The Needham Question

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Needham Question; why Europe and not China developed modern technology. What do these things have in common? Fireworks, wood-block printing, canal lock-gates, kites, the wheelbarrow, chain suspension bridges and the magnetic compass. The answer is that they were all invented in China, a country that, right through the Middle Ages, maintained a cultural and technological sophistication that made foreign dignitaries flock to its imperial courts for trade and favour. But then, around 1700, the flow of ingenuity began to dry up and even reverse as Europe bore the fruits of the scientific revolution back across the globe. Why did Modern Science develop in Europe when China seemed so much better placed to achieve it? This is called the Needham Question, after Joseph Needham, the 20th century British Sinologist who did more, perhaps, than anyone else to try and explain it.But did Joseph Needham give a satisfactory answer to the question that bears his name? Why did China’s early technological brilliance not lead to the development of modern science and how did momentous inventions like gunpowder and printing enter Chinese society with barely a ripple and yet revolutionise the warring states of Europe?

→ Play on BBC Sounds website

Guests

• Chris Cullen 2 episodes
  Director of the Needham Research Institute
• Tim Barrett 8 episodes
  Professor of East Asian History at SOAS
• Frances Wood 10 episodes
  Head of Chinese Collections at the British Library

Related episodes

• The Industrial Revolution
  
  23 Dec, 2010 940 History of Europe
• China’s Warring States period
  
  1 Apr, 2004 950 History of Asia
• The Iron Age
  
  24 Mar, 2011 930 History of the Ancient World
• Calculus
  
  24 Sep, 2009 510 Mathematics
• Episode 5
  
  6 Jan, 2012 500 Science
• The City - a history, part 2
  
  1 Apr, 2010 300 Social sciences, sociology and anthropology
• The Cavendish Family in Science
  
  20 May, 2010 500 Science
• The Measurement of Time
  
  29 Mar, 2012 520 Astronomy
• The Silk Road
  
  3 Dec, 2009 950 History of Asia
• The Enlightenment in Scotland
  
  5 Dec, 2002 190 Modern Western Philosophy
• Imperial Science
  
  1 Feb, 2001 940 History of Europe
• The Enlightenment in Britain
  
  18 Jan, 2001 940 History of Europe
• Automata
  
  20 Sep, 2018 600 Technology
• Renaissance Maths
  
  2 Jun, 2005 510 Mathematics
• Empiricism
  
  10 Jun, 2004 190 Modern Western Philosophy
• Electrickery
  
  4 Nov, 2004 500 Science
• Sources of Early Chinese History
  
  23 Jan, 2014 950 History of Asia
• Optics
  
  1 Mar, 2007 530 Physics
• Magnetism
  
  29 Sep, 2005 530 Physics
• The 12th Century Renaissance
  
  20 Oct, 2016 900 History

---

Programme ID: p0038x9m

Episode page: bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0038x9m

Auto-category: 509.51 (History of Science and Technology)