【龙腾网】为什么工业革命没有发生在中国?(评论)

Why the Industrial Revolution didn’t happen in China
为什么工业革命没有发生在中国?(评论)
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评论翻译
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codenectar
Rather than crediting the differences inculture / society between Europe and China in their different outcomes, what ifwe looked at how explorer-friendly Europe opened up vast new continents full ofresources to exploit? My feeling is that the ability to export adventurers andentrepreneurs, bringing riches back to innovators, had more to do with thesuccess of Europe than particular customs and systems of government.
Also we should be wary of valuing progressover stability: we live on a finite planet with increasing population,dwindling easy-access energy, and no more continent-sized presents to open.
(also: by the way, the ancients did notjust study science and natural phenomena to satisfy curiosity, but also to makeus materially better off: see Archimedes)
Thanks for the article!
与其把欧洲和中国的不同发展结局归因于它们在文化/社会上的差异,不如看看友好的欧洲是如何开辟了充满资源可供开发的广阔新大陆的呢?我的感觉是,出口冒险家和企业家,将财富带回欧洲的能力,欧洲的成功,更多的是与特定的文化和政治制度有关。
同时,我们也应该对未来的发展有一些警惕::我们生活在一个人口不断增加的有限星球上,能够获得的能源不断减少,再也没有新的大陆那样的礼物了。
(还有:顺便说一句,古人不仅为了满足好奇心而学习科学和自然现象,而且为了使我们物质上更富裕:见阿基米德)
感谢你的文章!
Errorr
I do think this is true but incomplete. Itisn't the monolithic nature of China that matters but the path of sciencethought took when constrained by a unified traditionalist understanding.Progress in certain areas was great but limited to math and astronomy mostly.The Song dynasty was so inventive because certain neo-confucist ideologiesallowed science to develop in a way of exploring li. The influence Daoism(Taoism) and Bhudism was a counterweight to science to some extent. This is incontrast to Western Christianity and Islam which was heavily influenced byneo-platonism which allowed for a search of universal truths created by asingle god. Chinese science wasn't systematic in its search for universalaspects of nature but instead looked for relative principles that were neverguaranteed to work and must be tempered by wisdom and discretion.
The counterfactual is still what would havehappened in the absence of the Mongol invasions and what would have continueddeveloping if the Song had continued.
我认为这是真的,但不全面。重要的不是中国的整体性,而是在统一的传统约束下,科学思考的方式。中国在某些领域取得了巨大的进展,但主要局限于数学和天文学。宋代之所以具有创造性,是因为某些新儒家思想允许科学以探索的方式发展。道教和佛教的影响在某种程度上是对科学的平衡。这与西方基督教和伊斯兰教形成鲜明对比,西方基督教和伊斯兰教深受柏拉图主义的影响,柏拉图主义允许寻找的是由一个单一的上帝创造的普遍真理。中国科学在寻找自然的普遍方面并不是系统的,而是寻找相对的原则,这些原则从未保证有效,必须由智慧加以总结。
另一个事实是,如果没有蒙古的入侵,中国会发生什么,如果这种中国的这种继续下去,继续发展。
hhodges1
It appears that competition is the forcethat drives progress. Western Europe apparently nurtured that competition bydeveloping social structures that promoted competition. Knowledge seems to growexponentially which must arrive at limits. The future is quite exciting.
竞争似乎是推动进步的力量。西欧显然是通过发展促进竞争的社会结构来培育这种竞争性。现在的科技似乎呈指数增长,远远没有极限,未来令人非常兴奋。

Errorr
I think the Mongol invasion is aninteresting turning point. Chinese philosophy was moving towards morescientific methods during the Song. Islam had taken up the mantle of greek thoughtand was the leading culture at one time. The renaissance was spurred on bycontact with Islam and European science is a direct continuation of thattradition. I always wonder what would have happened if Ogedei Khan had livedanother decade.
我认为蒙古入侵是一个有趣的转折点。中国宋代的哲学正朝着科学进步的方向发展。而在欧洲,伊斯兰教接替了希腊思想的衣钵,一度成为那里的主流文化。文艺复兴是在与伊斯兰教的接触下推动的,欧洲科学是这个的直接延续。我一直想知道如果窝阔台再活十年会发生什么。
Uselessboy
Every year a new way of saying whites aresuperior.
