Yuri had already seen Xiao Xuanye's plan, which was to let him avoid those intertwined contradictions, and it was best to get straight to the point. So, he no longer paid attention to Zhu Changzuo's self-righteousness, but laid it out according to his own ideas.

"What Lord Belle and Lord Zhu said is reasonable, after all, people can't transcend things, let alone leave this world and look at the world world. But in terms of way of thinking, the ancient Greek philosophers did exactly that. Archimedes famously said: Give me a fulcrum, and I can pry up the earth, which is indeed a vivid portrayal of 'the separation of heaven and man'! ”

As soon as Yuri's words came out, Hongyi, who was sitting on it, couldn't help but feel nervous - the earth, the earth! You said that the earth, this group of Confucian students has not turned the sky upside down? All they have to do is ask a single question that would turn today's popularization of scientific consciousness into an undisputed debate! For example: Earth as a ball? Is it round? Then how can we still stand on the earth, haven't we already fallen into the vast universe?

Yuri will inevitably be interrupted again! After this judgment, Hongyi was just about to come out of the "round field" again, but before he had time to stretch his neck, it was too late - Du Duhu opened his mouth first.

"Hehe, 'fulcrum'? Is it possible that this Mr. 'Aki' wants to use the Moon Palace as a fulcrum? Ha Luha, no wonder the Westerners have always wanted to get a glimpse of the Moon Palace! Hehe. ”

As soon as Du Duhu said this, he laughed playfully with Zhu Changzuo.

This was completely unexpected. He originally wanted to come out to explain what the earth is, but he didn't expect that Du Duhu's focus was on the "fulcrum"! Could it be that his thinking is very advanced?

Just when Hongyi was stretching his neck and stunned, Du Duhu seemed to have discovered the doubts of the superiors. Laughing explained:

"Lord Youzong, you don't know. This ancient theory that the sky is round and the place is round has been adjusted to the Westerners, and it has become the earth and the sky, so there is the theory that the earth is the ball. That's why they sailed thousands of miles away, and thought they could go back all the way east, so there were so many sailors who died in vain at the mouth of fish and shrimp! ”

Du Duhu was criticizing the earth theory that had been proven by Magellan a long time ago, and Hongyi did not care, after all, China did not participate in the discovery of the New World in the Age of Discovery. Very few people in the country know about it. But how did Du Duhu know what the earth said?

"Earth—" Hongyi asked, pondering how to ask. Said to himself.

"Oh, my lord, in the early days of the Ming Dynasty, there was a man named Lixitai. It's the 'senior' of the morning soup and John Tang. Where he entered China back then. In the twelfth year of the late Ming Shenzong Wanli, he made his own "Atlas of All Nations" in Guangzhou. So he drew the vast land into a sphere, and the land floated on the surface of the ocean. Later, he went to Beijing to present a picture, and won the love of Mingshen Sect. He made it draw the "Kunyu Wanguo Complete Map", and recorded the details of the distant kingdoms on it. It is the origin of the word 'earth'. ”

Du Duhu thought that the little guy didn't know what the earth was, so he explained it in detail according to his own understanding.

"Oh! I see! Hongyi hurriedly made a sudden realization, and accepted it when he saw it.

In fact, the "Lixitai" mentioned by Du Duhu is the well-known "Matteo Ricci" and "Xitai" is his cousin. However, whether this "Kunyu Wanguo Quantu" was drawn by Matteo Ricci himself is actually controversial, and it even cites that Zheng He first discovered the American continent!

The reason why some scholars in later generations believe that the "Kunyu Wanguo Quantu" could not have been drawn by Matteo Ricci or Europeans at that time is first of all because Italy on the map does not have papal territories, there are no important place names of the Renaissance Tuscany and Florence, and the topography of Italy is not right. In fact, the map of Europe on the Kunyu Wanguo Quantu is what Europe was like before the Renaissance.

