니시 아마네(西周)의 과학개념 - ‘學’, ‘物理’, ‘格物’을 중심으로 -

Abstract

This article is to study Nishi Amane’s scientific concepts, ‘gaku(學)’, ‘butsuri(物理)’, ‘kakubutsu(格物)’. Nishi is known not only as a translator of modern technical terms which have been widely used in East Asia, but also as an organizer who classified area of knowledge by accepting Western knowledge. The study on the change of the concepts such as ‘gaku’, ‘butsuri’, ‘kakubutsu’, illustrates how Nishi could accept modern Western knowledge during the nineteenth century. Nishi translated science into ‘gaku’, and divided it from ‘jutsu(術, art)’. According to Nishi, however, ‘gaku’ is strongly related to ‘jutsu’, so their relation is similar to science and technology. Nishi used the word ‘kagaku(科學)’, which is normally translated from science today, but that meant just each fields of knowledge. Nishi did not use the word ‘butsuri’ in the meaning of physics. He used the word in the meaning of the law of the natural world including animals and plants. The object of ‘butsuri’ by Nishi indicates physical, biological, and chemical phenomenon. Therefore, we can say his ‘butsuri’ is similar to traditional concept of ‘butsuri’ in Edo period rather than physics in Western science. ‘Kakubutsu’ was originally from Neo-confucianism, but Nishi redefined the meaning of ‘kakubutsu’. Nishi used the word ‘kakubutsu’ in the meaning of physics. Nishi translated ‘matter’ into the chinese character ‘butsu(物)’. According to Nishi, the concept of ‘butsu’ from ‘butsuri’ differs from the concept of ‘butsu’ from ‘kakubutsu’. It shows that Nishi divided the concept of ‘butsu’ from Neo-confucianism into two concepts. Division of the concepts of ‘butsu’ by Nishi was not only the key point that Nish divided ‘butsuri’ from ‘kakubutsu’, but also the starting point that he divided area of science such as physics and chemistry.