Actually the plagues killing half or moreof Europe's work force made the development of labor saving devices imperative.
每年都会有关于白种人优越性的新的说法。
事实上,瘟疫夺去了欧洲一半或更多的劳动力,这使得开发节省劳动力的技术势在必行。
scarecities
the main plague outbreak was in the1300s
the industrial revolution didnt kick intill the 1800s
瘟疫主要爆发在13世纪,
而工业革命到19世纪才开始兴起。
DaveoftheCoonties
The English were remarkably unhealthy circa1700s. A lot of it was tuberculosis. At the time of the American Revolution, itwas noted that American soldiers tended to be taller than their back-homeBritish counterparts, even though many Americans were ill-fed.
英国人在18世纪左右非常不健康,其中很多是肺结核。在美国大革命时期,有人指出,美国士兵往往比他们的老家英国士兵寿命久,尽管许多美国人吃不饱。
gsboy286
circumstances gave rise to Europe's riserather than China's, that's it.
种族特性导致了欧洲的崛起,而不是中国的崛起,这就是真相。

Bastille
The realm of science fiction typicallyprovides a template of sorts for invention and ideas.
Asimov's foundation series is a favoriteread, though probably boring for most folks, dabbled in quite a few bizarretechnological concepts well before time.
科幻小说通常为发明和创造提供了各种各样的模板。
阿西莫夫的《Foundation》系列是最受欢迎的读物,虽然对大多数人来说可能很枯燥,但超前于时代,涉猎了相当多的奇异的科技概念。
gsboy286
You need that 'what if' imagination toinnovate, to think of practical new ideas, and science fiction (and comicbooks) are food for that mentality.
你需要那种“假设”的想象力去创新,去思考实用的新想法,而科幻小说(和漫画书)就是这种心态的食物。
MENGER
We see advances in many of these fieldsbeginning to take shape in key industries like medicine and engineering, the'3d printer' a notable invention that will probably upend manufacturing at somepoint, a primitive precursor to more advanced replicator-type devices.
我们看到,很些研究的进展开始在医药和工程等关键行业实现,“3D打印机”是一项值得注意的发明,它可能会在某一时刻颠覆制造业,成为更先进的复制器类型设备的前身。
leochen24551
Once upon a time, America was known as theLand of Opportunity. We were the world's most powerful industrialized nation.And everything that we bought said Made In USA.
With the growth of Mass Production cameAmerica's growth in Mass Employment and the growth of our Working Class andMiddle Class.
No more.
Blame whom we wish, but for the pastseveral decades, American Big Business Owners have been firing their Americanemployees by the Millions. Then American Big Business Owners have shipped theirfactories -- along with our latest manufacturing technology -- to China, whereChinese Big Business Owners pay their Chinese peasant workers ten cents on thedollar.
So you know that those manufacturing jobsare never returning to our shores.
Everything that we now buy from WalMart,Target, BestBuy, Macy's, Autozone, etc. now says Made In China.
Blame whom we wish, but China has becomethe global manufacturer of choice.
With our Loss of Mass Production, we alsolost Mass Employment. In its place we now have Mass Unemployment and Mass
Underemployment. Over half of our collegegrads are either Unemployed or Underemployed.
从前,美国被称为机遇之地。我们是世界上最强大的工业化国家。我们买的任何东西都是美国制造的。
随着大规模生产的发展,美国大规模就业的增长,以及工人阶级和中产阶级的增长。
现在这种情况再也见不到了。
我们能怪谁?在过去几十年里,美国大企业主解雇了数百万的美国员工。然后,美国大企业主把他们的工厂连同我们最新的制造技术一起运往中国,中国大企业主在中国以10美分的价格支付中国的农民工人。
所以你知道那些制造业工作永远回不到我们海岸来了。
我们现在从沃尔玛、百思买、梅西百货等公司购买的所有产品都是中国制造的。
我们能责怪谁,中国现在已经成为了全球首选的制造商。
随着我们不再生产,我们也失去了大量的就业机会。我们现在有大量的失业人口,就业不足。我们半数以上的大学毕业生要么失业,要么未充分就业。

Maruchi
No one has forced American Big Business tochoose cheap overseas labor. They do it on their own preferring greed overcountry loyalty. It's all about the Big Bucks and there is no one to blame butthe user himself.
