RETROGRADE MOTION IN ANCIENT CHINESE CULTURE by Zoe K.

Description & My Question

zkoswara16 — 2025-05-27 04:41:29 UTC

This project revolves around my interest and curiosity around retrograde motion and how it's perceived in different cultures. The culture I'm focusing on my project is the Chinese astronomy. Therefore, the question I'm attempting to answer is: How did the Chinese make sense of the retrograde motion? How did it affect their utilization and interpretation of astronomy?

My Interest & Why

zkoswara16 — 2025-05-27 04:50:09 UTC

I've always been interested in retrograde motion since the moment it was introduced in week 2. I honestly couldn't stop thinking about it for a week (lol). I did a mini research on my own, and realized that this could be my topic for the special interest project, and here I am!

As to why specifically, there are several reasons. First, I find the humble existence retrograde motion fascinating. It makes me realize how humans always assume that everything revolves around them, when it doesn't. The second reason is how retrograde motion appears to be an 'illusion' to the human eye, because it never actually happened in the first place. Lastly, my interest towards the Chinese astronomy is backed up by my Chinese roots. I'd love to see what my people used to think about the retrograde motion, and how they attempted to make sense of it.

The Reason to Care

zkoswara16 — 2025-05-27 04:56:14 UTC

I'd like to remind anyone reading this that you don't necessary HAVE TO care. However, it is always great to 'care' and expand your knowledge some more!

Mostly, you should care about retrograde motion because it takes part in one of the most important turning points in astronomy! It sort of helped 'birthed' the existence of the heliocentric orbit, which is what has always been happening since the beginning. In short, retrograde motion is part of the most significant discovery in astronomy (which also helps with humans' navigation of Earth), so you should really care about it.

Picture/Drawing Related to The Topic

zkoswara16 — 2025-06-15 03:19:57 UTC

The ancient Chinese astronomers refer to retrograde motion as 逆行星, which literally translates to "retrograde planet". Interestingly, Chinese astronomers didn't use the concept of epicycles to explain these retrograde motions. Instead, they simply believe that the planet: slows down -> pauses for a while -> goes the opposite direction -> pauses for a while -> continues forward. They believed the planets had "a change of behavior". To illustrate what the Chinese astronomers thought, I made a drawing because there aren't any available diagram for it. This illustration is made based on the observation made by ancient Chinese astronomers on Mars' retrograde motion.

The Overlap Between My Project and The Class

zkoswara16 — 2025-06-15 03:23:14 UTC

In class, we explored retrograde motion in the face of ancient Greek astronomers that led to the development of epicycles as a reason behind the movement. If I am actually being honest, my project is quite contradicting with what we've learned in class. The topic remains the same: retrograde motion. However, in my project regarding Chinese astronomers, I saw how they disregarded the possibility of epicycles, and instead, concluded that the planets simply had 'pauses'. The one in class is more geometric-based, while the one in my project is more mathematics-based. Another overlap is that both the class and my project discusses about astronomy and its affects in a specific culture. In class, the focus is mostly on ancient Greek and modern Hawaii, while my project focuses solely on ancient Chinese.

More In-Depth Details of My Project

zkoswara16 — 2025-06-15 03:24:44 UTC

While this class focuses mostly on ancient Greek astronomy (Ptolemy, Kepler, etc.), I chose to introduce a completely new culture to discuss in my project. By doing this project, I discovered that the ancient Chinese had a totally different point of view and thought process when they observed the occurrence of retrograde motion. They didn't automatically reserve to complex possibilities like epicycles and deferent; they simply thought that the planets had changes of behavior. Sometimes they pause, sometimes they reverse, sometimes they move forward. I also highlighted my explanation of the difference of purposes of astronomy for the ancient Chinese and Greek/Western. The ancient Chinese' use of astronomy went beyond mere observation and scientific discoveries; they used it as a way to communicate with the Heaven, as well as a political tool.

