Many people have not understood what the true contribution of Chinese technology to the world is?
If it weren’t for China, Europe would still be in the ignorant and backward Middle Ages.

Part One: Why was Europe foolish for 1000 years and at the mercy of the Church?

In 313 AD, the turbulent Roman Empire established Christianity as the state religion in order to ease class conflicts and unify consensus.
From then on, the whole of Europe prostrated itself at the feet of God, and the Bible became the highest ‘constitution’ of Europe.

Although Rome lasted for more than 100 years until 476 when it collapsed due to the invasion of barbarians and entered the dark Middle Ages that lasted for thousands of years, in fact, Europe had already begun a period of ignorance since Christianity became the state religion of Rome.
The development of technology has almost completely stagnated because science and the Bible are contradictory.
Not only has technology not developed, but any scientific research that dares to go against God’s will will will either result in scientists going to jail or being burned to death.

Universities originated in Europe in the 11th century, but at that time, universities had little practical use.
At that time, universities were all “seminaries” for the training of clergy members in the church. In the early days, four disciplines were established: literature, law, medicine, and theology;
Literature, law, and theology all serve the church, while medicine is nonsense because traditional Western medicine only harms people and does not save them. Regardless of the patient’s symptoms, Western medicine is always a three pronged approach: bloodletting, inducing vomiting, enema, and the number of deaths caused by “medical treatment” cannot be counted.
A bunch of kings and subsequent presidents were killed by Western medicine, such as Louis XV and Washington;
The authority of God is sacred and unchallenged, and secular monarchy must be sidelined.

Because the king can only kill civilians once, and he cannot put a knife around the neck of every civilian; But if you are unfaithful to God, once the judgment of the end comes, you will be sent to hell and suffer in hell forever.
So, what Europeans fear the most is God, constantly demonstrating their devotion to God.

And what does God want everyone to do, and how can we show loyalty to God?
How can God’s instructions be conveyed to everyone?
So, the power of the church is sacred and unchallenged, because the church represents God.
God’s thoughts and instructions are all conveyed by the church to the people of Europe.

In front of the church, the king trembles because if the church feels that the king is disobedient, it can expel the king from the church at any time. However, all of Europe is Christian, which is equivalent to having a non Christian become the king and a non party member become the general secretary of the Soviet Union, and they will be overthrown in minutes.
King Henry IV of Germany was excommunicated by the Pope for disrespecting him and became a heretic. He was dumbfounded and braved the wind and snow to come to the castle of Carnosha. He knelt down in tears for three days to admit his mistake, only to have the Pope retract his order.

It can be said that in the Middle Ages, the Pope was God, and God was the Pope;
The power of the Pope is far greater than that of the King. Pope Urban II led the entire Europe to launch nine consecutive attacks on the world of Mu Commander, and it can be said that no King could have such power.
The power of church law is boundless. When there is no money left, they will issue indulgences and tell Europeans that they have committed murder and arson? You’re going to hell, it’s okay. Come and buy my redemption voucher. If you buy it, God will forgive your sins and you can go to heaven;
Whoever doesn’t like it, call them heretics, such as the witch trials that lasted from 1480 to 1780 and swept across Europe for 300 years. The church takes a liking to that beautiful woman. If she doesn’t listen, she becomes a witch and is immediately beheaded and publicly displayed, or burned at the stake. There are too many unjust ghosts to count.

The power of the Pope is much greater than that of the emperors in China, and for almost 1000 years, no one dared to oppose or doubt it.
The reason why the Pope has been dominant for nearly 1000 years is largely due to the fact that almost 99% of Europeans are illiterate and cannot even write their own names, let alone read the Bible. Therefore, whatever the Church says is what it says, and what the Pope says is as unquestionable as the Bible.

Part 2: How expensive is past knowledge? Europeans’ lifelong savings cannot afford to buy a book;

This logic is that the Bible constrains Europe and is the fundamental law of Europe, and what the Pope says is the Bible.
99% of people are illiterate, while the remaining 1% are mostly members of the church, which monopolizes knowledge.
Why can the church monopolize knowledge?
Because knowledge is too expensive.

In the Middle Ages, the price of a book was much higher than that of a house today.
If you can have 100 books, you are definitely the richest man, aristocrat, capitalist
Because at that time, there were two types of paper in Europe, one called papyrus and the other called parchment.

Shacao paper is a handmade woven fabric made by cutting Egyptian specialty Shacao into long strips, pounding them, spreading them out, squeezing water, and bonding them together. After drying, it takes about 10 days to complete. You can understand it as a small grass mat.
At that time, papyrus was only available in Egypt and needed to be transported from Egypt to Europe. Once war broke out in the Mediterranean, it was impossible to find it. Moreover, papyrus paper appeared in Egypt and was suitable for storing in dry climates. The weather in Europe was often rainy and very humid, and it would easily fall apart.

