[Marxism] Charlie Schwartz and Richard Levins exchange

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

(Fascinating exchange between Richard Levins and Charlie Schwartz on the
Science for the People Mailing list connected to a thread on Islam and
science. Schwartz is physics professor emeritus at Berkeley. Levins is at
Harvard. Co-authored "Dialectical Biologist" with Richard Lewontin.)

Richard Levins trying to explain the rise of Europe:
"Yes, but also recall that incipient developments toward capitalism in 15th
century China ( with the explorations of Cheng Ho) were suppressed by the
court and crushed definitively by the Manchu conquest."

Charlie Schwartz resonds:
There is a story I heard many years ago about something that happened in
Portugal in the 15th century.  It seems that a low ranking son of the king
was interested in science and he established a research center which
specialized in developing techniques for more effective ocean travel.  One
of their successes was learning how to keep water drinkable for longer
voyages: 500 miles was the new span of their ships and you can see on a map
how they (the Portugese) then established colonies in Africa at
Guinea-Bissua, Angola and Mozambique - colonies that lasted for 500
years!  And when Columbus did his thing, the experts at that research
enclave immediately understood what it meant and were able to get Portugal
effective in the New World.

So much for the (impotent) role of the ruling class in science.

But there is a second chapter to this story.  It seems that England decided
that this Portugese science laboratory was important. So they sent a
military expedition down there to steal everything they thought valuable
and destroy what was left.  And that, according to this story, led to the
birth of the most esteemed Royal Society.

Where did I hear this amazing story?  It was from my an MIT classmate, Hans
Mark, who went on to be Secretary of the Air Force and Chancellor of the
University of Texas.  When he told this ripe old tale in my class many
years ago, I congratulated him for his sophisticated Marxist view of
history; to which he responded with all sorts of denials.

Does anyone else know this story?  Is it accurate? What does it mean in
terms of this debate over the understanding of how science became
most  powerful in Europe?

Charlie


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