I just started The Three-Body Problem and have really been enjoying so far. That being said, the first chapter takes place during a struggle session at a university, where a professor is accused of reactionary thought by teaching Einstein’s theory of relativity and the Big Bang Theory by his own accord in an intro physics class.
Is there any historical truth to this sort of backlash, and if so, why? I’m no physicist, but I don’t understand how ToR/BBT contradict dialectical materialism.
I had actually totally forgot about that element in the book, but I also wasn’t as deep into ML thought and Chinese history when I read it about two years ago.
Criticism of relativity and Einstein himself was a big theme in China, from the founding of the PRC all the way through Deng’s reform period.
If I remember correctly these flashback moments in Three Body Problem take place during the Cultural Revolution, puts it right in the middle of this large cultural and academic debate over the theories of relativity.
I just read the abstract of this academic paper but you may be interested in making a Jstor account and skimming the whole paper.
Ooo thank you for the link. Luckily I have Jstor access through my job so I’ll give it a read later.
It’s also perfectly alright for the author to criticize the cultural revolution / reign of the gang of four, and it’s idealist / anti-science and anti-materialist ultra-leftism. iirc the book later brings that scientist back. The modern CPC also decries that period as a great mistake.
With Deng, science and it’s development became a huge emphasis again.
Speaking of, wasn’t the Soviet Union against genetic studies until the 80’s or something?