没有人强迫美国大企业选择廉价的海外劳动力。他们这样做是因为他们更喜欢贪婪而不是国家忠诚。一切都是为了赚大钱,除了用户自己,没有人可以责怪。
gsboy286
True perhaps but you can't just blamegovernment policies, some of it is unavoidable, the natural evolution ofeconomies. After WWII we were the only industrial power left or at least notbadly damaged, so we enjoyed perhaps thirty years before the others got back ontheir feet. With unions, factories and high demand we flourished. With advancesin automation, communications and transportation things changed. Since theautomation has advanced so far that skilled craftsmen are not needed as much,now they can set up a turn-key factory to produce cars in China and ship them.
也许是真的,但你不能只怪政府的政策,有些是不可避免的,经济的自然演变。第二次世界大战后,我们是唯一的工业强国,至少我们没有受到战争的严重破坏,所以我们享受了大约三十年的黄金时间,其他国家才重新恢复过来。在工业和高需求下,我们越发兴旺发达。但是随着自动化、通信和运输方式的进步,情况发生了变化。由于自动化技术已经发展到了不需要技术工人的程度,现在他们可以在中国建立一个工厂来生产和运输汽车。
peterjohn936
The answer is Protestantism and its lead touniversal education. Once most of the public was educated innovation increased.
答案是新教,这让教育被普及。一旦大多数公众接受了教育,创新就增加了。
Uselessboy
Protestants are leading the destruction ofuniversal education here.
The real reason was the plagues killinghalf the work force. Protestantism was to a large degree a reaction to that aswell.
新教徒正在领导破坏这里的教育普及。
真正的原因是瘟疫杀死了一半的劳动力。新教在很大程度上也是对这一点的反应。
gsboy286
Protestantism was indeed a huge step, after1000 years it defied the monolithic belief system of the governing Catholicchurch, a fetal liberty of thought. The church, at the time of Martin Luther,was corrupt and had been taken over for wealth and power. Probably the firststep towards educating the masses was translating the Bible from Latin so thecommon man could read it rather than having priests tell them what it meant andthe "proper interpretation"
.新教确实是一个巨大的进步,在1000年后,它挑战了单一信仰体系的天主教会,一个新生的思想自由。在马丁路德(宗教改革者,1483 -1546年),教会是腐败的,只是为了财富和权力。也许教育大众的第一步是把圣经从拉丁语翻译过来,这样普通人就可以阅读它,而不是让牧师告诉人们它的意思和它“正确的解释”。
Luka Raun
First off, the article presents far toorosy a picture of the Industrial Revolution, which in addition to its benefitscreated horrendous problems.
首先,这篇文章对工业革命的描述过于乐观,工业革命有好处但也造成了可怕的问题。
term_limits_please
The answer to the question at hand may befound in the answer to the following question: "Why did the UK lose worlddominance in the late 1800s onward?" The industrial revolution flourishedin the US, while stagnating in the UK. UK went from #1 world power to what itis today.
现在问题的答案可以在以下问题的答案中找到:“为什么英国在19世纪末以后失去了世界主导地位?”工业革命在美国蓬勃发展,而在英国却停滞不前。英国从世界第一大国走向今天。
I-270Exit1
I think I read this in The Rise and Fall ofthe Great Powers (1987).
我想我是在《大国的兴衰》(1987)中读到的。

Tungbo
It's certainly true that 'progress' doesnot equal happiness. OTOH, you cannot deny that most people today includingmost of the 'poor' have longer and healthier lives and that that we have themeans to feed ALL the population. (That some are still hungry are due topolitical and social factors.)
“进步”当然不等于幸福,OTOH,你不能否认,今天大多数人,包括大多数“穷人”,都有更长更健康的生活,我们有办法养活所有的人口。(有些人仍然生活在饥饿中是由于政治和社会的原因。)
brucehiggins1253
The author mentions Confucius but thendismisses his importance.
