Books in Brief: The Stone Monkey

The Stone Monkey: An Alternative Chinese-Scientific Reality, by Bruce Holbrook (Morrow, 408 pp., $15).

An argument for science the Chinese way by a man with an axe to grind. Holbrook toiled nine years learning the intricacies of his subject, part of the time with a practitioner of traditional medicine on Taiwan, only to be roundly chastised upon his return to the West. His teachers at Yale expected a critique from their industrious grad student. What they got were sermons. The gold needles of acupuncture, the wheels of yin-yang, the serenity, the simple ways had won a convert who fast became an impassioned missionary. Yale would have none of it. Holbrook was told to calm down and write a scholarly thesis or else go away. He gave them what they wanted. But as soon as he had his diploma he wrote again—from the heart. The result, this book, runs on anger. It is lively for that reason but also, perhaps, unreliable. Holbrook tells of a system of scientific thinking that places man firmly at the center. It makes for scientists at once homely and perceptive. They decry atom-smashing as an affront to the order of nature. They treat the photon as a particle with a mind of its own. The West, Holbrook says, favors extremes: a patient is either sick or well; he may be both sick and well according to the Chinese view. This sort of ambiguity may be exasperating but, as Holbrook argues, it is at the root of obvious Chinese medical successes like acupuncture. It also runs deep in their resilient, and quite charming, social system. There is a rule in traditional Chinese villages that a rich man must give one of his children to a poor family. Wealth pours into the adopted household on account of the well-born child, and prosperity gains a broader domain. Holbrook’s ire cannot dim the effect of such examples. But it nevertheless leaves one grateful for his extensive bibliography. There must be among those names an author capable of interpreting the queer logic of the Chinese system with a level head. Westerners, for all their faults, appreciate that.

PH

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Paul I. Hornak

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The Stone Monkey: An Alternative Chinese-Scientific Reality, by Bruce Holbrook (Morrow, 408 pp., $15).

An argument for science the Chinese way by a man with an axe to grind. Holbrook toiled nine years learning the intricacies of his subject, part of the time with a practitioner of traditional medicine on Taiwan, only to be roundly chastised upon his return to the West. His teachers at Yale expected a critique from their industrious grad student. What they got were sermons. The gold needles of acupuncture, the wheels of yin-yang, the serenity, the simple ways had won a convert who fast became an impassioned missionary. Yale would have none of it. Holbrook was told to calm down and write a scholarly thesis or else go away. He gave them what they wanted. But as soon as he had his diploma he wrote again—from the heart. The result, this book, runs on anger. It is lively for that reason but also, perhaps, unreliable. Holbrook tells of a system of scientific thinking that places man firmly at the center. It makes for scientists at once homely and perceptive. They decry atom-smashing as an affront to the order of nature. They treat the photon as a particle with a mind of its own. The West, Holbrook says, favors extremes: a patient is either sick or well; he may be both sick and well according to the Chinese view. This sort of ambiguity may be exasperating but, as Holbrook argues, it is at the root of obvious Chinese medical successes like acupuncture. It also runs deep in their resilient, and quite charming, social system. There is a rule in traditional Chinese villages that a rich man must give one of his children to a poor family. Wealth pours into the adopted household on account of the well-born child, and prosperity gains a broader domain. Holbrook’s ire cannot dim the effect of such examples. But it nevertheless leaves one grateful for his extensive bibliography. There must be among those names an author capable of interpreting the queer logic of the Chinese system with a level head. Westerners, for all their faults, appreciate that.