Introduction to "Gewu Ji: From Abacus to Steam"
There was an explosion in the laboratory, and when applied physicist Shen Que opened his eyes, he was already in the fictional Dayong Dynasty. There is no system, no space, only a pair of eyes that can see through the principles of all things.
In this era where morality is valued over weaponry, he refuses to pretend to be a god or a ghost, nor does he disdain to just be a "miracle doctor" or a "strategist." He started by improving farm tools, making glass, and refining refined salt. He used logic and experimentation to gradually shake the edifice of empiricism that had lasted for thousands of years.
When Confucian scholars were still debating the true meaning of "investigating things to gain knowledge", he had already created a hydraulic forging hammer; while the Qin Tianjian was still using the armillary sphere to predict good and bad luck, he had already used steam engines to drive the gears of the industrial revolution.
Technology is power. What Shen Que brought not only gunpowder and steel, but also a subversive world view. The old aristocracy regarded him as a scourge, and the poor students regarded him as a beacon. The empire trembled violently in the throes of change.
From the abacus to the difference engine, from the inn to the telegraph network, what Shen indeed wanted to create was not the prosperity of a dynasty, but the cornerstone of a civilization.
This is a long game between rationality and ignorance, and it is also a long night in which modern people use science to re-light ancient civilizations.
