents through which it is sustained, to then assess 
how and when it does or does not become canonized.  
Her book focuses on the whole of the extant corpus of the late Ming 
dynasty scientist, Song Yingxing (1587-1666?), combining an analysis of 
texts that Schäfer has convincingly and deftly unified for the first time in 
scholarship. Most students and scholars of the history of Chinese science 
and technology are aware of Song’s work titled Tian Gong Kai Wu, which in 
general has been translated as The Exploitation of the Works of Nature. Schäfer 
immediately sets out to reject such an unsatisfactorily static rendering of 
dynamic paradigm for the creation and revelation of existence that Song 
sought to articulate. Thus she translates the treatise as The Works of Heaven 
and the Inception of Things, underscoring the transformative process that 
things undergo in their very formation. The shift in the meaning between 
the two translations likewise serves to demonstrate Schäfer’s thesis that 
Reviews                                                                                                 87 
 
processes of inception and their interconnectivity within what members of 
societies construe as reality is a theme consistent in other writings of Song. 
Thus Schäfer investigates a larger scope of his writing with special 
emphasis on Lun Qi (On Qi), a discussion of the “reverberations” of qi in its 
manifestations of sound, particles, and primordial element among others. 
Schäfer’s book serves as an invaluable and articulate example of 
scholarship that challenges established notions of science and contributes 
to the advance of the knowledge production in the history of Chinese. It is 
inevitable (or perhaps predictable) that at least for now and in the near 
future, new publications on the history of science in China evoke and 
respond to the expansive accomplishments of Joseph Needham and his 
collaborators in their monumental work Science and Civilisation in China. As 
other scholars have observed, Needham’s project was motivated by a 
desire to understand why China, given its rich legacy of the creation of 
seemingly “modern” technological phenomena (papermaking, printing, 
gun powder, compass and so on), failed to establish modern science until 
late in its history. As we gain distance from Needham’s own historical 
context, we can position his premise as informed by the impact of the Cold 
War and its vying claims over varying ideologically charged models of 
modernity (in both science and culture). While Schäfer wisely does not 
directly address this context, she nonetheless pushes back from imposing 
modern constructions of science onto Song’s texts and instead she recreates 
Song’s historical environment in which he invented a new location or 
system for scientific inquiry. Song and his intellectual approach is thus 
illuminated as an alternative arena for the inscription of scientific 
knowledge in seventeenth-century China. While Song’s writings and 
indeed his era are not easily accommodated in definitions (or teleological 
narratives) of the development of “modern” scientific thought and 
technology, Schäfer draws him into the traditional lineage of scientific 
thinkers by pointing out that his modes of thinking, the strategies he uses 
to understand things share parallels with Kepler, Galileo, and Descartes 
albeit shaped by different cultural perceptions (92). Schäfer successfully 
demonstrates how Song explicated technology in terms of his era in order 
to recover the complexities of his thinking without exiling him to the 
periphery of scientific history.  
Schäfer’s research is to be commended for its broad exploration into the 
ideas and intellectual climate of Song Yingxing. As students of Chinese 
history are aware, the occupations of Chinese society historically were 
tidily divided into four large groups: the officials/scholars, the farmers, the 
artisans, and the merchants. In traditional histories of the Ming, we hear 
about the officials, the scholars and even the merchants, who in spite of 
their lowly standing parlayed their finances to establish claims to elite 
88                                                                                        EASTM 37 (2013)/2014 
 