And the papyrus cannot be folded, it will fall apart once folded This makes it impossible to bind and can only be placed one by one
Even so, papyrus is still a treasure in Europe. According to historians’ estimates, the current price of A4 sized papyrus, which has not been written, is equivalent to four days of output for European farmers at that time. In other words, European farmers could only buy seven sheets of paper after working for a month

Of course, Europe also has parchment, which is much better than papyrus. It can be bound, folded, and easily stored, but its price is even higher.
Don’t think that parchment paper is just a problem of waste sheep. One sheep can produce more than 20 sheets of parchment paper, and the production process is even more expensive than the cost of sheep.

The sheepskin peeled off by the butcher needs to be soaked in pure water for about 24 hours, and after cleaning thoroughly, it reaches the hair removal stage.
We need professional craftsmen and skills to allow sheepskin to naturally rot and wait for hair to fall off, which takes one to several months;
Of course, manual hair removal can also be done by soaking sheepskin in a mixture of lime and water for three to ten days.
After the hair is corroded, the masters will scoop it out and place it on a special scraper. Then, they will repeatedly scrape it with crescent shaped knives with wooden handles at both ends until the pink skin is exposed. After that, they will rinse the sorted fur with fresh water for about two days to complete the basic work.
Then we need to peel, air dry, and beat Stitching, basically can’t produce a few sheets of paper in a month.

So, even though the Pope has money, sometimes he can’t afford it, most of the church still uses papyrus.
But the Bible has a total of 1725 pages, not including appendices, which means European farmers have to work for 18 years to buy a book of the Bible.
Of course, parchment can also be used. A Bible requires 300 sheep to provide so much parchment
Europeans can say: I’ve been working for 18 years, but I still can’t afford a book

Part Three: How the Church monopolizes knowledge;

In fact, after working for 18 years, I really can’t afford to buy a book because I only bought the paper to make a book. Next, I have to transcribe the Bible onto paper.
But who copied it for you?
The literacy rate in Europe is only 1%, and many people only recognize their own names
A person who can read is either rich or noble, who will copy books for you?

If you hire an archer for 10 copper coins a day and a medieval scribe for at least 50 times the price.
Then, the copyist needs to copy on such valuable paper, so naturally they dare not be careless.
It usually takes two years to produce a complete Bible, and copyists work at their desks year-round to replicate it. It takes several hours just to depict the decorative letters on the book.

While working as a copyist, one will immediately develop late stage obsessive-compulsive disorder, requiring neat communication and fluent note taking. I also have to endure physical torture, with candlelight almost blinding my eyes, sitting for long periods of time causing my waist to protrude, my buttocks to become square, and staying up late until my liver explodes
They sit on chairs without backrests and work at least 8 hours a day.
Of course, why don’t they work 996? At that time, copyists were very expensive. If you asked someone to work 996, they would give you 996? Working for 8 hours a day has already done one’s utmost.

On average, 2-4 pages can be copied every day. Moreover, papyrus has no auxiliary lines, and the copyist standardizes the layout by making small holes with needles and scratching with a ruler.
Now, if you hire a copyist who is one in a million, and it takes two years to basically complete the Bible, Europeans can say: I’ve been working for 200 years, but still can’t afford to buy a book
So, naturally, Europeans had gold. At that time, the silk transported by Rome from China was equivalent to the same weight of gold. However, even if silk was used to make books, it would still take at least 2 years to transcribe a Bible

There is nothing more valuable than books.
A monastery with one to half books is already a treasure of the town.
In medieval Europe, it was possible to find few recognizable characters in entire towns and cities, so knowledge was completely monopolized by the church, which ultimately represented God.
Whoever doesn’t like you, call them heretics in the name of God;
If there’s no money left, issue indulgences in the name of God;

Europeans firmly believe that whatever the church says is true, because they have never seen the Bible and do not actually know what God is. They only know that if they do not listen to the church, they will fall into hell forever in the judgment of the end times.
The dark Middle Ages lasted for 1000 years. Originally, this history could have continued because as the top church, it wished that Europeans were as stupid as possible, knowing nothing, so that they could manipulate public opinion.

At that time, productivity in Europe was very low, and people’s cognitive level was almost non-existent. It was good enough for ordinary people to farm and fill their stomachs, so there was no need to worry about learning knowledge.
In Europe, there would not be a great educator like Confucius who advocated for education without discrimination, and no one would go to idle time to teach the people knowledge.