Foreword

zkoswara16 — 2025-06-15 03:34:44 UTC

As it turns out, retrograde motion isn't depicted exactly the same in Chinese astronomy as it is in Western astronomy. However, ancient Chinese astronomers are also involved in recording, analyzing, and understanding the movements of celestial bodies. This later on served as the groundwork for future astronomical developments and utilizations.

Connecting Heaven and Man: The Role of Astronomy in Ancient Chinese Society and Culture

zkoswara16 — 2025-06-15 04:05:27 UTC

This paper focuses mostly on the observation and calculation of retrograde motion done by ancient Chinese astronomers, and how specific things in the motion is closely related with real-life events that might happen; cosmology, politics, and state ideology. Western astronomy often focuses on geometric models (epicycles) in order to explain this phenomena. Meanwhile, Chinese astronomy was empirical and algebra-based.

There are several main points that I've derived from the research paper "Connecting Heaven and Man: The Role of Astronomy In Ancient Chinese Society And Culture".

Astronomy in ancient China is often (almost always) linked, and interpreted as signs from the heavens. Emperor Yao, the first person to ever establish a calendar in China, used astronomy to "communicate with the Heaven".
A lot of ancient Chinese rituals and events were conducted during specific celestial events, such as during solstice and eclipses.
A lot of celestial observations are noted down and worshipped by people. For instance, people of Shang Dynasty heavily relied on the Heaven for answers whenever they have unresolved affairs. People of Shang Dynasty also performed worshipping towards celestial bodies by presenting a sacrifice for them (none of the sacrifices were explicitly mentioned). Lu Buwei's book "Spring and Autumn Annals" mentioned instances where Chinese people believed that if no sacrifices were made, calamities would fall upon them.
An interesting fact regarding the planet Mars was also part of ancient Chinese astronomy. Mars is characterized as 'fighting', and the constellation Scorpion is related to the emperor then. Therefore, if the planet Mars is seen to temporarily stop at the constellation Scorpion, ancient Chinese people believed that there would be an impending disaster that would happen to the emperor.

In conclusion, in ancient China, astronomy was used not only as a tool to study celestial bodies and space, but also as a two-way communication with the Heaven, and as a tool to resolve and critique political affairs.

Works Cited

The Role of Astronomy In Ancient Chinese Society And Culture, adsabs.harvard.edu/pdf/2011IAUS..260...98S. Accessed 15 June 2025.

zkoswara16 — 2025-06-15 06:41:07 UTC

APFSLT, HKIEd. From Geocentric to Heliocentric Model of the Universe, and the Alternative Perspectives, www.eduhk.hk/apfslt/v6_issue2/liusc/liusc4.htm#:~:text=In%20ancient%20China%2C%20three%20main,the%20empty%20and%20boundless%20space. Accessed 14 June 2025.

zkoswara16 — 2025-06-15 06:42:58 UTC

The Role of Astronomy In Ancient Chinese Society And Culture, adsabs.harvard.edu/pdf/2011IAUS..260...98S. Accessed 15 June 2025.

zkoswara16 — 2025-06-15 06:43:51 UTC

AI (ChatGPT) was used to help me navigate the questions and my answers to them. I also used it to find and compile resources that I couldn't find manually.

Afterword

zkoswara16 — 2025-06-15 08:43:49 UTC

After finishing this project, I realized that my research lacks a lot of things that I should have. I did try my very best to approach the topic and find resources that are compatible with my topic. However, upon doing so, I realized that this topic probably isn't the best topic to choose in the first place. Since I am investigating ancient China's history of astronomy, almost all of the resources on this topic is in Chinese, and there aren't any translations available. I've tried using an online Chinese library that has 'English' option, but it didn't help much; it still lacks information. Anyhow, I managed to find a sprinkle of resources I can possibly try to make sense of, and compiled it in this padlet. I really hope it'll at least give readers a glimpse of what I'd like to convey through my project!

-Zoe.