作者提到孔子,但却忽略了他的重要性。
Tungbo
Confucius developed his ideas during theWarring Period. In other words, it was before China was unified and manycountries were vying for power. At the same time, there were many other schoolscompeting for dominance in the Chinese culture at the time: legalists, taoist,etc. In fact, it was time of great foment and revolution in thoughts. Onlylater on under the patronage of a centralized emperor, did Confucius become thedominant cultural pattern.
We have a similar foment in thoughts duringthe turn of last century. With the challenge of western thoughts and the riseor Japan, China had many intellectuals calling for various modernizationstrategies. So this evolution of cultures and thoughts had ALREADY beenunderway for more than 100 years.
孔子在战国时期发展了他的思想。换句话说,这是在中国统一之前,许多国家在争夺权力。同时,当时中国文化中还有许多其他的流派在争夺统治地位:法家、道家等,事实上,这是思想百家争鸣的时期。后来,在皇帝的推崇下,儒家文化才成为主流的文化。
在上个世纪初,我们的思想也有类似的萌芽。随着西方思想的挑战和日本的崛起,中国有许多知识分子呼吁采取各种现代化战略。因此,这种文化和思想的进化已经进行了100多年。
minstrelmike
Culture might be a driving facto. And I doagree that competition with other tribes and countries is a cultural driver.
文化可能是一个驱动因素。我也同意与其他国家的竞争会是一种驱动力。
klinger1
One development not mentioned here was themovable press invented around 1450. Much harder to make that work for theChinese writing system then for the Latin alphabet. Therefore the Chinesemissed out on vast dissemination of knowledge Europe gained with printing, whenthe number of books in circulation increased by over a factor of 10 within acentury.
这里没有提到的一个发展是1450年左右发明的活动印刷术。在汉语系统和拉丁字母表中,要做到这一点就要困难得多。因此,相比欧洲,中国错过了通过印刷让知识广泛传播的机会,一个世纪的时间,欧洲的图书流通量增长了10多倍。

Glenn Galen
The fact that the industrial revolutionoccurred in England was due to fortunate geographic circumstances (theavailability of cheap coal in the right places) and the fact that Europeancountries had access to colonies, which China lacked.
英国发生工业革命的原因是因为优越的地理环境(在适当的地方可以买到廉价的煤炭),以及欧洲国家可以获得中国所缺少的殖民地来获取财富。
DaveoftheCoonties
Perhaps the different choice of techniquein printing. Although the Chinese had invented the printing press, commercialprinters preferred to use a more labour-intensive technology, woodblockprinting. Since the middle of the 15th century, Western Europe concentrated onmoveable type printing as the most important technology, which was a verycapital-intensive process, with high levels of labour productivity.
也许是因为印刷技术的不同。尽管中国人发明了印刷机,但商业印刷商更喜欢使用更劳动密集型的技术,木版印刷。自15世纪中叶以来,西欧把活字印刷作为最重要的技术,这是一个资本密集型的过程,劳动生产率高。
Ha Luu
Perhaps Chinese and European producers had,as in the case of the printing press, in principle access to the same relativelyadvanced technologies, but radically different relative prices induced them toselect different modes of production, resulting in the big gap in labourproductivity that can be observed in the 1820s.
也许中国和欧洲的生产商,就像印刷术一样,原则上获得了同样的相对先进的技术,但相对成本根本不同,促使他们选择了不同的生产方式,从而导致了19世纪20年代可以观察到的劳动生产率的巨大差距。
econundertow
The industrial revolution was a process ofmechanisation in which expensive labour was substituted for by machines drivenby coal – as Bob Allen (2009) has demonstrated. Chinese factor costs were notat all conducive to such a change.
工业革命是一个机械化的过程,在这个过程中,昂贵的劳动力被煤驱动的机器所取代——正如鲍勃•艾伦(2009)所说的那样。中国的成本因素不利于这种变化。
Thomas J Costagliola
Whereas entrepreneurs in Europe were veryeager to develop new technologies that increased labour productivity via thecapital-labour ratio, Chinese businesses barely had any incentive to do so.That the industrial revolution emerged in England was therefore not accidentalor the result of luck, but the long-run effect of its fundamentally differentfactor prices, reflecting its different economic and institutional trajectory.
