This bibliographical study is designed to: (i) identify Western- language works published between 1800 and 1985 that deal specifically with traditional Chinese science and are written by those best described as representatives or members of academic, scholarly, professional, and similar communities from a West European country, America, Canada, Australia and New Zealand; (ii) provide a profile of these Western contributions through a systematic description of the works and the study trends that they demonstrate; (iii) review bibliographic access to and control of these publications; (iv) organise this body of material into a classified bibliography. There are two parts to this bibliographical study. PART I is the main text or literature survey. It consists of ten chapters: 1. Introduction; 2. Traditional Chinese Science - General Works; 3. Traditional Chinese Science - Fundamental Concepts; Philosophy; Social and Cultural Relations; 4. Mathematics; 5. Astronomy; 6. Earth Sciences; 7. Physics; 8. Alchemy; Early Chemistry; 9. Biology; 10. Conclusion. The eight subject chapters outline titles concerned in a roughly chronological order starting with the earliest works, and give an indication of the shapes and contours Western interests in the areas had assumed. Additionally, they review the level of activity of various countries and the professional training and specialisations of those responsible for the studies, address the forms which these publications have taken, and examine bibliographic provision and control. PART II is made up of two classified bibliographies. The first contains all the works covered by the main survey; the second is a supplementary bibliography of other titles relevant to the subject. The study is meant to be of interest to scholars, students and librarians with or without prior knowledge of traditional Chinese science. It is also hoped that the broad overview will persuade those in the field to pay closer attention to historiographical issues and bibliographic concerns.

A bibliographical study of Western publications (1800-1985) on traditional Chinese science

Over the years, plague has caused a large number of deaths worldwide and subsequently changed history, not the least during the period of the Black Death. Of the three plague pandemics, the third is believed to have originated in China. Using the spatial and temporal human plague records in China from 1850 to 1964, we investigated the association of human plague intensity (plague cases per year) with proxy data on climate condition (specifically an index for dryness/wetness). Our modeling analysis demonstrates that the responses of plague intensity to dry/wet conditions were different in northern and southern China. In northern China, plague intensity generally increased when wetness increased, for both the current and the previous year, except for low intensity during extremely wet conditions in the current year (reflecting a dome-shaped response to current-year dryness/wetness). In southern China, plague intensity generally decreased when wetness increased, except for high intensity during extremely wet conditions of the current year. These opposite effects are likely related to the different climates and rodent communities in the two parts of China: In northern China (arid climate), rodents are expected to respond positively to high precipitation, whereas in southern China (humid climate), high precipitation is likely to have a negative effect. Our results suggest that associations between human plague intensity and precipitation are nonlinear: positive in dry conditions, but negative in wet conditions.

https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/108/25/10214.full.pdf

Nonlinear effect of climate on plague during the third pandemic in China

Amoxicillin, cefotaxime, ceftriaxone, gentamicin, doxycycline, and ofloxacin were active in vitro, like the reference drug streptomycin, against the virulent strain Yersinia pestis 6/69M. The comparative efficacies of these drugs in vivo were evaluated in a standardized and reproducible mouse model of systemic infection. Each antibiotic was injected intravenously once, at 24 h postinfection, and then repeatedly during 48 h. In vivo results were measured by counting the viable bacteria recovered from the whole spleens of mice sacrificed at selected times. All the drugs were manifestly successful; ceftriaxone, ofloxacine, and the reference drug were the most effective. Therefore, gentamicin and doxycycline could be used, depending on the clinical forms of the Y. pestis infection. Further investigations on beta-lactams, especially those used in the present study, could be carried out to confirm or not confirm their activities against Y. pestis. Ofloxacin appeared to be as active and to perform as rapidly as streptomycin in the treatment of murine Y. pestis infection, which is in agreement with the previous successes obtained with the use of fluoroquinolones in the treatment of murine infections caused by other pathogenic yersiniae.

Assessment of a fluoroquinolone, three beta-lactams, two aminoglycosides, and a cycline in treatment of murine Yersinia pestis infection.

