On February 8 and 15, 2012, the second quarterly seminar of the China Department of the Institute of International Relations of the Russian Academy of Sciences "China and the World: Traditions and Modernity"was held. The seminar was attended by about 30 people representing various departments of the Institute of Information Technology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, as well as the Higher School of Economics and the Institute of Asian and African Countries of Moscow State University.

On February 8, the seminar session was opened with a welcoming speech by A. I. Kobzev (IB RAS). He congratulated Z. D. Katkova on her anniversary, who with her many years of work prepared the revival of scientific work in the Department of China, which we are seeing now.

L. S. Vasiliev (National Research University Higher School of Economics) made a report "On the problems facing humanity", noting that he started his scientific career as a Sinologist, but now his interests are much broader and do not fully fit into the concept of"Orientalist". His interest in world history in all its breadth makes him pay attention to the global problems of humanity both in the past and in the future.

During the twentieth century, humanity has increased fourfold, mainly at the expense of the poorest and most backward countries. The world developed very vigorously in the process of Westernization - it was from the West that technologies and developments came that led to an increase in the quality and duration of life in the East.

There are many criteria that allow us to confidently distinguish cultures with an early Eastern type of society (from China to tropical Africa, as well as aboriginal cultures of Australia and the Far North) and the West - the Greco-Roman and Western European civilization that arose on its basis. Only in the West, in the ancient polis, society was able to formulate such concepts as freedom and individual rights, an independent court, the responsibility of the authorities, and civil society.

Five centuries ago, colonization was carried out by Spain and Portugal - the most backward Catholic countries in Europe, and then thanks to the efforts of Protestant England and Holland. This was already a real, planned colonization. Since the 15th century, a vigorous process of Westernization of the world begins. All peoples who do not belong to Western civilization began to actively develop Western ideas, institutions, and technologies. Moreover, it was technology that had a particularly big impact on Eastern society.

The process of Westernization was not easy, painful, it dragged on for generations, much of it caused resistance from traditional society. The eastern markets were visited by the western ones.-

vars, which for a long time coexisted with traditional production, but gradually replaced its products. At first, Western goods began to seem acceptable, then their use became the norm, and finally a necessity.

As a result, the entire non-Western world began to live better. Previously, it was considered that colonization is evil, but, according to L. S. Vasiliev, it is a huge good and boon. Due to colonization in the East, living standards have dramatically increased, which led to an increase in the population. The demographic superiority of the East over the West is largely based on this.

Islam entered the world stage rather late as a real force. At the same time, it has a lot of advantages, especially in poor countries, as it provides new converts with a fairly developed social assistance system. There is no hereditary aristocracy in the Islamic structure of society, power belongs to successful military leaders and ulema, which also appeals to many in the East. In addition, Islam is quite simple to understand, its precepts are not too difficult to follow, which, for example, allowed this religion to quickly achieve huge success in Tropical Africa. Islamic countries have an incredibly high "happiness index". As a result, by 2050 or even earlier, Muslims will make up 30% of humanity.

So, what are the challenges facing humanity? First of all, it is Islamism. It is impossible to defeat it, and it is unlikely that it will come to naught on its own. The number of poor people is growing rapidly due to the demographic growth of developing countries. We can see from the example of many countries, especially in Tropical Africa, that these countries are not able to feed their rapidly growing populations on their own. Now they are being fed by the West, as it is the West that is responsible for demographic growth and rapidly increasing poverty in these countries. The West understands that it is "responsible for those whom it has tamed", and tries to help these countries, accepts migrants, which, by the way, strengthens the position of right-wing radicals in the West, which can also lead to extremely unpleasant consequences.

The world is dysfunctional. The West is rapidly aging, reproducing itself largely at the expense of migrants, but so far they are not able to completely replace Europeans, since on average they work much less efficiently. Will he be able to feed Tropical Africa in a few decades if he does not have enough funds to support his own elderly and sick? In addition, people in developing countries, having tasted the fruits of Westernization, are no longer satisfied with a piece of bread, like their ancestors - they need good salaries, cars, expensive equipment.

Many demographers argue that population growth in developing countries will soon decline, and people there, like Westerners, will give birth less. They won't. The East is fundamentally different from the West, since it is not production that is important to it, but reproduction. Representatives of Eastern civilizations will not become the same as Europeans. At the same time, over the past 120 years, the world's population has doubled every 30-35 years. It seems that this problem does not have a painless solution.

