I'm really not doing business

Chapter 591 A Test from Heaven
"This can explain a lot of problems," Zhu Zaiyu said. "For example, why is Japan warmer than Liaodong, which is in the same latitude as Ming Dynasty?"

The core concept of the Ming Dynasty Imperial Academy of Studies is that one should be faithful and honest, and the foundation of its existence is Guo Shoujing's "The basis of the calendar lies in testing, and the best instrument for testing is instruments." It uses actual, long-term observation and mapping as the practical theme to revise the calendar, and eventually expands its research on the calendar to the research on the infinite principles of all things.

Ever since the Ming Dynasty unearthed the discussion on latitude from Guo Shoujing's old cases, that is, the observation of the angle of the North Celestial Pole above the ground, a long-standing confusion has been plaguing the Five Classics doctors of the Ming Dynasty. Among these Five Classics doctors, in addition to Zhu Zaiyu, Xing Yunlu, Jiao Hong, Zhang Siwen, Huang Zifu, and Li Kaifang, there are also Wang Pan, Wang Duozhi, Zhao Kehuai, Wang Zuo, Wu Zhongming, Guo Zizhan, Feng Yingjing and many others.

The problem is that although they are at the same latitude, Suiyuan and Liaodong in the Ming Dynasty are colder, with stronger winds and snow in winter, a shorter frost-free period, and an earlier frost day, which makes the doctors of the Five Classics extremely confused.

At the beginning, the Five Classics doctors believed that it was the result of the combined effect of the cold air mass above Mobei and the widespread warm current in the ocean.

"In Nagasaki, coconut trees can be planted, but in Nanjing, Songjiang Prefecture and other places at the same latitude, coconut trees cannot be planted." Zhu Zaiyu said with great emotion: "The cold air from the northern desert and the warm ocean currents alone are not enough to perfectly explain why Japan is warmer than Liaodong."

"Studies of the heating of water have revealed another factor, which is large bodies of water."

"Your Majesty, what do you think is the source of the Earth's heat?"

"The sun. The temperature starts to rise at sunrise and starts to drop at sunset. It is obvious that the heat of the Ming Dynasty mainly comes from the sun." Zhu Yijun said immediately.

"If the ministers don't have the slightest bit of obedience, can't they handle state affairs completely and allow Your Majesty to focus more on the way of investigating things?" Zhu Zaiyu said sincerely after hearing this, and angrily scolded the ministers for not being strong enough, which made His Majesty waste his energy on state affairs and not have more energy to participate in the exploration of the boundaries of human cognition.

The exploration of the boundaries of cognition and infinite principles is a way of mutual confirmation and cyclical progress, rather than a concentric approach that breaks a big hole in the boundary of cognition and moves forward. Instead, it is a way of breaking through a little here and a little there, and then constantly expanding the boundary of cognition.

The Academy of Gewu is extremely eager for talents like Your Majesty who know a little bit about everything.

"Isn't that just neglecting government affairs?" Zhu Yijun said with a smile, "Uncle, please continue."

Zhu Zaiyu fiddled with the slightly tilted globe in his hand and said sincerely, "We talked about specific heat before. If water is 1, then the specific heat of soil is 0.2, which means that water can hold and release five times more heat than soil."

"Japan has a huge body of water, the vast Pacific Ocean, which has led to the reality that Japan is now warmer. When it is hot, the water evaporates and absorbs more heat, and when it is cold, it releases more heat, and the overall temperature difference will be smaller."

"In addition, the warm current from the equator flows continuously under the ocean currents, which makes the climate of Japan even warmer."

"So, Liaodong and Suiyuan, which don't have huge bodies of water, are colder, while Wa, which has huge bodies of water, is warmer."

Zhu Yijun thought for a moment and said, "Tangpo?"

A hot water bottle is a Ming Dynasty hot water bottle, but most of them are made of copper and tin. It has been common since the Tang Dynasty and can be placed in the bed to keep warm. What Zhu Zaiyu said is actually not complicated. Japan has a huge Pacific Ocean that is constantly heated by ocean currents, so Japan is warmer.

Zhu Zaiyu was choked, thought for a moment and said, "Your Majesty is wise!"

