Science and Civilisation in China. Volume 6, Biology and Biological Technology. Part 6, Medicine (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: Science and Civilisation in China. Volume 6, Biology and Biological Technology. Part 6, Medicine Mary Tiles (bio) Joseph Needham. Science and Civilisation in China. Volume 6, Biology and Biological Technology. Part 6, Medicine. Assisted by Lu Gwei-Djen. Edited by Nathan Sivin. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000. xviii, 261 pp. Hardcover $80.00, ISBN 0-521-63262-5. This volume consists of essays written by Joseph Needham and his longtime collaborator Lu Gwei-djen, mostly between 1939 and 1970, together with an introductory essay by the editor, Nathan Sivin. Needham and Lu had intended to write a comprehensive survey of the many aspects of Chinese medicine but were unable to complete it. Nathan Sivin justifies publishing this material as the representation of medicine in the Science and Civilisation in China series on the ground that no one else is yet ready to survey the whole history of medicine in a manner that retains the standards of the series. Sivin, who has himself published on Chinese medicine (Medicine, Philosophy, and Religion in Ancient China: Researches and Reflections [Aldershot: Variorum, 1995]) as well as many other aspects of Chinese science, has revised all the essays to incorporate the results of recent research and to cite pertinent publications. The essays included in this volume cover the position of medicine in Chinese culture, the origins of qualifying examinations in medicine, hygiene, and preventive medicine, and the origins of immunology and forensic medicine. They do not include material from Needham's and Lu's book-length study of acupuncture, its history and scientific rationale, published as Celestial Lancets (Cambridge University Press, 1980). In this volume the discussion of acupuncture is very brief. Sivin himself is critical of some of the assumptions that underlie Needham's work on Chinese science and civilization. Of particular relevance to his interpretations of Chinese medicine are the convictions (1) that the borders between science, magic and religion were heavily traveled, (2) that before modern times this was beneficial to science, (3) that Taoism was particularly responsible for originating scientific attitudes and accomplishments in China, and (4) that with the scientific revolution in Europe, modern science has transcended the bounds of any particular culture, making it absoluting international. In the Chinese context these convictions lead Needham to treat technology as science. As Sivin puts it, many of Needham's arguments about the influence of Taoism have not "aged gracefully." Scholars of religion now question the view that there was in China any unified natural philosophy / religious movement or "ism" to be labeled "Taoism" and viewed as the legacy of the Lao Tzu and the Chuang Tzu. Needham's positivist view of modern science as independent of culture leads him to seek in China for what are recognized as achievements in Western science and, frequently, to claim that the Chinese got there first, or at least independently. [End Page 220] Often this argument is based, as in the case of the discussion of immunology, on the use of techniques or technologies in China, rather than on theoretical writings. More recent historians of science and medicine tend to view priority disputes and claims about superiority with suspicion and as irrelevant to the main business of their disciplines, namely understanding the complex interactions over time between various aspects of society and disciplines and practices such as those of medicine. Sivin offers (p. 21) a list of research questions whose investigation would in his opinion serve as providing the first steps toward a comprehensive history of Chinese medicine, questions such as "What were the social settings of medical practice and scholarship? Were these separate activities? If so, how were they related? If not, how were they articulated to form a single complex?" Sivin is thus presenting Needham and Lu's work as a starting point that needs to be superseded, and has suggested research avenues and supplied the up-to-date references that would enable one to make that start. This is very useful. On the other hand, it does create a rather curious framework within which to read Needham and Lu's pieces. After all of the critical comments, one almost wonders why one should bother to read them...