What are the adverse scenarios? Evolution moves forward along the main lines, the rest either adapt to them or die. The basic laws of nature are natural selection and the struggle for existence, and it is she who may have the final say. Nature - not alive, but also not lifeless-like Cerberus, keeps order. Nature monitors what is happening on Earth and intervenes in these processes, and we see how much more natural disasters and cataclysms have recently begun to occur, claiming thousands of lives. Perhaps we will see new epidemics, perhaps the reproductive capabilities of all or part of humanity will decrease. Finally, the growing Islamist factor is not encouraging, especially when many countries around the world have nuclear weapons. It is unlikely that humanity will live in prosperity for at least a hundred years.

For us, of course, the most important thing is what will happen to Russia. The chances are there, but, like all of humanity, they are small. This is compounded by the fact that, despite the revival of recent months, there is no civil society in Russia. We have an extremely low "happiness index". In China, where there is also no civil society, the "happiness index" is very high, higher than that of other Eastern nations, and this gives them a chance. L. S. Vasiliev sees the reason for this situation in Confucianism, which has made a huge contribution to the history of the entire region, it has a huge ability to influence other cultures.

The report aroused great interest of the audience. A. I. Kobzev asked the speaker if the scheme proposed by him was too rough. Can modernization be explained only by Westernization? After all, according to J. R. R. Tolkien, According to Needham, out of the 40 most important inventions of mankind, 32 were made

in China and only 4 in the West? L. S. Vasiliev replied that, with a few exceptions, inventions made in China did not go beyond its borders. The Chinese themselves usually did not attach much importance to these inventions, and this is their fundamental difference from the West, where everything invented was developed. Therefore, Chinese inventions did not change the structure of civilization and society. In general, all participants in the discussion agreed that the report is extremely interesting, although it goes not only beyond the limits of Oriental studies, but also beyond the limits of historical science in general: it touches on the main issues of human existence, which is rarely found now at scientific conferences.

The report of M. V. Korolkov (Institute of Internal Affairs of the Russian Academy of Sciences) analyzed the procedure of judicial interrogation, as it is covered in legal documents written on bamboo slats and related to the Qin era (221-207 AD). Early Han (206 BC - 9 AD) - the time of the formation of the ancient Chinese Empire. These texts were discovered in the 1970s and 1980s as a result of archaeological excavations of burials of provincial officials conducted in Hubei Province. The report stated that during the interrogation procedure, the interrogated enjoyed a number of rights, which are characterized by modern sociologists as "process control", and that the use of judicial torture was strictly limited by law. Violation of these restrictions could and did lead to the punishment of the guilty judicial officials. These features of judicial interrogation are interpreted in the context of imperial construction as one of the strategies aimed at creating among the mass of subjects of the new state ideas of justice directly related to the imperial center and its institutions, and not with alternative agents of social justice, such as kinship and community structures and old polities destroyed during the Qin and Han conquests.. Interrogators were allowed to defend themselves without interference, as long as their arguments were based on the legal norms established by the Imperial Government. Through the introduction of a universal model of judicial argumentation, Qin and Han legislators sought to determine the forms and direction of public discourse on justice. The law in this situation was the most visible embodiment of the state, its materialization in the life of the general population.

The report sparked a lively discussion, during which the speaker noted that perhaps in China the first laws in which the term fa  was used were the so-called jun-fa   , which are quite numerous texts in Ancient China,

A. I. Kobzev noted that this is very different from the West, where the word "law" was primarily associated with the Law of God.

The message of G. A. Grebnev (ISAA) was devoted to the ancient Chinese calendar. The traditional Chinese calendar system is quite complex, and in addition to the lunisolar component associated with dividing the year into 12-13 months, there is a component based on the visible movement of the sun in the celestial sphere. It is associated with the division of the year into 24 seasons of jietsi  and 72 minor seasons of hou , while each of the 24 jietsi includes three hou.

A curious feature of the 72 Hou system is that each of these small seasons is correlated with one or another recurring seasonal phenomenon (the beginning of pheasant flow, the onset of rainy season, the solidification of the ice cover on water bodies, etc.). Together, the seasonal phenomena reflected in the traditional calendar create a fairly detailed picture of the environment. However, does this picture correspond to reality, and if so, to what time and region it could be correlated?

