Regional Networks in Chinese Mathematics and Astronomy, 311–618 ce

Abstract

This article offers a social and geographical network analysis of all attested works, authors, and practitioners in the mathematical sciences in China over the period of disunion and reunification from 311 to 618 ce. Inspired by Karine Chemla’s (2009) efforts to distinguish “different mathematical cultures” within the extant corpus of suan 筭/算 procedure texts, the goal is to explore a viable framework within which to break down the history of Chinese mathematics along different, pluralistic lines. What I find is that this period is home to distinct regional networks working in isolation from one another, and that situating authors within these networks helps explain continuities and discontinuities in their technical writing. This is evidence of plurality, but one that is incommensurable with Chemla’s “mathematical cultures,” so I offer it as an alternative means to the same historiographical ends. In examining what our historical subjects said and did about this plurality of traditions, however, we realize that it was as aberrant to them as the political disunion of which it was a product ‒ something to be rectified by “unification” (tongyi 統一), “integration” (tong 通), and, where necessary, force.

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“…The Yus were thus part of the scientific heyday of the Sun-Wu court, and one of the brothers-Song or Bing-wrote his own monograph on scientific cosmology (Qiongtian lun 穹天論). But that was another time: the south was defeated, its savants were dead or scattered, Yu Xi was an orphan, and the next century and a half saw no court activity in astronomy outside the Gansu Corridor and occupied Chang'an (Morgan 2021). Not only did Yu Xi choose to refuse office, live alone, and die childless, he was, in astronomy, a lost soul speaking into the void.…”

“…This is despite the transmission of southern works (520), the integration of southern experts (555), and the nominal interest in synthesizing the two traditions (557-584). As to why, Morgan (2021) argues that this is because northern astronomers were first unaware, then unconvinced, having formed their own tradition over a century of isolation from their southern analogues. Whatever the case, an explicit conflict arose from strange quarters aimed at Zhang Bin's coalition.…”

“…As concerns the lives and works of the key protagonists, the same is true of M. Chen (2003) and, to an extent, Martin and Chaussende (2020). As concerns the human geography, social networks, and transmission lines between protagonists, Morgan (2021) provides the tools for a finer contextual analysis of the ensemble than previously possible. Lastly, Yutong Wang (2022) has helped make further sense of the timeline by returning what has been long treated as a neat chapter in the history of astronomy to its context in Classical (i.e., "Confucian") exegesis and chronology.…”

“…Lastly, Yutong Wang (2022) has helped make further sense of the timeline by returning what has been long treated as a neat chapter in the history of astronomy to its context in Classical (i.e., "Confucian") exegesis and chronology. I will simply lean on the work of He, Qu, Chen, and Wang to flesh out the exploratory social and geographic treatment of precession in Morgan (2021), bringing additional texts and biographical details to bear particularly as the subject intersects with the "Three Teachings".…”

“…One was the articulation of the contradictory epistemologies of mathematical astronomy and Classical exegesis (Wang 2022). One was the fracture of mathematical astronomy into distinct regional networks and traditions in the Period of Disunion (220-589) (Morgan 2021). Another, inspired by the aforementioned approach of K. Chen (2015) as read through the lens of Collins' (1998) The Sociology of Philosophies, is that the dividing line seems to have been in constant flux, as each generation redrew it in a bid to distinguish itself amid the realignment of various forces.…”