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Daoism and Science

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Dao Companion to Daoist Philosophy

Part of the book series: Dao Companions to Chinese Philosophy ((DCCP,volume 6))

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Abstract

This chapter addresses relations or connection between early Daoist philosophy and science. It addresses three issues. The first section asks what we mean by Daoism and what we mean by science. The second addresses Daoist approaches to health and well-being in the broadest possible sense, including self-cultivation practices, medicine, and longevity techniques, focusing on theories of qi and their applications to medicine and techniques for longevity and “nurturing life” (yang sheng). The third turns to the association of early Daoism with various technical disciplines such as astronomy, mathematics, and cosmology.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Quantitative sciences included Mathematics (suan算), Mathematical harmonics or acoustics (lü 律 or lü lü律呂) and Mathematical astronomy (li歷 or li fa歷法), in relation to harmonics.

  2. 2.

    The six sections of the Han shu Bibliographic Treatise are: (1) the Six Arts (liuyi六藝) or Classics (liujing六經), (2) Masters (zhuzi諸子) texts of Warring States philosophy, (3) Poetry (shifu詩賦), (4) Military works (bingshu兵書), (5) Numbers and Techniques (shushu數術), and (6) Recipes and Methods (fangji方技).

  3. 3.

    Song shu宋書, “Benji” 本紀 9 (Taipei: Yiwen, 1987), 180; Sui shu隋書, “Zhi” 志 (Taipei: Yiwen, 1987): 32, 903–909.

  4. 4.

    Nathan Sivin (1995: 3n1) points out that there is no indigenous term for “nature” in China before the nineteenth century.

  5. 5.

    The “step” was a double stride, conventionally reckoned at about 2 m. There were 360 steps per li. A li was roughly equivalent to a mile.

  6. 6.

    Ancient Chinese astronomers divided the celestial equator around the pole star into 28 “lodges” (xiu宿), each named by a star within it and each comprising some 13° (du度) of the circle.

  7. 7.

    Such calendars also appear in almost identical form as chapters in the Guanzi and Lüshi chunqiu, and were incorporated into the Liji in the Later Han dynasty (Guanzi 3.8 and 3.9, Rickett 1985 I:148–192).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Comparative Literature and Foreign Languages, University of California, 92521-0321, Riverside, CA, USA

    Lisa Raphals

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  1. Lisa Raphals
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Correspondence to Lisa Raphals .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Chinese University of Hong Kong Dept. Philosophy, Shatin, New Territories, Hong Kong SAR

    Xiaogan Liu

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Raphals, L. (2015). Daoism and Science. In: Liu, X. (eds) Dao Companion to Daoist Philosophy. Dao Companions to Chinese Philosophy, vol 6. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-2927-0_24

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