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I've never understood why people espouse China's "4000 year history". The government purged nearly all aspects of traditional Chinese society during the Cultura

by brbsix 6y ago

I've never understood why people espouse China's "4000 year history". The government purged nearly all aspects of traditional Chinese society during the Cultural Revolution. If you want to be reminded of China's history, you travel to Taiwan. Even practitioners of Chinese traditional medicine tend to study overseas in Japan.

free_rms 6y ago
This is incredibly inaccurate. You work in tech, right? Ever run this take by your Chinese coworkers? Ask them about their families' connection to Chinese tradition?
- khuey 6y ago
  That "X thousand years of history" is a myth Chinese people believe about themselves doesn't make it true or a useful way of understanding anything.
  - free_rms 6y ago
    It's... literally true, you can look up photos of turtle shells with characters etched into them on Wikipedia. That doesn't mean they're perfect or blessed but they've definitely been there the whole time.
    - khuey 6y ago
      Stonehenge is also between 4 and 5 thousand years old but it's not going to tell you anything about the mystical traditions of the people of the British Isles.
      - justinzollars 6y ago
        The difference between the West and China is that China has been able to maintain its civilization state and it has a continuous history. The West's history is discontinuous
        chillacy 6y ago
        I noticed that "maintaining civilizational state" is.. to be generous.. simply a state of narrative. The imperial system is definitely over, Xi wears a suit and tie and there are no legions of eunichs running the country. Though fun fact, Mussolini was pretty big on emphasizing the whole Italy == Rome deal. And in the US there's only maybe 300 years of serious history to cover so I recall my history class had to reach all the way back to Greece as an idealogical source of American democracy.
        divbzero 6y ago
        > China has been able to maintain its civilization state and it has a continuous history To check the validity of this statement while neutralizing my own bias, I watched the following video [1] which maps out China’s political borders year by year from 1600 BCE to 2017. Watching at 2x speed on mute took 4 minutes and was quite illuminating. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UWqVzZnwnOk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UWqVzZnwnOk "The History of China : Every Year"
        divbzero 6y ago
        This one takes 10 minutes at 2x speed and provides a global perspective. [2] [2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6Wu0Q7x5D0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6Wu0Q7x5D0 "The History of the World: Every Year"
        peteretep 6y ago
        > China has been able to maintain its civilization state and it has a continuous history I'm baffled by what this means. Could you compare it to the United Kingdom for me? Are you conflating written history with continuous history?
        yomly 6y ago
        While as an island the UK means its borders have mostly been fixed, it has definitely had quite a fluid culture and language history. The romans came and left their mark. Then the Vikings and the normans. We've had a strange love hate relationship with the French forever, branding them frogs while learning French so we can seem sophisticated. So in my mind it does lack that continuity that China has: For instance the sunzi bingfa (art of war) was written in 500BC and still is mostly understandable today. On the other hand if I were to drop a reference from Vergil or Homer in latin/greek. I would be branded of being in cahoots with Boris Johnson and very few people would understand it. Edit: And even that - I don't think Italians really would understand Latin texts (tho will have a better chance than brits). I think ancient greek is a little easier for modern greek speakers tho.
    - sebmellen 6y ago
      I'm half Basque. The Basques have been in Europe for 5,500+ years. There are plenty of loosely-defined cultures which are over 4,000 years old.
      - free_rms 6y ago
        If I recall correctly, Basques also have a history of reacting poorly when people try to deny their culture exists or eradicate it.
    - robjan 6y ago
      I'm not going to get into a debate, but Traditional Chinese characters are only really used in Hong Kong and Taiwan these days.
      - Al-Khwarizmi 6y ago
        Simplified Chinese characters are just that... simplified versions of the traditional characters. In fact, many don't change at all from the traditional version to the simplified version. It's a change, and one that history purists tend to not like, but definitely not a culture-breaking change or something that breaks links to the past. There are still a lot of ancient pictograms left in the simplified characters, a lot of connections to concepts, ideas and views from past millennia.
      - yomly 6y ago
        Plenty of mainlanders can read fanti FYI. Writing is harder as that requires active memory and practice but fanti is perfectly decipherable for a fluent mandarin speaker. And when in doubt using a dictionary is trivial. If the text is digital you can pretty much get a 1-1 mapping 99% of the time. Especially if it is putonghua (as opposed to dialect) Obviously something as big as the introduction of jianti is quite radical and will have downsides but it's really overplayed by armchair spectators. For a fluent speaker it is at most an inconvenience - like reading chaucer or shakespeare, except the grammar is exactly the same only the spelling differs.
        free_rms 6y ago
        And the ancient characters are different still, they're all wavy and it's a lot of guesswork for people who haven't specifically studied them. But it's clearly a continuous culture. We don't use a bunch of wacky f's in our writing anymore in America, doesn't mean we're not a continuous culture on our timeframe.
justicezyx 6y ago
> purged nearly all aspects of traditional Chinese society There has been multiple rounds of racial genocide in China's history, some by internal turmoil, and more by external invasion. Yet the Chinese culture survived. It might sounds incredible, but so many people in such a huge land, have its own life strength. If you think a political dictator can purge a nation's history tie, in 10 years, without actually killing all the people, then you are certainly underestimate Chinese people's strength and ernacity...

