China's Transition to Modernity by Minghui Hu

Author:Minghui Hu [Hu, Minghui]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Asia, China, Science, Space Science, Astronomy
ISBN: 9780295741802
Google: dQwVvgAACAAJ
Publisher: University of Washington Press
Published: 2017-02-15T00:40:01+00:00

CONCLUDING REMARKS

Chinese, Japanese, and Western scholars have long ranked Dai Zhen among the most important thinkers in modern Chinese history. Yet no previous studies, whether brief and focused or long and comprehensive, have paid much attention to how his social ambitions affected his scholarly idiosyncrasies. As he moved from place to place, seeking examination success, companionship, and patronage, he found inspiration outside of the intellectual mainstream, and by the force of his own intellect he drew others along the same path. At a crucial moment, an acquaintance attacked Dai’s mentor for adopting Jesuit methods, providing a decisive impetus for a rupture between mentor and follower.62

For Dai, the goal that trumped all other considerations was the overall reconstruction of the classical world—a perfect realm that served as his moral foundation. If only he could figure out every single detail, retrieving the precise scale, design, and shape of everything recorded in the great books of antiquity, his mission would be complete. Mathematical astronomy would retrieve only some details. Such a vision of classical knowledge distinguished him from his mentor, Jiang Yong. But his insistence on historicizing European knowledge would have greater repercussions than he could have imaged.

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