著者

Mai SUGIMOTO

出版者

The History of Science Society of Japan

雑誌

Historia Scientiarum. Second Series: International Journal of the History of Science Society of Japan (ISSN:02854821)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.31, no.3, pp.208-223, 2022-03-31 (Released:2023-02-01)

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This paper describes the introduction of general education within higher education as part of the US-led education reform after World War II (WWII) and analyzes how it led to the justification of the history of science education. After a brief description of the state of research and education pertaining to the history of science in Japan before WWII, this paper reviews the process of the introduction of general education as part of Japan's education reform under the US occupation policy. In this process, the “case history” method proposed by James B. Conant was frequently referred to, and Sidney J. French, a US researcher who had discussed general education at the History of Science Society, was invited to Japan as a lecturer for the Institute for Educational Leadership. Further, Bun'ichi Tamamushi, one of the founders of the History of Science Society of Japan (HSSJ), visited the US and played a key role in implementing the history of science subject in general education, and people involved in the HSSJ took advantage of this situation to promote this discipline. These events legitimized the history of science education in universities.

著者

OKI Sayaka

出版者

日本科学史学会

雑誌

Historia scientiarum. Second series (ISSN:02854821)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.23, no.2, pp.82-91, 2013-12-31

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The term 'mixed mathematics' originally derived from the Aristotelian framework of sciences in which mathematics treated abstract entities and could be 'mixed' with sensible properties in varying proportions. Its history is deeply concerned with major events in history of science: the mathematicians' manifesto on mathesis universalis at the end of the sixteenth century, the impact of Newtonian sciences at the end of the seventeenth century and the development of algebraic analysis in continental Europe in the latter half of the eighteenth century. The first two contributed to extending the scope of mathematics to the cognitive territory of the natural philosophers, and the third encouraged the further enlargement of its scope to the fields of engineering and even those of social human activities such as economics and demographics. It was at the beginning of the nineteenth century that the notion of 'mixed mathematics' gradually disappeared and was replaced by a set of modern terminologies.

著者

METAILIE Georges

出版者

日本科学史学会

雑誌

Historia scientiarum. Second series : international journal of the History of Science Society of Japan (ISSN:02854821)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.11, no.3, pp.205-217, 2002-03-31

参考文献数

42

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Prior to the eighteeth-century, a similar approach towards the vegetable kingdom, mainly influenced by the tradition of the Chinese pharmacopoeias, could be observed in China and Japan. During the eighteenth-century, the interest for <<Dutch learning>> led some Japanese physicians and interpreters to be more and more interested in Western knowledge about medicinal plants. At the beginning of the nineteenth-century, a few scholars, through direct contact with foreigners or with foreign books, realised that there was a specific scientific field called <<botany>> and began to introduce the Japanese sholarly community to this new science which became one of the subjects taught at the <<University of Tokyo>> in 1877. In China, up to the middle of the nineteenth-century, no trace of modern botany can be found in any published document. In the second half ot the century, a few botanical treatises were published, all being adaptations or translations of Western books, does by foreign-Chinese teams of translators. This situation began to change when Chinese students had the opportunity to go and study abroad, mainly to Japan, at the beginning of the twentieth-century, and, actually, it is between 20 and 30 years later that botany became a real scientific practise in China. We will analyse these two processes, their specificities and their interactions.

著者

NAKAO Maika

出版者

日本科学史学会

雑誌

Historia scientiarum. Second series : international journal of the History of Science Society of Japan (ISSN:02854821)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.19, no.2, pp.119-131, 2009-12-19

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This paper traces the roots of the image of the atomic bomb in Japan by investigating the various discourses on atomic energy and atomic weapons in Japanese literature prior to the bombing of Hiroshima in August 1945. Japan is a country that suffered an atomic attack and, at the same time, one of the countries that was engaged in atomic weapons research during the Second World War. During the war, the discourses on atomic weapons were not limited to the military or scientific communities, but included the general public, thus facilitating the creation of a shared image of the atomic bomb as an ultimate weapon. This paper examines how this image was created. This special issue deals with the comparison among different countries, but the purpose of my paper is to deepen this subject by illustrating the differences within a single country in different periods. This research aims to extend the historical perspective concerning the atomic bomb in Japan, and offers another way of looking at this both historical and contemporary issue.