Your Majesty's analogy is easy to understand. This is what he meant. He just used more specific experiments to verify his conjecture and explain the problem.

The existence of huge bodies of water is a necessary living condition to ensure that the climate does not fluctuate drastically. If the earth did not have so many water bodies and was all land, the temperature difference between day and night would increase fivefold. What a horrible scene this would be! The Royal Academy of Gewu did not even dare to imagine it.

"We have discovered that water is a material that can carry everything. In our daily lives, it is difficult for us to find substances with a higher specific heat capacity than water," Zhu Zaiyu said with deep emotion.

Water, in the physical sense, is a carrier of all things.

Specific heat capacity can explain many problems. For example, the Academy of Sciences improved the thermometer and chose to use mercury instead of alcohol. For example, the calorie calculation of coal is measured with a standard unit of water, and there is a new definition for the quality of coal.

This is also part of the degree bypass. Under the influence of the degree bypass, the production during the Wanli Restoration already had the concept of precise measurement, and everything was defined mathematically, making it more standardized.

"The grasslands began to get colder during the Yongle reign. From the records of Kaiping Wei and Tatar, we can see that in the past 102 years, the frost-free period near Guihua City has been shortened from an average of 81 days to an average of only days now. The wind blowing through the grasslands with cattle and sheep can only be seen for less than three months. Most of the time, the grass is withered and the world is covered with ice and snow." Zhu Zaiyu said solemnly, "We are going through a huge test."

"A test from destiny."

"81 days of frost-free period, this production time is really too short. With the nomadic lifestyle, people simply cannot create enough materials to meet their needs for a year during this period of time."

"Tianyun" is the general name given to climate change by the Ming Dynasty. It has been an ongoing subject since the establishment of the Imperial Academy of Gewu. The test of Tianyun mentioned by Zhu Zaiyu is what later generations often called the Little Ice Age.

Before the Royal Academy of Sciences was established and began its research, people living in this era did not have a specific and clear understanding of the impact of climate change.

Now, research by the Imperial Academy of Sciences has provided a detailed study showing that climate challenges on the Ming Dynasty were intensifying.

During the Little Ice Age of the Ming Dynasty, the global average temperature dropped by 2°. This may not seem like much, but in fact, because the earth is a water ball, the impact of the Little Ice Age on coastal areas was not particularly severe. However, for Suiyuan, Liaodong, Shaanxi and other places, it was a natural disaster, like the end of the cold winter.

"Because water is able to carry everything, the farther away from large bodies of water one is, the greater the temperature change will be. Along with the drop in temperature, land desertification will intensify." Zhu Zaiyu began to explain the logic behind it.

it's actually really easy.

The cooling means that the duration of the warm and humid trade winds from the southeast becomes shorter, which leads to a rapid decrease in precipitation. The frost-free period is inevitably shortened, the water and grass become less lush, and the cost of production and life increases. In order to survive, more cattle and sheep have to be raised to help with migration. The long period of grass withering and severe winds take away the soil, making the land deserted, and the cost of production and life further increases.

The Little Ice Age made the already poor grassland even worse.

"So, opening the sea is the only way to withstand the test of fate." Zhu Zaiyu said excitedly: "In fact, when we studied the specific heat capacity of water and found that the temperature of Daming has been decreasing for 170 years and will continue to decrease, all the five classics doctors were filled with despair."

"But soon, we checked the data on grain passing through the Shibosi Duxiangguan from the first year of the Wanli reign to the eleventh year of the Wanli reign until now. What excited us was that the grain entering the customs after the opening of the sea was able to offset the reduction in grain production caused by the test of fate!"

Zhu Yijun shook his head and said, "Uncle, have you considered the factor of population growth?"

"Huh?!" Zhu Zaiyu's face changed. He was stunned for a long time before he shook his head and said, "No, this..."

Zhu Yijun was very good at pouring cold water on others. He poured cold water on Zhu Zaiyu's theory of opening up the sea, which made Zhu Zaiyu calm down.

According to the approximate model that the population would double every 2.4 years, by the nd year of the Wanli reign, or at the latest by the th year of the Wanli reign, the population of the Ming Dynasty would have increased to about million. However, the severe climate showed no signs of ending. With the increase in population and the worsening weather, this seemed to have become an unsolvable and desperate dilemma.

