When was the last time China was technologically superior to the West?

Before the 15th & 16 centuries, China was basically technically superior to the West in almost every field. I watched some youtube videos not long ago on China inventions and I was surprised by what I see compared to the West at that time seemed very backward to China. The video documentary IIRC was called, "what the West stole from China" and "Ancient Chinese inventions." I was so amazed with the list on inventions that I even downloaded the videos for references in the future, but don't ask me for them as I stored them on disc somewhere now. basically, the West only started to play catchup when Ghengis Khan invaded Europe and brought along Chinese inventions with them that the Europeans could learn and innovate further just like the process China is quickly learning from the West.

bluewater2012 said:

basically, the West only started to play catchup when Ghengis Khan invaded Europe and brought along Chinese inventions with them that the Europeans could learn and innovate further just like the process China is quickly learning from the West.

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I would have to disagree here. Genghis Khan didn't attack the Chinese in any of his campaign, his grandson did. Those campaign are held against the Jin Dynasty, which are basically not CHinese. at the same period, Chinese are more or less confined to the Song Dynasty, which was essentially a small country... although there are lots of inventions and military equipment produced at that time.

In actual fact when Genghis Khan's grandson attacked the Song Dynasty, he did make use of Middle Eastern engineering feat (Trebuchet) to defeat the chinese in Battle of Xiangyang.

rhino123 said:

I would have to disagree here. Genghis Khan didn't attack the Chinese in any of his campaign, his grandson did. Those campaign are held against the Jin Dynasty, which are basically not CHinese. at the same period, Chinese are more or less confined to the Song Dynasty, which was essentially a small country... although there are lots of inventions and military equipment produced at that time.

In actual fact when Genghis Khan's grandson attacked the Song Dynasty, he did make use of Middle Eastern engineering feat (Trebuchet) to defeat the chinese in Battle of Xiangyang.

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Okay, you are right it was indeed Ghenghis grandons. Mine was a basic general statement. And I am also aware of the Middle East Trebuchet since I'm also a member from CHF. However, my statement still stand. The Jin dynasty, they had superior siege weapons than the Mongols, they had to coordinate with the Song to bring the downfall of Jin and afterward the Mongols absored what the Jin had absorbed from the Song. Now you can picture what I mean generally. It was after this period that gunpowder started widely used by the West and superior Asian crossbow were also introduced.

rhino123 said:

I would have to disagree here. Genghis Khan didn't attack the Chinese in any of his campaign, his grandson did. Those campaign are held against the Jin Dynasty, which are basically not CHinese. at the same period, Chinese are more or less confined to the Song Dynasty, which was essentially a small country... although there are lots of inventions and military equipment produced at that time.

In actual fact when Genghis Khan's grandson attacked the Song Dynasty, he did make use of Middle Eastern engineering feat (Trebuchet) to defeat the chinese in Battle of Xiangyang.

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trebuchet is another chinese invention.

It is believed that the first traction trebuchets were used by the Mohists in China as early as in the 5th century BC descriptions of which can be found in the Mojing (compiled in the 4th century BC).

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en.wikipedia. org/wiki/Trebuchet

armchairwarrior said:

trebuchet is another chinese invention.



en.wikipedia. org/wiki/Trebuchet

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Sorry, I should have make myself clearer. Trebuchet came in a few forms. The one that was design by China is actually the traction Trebuchet. The one that was used to defeat the Xiangyang city was counterweight Trebuchet (which was not invented by the Chinese).

rhino123 said:

Sorry, I should have make myself clearer. Trebuchet came in a few forms. The one that was design by China is actually the traction Trebuchet. The one that was used to defeat the Xiangyang city was counterweight Trebuchet (which was not invented by the Chinese).

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Correct. Counterweight trebuchets were invented by the Arabs and were thus named huihuipao.

Roger604 said:

And on top of that, the late Ming Dynasty (eunuch politics) was quite conservative too compared to the dynamic and imaginative early Ming Dynasty (early gunpowder and all that) and Song Dynasty (steel smelting).

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I remember seeing in the magazine 'Technology and Culture', about thirty years ago, a photograph of a sculpture in a temple of 1198, Southern Song, of a gun complete with gun smoke and departing ball, the gun looking remarkably like a Western gun depicted in a miniature of about 1325.

Actually Song dynasty was a dynasty whereby great invention (including military hardware invention) was being created. I remember reading it somewhere that during the Song Dynasty, the Song army actually uses firearms such as canon, fire lances, gun powder bombs, etc... and the chinese actually had kept the formula for these bombs in the book known as the Wujing Zongyao (武經總要) - (see, )

rhino123 said:

Actually Song dynasty was a dynasty whereby great invention (including military hardware invention) was being created. I remember reading it somewhere that during the Song Dynasty, the Song army actually uses firearms such as canon, fire lances, gun powder bombs, etc... and the chinese actually had kept the formula for these bombs in the book known as the Wujing Zongyao (武經總要) - (see,

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Technically the Song Army didn't employ firearms until very late in the game (Mongol Invasion). The firelances were at first fashioned from bamboo but were eventually cast in bronze (the first hand cannons).

siegecrossbow said:

Technically the Song Army didn't employ firearms until very late in the game (Mongol Invasion). The firelances were at first fashioned from bamboo but were eventually cast in bronze (the first hand cannons).

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Yeah, agreed with that. And I believe the effectiveness of these fire lances are terrible that they are of nowhere near the crossbows and bows that were employed by the army at that time that the Chinese didn't really see the uses of these weapons and so still rely mostly on traditional bows and arrows and crossbows...

The failure to see the potential of the technology used in a weapon was a big mistake that I think the Chinese are making coupled with the fact that confusion caused by changing of dynasties had seriously impacted on the development of new those hardwares.

(PS. In actual fact, we are seeing alot of these in modern world examples too... remember digital calculators? It was invented by the Americans - I believe, but they fail to see its potential and thus lose to the Japanese when they came into the market... and digital watches, Sun Computers, Creative's MP3 players, etc).