Part Four: How great is China’s paper-making technology?

However, history has ultimately changed.
If it weren’t for China, Europeans would still be in the Middle Ages.
400 years before entering the Middle Ages in Europe, the great scientist Cai Lun of the Eastern Han Dynasty actually invented papermaking.
In fact, Cai Lun not only invented papermaking, but also invented an efficient way of disseminating knowledge.

Because the characteristics of Chinese papermaking are:
Firstly, it is cheap;
Ten sheets of paper were converted into purchasing power in the late Eastern Han Dynasty, which is equivalent to the price of half a bowl of rice;
Equivalent to one ten thousandth of the cost in Europe;
Secondly, scale;
Cai Lun’s paper-making technique can be mass-produced in a semi industrial manner, and the materials used are simple. Plants and trees can be used as raw materials, and most parts of the world can produce them freely;
Thirdly, durability;
Can be folded and bound freely, not afraid of humid weather, easy to store;
These have fundamentally changed the world for the next 2000 years, revolutionizing the dissemination of knowledge.

Do you think Cai Lun’s paper-making technique is very simple, just soak the wood and grass and press them?
Too naive. If it’s that simple, why didn’t Europe and the Middle East come up with it? It wasn’t until almost 1000 years after China invented papermaking that Europeans were still using expensive and difficult to use papyrus paper?

Unfortunately, the Chinese are not as boastful as the Japanese. If they were Japanese, they would package this technology as “advanced plant fiber papermaking”.
In fact, even according to today’s scientific explanation, the description of Cai Lun’s papermaking technique should be:
After mechanical and chemical processing of plant fiber raw materials, pure dispersed plant fibers are obtained, which are mixed with water to form a slurry. The slurry flows through a porous mold curtain surface, and after filtering out the water, the fibers form a wet thin layer on the curtain surface. After drying, a fiber sheet with certain strength is obtained, which is formed by the hydrogen bonding of cellulose and is used for writing, printing, and packaging.

Cai Lun, after at least thousands of scientific practices, finally embarked on the path of papermaking, and it has been over 2000 years since the invention of papermaking by Cai Lun. The papermaking industry of human technology still follows this principle.
Note that China’s paper-making technology is based on fiber sheets!
The European papyrus is a hand woven fabric!

In fact, Cai Lun invented papermaking around the 1st century AD, and we have always kept the technology strictly confidential. Until the 12th century AD, Europeans did not invent such mass-produced papermaking, but it was eventually introduced from China.
It can be said that it is not because of China’s technology that Europe still lacks paper;
How was papermaking ultimately learned in Europe? When it comes to this topic, we have to mention a war – the Battle of Talas in 751 AD

This is the first official confrontation between the two great empires of Eastern and Western civilizations, the Tang Dynasty and the Arab Empire! It was also a turning point in the prosperous era of the Tang Dynasty, from which its expansion reached its limit and began to trend towards conservatism, because the technology of agricultural civilization could no longer support the unlimited territory of the empire.
At that time, the border of the Tang Dynasty had already reached Afghanistan, adjacent to the Arab world.
Gao Xianzhi’s army was a coalition of over 20000 Tang soldiers and over 40000 local Hu tribes; The Arab Empire’s army consisted of 50000 domestic soldiers and 50000 mercenaries.

At this time, the Tang army was already thousands of miles away from the center of the empire, and there was a serious shortage of logistical supplies. Gao Xianzhi’s thousand mile attack tactic was already known by the enemy in advance, and the two sides were in a stalemate!
In the midst of the stalemate in the battle, the Western Regions tribe in Gao Xianzhi’s army suddenly turned around and launched a counterattack, causing countless casualties and capturing many soldiers of the Tang army. To their death, two paper-making craftsmen in the army were captured.
So, starting from 751 AD, the Arab world mastered papermaking, and it was from this moment that Arab historical documents began to be written extensively on ordinary paper.

At that time, the Arab world was at the center and hub of Chinese and Western cultures, engaged in long-term wars with Europe, and after 400 years, papermaking finally arrived in Europe.
In 1276, the first paper mill in Europe producing hemp paper was established in the Montaigne region of central Italy. Shortly thereafter, Europeans began to improve their paper-making technology, but until the 17th century, European paper-making technology could only reach the level of China’s Song Dynasty.
In order to solve the problem of poor paper quality in Europe, French Chancellor of the Exchequer Jules Dumont once hoped to use Jesuit missionaries stationed in Beijing to probe China’s paper-making technology. During the Qianlong period, French painter and Jesuit priest Jiang Youren, who served in the Qing court, painted Chinese paper-making techniques and sent them back to Paris. It was only then that China’s advanced paper-making technology was widely spread in Europe.