by brbsix 6y ago

free_rms 6y ago

This is incredibly inaccurate. You work in tech, right? Ever run this take by your Chinese coworkers? Ask them about their families' connection to Chinese tradition?

khuey 6y ago
That "X thousand years of history" is a myth Chinese people believe about themselves doesn't make it true or a useful way of understanding anything.
- free_rms 6y ago
  It's... literally true, you can look up photos of turtle shells with characters etched into them on Wikipedia. That doesn't mean they're perfect or blessed but they've definitely been there the whole time.
  - khuey 6y ago
    Stonehenge is also between 4 and 5 thousand years old but it's not going to tell you anything about the mystical traditions of the people of the British Isles.
    - justinzollars 6y ago
      The difference between the West and China is that China has been able to maintain its civilization state and it has a continuous history. The West's history is discontinuous
      - chillacy 6y ago
        I noticed that "maintaining civilizational state" is.. to be generous.. simply a state of narrative. The imperial system is definitely over, Xi wears a suit and tie and there are no legions of eunichs running the country. Though fun fact, Mussolini was pretty big on emphasizing the whole Italy == Rome deal. And in the US there's only maybe 300 years of serious history to cover so I recall my history class had to reach all the way back to Greece as an idealogical source of American democracy.
      - divbzero 6y ago
        > China has been able to maintain its civilization state and it has a continuous history To check the validity of this statement while neutralizing my own bias, I watched the following video [1] which maps out China’s political borders year by year from 1600 BCE to 2017. Watching at 2x speed on mute took 4 minutes and was quite illuminating. [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UWqVzZnwnOk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UWqVzZnwnOk "The History of China : Every Year"
        divbzero 6y ago
        This one takes 10 minutes at 2x speed and provides a global perspective. [2] [2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6Wu0Q7x5D0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6Wu0Q7x5D0 "The History of the World: Every Year"
      - peteretep 6y ago
        > China has been able to maintain its civilization state and it has a continuous history I'm baffled by what this means. Could you compare it to the United Kingdom for me? Are you conflating written history with continuous history?
        yomly 6y ago
        While as an island the UK means its borders have mostly been fixed, it has definitely had quite a fluid culture and language history. The romans came and left their mark. Then the Vikings and the normans. We've had a strange love hate relationship with the French forever, branding them frogs while learning French so we can seem sophisticated. So in my mind it does lack that continuity that China has: For instance the sunzi bingfa (art of war) was written in 500BC and still is mostly understandable today. On the other hand if I were to drop a reference from Vergil or Homer in latin/greek. I would be branded of being in cahoots with Boris Johnson and very few people would understand it. Edit: And even that - I don't think Italians really would understand Latin texts (tho will have a better chance than brits). I think ancient greek is a little easier for modern greek speakers tho.
  - sebmellen 6y ago
    I'm half Basque. The Basques have been in Europe for 5,500+ years. There are plenty of loosely-defined cultures which are over 4,000 years old.
    - free_rms 6y ago
      If I recall correctly, Basques also have a history of reacting poorly when people try to deny their culture exists or eradicate it.
  - robjan 6y ago
    I'm not going to get into a debate, but Traditional Chinese characters are only really used in Hong Kong and Taiwan these days.
    - Al-Khwarizmi 6y ago
      Simplified Chinese characters are just that... simplified versions of the traditional characters. In fact, many don't change at all from the traditional version to the simplified version. It's a change, and one that history purists tend to not like, but definitely not a culture-breaking change or something that breaks links to the past. There are still a lot of ancient pictograms left in the simplified characters, a lot of connections to concepts, ideas and views from past millennia.
    - yomly 6y ago
      Plenty of mainlanders can read fanti FYI. Writing is harder as that requires active memory and practice but fanti is perfectly decipherable for a fluent mandarin speaker. And when in doubt using a dictionary is trivial. If the text is digital you can pretty much get a 1-1 mapping 99% of the time. Especially if it is putonghua (as opposed to dialect) Obviously something as big as the introduction of jianti is quite radical and will have downsides but it's really overplayed by armchair spectators. For a fluent speaker it is at most an inconvenience - like reading chaucer or shakespeare, except the grammar is exactly the same only the spelling differs.
      - free_rms 6y ago
        And the ancient characters are different still, they're all wavy and it's a lot of guesswork for people who haven't specifically studied them. But it's clearly a continuous culture. We don't use a bunch of wacky f's in our writing anymore in America, doesn't mean we're not a continuous culture on our timeframe.

justicezyx 6y ago

> purged nearly all aspects of traditional Chinese society There has been multiple rounds of racial genocide in China's history, some by internal turmoil, and more by external invasion. Yet the Chinese culture survived. It might sounds incredible, but so many people in such a huge land, have its own life strength. If you think a political dictator can purge a nation's history tie, in 10 years, without actually killing all the people, then you are certainly underestimate Chinese people's strength and ernacity...