"So, the Imperial Academy of Gewu has a long way to go." Zhu Yijun said optimistically: "Life will naturally find a way out. This is a very important result in the Theory of Evolution. As the imperial court, if we don't want to be abandoned by the people, we must find a way to solve these problems."

After unifying the six kingdoms, the Qin Empire still refused to distribute benefits to the Qin people, which eventually led to the Qin people abandoning the Qin Dynasty and choosing to embrace Liu Bang. Under the leadership of Liu Bang, the Qin people conquered the world again.

This is the basic logic. If the Ming Dynasty cannot meet the needs of the people, it will be abandoned. As the emperor, Zhu Yijun's first responsibility is to maintain the continued existence of the dynasty. No matter how bad the result is, it is just a rope under a crooked tree.

Zhu Yijun had already prepared for this.

"The results of water and fertilizer are not as expected." Zhu Zaiyu reported another sad news, that is, the emergence of water and fertilizer did play a role in increasing production, but it was also an increase of orders of magnitude, not an exponential increase.

The population growth is exponential, but the increase in grain production is still only of an order of magnitude. The anxiety about food security has not been completely resolved with the emergence of water and fertilizer.

Because a new problem arises: falling down.

In the 11th year of Wanli, a total of 300,000 mu of water and fertilizer experimental fields were built. These experimental fields conducted large-scale experiments on compost, poor fertilizer, half fertilizer, full fertilizer and abundant fertilizer. The result was that while there was almost no difference in water irrigation, water and fertilizer were not as effective as imagined.

In the case of semi-fertilizer, it is not much different from compost, and the yield of full fertilizer is not as good as that of semi-fertilizer and rich fertilizer.

The result of sufficient fertilization is that the wheat seedlings are too tall and too big, and do not produce ears. The wheat seedlings that are half a person tall or even one person tall have small and shriveled ears. And because they grow too tall, they fall down when the wind blows. This makes the farmers in charge of these fields very anxious. The wheat seedlings that are sufficiently fertilized are taller than people, which is indeed an unexpected problem.

The doctor of agronomy at Baoqisi was also extremely worried. This problem was difficult to solve. The yields of semi-fertilizer and compost were equivalent, but the result of full fertilizer was that the wheat seedlings grew too tall, the stalks were thin and tall, the wheat was shriveled and small, and fell down in large areas when the harvest season was approaching. The doctor of agronomy saw these "strange wheats" and felt pain in his heart.

With full fertilizer, instead of increasing the yield, it decreased, and the harvest was only one-fifth of that with half fertilizer.

As for abundant fertilizer, the result is burning the seedlings, and the wheat seedlings have no chance to grow at all.

As a farmer, Zhu Yijun knew this feeling too well. After working so hard, when it’s time to harvest, this is the result. Any farmer would be heartbroken.

The method proposed by Baoqisi is still to plant with sufficient fertilizer, and to use large-scale experimental fields with sufficient fertilizer to find individual plants that are still short under sufficient fertilizer conditions for cultivation and transplantation. Then, through various breeding methods, seeds are cultivated that can still grow short, have full ears of wheat and high yield under sufficient fertilizer conditions.

A breeding experiment takes a year. Only after years of planting and tireless cultivation can we finally get the desired answer. Of course, it is also possible that all expectations will be in vain after years of hard work.

In order to help Baoqisi, Zhu Yijun even issued an edict to search for dwarf wheat all over the world to help Baoqisi select and breed good varieties. Once verified, each dwarf wheat variety would receive a reward of 5,000 silver.

After selecting and breeding good varieties, they will be promoted, which will take five or ten years.

This is a journey where one does not know whether one can reach the other side, and the road is full of thorns. However, all those who set out on it do so without any hesitation. Even if it cannot be completed now, it will be completed one day by future generations.

This is the benefit of the cultural inertia of being responsible for history. Once it starts, even if the timeline is extended to hundreds or thousands of years, it will eventually get a response. This is a romance unique to the long river of history. Back then, Zhuge Liang walked his entire life but never got to Chang'an from Chengdu, but now it has become a thoroughfare.