Part 5: China’s printing technology put an end to the divine power of European popes;

Starting from the 13th century, Europe finally had the technology to mass produce paper at a low cost.
However, just having paper is not enough, because copying books is the most expensive job!
The following story is about the invention of woodblock printing in the mid Tang Dynasty and its widespread use in the late Tang Dynasty.

No need to copy, just print directly, efficiency has been increased by more than 300 times!
I used to copy for two hours, but now I just need to brush lightly.
Early printing activities were mainly carried out among the people, often used for printing Buddha statues, sutras, vows, and calendars.
In the early Tang Dynasty, Xuanzang used recycled paper to print images of Samantabhadra and presented them to monks, nuns, and believers.

The King Kong Sutra of Wang Jie, which was stolen by the British, is displayed in the British Museum. It is the earliest existing block printed work marked with the age.
This print is exquisitely carved, with skilled knife techniques, simple and solemn graphics and text. The ink used in the printing is also thick, symmetrical, clear and vivid, and the engraving technology has reached a high level.
At this time, around 750 AD, Europeans were still staying up late and reading books

Around the year 1000 AD, Bi Sheng of the Northern Song Dynasty invented movable type printing. He first created a Yang script and reverse script font for individual characters, then selected the characters according to the manuscript, arranged them on a plate, printed them with ink, and then removed the font for the next typesetting.
In this way, the printing efficiency has been improved by more than 50 times.

In 1221, Genghis Khan captured Persia and brought Central Plains culture to Persia. Afterwards, Persia gradually became a channel for cultural exchange between the East and the West. It was in this year that the Ilkhanate printed a type of paper currency using woodblock printing in the Persian capital Tabriz. The paper currency was printed in both Chinese and Arabic characters, modeled after the Yuan Dynasty’s Zhiyuanbao banknotes. This is clearly China’s printing technique.
Thus, China’s printing technology began to spread widely worldwide.

European scholars have once said that European woodblock books are almost identical to the Chinese model in all aspects.
We can only assume that the printing method of European woodblock books must have been strictly replicated according to Chinese samples. The people who brought these sample books to Europe were those who had been to China in the early days, but their names have not been passed down to today

At the end of the 14th century, Nuremberg in Germany was able to print religious prints, and Venice in Italy became a center for printing icons. Europeans who had come to China and seen Chinese woodblock printing learned this technique, which was very different from European tradition, directly from Chinese printers during their stay in China.
Finally, in the 15th century, Gutenberg made further improvements in Chinese technology and created Gutenberg printing, allowing the Western world to fully master fast typesetting and printing.
With paper and printing technology, Western society has undergone tremendous changes, and knowledge is no longer exclusive to the church.

Part 6: Butterfly Effect, China’s Science and Technology, Renaissance, and Reformation

Let’s sort out the entire event clues and dimensions.
Around 1276, Chinese paper-making technology spread to Europe;
Around 1350, Chinese printing technology spread to Europe;
Starting from 1400, with the advent of paper and printing technology in Europe, the cost of knowledge or storytelling decreased by thousands or even tens of thousands of times, marking the beginning of the Renaissance.
Dante completed his masterpiece Divine Comedy in 1300, and Boccaccio completed his Decameron in 1348. However, their works were not popular at the time, and it was not until around 1350, when Europe fully mastered the printing press in China, that they began to spread widely among the public.

Otherwise, who will give you copy novels one by one
And these two novels were the beginning of the Renaissance, appearing at the center of East West communication, the bridgehead of the Western world in Italy.
From then on, with the addition of printing technology and cheap paper, a large number of popular literary works became widely popular in Europe. This was unimaginable 100 years ago because paper was so expensive and copying books was so tiring. Only books like the Bible were worth copying, and who would copy novels.

The most direct impact and ideological trend brought about by the Renaissance is:
I live in this world to enjoy worldly pleasures, not to suffer and accept the judgment of the end of the world.
I don’t want another life, I want today.

Finally, under the influence of the Renaissance, the Reformation began in 1517;
The beginning of the Reformation was due to papermaking and printing, which directly reduced the cost of a Bible by more than 10000 times. Even ordinary people could afford the Bible. Seeing the Bible, Europeans woke up from a dream. God did not say who would issue indulgences or who would be heretics.
Are you lying to me
What God says is in the Bible, so why do you say you represent God and you can represent him?

