Our vocabulary for describing what is great has been so impoverished by the misuse of Hollywood publicists (Stupendous!!! Colossal!!!) that it is hard to find suitable words to describe the real thing. And Joseph Needham is the real thing: he is one of the great intellects of our time. Merely to call him a polymath gives no idea of his achievement: a fellow scholar at Cambridge University, a man who is not given to making rash judgments and who is well‐versed in the British art of understatement, recently commented to me that you have to go back to Leonardo before you can find anyone with such a grasp of the whole of human knowledge.
History, philosophy, religion, mathematics, astronomy, geography, geology, seismology, physics, mechanical and civil engineering, chemistry and chemical technology, biology, medicine, sociology, economics.... just to list the topics covered in his massive “Science and Civilisation in China” would take more than the space of this article (the summary of contents in the publisher's prospectus covers more than 12 closely printed pages.) And, at the same time as dealing with China, throughout the work Needham compares and contrasts with what was going on all over the rest of the world. In spite of Hollywood, it is stupendous, it is colossal.
Joseph Needham, Fellow of the Royal Society and holder of the Brilliant Star of China, was born in 1900, the son of a doctor. He took his degree at Cambridge, and in 1924 became a Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, of which he is now the Master. In the same year he married a fellow‐student and fellow‐biochemist, and later Joseph and Dorothy Needham became the first husband and wife both to be made Fellows of the Royal Society.
When he was 31, Needham published a three‐volume work on “Chemical Embryology.” This led to his “History of Embryology,” and his involvement in the history of science. Then, before the Second World War, an important influence came in the form of a group of Chinese scientists who came to Cambridge to do postgraduate work in biochemistry. Working alongside them Needham developed an interest in Chinese culture and science, and simply for his own interest taught himself the language.
He also began to ask himself, first, why it was that during ancient and medieval times China was so far ahead of Europe in science and technology, and then why the advance to modern science took place in the West: these were the basic questions that were later to underlie his great work. One of these Chinese scientists, Lu Gwei‐djen, was a cardinal influence at this time. Not only was she trained in modern science, but also she had access to the old Chinese culture through her apothecary father, to whom the first volume of “Science and Civilisation in China” is dedicated. Later she returned to Cambridge, where she has now been working full‐time with Needham on the project for 12 years.
When the war came Joseph Needham was, as a Chinese‐speaking scientist, exceptionally qualified to be sent to China as head of the British scientific mission. For four years during the war he directed the SinoBritish Science Cooperation Office, in the course of which he travelled thousands of miles all over China, made contact with a vast number of. Chinese scientists and engineers, and began to build up material about Chinese science.
History, philosophy, religion, mathematics, astronomy, geography, geology, seismology, physics, mechanical and civil engineering, chemistry and chemical technology, biology, medicine, sociology, economics.... just to list the topics covered in his massive “Science and Civilisation in China” would take more than the space of this article (the summary of contents in the publisher's prospectus covers more than 12 closely printed pages.) And, at the same time as dealing with China, throughout the work Needham compares and contrasts with what was going on all over the rest of the world. In spite of Hollywood, it is stupendous, it is colossal.
Joseph Needham, Fellow of the Royal Society and holder of the Brilliant Star of China, was born in 1900, the son of a doctor. He took his degree at Cambridge, and in 1924 became a Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, of which he is now the Master. In the same year he married a fellow‐student and fellow‐biochemist, and later Joseph and Dorothy Needham became the first husband and wife both to be made Fellows of the Royal Society.
When he was 31, Needham published a three‐volume work on “Chemical Embryology.” This led to his “History of Embryology,” and his involvement in the history of science. Then, before the Second World War, an important influence came in the form of a group of Chinese scientists who came to Cambridge to do postgraduate work in biochemistry. Working alongside them Needham developed an interest in Chinese culture and science, and simply for his own interest taught himself the language.
He also began to ask himself, first, why it was that during ancient and medieval times China was so far ahead of Europe in science and technology, and then why the advance to modern science took place in the West: these were the basic questions that were later to underlie his great work. One of these Chinese scientists, Lu Gwei‐djen, was a cardinal influence at this time. Not only was she trained in modern science, but also she had access to the old Chinese culture through her apothecary father, to whom the first volume of “Science and Civilisation in China” is dedicated. Later she returned to Cambridge, where she has now been working full‐time with Needham on the project for 12 years.
When the war came Joseph Needham was, as a Chinese‐speaking scientist, exceptionally qualified to be sent to China as head of the British scientific mission. For four years during the war he directed the SinoBritish Science Cooperation Office, in the course of which he travelled thousands of miles all over China, made contact with a vast number of. Chinese scientists and engineers, and began to build up material about Chinese science.
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