status via officialdom or cultural patronage. The farmers toil in the 
background of these histories, either ploughing ceaselessly under the best 
of conditions or rising up in rebellion during the worst. The artisan and his 
or her relationship to those scholars or officials who wrote on crafts or 
technology in the Ming are generally absent. Schäfer calls attention to this 
lacuna and casts light on how the elite who may or may not have written 
about the labours of the artisans were unable to appreciate their 
technological skills or specialized knowledge. Schäfer raises such questions 
as “Who were the artisans? How did they produce the ten thousand 
things?” and concedes that at present we only know enough to answer 
such inquiries with rough sketches. These are fascinating issues, and 
Schäfer’s scholarship will inspire further research.  
Not only content to consider Song Yingxing’s textual record alone, 
Schäfer also investigates the implications of the imagery or tu that was 
included in The Works of Heaven and the Inception of Things. Her discussion 
of the content of the images associated with the production of silk fabric is 
highly insightful, drawing upon classical theories of government as it 
intersects with associations of the proper functions of looms and the 
production of fabric. Schäfer through considered interpretations enlivens 
the content of the technological-informed images and thankfully does not 
interrogate them for what many have described as their lack of accuracy. 
She acknowledges that tensions may exist between the images and text 
given our expectations for some cohesion or correspondence that arise 
from our post-Ming perspective (149). Such a sensible re-evaluation of the 
importance of accuracy in representation is most welcomed by this 
reviewer.  
Schäfer’s handling of the tu as a category of imagery incorporates earlier 
research by Francesca Bray and others. The term tu in conjunction with 
technological content may be defined as a blue print or “template for 
action” (142). This notion has merit, but tu without overt technological or 
scientific material historically in China has had a much broader domain 
and may be best translated simply as “image.” For this reviewer it is 
unclear if the category of tu with technological information is a heuristic 
device, or if historians of science and technology are attempting to define 
the parameters of technologically-informed tu as a period term. If the latter 
is the case, then what constitutes technological information? The term tu 
has been by applied by its contemporaries to paintings of views of the 
Qing-era ‘Yuanming Yuan’ or Garden of Perfect Brightness, Song-era 
illustrations of the Classic of Filial Piety, and even to a Song-handscroll of 
the famous poet Tao Yuanming’s (365-427) poem Returning Home. In these 
instances—and this is not to suggest all—tus are often accompanied by text 
that the images may represent with varying degrees of fidelity to depicting 
Reviews                                                                                                 89 
 
the contents of their verse. This is to say a tu can be a highly imaginative 
interpretation of its accompanying text. It may or may not have 
technological information. In many cases the tu does not. Nonetheless if we 
accept images with scientific or technological content as tus, as templates 
for action, does this mean illustrations or diagrams that tell consumers how 
to connect computers to televisions also constitute tu? Are these kinds of 
technological images, as tu, simply visually-based instructions, imagery 
designed to reveal to us what we need to see and then do if we want the 
computer, society, or the government to function properly? 
My concerns about the nature of tus aside, Schäfer’s scholarship is 
outstanding; her writing is lucid. She has a knack for telling stories and for 
explaining with clarity complex ontological and epistemological concepts 
that cross cultures. It seems a shame and a disservice to her research that 
primary Chinese quotes were not reproduced in her publication. I realize 
this may be a limitation imposed upon by the press, but given Schäfer’s 
innovative approach to the materials, it would have very satisfying to have 
the Chinese text along with her translations. Nevertheless, Schäfer’s 
research opens up many avenues for further study, and will serve as the 
methodological model for scholars who investigate histories of science in 
all regions, especially if they, like Schäfer, are attuned to the 
complementary interactions among science and culture and the resulting 
complexities that collectively consolidate the production of knowledge. 
 


Dagmar Schäfer, The Crafting of the 10,000 Things: Knowledge and Technology in Seventeenth-century China

 East Asian 
Science, Technology, 
and Medicine 
 
Number 37 (2013) 
2014 
 
A journal dedicated to the study of traditional and modern 
East Asian science, technology, and medicine. 
 
Editor-in-Chief 
Hans Ulrich Vogel 
Asien-Orient-Institut 
Abteilung für Sinologie und Koreanistik 
Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen 
eastm@uni-tuebingen.de 
 
 
Editors 
Christine Moll-Murata                                                       Ulrich Theobald 
Fakultät für                                                                   Abteilung für 
Ostasienwissenschaften                                             Sinologie und Koreanistik                                   
Ruhr-Universität Bochum                      Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen                 
                                                                    
                                                        
Managing and Production Editor 
Ailika Schinköthe 
Abteilung für Sinologie und Koreanistik, Tübingen 
 
 
English Language Editor: 
John P. C. Moffett, Needham Research Institute, Cambridge (UK) 
 
