From: nguyenpd@ntmtv.UUCP (Phat Nguyen)
Subject: [SOC] Blame that Asian!!!
Originator: nguyenpd@nmtvs315
Reply-To: nguyenpd@ntmtv.UUCP (Phat Nguyen)
Organization: Northern Telecom Inc, Mountain View, CA
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 1992 19:01:36 GMT

In article <Bw51IL.2EG@ulowell.ulowell.edu>, 
cshi@cs.ulowell.edu (Chunde Shi) writes:
|>In article <1992Oct13.222832.19424@morrow.stanford.edu>
|>berne@nova1.stanford.edu (Jean-Francois Berne) writes:
|>>In article <1992Oct13.205627.17007@news.Hawaii.Edu>
|>gerard@caliban.soest.hawaii.edu (Gerard Fryer) writes:
|>>>A similar racially-inspired adjective comes to mind: slovenly.  Now
|>>Guess that answer the question "why are they held as barbarians".
|>                                 *******************************
|>Those mogol "barbarians" brought to Europe a magic staff, invented by
|>Chinese,
|>GUN POWER! Without which is unconceivable that europeans could colonized 
|>most of the world.

>From: poser@vxdsyc.desy.de (Till Poser  -  ZEUS OFFLINE) writes:

> While it is true that the Chinese had used black powder for a couple of 
> centuries before it became known to the Europeans, and sometimes in military
> applications, it is fairly obvious that the Mongols didn't bring it to
> Europe. Black Powder and gunnery started up in Europe in the late 14th 
> century while the Mongol incursions into Europe took place in the early 13th.

> There a varied accounts on how that knowledge was developed, or, if You will,
> redeveloped, and one centers around the German monk Berthold Schwarz from
> the town of Freiburg around 1350. This had something to do with the rise of
> the science of alchemy in Europe at a time when it started to stagnate in
> the Islame world, where it first was developed.


-> From: jbm@hal.trl.OZ.AU (Jacques Guy) writes:

-> Ah, no, they didn't! Gun powder was independently reinvented in Europe, in 
-> Germany if memory serves me, centuries after it had been discovered by the
-> Chinese. The Chinese used it for fireworks, and never for guns.

-> Ditto the Koreans invented movable type long before Gutenberg did, and that
-> doesn't mean Gutenberg got it from them.

-> Ironclads again were invented by the Koreans, and much later, independently
-> rediscovered in Europe.

-> There is good archaeological evidence that the Assyrians had discovered 
-> electroplating too. Rediscovered thousands of years later.

-> And the Antikythera orrery, how about that?

-> So let's not call X, Y, or Z a plagiarist because A, B, and C came up
-> with the same ideas centuries earlier and continents away.

If I remember correctly, gunpower was brought back to Europe from
China along the Silk Road.  Chinese technological knowledge came
to Europe from this road -- i.e. Marco Polo brought back with him
not only silks, china vases, and spaghetti, but he also brought
back with him technological know-how of the Chinese at that time.
The transfering of knowledge along the Silk road sparked scientific
curiosity that moved Europe away from the Middle Ages toward the
Renaissance some years later.  I believe that the NOVA series
on PBS --  "The Genius that Was China" -- has done an extraordinary
job of researching and documenting this story.  They are being
done by experts in the fields.