356
BOOK REVIEWS
confusing intermixing of columns is an unfortunate example of false economy.
My last few negative comments are directed against purely mechanical aspects of Sagart's monograph. In sum I consider them minor by comparison with the strong plus values I put on the work as a whole. He has made a genuine contribution to our growing body of data on Chinese dialects and this is much more important than the negative suggestions I have made concerning format. No one should do further work in Hakka without touching base with Sagart's study.
JOHN MCCOY
Science in Traditional China: A Comparative Perspective. Joseph Needham, Hong Kong: The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press, 1981, x+131pp., appendix 2pp.
In this volume Dr. Needham extensively compares the various scientific approaches of China, India, Persia, Arabia, Israel and the West. In the "Introduction", he observes that the Chinese mind was too algebraic (rather than geometrical) to accept Indian Vaiseshika theories about atoms. In this I think he is correct, but I would like to comment on his remark that the philosophy of China has always been an organic materialism. China Mainland scholars always exaggerate the status of dialectical materialism in Chinese thought, while Taiwan professors overstress the significance of subjective idealism in the Chinese history of ideas at the cost of neglecting creative materialists like Wang T'ing-hsiang# of the Ming dynasty. Fortunately, I received my education in Hong Kong and the U.S. and so have avoided having political prejudices projected onto
onto philosophy. Needham, however, seems to be overwhelmed by the Mainland bias.
Western scholars tend to liken the Chinese organicism of the Book of Changes (B), Hua-yen Buddhism and Neo-Confucianism to the organicism of Leibniz and Whitehead. However, organicism may be combined with both idealism and materialism, which in fact run in parallel throughout Chinese history.
356
BOOK REVIEWS
confusing intermixing of columns is an unfortunate example of false economy.
My last few negative comments are directed against purely mechanical aspects of Sagart's monograph. In sum I consider them minor by comparison with the strong plus values I put on the work as a whole. He has made a genuine contribution to our growing body of data on Chinese dialects and this is much more important than the negative suggestions I have made concerning format. No one should do further work in Hakka without touching base with Sagart's study.
JOHN MCCOY
Science in Traditional China: A Comparative Perspective. Joseph Needham, Hong Kong: The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press, 1981, x+131pp., appendix 2pp.
In this volume Dr. Needham extensively compares the various scientific approaches of China, India, Persia, Arabia, Israel and the West. In the "Introduction", he observes that the Chinese mind was too algebraic (rather than geometrical) to accept Indian Vaiseshika theories about atoms. In this I think he is correct, but I would like to comment on his remark that the philosophy of China has always been an organic materialism. China Mainland scholars always exaggerate the status of dialectical materialism in Chinese thought, while Taiwan professors overstress the significance of subjective idealism in the Chinese history of ideas at the cost of neglecting creative materialists like Wang T'ing- hsiang # of the Ming dynasty. Fortunately, I received my education in Hong Kong and the U.S. and so have avoided having political prejudices projected onto
onto philosophy. Needham, however, seems to be overwhelmed by the Mainland bias.
Western scholars tend to liken the Chinese organicism of the Book of Changes (B), Hua-yen Buddhism and Neo- Confucianism to the organicism of Leibniz and Whitehead. However, organicism may be combined with both idealism and materialism, which in fact run in parallel throughout Chinese history.
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