Being responsible for history is the most fundamental source of the high moral disadvantage of the Ming Dynasty. "Your Majesty, has anyone told you about the anecdote that the yield per mu of land can reach over 1,000 kilograms per year after sufficient fertilizer application?" Zhu Zaiyu asked curiously. According to the character of the Ming Dynasty bureaucrats, this unrealistic propaganda should have started long ago.

Song Renzong once personally engaged in farming, but after two years it became a face-saving project because the eunuchs/ministers, in order to please the emperor, put wheat with two ears of wheat on one field, creating a mythical story of a yield of 1,000 kilograms per mu, forcing Song Renzong to stay away from the fields.

Good things, under the manipulation of despicable Confucian scholars, will become a joke like "The Emperor's New Clothes".

"Wang Ci Fu didn't dare to do so, because I really farm. The county clerk of Daxing County planned to report such an auspicious sign. As soon as the memorial entered the cabinet, Wang Ci Fu rushed from the Xishan Coal Bureau to the Daxing County Government and gave the county clerk a severe lesson with fists and feet, bang bang bang, hahaha." Zhu Yijun put his hands on his hips and laughed.

He thought of something interesting, which only Wang Chonggu himself knew. What was Wang Chonggu's mentality when Zhang Juzheng told him that the Daxing County county book reported the good news.

Is this good news? This is basically the death knell for Wang Chonggu's entire family!
As a result, Wang Chonggu, despite his old age, was determined to physically beat the county clerk before he would give up. As the second prime minister of the Ming Dynasty, he ran to the county government and beat the county clerk violently. This can be regarded as a small story in the jokes of the Wanli period.

This matter is difficult to handle because the emperor is really hard to fool. If you say that the yield per mu is 1,000 kilograms, His Majesty will dare to let the imperial guards enclose the land and plant another round under the same conditions. If it is not achieved, the wrath of thunder will be unbearable for human beings.

Now it is a feudal monarchy, and deceiving the emperor is equivalent to putting the whole family on the gambling table.

"Very good, very good." Zhu Zaiyu kept muttering, turning the globe in his hand, with a gratified smile on his face.

Zhu Zaiyu was obviously well aware of these tricks of deceiving superiors and concealing the truth from subordinates. His father's unjust case was caused by this kind of deceiving superiors and concealing the truth from subordinates.

The meeting of Zhu Yijun and Zhu Zaiyu was a mutual gain. The emperor wanted Zhu Zaiyu to come to Beijing just to express his friendship. After all, Zhu Zaiyu, who had lived in a thatched cottage outside the Prince Zheng's Mansion for fifteen years, was a very suitable candidate; and Zhu Zaiyu only wanted the precise sextant. As a person who worked on calendars and calendrics, he could not resist the temptation of the sextant.

Eleven years passed quickly. Zhu Zaiyu witnessed the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty grow from a little fat boy to the strong man he is now, and from a child to a man with several children. Zhu Zaiyu saw how much effort His Majesty had devoted to the Ming Dynasty.

In eleven years, a stone has been warmed up. His Majesty has been calling him "Imperial Uncle" for eleven years. Zhu Zaiyu was also worried that all the efforts of his nephew, who was five generations away from him, would only bring greater disappointment.

But now it’s okay. At least Wang Chonggu is really afraid of death and dares not deceive the emperor, nor does he allow others to deceive the emperor in agricultural and sericulture matters.

Zhu Yijun and Zhu Zaiyu talked about agriculture and sericulture for a long time, especially about how to increase production.

Two parts planting, three parts management, and five parts fertilizing. The only thing that does not require attention is the three parts management. The production in the Ming Dynasty has never lacked enthusiasm. This is the result of Zhu Yijun's practical attention.

The wheat seedlings growing all over the desert land are a true reflection of the hardworking people of the Ming Dynasty.

On Chaoyang Gate, there is always a figure who likes to stand there and watch, and he can watch for most of the day.

That was the Ming Emperor, Zhu Yijun. Whenever he had nothing to do, he would go to the Wufeng Tower at Chaoyang Gate to observe the human world.

At Chaoyang Gate, he saw rickshaw drivers who toiled all day long, regardless of wind or rain; trackers whose tow ropes cut into their shoulders and whose bodies were bent so that they could reach the ground with their hands; and stevedores carrying 180-pound bags of grain to and from the docks.

