Q: In this book, you smash the conception of an opposition between science and humanity. Besides being fundamentally different in nature, what are the major reasons for there appearing to be opposition between these realms?

A: Structuralists believe that our thinking and models of knowledge are closely related to all we know of the world and all of the knowledge accumulated by humanity. Models of collective human thought break things apart for analysis and then handling. And these kind of classifications are usually related to a dualism. For example, children put things into two categories, edible and inedible. To determine which category something is, a child will just stick it into his mouth for a taste. This is an ability children have from birth.

Is knowledge dualistic?

So-called science and humanity have to some extent been affected by this kind of model of thinking. Of course, there are fundamental differences between them, but perhaps these fundamental differences are observed through this kind of model of thinking.

It's just like how we split knowledge into physical science and social science--this kind of pigeon holing isn't very appropriate. Some people describe natural science as "hard science" and social science as "soft science." And there are also people who describe natural science as "easy science" because it is easy to control and define--being that everything can be measured--and social science as "difficult science" because the variables are many and it's hard to control. Hence, in the social sciences of psychology and sociology, there are numerous factions, all saying their own things. Perhaps they still aren't clear about what the true principles and laws are. Perhaps there are laws and perhaps there aren't. And it may be quite difficult to find these laws.

This level of difficulty isn't because social scientists have weaker intellectual capacities but because the degree of difficulty is indeed higher. In basic disposition and nature, there is a great difference between students of science and students of the humanities. The former tend to use "convergent thinking"--looking at a variety of phenomena to find one theory, whereas the latter use "divergent thinking," finding all kinds of possibilities from one phenomena.

For example, the English novelist D.H. Lawrence, the author of Lady Chatterly 's Lover, was critical of the machine culture saying things like "the earth revolving around the sun is rubbish" and "hateful steel." Science and technology are supposed to accept criticism, but we should not try judging his ignorance from a scientific angle. His denial was a kind of emotional taunt.

If writers from the humanities would sing the praises of science and technology, their roles would become unclear as they lose their central focus. They ought to be skeptical about science and technology. If science alone progressed, it would be bound to cause problems. Society needs the mutually opposing opinions of these two kinds of people.

Books should be accessible

Q: When you are writing, do you think about your readers' ability to handle scientific knowledge?

A: Why do most students in Taiwan decide to study humanities? A major reason is that their math is poor. Math is the king of science. Looking at it psychologically, these students subconsciously hate math and knowledge related to math. Psychoanalysts will trace it back to childhood, to bad experiences in junior high school and high school.

I hope that this book will allow for communication between those in science and those in the humanities. Scientists are welcome to take a look, but I hope even more that those who studied humanities will read it, and so in making my points I try as much as possible to be accessible and easy to read.

And because these pieces were originally columns from a monthly magazine, there is no strict over-all plan. What made me most happy was that one friend of mine who studied law said that she read the book until dawn unaware of the time. Another reader said that after reading this book, he went out to buy the rest of my work.

I deeply feel that you can make books about science as accessible to everyone as kungfu novels.

Bowing to the ancient Chinese scholars

Q: After medical school, what made you think of turning to a career in the humanities as a writer?

A: I jumped into the cultural sphere because I discovered that this kind of work was more interesting to me. This could be traced back to past experience. In high school, I wasn't particularly interested in any subject, but I was influenced by Wenhsing Magazine of that time, whose writers were all National Taiwan University students and professors, and so I wanted to go to National Taiwan University. My family wanted me to study medicine. I didn't really harbor any ambitions to be a doctor but rather just wanted to get into the most prestigious university.

Basically I thought of college as being a place for seeking knowledge and making friends and not a high class vocational institute. In college I read a lot of books that had nothing to do with medicine, like Chuang Tzu, books by Western existentialists, novels, etc. Frankly speaking, I read more books that weren't related to medicine than were.

After studying medicine for seven years, I had only the vaguest of longings to go on and be a doctor. When I was just about to graduate, I discovered that with my grades I could only go into otorhinolaryngology, and I suddenly became conscious that for the next 40 or 50 years I might spend all day looking in ears and up noses. Medical science is a modern system of specialized work, and these so-called specialists are people that focus in giving their opinions about extremely specific matters. The result was that I didn't even send out the application to the otorhinolaryngology department.

Paying back the debt to medicine

Right after graduation I translated books for a publishing house with the goal of working in a cultural field. As I remember it, I think the reason I rejected being a specialist was perhaps because I had been influenced by traditional culture. In high school, when reading the classics, I deeply internalized an identification with the character of the ancient Chinese men of letters.