In answering this question, we should pay attention to the textual sources from which the 72 howe system is derived. In its current version, approved in 520 AD, it is based on the contents of the First-second centuries AD chapter "Shi Yeyun" ("Interpretation of seasonal [phenomena]"). from the collection "Yi Zhou shu" ("Zhou's Left Notes"). If we compare the contents of the Shi Yeyun with the earlier calendar text Yue Ling ("Monthly Orders", circa IV-III centuries AD), we will see that 100% of the information about seasonal phenomena in the Shi Yeyun is borrowed from this earlier text, while the sequence of seasonal phenomena is preserved, but their specific dates are practically invented anew. This is due to the fact that in the" Yue Ling " most descriptions of seasonal phenomena are given in groups of 2-5 phenomena, which are correlated with 12 months, two equinoxes and two solstices. The compilers of Shi Yeyun needed to adapt these descriptions to the new system that divides the year into 72 equal five-day segments, and this adaptation was carried out

it is completely mechanical, so it is not necessary to talk about the correspondence of the 72 Howe system to the real picture of seasonal natural phenomena. The most obvious example is how the description of the first spring thunderstorm from Yue Ling was perceived in the text "Shi Xun". In the original text of the Yue Ling, this description is as follows: lei nai fa sheng, shi dian  ("Then the thunder speaks, and lightning begins to [appear]"). In the Shi Xun text, it splits into two separate hou, separated by a five-day interval: lei nai fa sheng, yu wu zhi shi dian  ("Then the thunder speaks. After five days, lightning starts to appear.") This led to an absurd situation: the first thunder, according to "Shi Xun", is heard five days earlier than the first lightning.

But the text "Yue Ling", if you look at it more closely, raises suspicions of artificiality. The authors of the text seem to have sought to reflect their own ideas about the order of seasonal phenomena rather than the actual picture observed in nature. This can be seen in several seasonal events. Thus, according to the Yue Ling, the antlers of various species of deer are shed during the winter and summer solstices. Indeed, as noted in special works, David's deer can often be observed without horns at the end of December. But the problem is that none of the known species is characterized by shedding horns at the end of June - it occurs several months earlier, and until mid-summer it is done only by individuals of certain age groups, and even then only in those regions where they receive relatively little sunlight (the north-eastern provinces of China). Obviously, for the compilers of the Yue Ling, the impressive but, alas, imaginary correspondence between the turn in the sun's movement and the dropping of antlers by deer was more important than reality.

Another example is the presence in the text" Yue Ling " of a group of seasonal phenomena associated with the first month after the winter solstice, which indicate the revival of nature (pheasants tokuyut, geese return to the north, etc.). But these phenomena are observed one and a half to two months later, and we can only conclude that the compilers of " Yue Ling "were important to show how nature revives immediately after the sun turns"for the summer". Perhaps they deliberately introduced distortions into the material of an earlier local calendar, correcting the actual natural reality for an idealized one. But it is also likely that they could not quite honestly imagine that reality might not correspond to their book ideas.

Thus, not only "Shi Xun", the direct source of the 72 hou system is artificial - signs of artificiality are also present in" Yue Ling", on which" Shi Xun " is based. However, all this did not prevent the 72 Hou system from firmly establishing itself in the Chinese calendar, and the fictional picture of nature recorded in this calendar often continues to be perceived as an accurate record of observations made long ago by the ancients.

During the discussion of the report, the speaker was asked whether the discrepancy between the actual dates of natural phenomena and the source data noted by him could be explained by the fact that the authors did not describe the middle Yellow River region, but a different climate zone. G. A. Grebnev replied that this is extremely unlikely - the whole set of animals and plants mentioned in Shi Xiong is characteristic of the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River, and all these species are not present in any other region. Thus, there is only one possible explanation for such inconsistencies: the text was written by scribes who were relatively unfamiliar with natural phenomena, but who relied on the written tradition and wanted to "fit" the result to the prevailing natural philosophical concepts at that time.

Vladimir Golovachev (IB RAS) spoke about the international sinological forum "Chinese Studies in the International Perspective: Past and Present", held in Beijing on October 31-November 1, 2011.*

The second quarterly seminar of the China Department was held in an atmosphere of intense friendly scientific communication, and all participants noted that the chosen format allows discussing a wide range of issues, and without the rush typical of larger scientific conferences, which has its positive aspects.

* An overview of this conference is published in this issue.

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