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Writer's pictureLeo Jr.

The 2024 Needham Conference

Science and Civilization: The Magnetic Compass and Maritime Navigation


(Please also see attached the 2024 Needham Conference brochure for more information)



We have just held this two-day conference that brought together international scholars to Sun Yat-sen University (Guangzhou) to explore Joseph Needham's monumental legacy in two directions. The first day was spent surveying his impact and relevance for Chinese and global science studies. The second day focused on how the discovery of the magnetic compass in China had shaped maritime navigation in the South China Sea and the INdian Ocean, and then trans-Atlantic and trans-Pacific navigation. The impacts of these magnetic connections in shaping modern science and socirty, as well as commerce in commodities, diasporas of people, and intellectual exchanges across cultures was also investigated.



Concerning the impact of Chinese magnetic discoveries, it is significant that beginning with the very first volume of SCC, Needham had pointed to Francis Bacon’s aphorism that one of the major technological achievements which brought the different global civilizations into dialogue was the crucial role of the magnetic compass in navigation:





Printing, gunpowder, and the magnet … have changed the whole face and state of things throughout the world, the first in literature, the second in warfare, the third in navigation; whence have followed innumerable changes; insomuch that no empire, no sect, no star, seems to have exerted greater power and influence in human affairs than these mechanical discoveries. (Quoted in Needham, SCC, vol. 1 (1954), p.19)


Although the role of printing and gunpowder has been much discussed in detail within modern science studies, the impact of the magnet is much less explored. Needham Conference 2024 is designed to look at Needham’s studies of the magnet, its rise and development in China, and its role in global navigation which brought civilizations and their diasporas together.


The conference was held in celebration of the 100th Founding Anniversary of Sun Yat-sen University 2024, and on the 124th birthday of Dr. Joseph Needham. The Joseph Needham Foundation and Needham Research Institute (Cambridge) are co-organizing it with the Institute for Advanced Studies in Humanities, Sun Yat-sen University, from 9-10 December 2024.

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