著者

Daisuke KONAGAYA

出版者

The History of Science Society of Japan

雑誌

Historia Scientiarum. Second Series: International Journal of the History of Science Society of Japan (ISSN:02854821)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.29, no.3, pp.280-299, 2020-03-31 (Released:2022-03-25)

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Werner K. Heisenberg toured the United States from March to August 1929 and Japan, together with Paul A. M. Dirac, from August to September 1929. In Japan, they gave several impressive lectures on quantum theory, mainly at Tokyo Imperial University and the Institute of Physical and Chemical Research in Tokyo. Though it is well-known that their lectures "stimulated the minds of young Japanese physicists" at that time, this paper treats Heisenberg and Dirac's visit to Kyoto and their Kyoto lectures. The Kyoto lectures are mostly overlooked in the history of science because the event was smaller than Tokyo's, and it was likely that the Kyoto lectures were simply selected from several lectures held in Tokyo. However, young physicists, including Hideki Yukawa and Yoichi Uchida, attended the event in Kyoto, and they had the opportunity to consider each important theoretical topic covered in the lectures. This paper presents the details of their visit to Kyoto together with the itinerary of their travel in Japan; it focuses particularly on Heisenberg's Kyoto lecture and its stimulation of future generations of Japanese scientists.

著者

Jimmy AAMES

出版者

The History of Science Society of Japan

雑誌

Historia Scientiarum. Second Series: International Journal of the History of Science Society of Japan (ISSN:02854821)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.31, no.1, pp.72-86, 2021-08-31 (Released:2023-02-01)

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This paper traces the development of Newton's theory of “fits,” designed primarily as an explanation of the phenomenon of periodic rings created by light, and developed in Bk. II of his Opticks. We can recognize three distinct stages in the development of Newton's explanation of this phenomenon: the aethereal vibration hypothesis, the corpuscular vibration hypothesis, and the theory of fits. My aim is to show what led Newton through these successive explanations, and why he ultimately settled on the theory of fits in the Opticks. Alan Shapiro has argued that Newton avoided committing himself to the corpuscular vibration hypothesis in the Opticks because of his methodological precept of abstaining from hypotheses that lack sufficient demonstration. In addition, I highlight Newton's observations concerning the partial reflection of light and his experiments involving thick glass plates, which may provide a further reason why he avoided committing himself to the corpuscular vibration hypothesis.

著者

KIM Dong-Won

出版者

日本科学史学会

雑誌

Historia scientiarum. Second series : international journal of the History of Science Society of Japan (ISSN:02854821)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.19, no.2, pp.105-118, 2009-12-31

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Two atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 brought the unexpected liberation of Korea from the 35-year Japanese occupation. Koreans therefore had a very favorable and positive image of the nuclear bomb and nuclear energy from the beginning. The image of the nuclear bomb as "savior" was strengthened during the Korean War when the United States openly mentioned the possible use of the nuclear bomb against North Korean and Chinese military. After the end of the Korean War in July 1953 South Koreans strongly supported the development of the nuclear bomb in order to deter another North Korean invasion. When the US government provided South Korea with a research nuclear reactor in the late 1950s, most South Koreans hailed it as the first step to developing their own nuclear bomb. This paper will analyze how and why the savior image of the nuclear bomb originated and spread in Korea during the 1950s.