Local Advisory Board: 
Klaus J. Antoni, Abteilung für Japanologie, Tübingen 
Viktoria Eschbach-Szabo, Abteilung für Japanologie, Tübingen 
You Jae Lee, Abteilung für Sinologie und Koreanistik, Tübingen 
Robert Horres, Abteilung für Japanologie, Tübingen 
Achim Mittag, Abteilung für Sinologie und Koreanistik, Tübingen 
INTERNATIONAL EDITORIAL COMMITTEE 
Iwo Amelung, Sinologie, Institut für Orientalische und Ostasiatische Philologien, Goethe 
Universität Frankfurt am Main 
Bridie J. Andrews, Department of History, Bentley College 
Francesca Bray, Department of Social Anthropology, University of Edinburgh 
Chang Chia-Feng, Department of History, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan  
Jiang-Ping Jeff Chen, Department of Mathematics and Statistics, St. Cloud State 
University, St. Cloud, Minnesota 
Christopher Cullen, Needham Research Institute and Darwin College,Cambridge 
Vera Dorofeeva-Lichtmann, Centre Chine-Corée, CNRS-EHESS, Paris 
Jacob Eyferth, Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations, University of 
Chicago 
Fan Fa-ti, Department of History, State University of New York, Binghamton, New York 
Marta E. Hanson, Department of the History of Medicine, Johns Hopkins University, 
Baltimore, Maryland  
Hashimoto Keizō, Faculty of Sociology, Kansai University, Osaka 
Catherine Jami, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Paris 
Yung Sik Kim, Program in History and Philosophy of Science, Seoul National University 
Angela Ki Che Leung, Hong Kong Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences, 
University of Hong Kong 
Liu Dun, Institute for the History of Natural Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 
Beijing 
Morris Low, Languages and Comparative Cultural Studies, University of Queensland, 
Australia 
Georges Métailié, Centre Alexandre Koyré, CNRS-EHESS-MNHN, Paris 
Lisa Raphals, Chinese and Comparative Literature, University of California, Riverside 
Dagmar Schäfer, Dept. III Artefacts, Knowledge and Action, Max Planck Institute for the 
History of Science, Berlin, Germany  
Shi Yunli, Department of the History of Science and Scientific Archaeology, University of 
Science and Technology of China, Hefei 
Nathan Sivin, Department of the History and Sociology of Science, University of 
Pennsylvania, Philadelphia 
C. Michele Thompson, Department of History, Southern Connecticut State University, 
New Haven 
Tsukahara Togo, History and Philosophy of Science, Technology and Medicine, Kobe 
University 
Paul U. Unschuld, Horst-Götz-Stiftungsinstitut für Theorie, Geschichte und Ethik 
Chinesischer Lebenswissenschaften, Charité, Berlin 
Donald B. Wagner, Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, University of Copenhagen 
Zhang Baichun, Institute for the History of Natural Sciences, Chinese Academy of 
Sciences, Beijing 
THE SCOPE OF EASTM 
Copyright  2014. EASTM (formerly Chinese Science) is published by the 
International Society for the History of East Asian Science, Technology, and 
Medicine (ISHEASTM). Numbers 1-10 (1975-1992) were published irregularly 
under the editorship of Nathan Sivin (University of Pennsylvania). Numbers 11-15 
(1993-1998) were issued annually at the University of California, Los Angeles, by 
Benjamin A. Elman. Beginning with Number 16 (1999), the name of the journal 
changed to East Asian Science, Technology, and Medicine and it is published by Hans 
Ulrich Vogel at the University of Tübingen, Germany. The publication of this 
periodical has been supported by a grant from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft 
(DFG) since 1999. In 2010 Mark Elvin (Oxford) and Robert Horres (Tübingen) joined 
as co-editors. One year later, in 2011, Christine Moll-Murata (Bochum) replaced 
Robert Horres as co-editor, while in 2013 Ulrich Theobald (Tübingen) took over 
Mark Elvin’s editorial function. 
This journal includes studies on the science, technology, and medicine of traditional 
and contemporary East Asia. Any study based on original research using Chinese, 
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The publication, since the fifties, of Joseph Needham’s (1900-1995) monumental 
work, Science and Civilisation in China, has been followed by a rapid development of 
research on the history of science, technology, and medicine in China, as well as in 
civilisations upon which Chinese culture exerted an important influence, such as 
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birthday, participants agreed to found the International Society for the History of 
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