Using structural linguistics, the present article offers an impartial frame of reference to analyze science education in the non-Western world. In Japan, science education has been free from epistemological reflection because Japan regards science only as effective technology for modernization. By not taking account of the world-view aspect of science, Japan can treat science as not self-referential. Issues of science education are then rather simple; they are only concerned with the question of ‘how to’, and answers to this question are judged according to the efficiency achieved for modernization.

The Concepts of Science in Japanese and Western Education

Logarithmic spirals are ubiquitous in nature. This paper presents a novel mathematical definition of a 3D logarithmic spiral, which provides a proper description of objects found in nature. To motivate our work, we scanned spiral-shaped objects and studied their geometric properties. We consider the extent to which the existing 3D definitions capture these properties. We identify a property that is shared by the objects we investigated and is not satisfied by the existing 3D definitions. This leads us to present our definition in which both the radius of curvature and the radius of torsion change linearly along the curve. We prove that our spiral satisfies several desirable properties, including invariance to similarity transformations, smoothness, symmetry, extensibility, and roundness. Finally, we demonstrate the utility of our curves in the modeling of several animal structures.

The Natural 3D Spiral

WITH regard to the questions asked by “M. A. B.” about the grouping of stars into constellations (NATURE, August 17), I venture to answer the last two, which the limited knowledge of an Oriental may partly meet, hoping thereby to interest some of your readers.

/pdf/the-constellations-of-the-far-east-1x8ien373s.pdf

The Constellations of the Far East

FROM a review in NATURE of November 13, 1902 (vol. lxvii. p. 28), I gather Herr Hans Haas, like many other writers on Japan, considers Ser Marco Polo the first who brought any news of Japan to the west. In this connection, it will be interesting to note that in his “Six Voyages,” Paris, 1676, Tavernier tries to identify a local name of the classic geographers, Jabadi, if I remember correctly, with the ancient vernacular designation of the empire, Yamato, or rather with its Chinese rendering, Yamadai or Jabatai.

The Discovery of Japan

IN the “Encyclopaedia Britannica” (ninth edition, vol. xix. p. 168), Dr. J. F. Payne writes: “It is remarkable that of late years reports have come of the occurrence of Oriental plague in China. It has been observed in the province of Yunnan since 1871 … it appears to be endemic, though there are rumours of its having been brought from Burmah, and become more noticeable after the suppression of rebellion in that province [1872].” However, the following passage I have lately found in Hung Liang-Kih's “Peh-Kiang-Shi-Hwa” (British Museum copy, 15,316, a, tom. iv., fol. 4, b), bears witness to the much earlier occurrence of the pest in Yunnan, inasmuch as the author, who was born in 1736, and died in 1809, speaks of his contemporary dead thereby:—“Shi Tau-Nan, the son of Shi Fan, now the Governor of Wang-Kiang, was notorious for his [poetic] gift, and was only thirty-six years old when he died. … Then, in Chau-Chau [in Yunnan] it happened that in daytime strange rats appeared in the houses, and lying down on the ground, perished with blood-spitting. There was not a man who escaped the instantaneous death after being infected with the miasma. Tau-Nan composed thereon a poem, entitled “Death of Rats,” the masterpiece of his; and a few days after, he himself died from this queer rat epidemic.”

Plague in China

IN December, 1891, I found in a pit near Port Katsura, a few miles off this place, a species of Calostoma in abundance, and this year I see the same fungus now and then occurring here I send you some specimens of it herewith, in the hope that some mycologist of your acquaintance may determine it in my behalf Of all the species given in Mr Massee's monograph of the genus in the Annals of Botany, vol ii 1888, it seems most near C Ravenelii, Mass

/pdf/distribution-of-calostoma-56cobau88o.pdf

Distribution of Calostoma

http://academic.oup.com/nq/article-pdf/s11-V/121/313/20270754/313c.pdf

Kumagusu Minakata

Papers

The Constellations of the Far East

The Discovery of Japan

Plague in China

Distribution of Calostoma

Whittington and his cat