著者

SUGIMOTO Mai

出版者

日本科学史学会

雑誌

Historia scientiarum. Second series : international journal of the History of Science Society of Japan (ISSN:02854821)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.23, no.1, pp.1-23, 2013-07-31

参考文献数

5

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This paper explores how Edmund C. Berkeley tried to instruct and popularize high-speed computers in the 1940s and 1950s and how Berkeley emphasized the connection between computers and symbolic logic. Berkeley strengthened his conviction in the significance of symbolic logic and Boolean algebra before his graduation from Harvard University and maintained this conviction for more than 30 years. Berkeley published books and articles, including Giant Brains, and sold electrical toy kits by which yound boys could learn electrical circuits and their logical implications. The target audience of Berkeley covered wide range of people including those who were not making computers but were interested in using them, that is, amateur adults technology enthusiasts who enjoyed tinkering with technology or reading about science and technology, and young students. In these projects Berkeley used Shannon's paper of 1938, "A symbolic analysis of relay and switching circuits" as a theoretical basis of his conviction. Design of these kits was fine-tuned by Claude E. Shannon.

著者

DHOMBRES J.

出版者

日本科学史学会

雑誌

Historia scientiarum : international journal of the History of Science Society of Japan (ISSN:02854821)

巻号頁・発行日

no.28, pp.91-137, 1985-03-25

著者

MATSUNAGA Toshio

出版者

日本科学史学会

雑誌

Historia scientiarum. Second series : international journal of the History of Science Society of Japan (ISSN:02854821)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.11, no.3, pp.218-225, 2002-03-30

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In Japan, evolutionism became popular towards the end of nineteenth century. Mendelism became popular around 1920. Mendelian genetics has become one of the important branches of Japanese biology. But evolutionism did not become an academic subject among Japanese biological researchers. Popularization of Mendelism had not changed this state of evoutionism in Japan. In this report I will describe mainly the state of evolutionism in Japan untill the 1920s, and comment briefly on the state of evolutionism arter that.

著者

SHEYNIN Oscar

出版者

日本科学史学会

雑誌

Historia scientiarum. Second series : international journal of the History of Science Society of Japan (ISSN:02854821)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.11, no.2, pp.168-175, 2001-11-25

参考文献数

36

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I am dwelling on Bessel's indirect conflict with Gauss over the adjustment of triangulation, a subject overlooked by Biermann and other commentators, e.g., May. I begin by touching on Biermann's paper who discussed the relations between the two scholars and provide my own relevant material in §§3 and 4. I also have to explain the two main patterns of adjusting geodetic measurements (§2), and to formulate some conclusions and offer additional related considerations (§5). Finally, §6 is devoted to several new unexpected dramatis personae.

著者

KONAGAYA Daisuke

出版者

日本科学史学会

雑誌

Historia scientiarum. Second series : international journal of the History of Science Society of Japan (ISSN:02854821)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.12, no.1, pp.43-58, 2002-07-30

参考文献数

29

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Max Planck(1858-1947) introduced energy quanta into his radiation theory in December 1900. Energy quanta, together with Albert Einstein's theory of relativity, heralded the beginning of today's physics. Although Planck differed from Einstein in being a completely classical physicist, he successfully introduced this non-classical conception into his theory. Why was it that Planck had worked out it in his heat radiation theory? In order to approach this question, we will focus on the formulation of the "electromagnetic entropy" of a resonator in the theory and argue Planck's method of radiation theory had both inductive and deductive aspects. His method was inductive because he always defined the formula of entropy so that the experimentally confirmed spectral distribution law of radiation energy could be derived from it, and also deductive because he derived some important mathematical formulas from classical electromagnetic and thermodynamic theories. The method was different from those of other researchers on heat radiation at the time, those of not only theoretical but also experimental physicists. Planck did take the original theoretical induction of the entropy concept from experimental results and derive his radiation law. The present article first outlines the paper Planck presented on May 18, 1899, focusing on how he treated the entropy formula. It then reconsiders the origin of the formula for entropy as postulated in previous studies, concluding with a discussion of Planck's radiation research method and its historical significance.