尽管欧洲的企业家们非常渴望通过资本劳动率来开发提高劳动生产率的新技术,但中国几乎没有动力这么做。因此,英国发生工业革命不是偶然的,也不是运气使然的结果,而是其根本不同的成本关系的长期结果,反映了不同的经济和制度轨迹。
Victoria Stellar
British Emprie destroyed millions ofChinese... Horror and suffer for 100 years under anglo-saxon rule froze anyprogress.... And yes China invented all things 3000 years ago... the realproblem of Chinese, they are soft, kind and trust every monster from thewest...
英帝国毁灭了数百万的中国人…在盎格鲁-撒克逊的统治下,中国人的恐惧和痛苦长达100年,这期间所有的发展都被冻结了……是的,中国在3000年前发明了所有的东西…中国人真正的问题是,他们软弱、善良、信任来自西方的每一个怪物…
Arshyn Amantay
chinese is soft,but they aren't kind ortrust....
中国人很软弱,但他们不善良,也不随便信任……
Victoria Stellar
Cannibals in good costumes pretending theywere civilized were worst than stone age tribes...
穿着文明服装的食人族假装他们是文明人,但他们其实比石器时代的部落还要糟糕……

Commonsense25
What is not mentioned is the English gotthe idea of the corporation from others , put it into practice and used theresulting resources to make themselves rich first in trade and than inindustry. The idea of getting wealth from something other than land started alot early. That idea spread to everywhere else in europe and eventually aroundthe world as european power increased.
文章没有提到的是,英国人是从其他人那里学到了公司的概念,将其付诸实践,并利用由此产生的资源,使自己在贸易和工业上首先致富。从土地以外的地方获得财富的想法很早就开始了,随着欧洲实力的增强,这一想法传遍了欧洲其他地方,最终传遍了世界各地。
Zeyu
Manchu did change the structure of thestate, they did not dress like Chinese. They killed any Chinese who refused togive up their dressing style and hair style.
They weakened Chinese culture and Chinesepeople's cultural identity so much that most of modern Chinese do not know whattheir ancestors' life was like.
And of course, you might argue that just apiece of dress or lost some hair no big problem.
But please do not stop there and dig more,you will know how Manchu invasion and rule made it so difficult for Chinese toachieve what they could have achieved.
And I do apologize that I did not read therest of this article after read "They learned to speak Chinese, dress likeChinese and eat like Chinese." which sounds to me a humiliation towardsChinese culture.
满族确实改变了中国的国家结构,他们的穿着并不像汉族人。他们杀死了任何拒绝放弃自己的着装风格和发型的中国人。
他们削弱了中国文化和中国人民的文化认同,以至于大多数现代中国人不知道他们祖先的生活是什么样的。
当然,你可能会争辩说仅仅是一件衣服或是掉了一些头发没什么大问题。
我很抱歉,我在读了“他们学会了说汉语,穿得像汉族人,吃得像汉族人”之后就没有继续看了,这对我来说是对中国文化的耻辱。
Toan Luc
I totally agree with the author. It issomething that many others, myself included believe for years. Modern China forthe same reason will remain uncompetitive today and in the future. One historyfact, China's Ming dynasty had to hire a young chief architect Nguyen An fromanother country - Vietnam - as a much smaller country next door that China usedto look down as a vassal state to build its forbidden city: Why? probablybecause of new thinking brought in from this young chief architect. Thishistory was hidden for centuries until it was revealed by the Westernhistorians. The ancient Chinese did not like competition nor sharing knowledge:everything must be kept secret and the progress died with the inventors; and asa result, China could not progress like the West.
