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The Needham Question

After his extensive research of Chinese innovations, Joseph Needham became concerned with the question: Why did Modern Science stop developing in China after the 16th century? Needham believed this was due to China’s sociopolitical system which was not affected by Chinese inventions. China did not have a structure in which merchants could profit off of their inventions, unlike the West. Once Chinese inventions reached Europe, they revolutionized their sociopolitical system, which used the inventions to dominate political rivals. According to Needham, Chinese innovations, such as gunpowder, the compass, paper, and printing, helped transform European feudalism into capitalism. By the end of the 15th century, Europe was actively financing scientific discoveries, and nautical exploration. The paradox of this conclusion was that Europe surpassed China in scientific innovations, using Chinese technologies.

After several volumes of Science and Civilisation in China had been published, Needham was questioned about his theory of the origin of science in the West. Needham, troubled by past criticism and dismissal of his work as Marxist theory, declined to publicly state his relationship to Marxism. Later, in Needham’s work The Great Tritation, he re-framed his question as: “why, between the first century BC and the fifteenth century AD, Chinese civilization was much more efficient than occidental in applying human natural knowledge to practical human needs” The reformulation of the question, changed the narrative of Science and Civilisation in China. Initially, the question centered around China’s failure to develop scientifically after the 16th century. The focus shifted towards an examination of China’s accomplishments prior to development in Europe.