At the Xishan Coal Bureau, Zhu Yijun saw kiln dwellers whose teeth were black, coal washers whose hands were covered with calluses, furnace masters and assistant masters with countless burns on their bodies, and dyers in the woolen factory whose hands were discolored by the dye vats.

Is it hard? Is it tiring? Of course it is hard and tiring, but their life is what countless farmers dream of, because a heavy rain, a strong wind, or a drought can make farmers displaced.

Each of these seemingly thin bodies seems to contain infinite power.

If anyone told the emperor that the people were unruly, cunning, lazy and unwilling to work, and if it was an individual phenomenon, then it must exist. People are lazy. If anyone wanted to deny the overall production enthusiasm of the people of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yijun would definitely slap him in the face and throw him into the kiln to work hard for a few months.

The Ming emperor, who farmed the land himself, had a very clear understanding of the people's enthusiasm for production.

Zhu Yijun only needs to sort out the breeding, fertilizer and production relations, and the people of the Ming Dynasty will use their hard work to show the Ming Emperor what it means that human power can overcome nature.

Zhu Yijun never doubted this.

Zhu Zaiyu reported on the progress of various major projects of the Royal Academy of Sciences. Except for the steam turbine, which still had no progress, all other projects were going smoothly, especially the steam engine. The Ming Dynasty's reciprocating steam engine had increased from the limit of 16 horsepower to 32 horsepower. It was still in the trial stage and was expected to achieve an annual production capacity of 4,000 units by the end of the 12th year of Wanli.

It is basically in line with the pace of the Royal Academy of Sciences. In one to two years, the horsepower will double and the production capacity will also double.

"Is this the lightning-attracting tower?" Zhu Yijun walked out of the workshop and stood in front of the two lightning-attracting towers that were towering into the sky. Lightning protection can prevent fires, which is of practical significance. The Gewu Academy was also curious about what kind of power lightning was, so two lightning-attracting towers were erected in the Gewu Academy.

The two lightning towers are thirty-three meters high, from thick to thin, reaching straight into the sky. They are fixed with several inclined steel cables and surrounded by stone fences. There are signs in conspicuous places on the fences: No climbing, avoid thunderstorms.

"Your Majesty, in fact, there is a similar lightning rod on the top of the Zhengya Bell and Drum Tower." Zhu Zaiyu introduced the lightning-attracting design of the Zhengya Bell and Drum Tower. The Zhengya Bell and Drum Tower is the tallest building near the Ming Imperial Palace. The Zhengya Bell and Drum Tower can attract lightning to prevent fires.

Thunder from the sky was the first cause of the fire in the imperial palace, and arson was the second reason. After all, Emperor Wuzong of the Ming Dynasty personally set fire to the Qianqing Palace and moved into the Leopard House.

The exquisite design is no longer useful. After the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty stopped living in the palace, it became a place like a government office. If the ministers had not stopped him, given His Majesty's character, he would have started selling tickets to make money long ago.

"Will the image of the emperor's uncle among the people in the future become Lei Zhenzi?" Zhu Yijun said happily as he looked at Zhu Zaiyu.

Lei Zhenzi is the god who controls thunder and lightning, and at this time Zhu Zaiyu was doing this, trying to control thunder and lightning.

"Maybe." Zhu Zaiyu thought about it for a while and smiled at himself. Lei Zhenzi was also quite interesting. When Zhu Zaiyu was still alive, he had been turned into Beiji Xuanling Dangmo, Nanji Chiyan Guangli, Hongsheng Tianzun, one of the water and fire gods, the God of Fire.

When Zhu Zaiyu knew that he was one of the gods of water and fire, he felt as helpless as he is now. He never believed in ghosts and gods. As the president of the Royal Academy of Gewu, he studied the power of nature and devoted his life to understanding nature, explaining the strange phenomena that people did not understand and preventing ignorance from harming people. But he had to accept the fate of becoming the God of Fire, one of the gods of water and fire.

The gods of water and fire actually express to a certain extent the magic of the steam engine and the great power generated by the collision of water and fire.

Thunder and lightning are also within the research scope of the Royal Academy of Sciences.