我完全同意作者的观点。很多其他人,包括我自己,多年来都相信这一点。出于同样的原因,现代中国在今天和未来仍将缺乏竞争力。一个历史事实是,中国的明朝不得不从另一个国家——越南(一个小得多的邻邦,中国曾经视其为一个附庸国)——请一个年轻的首席建筑师阮安来建造紫禁城:为什么呢?可能是因为这位年轻的首席建筑师带来了新的想法。这段历史被隐藏了几个世纪,直到西方历史学家发现这段历史。古代中国人不喜欢竞争,也不喜欢分享知识:一切都必须保密,进步与发明者一起消亡;结果,中国不能像西方那样进步。
istheotherjess
Nguyen An wasn't "hired from anothercountry"—he was a spoil of war, taken after the Ming conquest of Vietnam,and sent to Beijing to become a eunuch. Not the most glamourous start to life,but he ended up becoming a favourite of the Yongle Emperor, so I guess thatworked out for him, castration notwithstanding.
阮安不是“从另一个国家请来的”——他是战利品,在明朝征服越南后被抓走的,并被派到北京成为了一名太监。开局并不迷人,但他最终成为了永乐皇帝的宠儿,所以我想这对他来说也挺好,尽管他被阉割了。
Toan Luc
The fact that Nguyen An had been capturedduring a Ming invasion of VN does not change the fact that the Ming emperorcould not find other Chinese architects to handle this gigantic task despitethe vast population. Also I'm not surprised that the Chinese always bring upthe "eunuch" thing as something to be ashamed of. FYI, All theeunuchs were victims of tyrannical monarchs, emperors' cruelty in the ancienttime; no wonder the Chinese "moral" values are corrupted.
明朝入侵越南期间,阮安被俘虏,这一事实并没有改变明朝皇帝找不到其他中国建筑师来建造这一庞大都城的事实,尽管明朝人口众多。我也不奇怪中国人总是把“太监”这件事当作可耻的事来讲。仅供参考,所有的太监都是专z君主的牺牲品,古代帝王的残暴,难怪中国的“道德”价值观被破坏了。
Matthew Morgan
The industrial revolution didn't happen in'Europe', it happened in the United Kingdom. Failing to take any notice of thatsimple fact renders your whole article nonsense.
工业革命不是发生在“欧洲”,而是发生在英国。不注意这个简单的事实会使你的文章变得一文不值。
Yiling Tan
It is due to neo-Confucianism,isolationism, a super sense of cultural superiority that prevented China fromprogressing more and adapting new ideas from others. Once it learnt to overcomethose mental hurtles, its progress is startling to say the least.
正是由于儒家思想、闭关锁国主义和一种超然的文化优越感,中国无法取得更大的进步,也无法适应他人的新思想。一旦它克服了这些心理障碍,它的进步至少会是令人吃惊的。
RonnyRay
It's also startling how much technologythey steal from the West to get ahead...
同样令人吃惊的是,他们从西方窃取了多少技术来取得进步……

finleyd
Then why was Japan able to undertake itsIndustrial Revolution? Shogunate Japan had many of the same faults as imperialChina. But Japan was able to industrialize rapidly under Meiji.
为什么日本能够进行工业革命呢?幕府时期的日本和帝国时期的中国有许多相同的缺点。但日本在明治天皇统治下迅速实现了工业化。
justaguy22
Both Japan and China able to industrializerelatively rapidly, just at different points in time.
Is one factor in the relative timing thatthe US used weapons to open up Japan to westerners but not colonize the wayChina was partially colonized?
日本和中国在不同的时间点都实现相对快速的工业化。
是不是因为美国对日本的做法是使用武器强迫日本向西方开放,但是对中国却采取不一样的半殖民政策?
minstrelmike
Perhaps one of the differnces between Chinaand Japan is the competition the author was talking about. Japan never seemedunified the way China was (there are still important tribal differnces inJapan), and once they were unified, the national government was still worriedabout foreign invaders. They knew China was big enough to invade.
也许中国和日本的区别就是作者所说的竞争性。日本似乎从未像中国那样统一过(日本仍然存在着极大的族群差异),就算他们统一了,当权者仍然担心外国的侵略者,他们知道中国强大到足以入侵日本。
Tungbo
Japan had unified language a commondominant culture except for some outer islands.
除一些外岛外,日本有着统一的语言和共同的主导文化。