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July 1, 2016

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A curious mind exploring ancient science

A telescope in the hand of a statue of Xu Guangqi attracted the attention of my four-year-old son during a visit to the newly reopened memorial hall honoring the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) scientist. My son peered into the telescope and asked what the bearded grandpa was looking at with it.

This is no ordinary grandpa. Xu is often called the “Francis Bacon of China” and the downtown area of Xujiahui is named after him.

A few steps away in the memorial hall is a black marble stele inscribed with excerpts from an essay written by renowned Chinese scientist Zhu Kezhen in 1933, marking 300 years since Xu’s death.

Zhu wrote, “The telescope was invented in Europe in 1608, and a 1629 memorial implies that Xu already had three telescopes by then. It took barely 20 years for a European invention to be introduced to China and made in China. Considering traffic condition of that era, the speed was amazing.”

Xu is widely regarded as “the first Chinese who opened his eyes to the world.” He was born in Shanghai in 1562, living in an era when interest in practical science was declining in China.

In 1600, on a trip to Beijing, Xu met the Italian Jesuit missionary Matteo Ricci and converted to Catholicism. Ricci was a Renaissance man of his time and shared his knowledge across a spectrum of science and humanities subjects with Xu.

Together, they translated several ancient Western texts, most notably part of Euclid's “Elements,” into Chinese. Xu became a scientist and scholar in his own right. He set up Western astronomy instruments in Beijing, experimented with cultivation of sweet potatoes in Shanghai to feed the starving, helped organize self-sufficient military settlements in Tianjin and authored many books on practical science, from agriculture and hydraulics to the significant “Chongzhen Almanac.”

When he died in 1633 in Beijing, Xu held minister-level positions. He was buried in farmland in what was then western Shanghai. His descendants eventually settled there. The name Xujiahui means “gathering of the Xu family.”

After Shanghai opened its port in 1843, the Jesuits set up headquarters in suburban Qingpu and purchased the land of Xujiahui in 1847 largely due to Xu. It became a hub for the spread of science and culture.

Xujiahui was a cradle of knowledge. It was the home of China’s first library, its first Western-style middle school, its first museum, its first modern publishing house, its first observatory and three of Shanghai’s most important universities.

Today, some historical buildings from the “Xujiahui era” still exist. Among them are the Major Seminary and the Xujiahui Observatory, which are newly renovated and now open to the public. Xujiahui Cathedral is scheduled to reopen in several months after a big-scale restoration.

The Needham question

During a forum to celebrate the reopening of the Xu Guangqi Memorial Hall this spring, Fudan University Professor Li Tiangang discussed the famous “Needham question.”

In the 1940s, Joseph Needham, an eminent British sinologist and scholar on the history of Chinese science, asked why China had been overtaken by the West in science and technology despite the nation’s earlier achievements in both fields.

“Chinese educator Ma Xiangbo asked the same question even earlier, during a speech at Aurora University in 1929,” Li said. “In Ma’s opinion, if the Western research methods Xu learned from Mateo Ricci had been passed on, China could have kept pace with the West when scientific civilization was budding.”

Unfortunately, he explained, Catholic priests and Chinese Confucians came to loggerheads, causing an abrupt end of scientific research in the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911).

Thus, the answer to the Needham question may be laid to a “human mistake,” Li said.

Today, Xu is honored by many place names around Shanghai. Wending Road refers to his posthumous work “Wending Gong.” A residential complex on Nandan Road is called the Guangqi Apartments, and Guangqi Park was created to house Xu’s tomb. A memorial statue sits at the crossroads of Nandan and Caoxi roads.

“Xu believed that China should activate its own ancient traditions of advanced science and technology dating back to the Han (202 BC-AD 220) and Song (960-1279) dynasties, and absorb the accomplishments of the European Renaissance,” Li said, calling it a “double renaissance.”

He noted that Xu even advocated the founding of a China academy of science long before the existing institution was created.

“If China had followed Xu’s advice, its academic history would rival that of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and French Academy,” Li said.

Thinking of my son’s question, it occurred to me that the spirit and scientific curiosity of “Shanghai Xu,” never taken seriously in his lifetime, should rightly be revived today as Shanghai strives to become a global hub for science, technology and innovative thinking.

Maybe what the bearded grandpa was gazing at through a 17th-century telescope was our future in the 21st century.




 

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