Europe vs rest of world in the Middle Ages

 

I don't much understand this reasoning, perikles. Whenever I try to explain Chinese history to people, I always begin by relating it to the west, saying Han China was to the East what the Roman Empire was for the West, laying the groundwork for high civilization spread throughout vast regions and affecting later civilizations who came after them in the same region or surrounding areas. Although the Romans borrowed much from the accomplishments of the earlier Greeks, the Roman Empire left the Middle Age European societies that came after them the groundwork for written law, urban development, sophisticated culture and governance, technological base for further achievements, etc., and Roman influence left permanent marks on territories outside of Europe as well.

 

The same principles mentioned above for the Roman Empire to later civilizations greatly parallels China's importance to early social, political, economic, martial, agricultural, literary, and philosophical development in nearly the whole of East Asia, spreading Chinese goods and ideas through land/maritime trade and conquest to foreign regions such as Korea, Japan, Vietnam, Central Asia, Inner Mongolia, Manchuria, etc. 

 

To say that European art is "more advanced" than Eastern art is a matter of subjectivity and largely one's own personal opinion, but it is rediculous to say that Western Art reached a more sophisticated level than Eastern Art. Do I even need to list all the examples (I will if you press me about that one, and I don't want to go on a rant, but I will if provoked)?

 

European armies of antiquity and the middle ages were superior to that of China's?  Dude, read a friggin history book. Seriously. I'd be glad to point you out to a few good ones.

 

It doesn't take a genius to figure out that by the 19th century Industrial Revolution, European powers were far more advanced in science and technology than China. However, China is not only the birthplace of many indigenous innovations and incredible inventions that helped shape their society and spread out to the Eurasian world, but China also underwent their own proto-Industrial Revolution during the Song Dynasty, from the 10th to 13th centuries, long before Europe would ever dream of producing goods on such a massive scale or monitoring an enormous economy on such a massive scale for that matter. In terms of mathematics, technology, and science, we see such figures as the mathematicians, scientists, and inventors Gan De, Liu Hui, Luoxia Hong, Zhang Heng, Tu Shih, Zu Chongzhi, Zu Geng (whose writing was a thousand and one hundred years before Bonaventura Cavalieri's), and with the earliest Chinese doctrines and lengthy treatises on math, science, and invention stemming back all the way to the Western Zhou period (1045 - 771 BC), and maybe even prior during the Shang (I'll get back to you on that one). The ancient Chinese were largely equal to their Hellenistic and Roman contemporaries in terms of mathematical, scientific, and technological innovation, and early on were experts of documenting herbal medicication for illnesses. 

 

And finally, we come to your listing of philosophy. This part of your post displays in a most comical/ironic fashion your complete ignorance of Chinese and East Asian history for that matter, and the importance of early Chinese philosophy, with its deep impact on the future generations of the Eastern World, not just China. In the same time frame and age of the Athenian Golden Age, the great Greek philosophers Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, the Chinese states under the weakening hegemony of the Zhou Dynasty were undgoing a widespread movement known as the One Hundred Schools of Thought, a movement sparked by figures who were concerned with the rising social ills that were harming the fabric of moral society and driving human beings to engage in what many considered futile and wasteful fulfillments of mindless warfare and trivial, materialistic, and petty pursuits that undermined the basic needs of the people and stability of the state. Let's look at some basic information about Chinese philosophers during the age before Jesus Christ (BC):

 

*Kong Fuzi (Latinized as "Confucius" by the Jesuit Matteo Ricci), a 6th to 5th century BC traveling philosopher who gathered many disciples (chronicling his life as well as the Spring and Autumn Annals). Kong Fuzi is the founder of Confucianism, a 2,500-year-old tradition of China, famous for the Golden Rule, "Is there is one word which may serve as a rule of practice for all of one�s life? Is not �reciprocity� such a word? What you do not want done to yourself, do not do unto others." In his philosophy he built a formal system of moral and ethical conduct within different levels of human social relations, such as ruler and ruled, friend to friend, father to son, husband to wife, etc. His movement was largely implemented into Chinese tradition once Emperor Wu (r.141 - 87 BC) of the Han Dynasty made it official that the Imperial Exams of drafting officials into the bureaucracy were to be designed emphasizing the Confucian Classics.
*Mengzi (Mencius), promoted early Humanism as an aspect within Confucian teaching, taught that all human beings were born with innate goodness and were corrupted by the ills of society; he also praised the well-field system of distributing private property to sharecroppers (in a system of 9 square girds, with the 9th square grid in the center being used to produce food for the government graneries in times of economic uncertainty and inflation of grain prices), and preached that any king who abused governance and the right of the people should be overthrown by the people, who would effectively revoke his right in the "Mandate of Heaven" Mencius once told a Warring States Era King these words of wisdom:

 

"Now when food meant for human beings is so plentiful as to be thrown to dogs and pigs, you fail to realize that it is time for garnering, and when men drop dead from starvation by the wayside, you fail to realize that it is time for distribution. When people die, you simply say, 'It is none of my doing. It is the fault of the Harvest.' In what way is that different from killing a man by running him through, while saying all the time, 'It is none of my doing. It is the fault of the weapon.' Stop putting the blame on the harvest and the people of the whole Empire will come to you," (Mencius, Book 1 Part A, 3).

