Blog New World
So the Chinese reckon they invented golf do they? Every so often they claim to have invented something 2000 years before the rest of us: This week it’s golf, last time it was football, then compass navigation, the Bessemer Converter and string and the only proof they ever show is a bunch of ancient Mandarins
Don’t get me wrong, the Chinese have an incredible history and developed many things whilst such as medicine, science, astronomy, trade, construction and so forth at a time when we in the West considered the bronze spear to be a cool thing. I’m not knocking the culture, but there’s something about China that reminds me of the kid at school who claimed to have done everything and seen everything to his classmates…you know the type.
“Yeah, I have all the set of Pokemon, and every X-Box game ever designed and my brother gets me all the movies BEFORE THEY’RE EVEN RELEASED! Yeah, been there, done that, more times than you.”
One day we’ll get a story on the news that goes like this: “Well, we’re very pleased to announce that we’ve discovered a radical new way stem cell research technique that will revolutionise treatment of many diseases…and it was done here, in Britain”
“Excuse me…but you’ll find we Chinese discovered this technique over 2500 years ago”
“Wait a minute, you need complex laboratories, computer mapping, an advanced knowledge of microbiology….”
“Yes…in this picture that was recently discovered in a shed, er, I mean Emperor’s tomb, you can clearly see courtiers using petrie dishes and a centrifuge.”
“Let’s have a closer look at that picture!”
“No, it is sacred Chinese text. Trust us, we invented it. We did. We invented everything ever and 500 years before Christ”
And that’s another thing; reporters always underscore the point by saying these things were happening or invented in China before Christ. Sorry, but since when was Christ an inventor? Is he the invention benchmark here?
“Ah, but didn’t he invent Christianity?” says smug person at the back there. No, he IS Christianity, died for our sins, son of God and all that but that doesn’t mean he was an inventor unless I’m missing something.
“And so, my disciples, I am the way, the truth, the light. Whoever believes in me shall have eternal life….now I’ve got to go and finish the designs for the pneumatic tyre. Patent office shuts at 5.”