What exactly is a Chinese man of letters? There are numerous types in history. In my way of thinking, he first of all wants to write essays and play with language. He has a lot of basic knowledge about many matters but isn't specialized. Liang Chi-chao and Hu Shih are quintessential Chinese men of letters. These thoughts come from a process of self-reflection. Deep down I think of myself as this kind of person.

Later as I put out a magazine and had editorial duties, I think that I made a compromise between my interests and what I had studied because I ended up in a cultural field where I spread medical knowledge.

With more than ten years of work experience, I deeply feel that medical education is extremely strange. If I had studied electrical engineering I wouldn't have felt guilty if I had chosen not to work in the field. Among all curriculums, education in medicine is unique for really training one to become a doctor: corpses are provided you to dissect, patients are provided you to harass. From being a student observer to serving as an intern, I learned from patients and I used patients to do experiments. The training exposed me to a lot--it transcended being in one category of human endeavor. Doctors, like priests, need to take oaths. Patients undress in front of you and tell you inner secrets that they wouldn't communicate to anyone else because you are a doctor. Hence, doctors are more than just working in a certain field. It's a profession where you must take an oath--like being a priest.

In medical school I also dissected corpses and bothered patients, and I also took an oath. I feel as if I owe something to medicine and so I have been repaying my debt to it in a cultural field.

Science as captivating as kungfu

Q: What do you feel is most difficult about making specialized scientific knowledge widely accessible?

A: I feel that what is most difficult is that the people in society who most need specialized knowledge don't come in contact with this kind of information. Universal scientific education poses the problem of how to write about difficult, specialized knowledge while making it interesting to people. This is a special field that isn't highly valued in Taiwan.

For example, Science Monthly should define itself as a magazine for a general audience rather than as a journal for specialists. Even if specialists are writing, they needn't write in a specialist's style from a specialist's point of view. One aspect is realizing that there is a problem, and the other aspect is technique. In the United States, for example, there are specialists writing books for a general audience that have not only introduced specialized knowledge but have also become best sellers.

This makes me think of the 17th century Italian astronomer Galileo. He thought that he had proved Copernicus's sun-centered theory. He openly published these views in a book, Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems. This book was very scholarly. At the time, all of Europe's scholarly books were written in Latin to show that they were very professional, just like our medical papers today are all written in English. But Galileo published this book in Italian. The reason was that he was no longer willing to bend over backwards to convince scholars and philosophers--he wanted to make an appeal to the public at large. But the earth-centric view was a tenet of the church, and so the pope felt that Galileo was publicly making enemies with the church.

I believe that Galileo's approach is one that specialists should adopt. Specialists need not use the arcane terminology of their field when they write. They should do their best to make a general audience understand.

A bridge between science and humanities

Q: Specialist journals about science have been around for over ten years in this country. How do you feel that science writers have changed from the early period to now? Is your own writing different?

A: The earlier articles were stiffer. Now, in order to let readers understand, the articles are not only smooth and clear but also need to interest people. Take writing about medicine. You've got to take patients as your main frame of reference--the readers are potential patients. For example, first introduce a story of a patient. Reader's Digest does a good job of doing this. They write about Old Chao's stomach or Old Chou's body. In taking patients as your focus, you first tell a story and then add some medical knowledge.

Doctors who have written for our magazine for over ten years told me that their biggest reward is being told by readers how best to write their articles. In the hospital, they instruct patients on how to care for their health, so it's a two-way street.

My own writing has of course been influenced by my training in medicine. Medical knowledge is built by examining the "abnormal" to understand the "normal." You can only know what it is to be healthy if you have experienced being in poor health. The functions of the brain are also understood by looking at patients with abnormal brains. This is a way of thinking that goes to the center from the periphery. And so I think that every matter has its normal and abnormal sides. In most cases, I start by trying to understand the abnormal to reveal the normal.

In this book, I approach scientific problems from a humanitarian angle. Before, I analyzed the ghost stories of Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio, Lin Tai-yu of Dream of the Red Chamber, A Tale of a White Snake and other classics, looking at these literary works and characters from a scientific perspective. I hope I can play the role of a bridge builder. When I'm dealing with problems in the humanities, I take a scientific approach, and when I look at problems in science, I take the perspective of someone in the humanities. For many years this has been my basic direction as a writer.

[Picture Caption]

p.97

photo by Pu Hua-chih