 

*Xunzi, another Confucian follower who went against his contemporary Mengzi and said that all human beings were born wicked and evil, and thus it was society's job to maintain them and look after them by strict adherence to code of law. Han Feizi and Shang Yang would later develop his teachings to the harsh philosophy known as Legalism
*Mozi (Micius), founder of Mohism in the 5th century BC. His teaching was founded on the principle of universal love for all people, and that all were created equal by the will of heaven, and that the harmonious balance believed to encompass heaven should be set as the prime example for those on earth. Mozi taught that the material physical world of the human senses wer more important and valuable to understanding the world than relying on human imagination and internal logic, based on the capacities in our ability to form knowledge through abstract thought. He was often a critic of Kong Fuzi's ideas as being too elitist and noble-centric), he stressed principles of merit over heredity in governmental importance, and believed ancient rituals were a waste of time and weren't necessary in a more advanced, functioning society. Mozi aligned his philosophy to help the smaller, weaker states against the larger, more militaristic ones, believing warfare was a waste of time and state energy, in the end, bringing his philosophy on the brink of extinction (with Qin's infamous Burning of the Books in 213 BC) until it later blended with the ideas of Confucianism in the Han Dynasty.
*Laozi, founder of Daoism, emphasizing the natural course humans should follow, that human society was just a part of the fabric of the overall world and greater surrounding of nature, that people's lives were guided by natural elements that were largely out of their control, and responsible for the written classic known as the Tao Te Ching in the 6th century BC
*Sun Tzu, a 6th century government official from the State of Wu who wrote his famous Art of War on military tactition and treatise on ancient international diplomacy between neutral, rivaling, and allied states

Strike the enemy when he is in disorder.
Avoid the enemy when he is stronger.
If your opponent has a temper, irritate him.
If he is arrogant, encourage his egotism.
Attack the enemy when he is unprepared.

 

He who knows when he can fight and when he cannot will be victorious

He who understands how to fight in accordance with the strength of antagonistic forces will be victorious

He whose ranks are united in purpose will be victorious

He who is well prepared and lies in wait for an enemy who is not well prepared will be victorious

 

One defends when his strength is inadequate;
he attacks when it is abundant

 

When torrential water tosses boulders,
it is because of its momentum;
when the strike of a hawk breaks the body of its prey;
it is because of timing

 

*Shang Yang, a Qin-State reformer of Legalism, which was a harsh authoritarian philosophy stressing small rewards for merit and contribution to the state, larger rewards for greater and more frequent deeds done to support the state, and cruel and exacting punishments for crimes, transgressions, and failure to meet state quotas and expectations
*Other 100 Schools of Thought not yet listed: the Yin-Yang School, stressing the emphasis of natural forces causing natural events and influencing human relations, the School of Agriculture, promoting the knowledgee of agricultural processes and explaining agricultural methods and devices used to promote it, the School of Logicians, who much like the traveling sophists and philisophs of ancient Greece, traveled around and promoted the teachings of logic to come to mathematical certainties and understandings, and finally the School of Horizontal Alliance and the School of Vertical Alliance during the mid 3rd century BC, which supported either allying with the State of Qin to destroy the other states militarily, or allying with the other six Warring States left to oppose the behemoth military power that was Qin, who were quickly advancing in greater production of iron weaponry and driven by a harsh system of meritocracy to meet all goals and ends of the militarized state.
 

Eric   

 

Let's focus on painting, for instance.

 

Since 13th century (Giotto) Western art (re)discovered spatiality, with Renaissance (da Vinci) the painting becomes more "scientific" (Leonardo himself invoking geometry basic principles or some averages to correctly depict the human body proportions but also other bodies - animals, various objects, etc.). Without going at length (for now I think it's not necessary) on it, I'd say in the Early Modern Age, the so called "Classical" Europe, we find an impressive Western expressivity with no match in other corner of the world (at least until they made contacts with Western art).

 

It's a bit difficult to put it in a few number of words.

 

I am not specialist in Chinese art (not even in Western art, however I know much more about it), I've seen some paintings executed during Qing dinasty (some of the Eight Eccentrics, Shi Tao, and others whose names I don't remember right now). They certainly are art, some are masterpieces in their own way, the technique is admirable, I could even understand someone being impressed by this art. But they do not have that quasi-universable beauty, the volumes, the colors, the strong organic feelings the Western art is giving. Contemporary Western art is quasi-photographic, the symbolism (that to give the Chinese artists full trust in their artistic skills and capacities) does not mean simplistic or clumsy depiction, lacking volume or narrow ranges/depths of colors.

Western paintings can easily and eloquently represent a variety of emotions - one can feel the joy, the sorrow, the melancholy - from colors, attitudes, eyes, faces. Western portraits are not sketched like the contemporary Chinese ones. And it's not culture here, it's basic human psychology. 

I have yet to find a Chinese match of Caravaggio, Velazquez, Rembrandt or Goya to value Chinese art as much as I value Western one (and it's not only painting, it's also sculpture, music).