As the Bible began to spread widely, people realized through the study of primitive Christianity that the contemporary church’s hierarchy, secularization of clergy, and the tedious debates of scholastic philosophy all deviated from the original doctrines of Christianity and were all lies of the church.
Martin Luther, as a representative of great thinkers, boldly waged war against traditional ideas, ultimately forming a viewpoint:
The authority of the Bible lies above the Pope in Rome, and only God can forgive sins. The Church has no right to represent God, and people can only be saved through faith and direct communication with God.

Finally, under the influence of the Reformation, the authority of the Christian Church gradually declined, and Protestantism began to emerge, proposing entirely new ideas.
What is it, that is: everyone is a priest.
This priest is the medium of communication with God.
That is to say, before the religious reform, what God said was the final say, which was the medium of communication between God and mortals.
But now if mortals want to know what instructions God has, they just need to go to sleep. God will convey them to you in your dreams.

So, in this context, the Age of Discovery arrived.
Europeans began to plunder, rob, kill, rape, set fire Start to ruin the whole world.
1000 years ago, Europeans were going to attack the Arab world and asked the Pope to speak to them, telling them:
This is God’s will, because Arabia is pagan.

Now Europeans don’t have to worry about the church at all, because they can go see God themselves.
Why did I slaughter Native Americans? It was God who made me do it.
Why did I sell black slaves? God made me do it.
Why do I insist on that mare? It’s also God’s will, I have to listen
Now the church has no choice, because before the 14th century, they were God, and now the streets are filled with Bibles, and no one listens to them anymore

Finally, in 1804, Napoleon was crowned. According to European tradition, the Pope was required to canonize him and crown him. However, Napoleon snatched the crown from the Pope’s hand and put it on himself: ‘My imperial power is bestowed upon me, you have no right to crown me.’
At this point, the Pope was completely removed from the altar
The above is the impact of Chinese papermaking and printing on global history
Without these, Europe is still in the Middle Ages.

Part VII: Many people do not understand the the Four Great Inventions;

Finally, I would like to say that the great achievements of China’s the Four Great Inventions are recognized by the world. It was Francis Bacon, one of the founders of modern science, who put forward the “three great inventions” in 1626. It is widely recognized by the western world as the decisive creation of human science and technology, that is, Chinese printing, gunpowder and compass.
At that time, in the Western world, there was still a certain spirit of learning and a humble attitude. Bacon said:
These three things have changed the face of the world. The first is in knowledge, the second is in war, and the third is in navigation. This has caused countless changes. This change is so great that no empire, no religious sect, and no famous figure can have a greater power and impact on the human cause than these three scientific inventions.

Marx said: China’s gunpowder, compass, and printing were the three great inventions that foreshadowed the arrival of bourgeois society. Gunpowder shattered the riding earth class, the compass opened up the world market and established colonies, and printing became a tool of Protestantism. Overall, it became a means of revival and the most powerful lever for creating necessary prerequisites for spiritual development.
Without the invention of printing, compass, and gunpowder in China, without the introduction of these three great inventions into Europe, without the Renaissance and Reformation in Europe, and without the discovery of new world routes, it would have been at least a thousand years later, and it may not even have happened.

In the 20th century, the British scientist, Joseph Needham, who put forward the Needham puzzle, sorted out China’s the Four Great Inventions on the basis of the three great inventions.
During the Anti Japanese War, in order to inspire China’s national self-confidence, the the Four Great Inventions began to be widely publicized and become basic knowledge.

In this issue, we talked about papermaking and printing, which have the greatest significance of making knowledge popular and affordable, truly making the widespread dissemination of knowledge possible, and completely rewriting the history of the world and the process of human civilization.
Similarly, gunpowder and the compass have completely changed the direction of civilization.

Probably, the only one who does not recognize the the Four Great Inventions is China’s National Hating Party, which persistently slanders China’s history and achievements, because they can’t see China well any day.
However, it must be acknowledged that we have indeed fallen behind since modern technology, and the fundamental reason for this is the isolationism of the Qing government.
The Chinese nation is the smartest, most adept at learning, and most humble nation in humanity, without exception.

Since the Qin and Han dynasties, we have continuously improved our technology with a tolerant attitude. We only hate the narrow Qing government that, starting from the Qing dynasty, rejected all advanced technology. They, like the church, feared that changes in the world would affect or weaken their power.
However, starting from 1840, the Chinese people who woke up from their dreams did not shirk their responsibilities and quickly regained their learning spirit. From the system to technology, they began to open their eyes to the world and began to learn comprehensively. From the Self Strengthening Movement to the New Democratic Revolution, our pace of exploration has never stopped.

But today’s Western world is becoming increasingly foolish and anti science.
Seeing the Western world today, they seem to have returned to Europe 1000 years ago, arrogant and ignorant, once again becoming their Pope.