Secondly, according to legend, Matteo Ricci compiled this map of the world is based on the maps drawn by Ortilly, Mercator and others. In fact, Ortilly and Mercator's maps are simpler and more erroneous than the Kunyu Wanguo Map. In the 16th century, the Australian continent had not yet been discovered by Europeans, and the "Parrot Land" on the "Kunyu Wanguo Quantu" was actually Australia. The Kunyu Wanguo Quantu says that the land of the south, translated from Latin as Austris and English as Australia, is actually translated from Chinese. The four oceans are all represented on the map: the Atlantic Ocean, the Greater Eastern Ocean (i.e., the Pacific Ocean), the Lesser Western Ocean (i.e., the Indian Ocean), and the Ice Sea (i.e., the Arctic Ocean). There is no small Western Ocean on the Western map, because Europe is the center, and the small Western Ocean is in the East. The difference between the large and the small Western Oceans is evidence that the Chinese Zhilu Road has crossed the Atlantic Ocean and reached the Americas.

Third, the Chinese's own "Complete Map of Mountains and Seas and Public Opinions[1]" already has "Cangming Zong", that is, the Pacific Ocean that is now mistranslated, while the "Kunyu Wanguo Quantu" does not have "Cangming Zong", which proves that Matteo Ricci did not understand that this is the largest ocean. Although the shape of the continent and islands on the map is not correct, especially in the southern hemisphere, which is more different from the actual situation, it is basically complete in terms of the outline of the sea and land in the world. The geography of western North America was only known to Europeans in the nineteenth century, but it appeared on the maps of Europe in the sixteenth century, and the geographical names were wrong, but there is no way to explain them. These geographical accurately appear in the Chinese "Kunyu Wanguo Quantu", which proves that the Chinese arrived in western North America more than 200 years earlier than the West, and that the West copied China's geographical materials.

At the same time, there is a text above the location of Spain in the "Kunyu Wanguo Quantu": "(Europa) to China 80,000 miles, since ancient times, it has been connected for nearly 70 years. But the first official exchanges between China and Europe began in 1342-1347, when the pope sent 50 clergy to China during the Yuan Dynasty, more than 70 years later, during the Zheng He era. If Matteo Ricci drew a map brought by Europe at that time, Matteo Ricci went to Macao in 1582, and the map he brought was drawn about 1570, which is about 70 years, that is, around 1500-1530, when China was still in a strict "sea ban period", and there was no access to the West at all, and it was not until the first year of Longqing (1567) that the sea ban was partially lifted.

Based on this, scholars boldly conclude that this passage was not written by Matteo Ricci at all, but was annotated by a cartographer in the era of Zheng He. Matteo Ricci and his cartographers inadvertently left this section untouched, explicitly dating the map to the time of Zheng He.

According to the above calculations. The Kunyu Wanguo Quantu was written more than 70 years after China and Europe were connected, which should be around 1430. And the Europe on the map should be the map brought by the European popes when they sent envoys to China, so there are no Renaissance place names, and there are no papal territories, because the pope was in France at that time, not in Italy. There are a number of other circumstantial evidence that conclude that the date of the picture was not the time of Matteo Ricci. If this map is used as important evidence, we can overturn the classic theories of the three major world history, such as Columbus's discovery of the New World, Zheng He's end in East Africa, and Matteo Ricci's introduction to Western geography.

It's a pity that Hongyi has no one to use as an audience to show off at this time.

But. Hongyi did not regret this. On the contrary, after listening to Du Duhu's explanation of the earth, he was overjoyed. Since Du Duhu knew the "earth theory", at least in the more than half a century after Matteo Ricci entered China, in the dissolution of the scholar class and the Jesuit priests, many advanced ideas and theories in the West have more or less entered the field of vision of the Chinese. Believe it now or not. At least subtly there's going to be a subtle effect!

"I see! Hehe. Is the earth a ball? Hongyi asked with a smile.

"Ahh My lord, the sky is round and the earth is round, and the ancients are also! How can it be changed? You must not be fooled by those Westerners! Du Duhu was a little anxious.

"But did the Westerners drive a boat all the way east or west? Instead, they went around in a big circle and returned to their starting point? Hongyi's face was inquisitive.

"This ......" Du Duhu was naturally speechless.

"Back to the master, some Westerners have already done it." At this time, it was finally Yuri's turn to speak again, who was left on the sidelines.

