12. The Problem of China in the Study of the History of Korean Science

Due to the Chinese origin of many ideas and artifacts of traditional Korean science, and the overwhelming Chinese influence on its development, the history of Korean science suffers from a kind of identity crisis, based on the issue of whether traditional Korean science should be considered simply a part of Chinese science. This chapter discusses the following questions: What roles and meanings should be assigned to such ideas and techniques in the history of Korean science? Would it be reasonable, or permissible, for a historian of Korean science to neglect them and to study only what is uniquely Korean? The Chinese dominance in East Asian science was absolute. Due to this absolute supremacy, the Chinese centrality was accepted by people living at the peripheries of the Chinese cultural world. This is best illustrated by the acceptance, among eighteenth-century Koreans, of the so-called theory of 'the Chinese origin of Western learning'.Keywords: China; Chinese origin of Western learning; Chinese science; culture; East Asian science; Korean Science