Zhu Yijun left the Royal Academy of Gewu with satisfaction and returned to Tonghe Palace. He sat beside the Dragon Pool and flipped through the miscellaneous newspapers in his hand.

"Lord Wan's fighting power is truly amazing." Zhu Yijun said to Feng Bao with great interest as he read the discussion in the magazine.

"That's right. When it comes to scolding, few can be a match for Lord Wan now." Feng Bao said sincerely. As someone who practices the art of angering others, he sometimes has to avoid the opponent's sharp edge. Feng Bao somewhat missed the old Wan Shihe. At that time, Wan Shihe was really easy to bully.

Now, Lord Wan is not easy to mess with.

Wan Shihe's fighting power was so strong that his compilation of "Annotations to the Collection of Philosophers and Scholars" aroused opposition from some people. These people were eagerly discussing that Wan Shihe, as a Confucian scholar, became a Jinshi, but now he has become a heretic, which is a betrayal of Confucianism!

But when it comes to quarreling, these cheap Confucian scholars could never win against Wan Shihe, because the way scholars quarrel mostly involves quoting from classics, and in this regard, these cheap Confucian scholars are doomed to lose. They really haven't read as many books as Wan Shihe, so they were scolded by Wan Shihe in the miscellaneous newspapers and couldn't even raise their heads.

It was originally thought that Lin Fucheng, Li Zhi and others who were able to debate with the scholars were already very strong, but now Wan Shihe only needed to make a slight move to let those lowly scholars know what cruelty was.

No matter how much they argued, the compilation of various philosophers was still carried out in full swing. Wan Shihe opened a compilation hall under the Royal Institute of Technology, recruiting people from all over to join in the event. The lowly Confucian scholars who had been waiting to see Wan Shihe's excitement did not see any excitement. There was an endless stream of scholars signing up for the compilation hall, and some even had to take an exam before they could enter.

This is completely different from what the lowly Confucians imagined! Confucianism has been a prominent school of thought for 1,700 years. In the eyes of the lowly Confucians, it is normal that this compilation office cannot recruit anyone.

The result is that not only are there, but there are a lot of them, especially the disciples of the Legalists who are responsible for studying the Legalists' great works.

This has a lot to do with the Confucian appearance and Legalist spirit. When Wan Shihe received the emperor's order and raised the flag, these people simply took off their Confucian appearance, revealed their cards, and stopped pretending. I am a disciple of the Legalist school!

In fact, the works of various philosophers have always been read by people, otherwise they would have been lost long ago. For example, "Zhuishu" written by Zu Chongzhi and his son was lost because no one could understand it. Later, when Wang Xijue's property was confiscated, a unique copy was found in the sea of ​​books.

Many classics of the various schools of thought could only be explained by using a Confucianist skin when Confucianism was the dominant school of thought.

"Tsk tsk, it turns out that there are quite a few people in the Ming Dynasty who are just like you, sir. They are disciples of the School of Legalism at heart, but the social situation does not allow it, so they can only dress themselves up as Confucian scholars." Zhu Yijun looked at the news from the Compilation Office.

Zhang Juzheng really deserved to die. What he did was definitely not what a Confucian scholar should do.

The compilation of various philosophers is progressing smoothly, and the momentum of the Wanli Reform cannot be stopped by a few shouts from the lowly Confucian scholars.

In the past, it was the lowly Confucian scholars who made the moves and Zhu Yijun could only struggle to cope with them. Now it was Zhu Yijun's turn to make the moves and these lowly Confucian scholars, who had deep roots, were completely powerless to resist.

"Your Majesty, Wang Ci Fu has sent a memorial, requesting Your Majesty to go to the Royal Academy of Sciences tomorrow to present this year's Technological Progress Award, and then go to the Xishan Coal Bureau to issue this year's start-up silver." Feng Bao placed a memorial in front of His Majesty.

The Technological Progress Award and the Start-up Silver are two ceremonies that Your Majesty will definitely attend after the New Year. This time the awards are presented at the Royal Academy of Gewu, and the start-up silver is also calculated clearly. Each kiln worker can receive a dividend of nearly 11 silver coins.

The opening silver was one of the important means for the Ming Dynasty to distribute funds downward.

(End of this chapter)