"What? No way! Du Duhu was deeply skeptical.

"Master Du, there is indeed a man named Magellan, who began his voyage around the earth more than a hundred years ago. Although he died in a foreign land, his sailors accomplished this feat, and it took more than two years to circumnavigate the globe and return to the same place where they had set out in Europa! ”

"How can we prove anything about the roundness of the earth when we go back to the same place? Maybe it's just a spin around the horizon! After all, Zhu Changzuo is young and his mind is much more flexible, and he cross-examined.

"But Magellan and his entourage have always been moving in one direction!" Yuri couldn't stop laughing.

"One direction? Ha Luha, that's the direction he thought it was going. Perhaps your God has quietly manipulated the compass they put on, fearing that they will die in the belly of the fish! Zhu Changzuo ended the argument that had just begun by himself with an unsolvable question.

"My lord......" Yuri is really at a loss.

"Ha Lu Ha! Alright, folks, for now. One day, I, Xuan Ye, would like to be the first person to sail a boat to China, and see whether the earth is round or square! ”

Hongyi is also not interested in such pointless arguments. Before Magellan's voyage, wasn't Europe also arguing over the theory of the circle of the earth and the theory of the flatness of the earth[2], which began in ancient Greece? After 2,000 years, there was no result, but Magellan's success naturally fell into place!

Du Duhu and Zhu Changzuo had to shut up. The little guy's words actually sounded to them, saying: You haven't tried it yourself, how can you make up your mind? If you have the ability, you will take the risk of "burying yourself in the belly of the fish" to go to the sea and try it?

"Yuri, we're distancing. Let's talk about the differences between Chinese and Western perceptions of learning? "Hongyi once again wants to bring today's protracted learning back to the topic, so that it can be concluded.

"Huh!"

This time, Yuri finally made a brief "similarities and differences between Chinese and Western sciences" according to his own understanding without disturbing.

(Chapter to be continued)

"A limerick poem. Hidden Head

Reading literature and reading history is only a long breath

I was saying that there was an opportunity back then

The layout is a long-cherished wish

It's hard to come and go

Get up and spend a hundred years

Point out the suffering and diseases of the world

The edge of the town was razed to the sea

Wen'an Wuding tears of joy

[1] The Complete Map of Mountains and Seas is a map of the Sancai Tuhui written by Wang Qi and his son Wang Siyi of the Ming Dynasty. The map, which was edited in 1607 and published in 1609, is the second map of ancient China, second only to the Kunyu Wanguo Quantu.

[2] The "horizon theory" is a worldly view of the earth's surface, which holds that the surface of the earth is a plane, rather than a huge sphere. This view has been held by the vast majority of peoples since ancient times. It wasn't until the time of the Hellenistic Hellenistic era, about the 4th century BC, that many ancient Greek scholars began to use science (rather than religion or mythology) to discuss the shape of the earth. Later, Aristotle summarized 3 ways to prove that the earth is spherical:

1. The farther north you go, the higher the North Star; The further south you go, the lower the North Star becomes, and you can see some new stars that you won't see in the north.

2. For long-distance ships, the top of the mast is exposed first, and the hull is slowly exposed, and the whole ship can be seen only after the last day.

3. At the time of the lunar eclipse, the shape of the Earth cast onto the Moon is round.

Eratosthenes was the first to propose a formula to calculate the radius of the Earth, and although the results were very different from today's observations due to the limited accuracy of the observations at the time, it shows that the earth was already known to be spherical at that time. Since then, most Westerners have accepted that the earth is spherical, and Ptolemy's geocentric theory is based on the theory of the circle of the earth. In the Middle Ages, the Roman Church enshrined the geocentric theory as orthodoxy, which accelerated the spread of the geocentric theory. It was only in the era of the Great Geographical Discoveries that Magellan made a circumference around the earth, which directly proved the theory of the circle of the earth, and the theory of the horizon was completely proved wrong. However, in other parts of the world outside of Europe, until Westerners introduced the theory of the circle of the earth, except for the ancient Egyptian civilization and the Chinese civilization, including the Indian civilization, did not realize that the earth was spherical. (To be continued......)