People in Hongwu, from heavenly master to emperor master

Chapter 122 National Destiny in Mathematics, Strategy to Destroy the Country

"In fact, the knowledge in this world can be roughly divided into two types. One is metaphysics, which is the theory of guesses made by the sages on the origin of the world under subjective circumstances! The other is to study through phenomena in nature. The doctrine of the laws of things!
If we use our Taoist practice as an example, Lao Tzu's "Tao Te Ching" is the former, and our alchemy is the latter...

The former is Tao, the latter is art!
Let’s apply this logic to Confucianism. The Four Books and Five Classics left by Confucius are his way of understanding the world and the law of governing the country.
The emperors of the past dynasties respected the sage Confucius, so they practiced his way. I can’t say that there is nothing wrong with it.
But uncle, have you noticed that there is something missing in this method of selecting talents? "

"Surgery!"

This is actually the reason why Zhang Yixiang guided Zhu Yuanzhang and Zhu Biao to understand.

Waiting for the Zhu family's father and son to answer, he nodded:

"That's right, the upper echelons of our Ming Dynasty, or the upper echelons of China since ancient times, have always emphasized the role of Dao, but underestimated the small arts, but they don't know the art. It's like knowing and doing. Some people say that there is nothing wrong with the prophet.
Some people say that there is nothing wrong with the unity of knowledge and action!
The really problematic thing is that I just don’t know how to do it. Since the imperial examination, most of the time for the selection of talents, I have no skills..."

"Give you a copy of Sun Tzu's Art of War, can you lead the army?"

Zhu Yuanzhang shook his head.

Zhang Yi said again:

"Then are there any books that can make Brother Huang become a businessman like you tomorrow?"

Zhu Yuanzhang shook his head even more.

"So that's it, because these things are not in the Four Books and Five Classics, nor in the Tao Te Ching, nor in Sun Tzu's Art of War. These books are books that try to explain the essence of a certain field. How few people may apply what they have learned?

For some people, Sun Tzu's Art of War may not be as useful as a book that explains in detail how to train soldiers, how to deploy troops, and how to march!

The same is true for imperial examinations.

It is impossible for the imperial examinations to select only geniuses, and more people are in high school, and they have to learn from scratch when they go to the local government!
If you learn well, you can naturally become a capable official, and if you don't learn well, you will become a moth of the court!
All these costs need to be borne by the imperial court!
But if the imperial court takes the content of [Skills] as a necessary standard for assessment before the imperial examination,
Would it be possible to let some people who can only read dead books be screened out by the imperial examination, and although the remaining people dare not say that they are all available talents, at least it reduces the invisible cost for the court! "

"But why math?"

Zhu Yuanzhang was aroused by Zhang Yi, and hurriedly asked.

"Because arithmetic is the source of [skill], we can't let candidates know everything, but we can use arithmetic to select those who are not good at learning,

The truth can be memorized by rote, but arithmetic will not deceive people, it will not be true...

If you want to learn arithmetic well, logical ability is very important. Generally speaking, it is difficult for people who are mediocre to pass the level of arithmetic!
And there is an advantage of adding mathematics to the imperial examination, that is, it belongs to the small way and will not involve in disputes.

Those literati and bureaucrats may fight together for the sake of prophecy and later action or the unity of knowledge and action. Mr. Xu may also remonstrate with the emperor because of his different political opinions, but there is a high probability that he will not be entangled in arithmetic...

Thinking that arithmetic is art, not Tao,

There is no so-called Taoism, but it is more cost-effective for selecting talents than the Four Books and Five Classics themselves! "

"Anaithology, is it that important?"

This field is indeed not the field that Zhu's father and son are good at, so Zhang Yi's proposal is a bit difficult to accept.

Zhang Yi shook his head. The Huang family and his son are businessmen, and they can be regarded as the closest to mathematics in life.

However, they all expressed doubts about the move of including the imperial examinations into mathematics. It is conceivable that mathematics declined in ancient times.

In fact, it is not considered to be a decline. Huaxia also has a lot of research on mathematics. Let alone the Song and Yuan dynasties, the ancients also had methods such as multiplication, quadratic, and high-order arithmetic. Summing, proposing the approximate formula of the arc length of the bow, and the negative coefficient equation.As well as the solutions of higher-order equations discussed by Zhu Shijie, the summation of higher-order arithmetic differences, and the higher-order interpolation method.

But these achievements may be good achievements in future generations, but in the mainstream of society, they are not paid much attention to, and arithmetic is just a toy in the hands of some geniuses.

"Let's give an example, use arithmetic to calculate the fortune of the country for Daming..."

The word "National Fortune" made Zhu's father and son excited.

This kid Zhang Yi usually hides and tucks away, and rarely involves too many topics about the national destiny, but today he took the initiative to speak up.

However, this method is unheard of to measure the fate of the country. The Zhu family and his son have long forgotten the purpose of coming here in the first place, and they were brought in by Zhang Yi's topic.

"Not counting the princesses, His Majesty currently has seven sons... Excluding the prince Zhu Biao, the remaining six children will be the future princes. Because the emperor loves his sons, after the princes become kings, we will not give them to each other. How many, is it not too much for one person to give a salary of [-] shi?"

Zhu Yuanzhang nodded. In fact, what he thought in his heart was that he wanted to give the children more than [-] shi of grain.

Zhang Yi said:

"That is to say, if Your Majesty does not have children in the future, these six princes will spend 12 shi of food a year, which is not too much...

Then let's look down, the princes are going to have children, let's assume that each prince has five children, then the third generation of the Zhu family will have [-] descendants.

The king of the county must be paid less than the prince. Even if we count five thousand shi, 15 kings of the county will need to spend [-] shi of food from the court tax a year! "

Zhu Yuanzhang and Zhu Biao frowned slightly. Zhang Yi's calculation here is not an exaggeration. The royal clan spends 27 shi of grain a year, which is not too much pressure on finances.

But Zhang Yi continued to count, and Zhu Yuanzhang became more and more restless.

"Assuming that the king of the county is reborn as the king of the county, and each of them has five children, then there will be 150 people in the fourth generation clan of the Ming Dynasty. If each person can get an annual income of 45 shi, the total expenditure will be [-] shi ..."

"The fifth generation has 750 members in the clan. If we calculate it at two thousand shi, we need to spend about 150 million shi..."

"The sixth generation clan has 750 members. I don't know how to calculate this, but what can be imagined is that the seventh generation clan has as many as 750 members..."

"Forget it!"

Zhu Yuanzhang has been dazed by Zhang Yi's list of qualities. Although he didn't understand Zhang Yi's algorithm for a while, but hearing this number, he could hardly feel that according to Zhang Yi's statement, something big will happen next!

Although what Zhang Yi said may not be in line with reality.

For example, it is impossible for each clan to have five children, and it is unlikely that some children will all grow up...

But the truth behind this made the emperor sweat coldly, because Zhang Yi only used his six children as the base to do this math problem, and Zhu Yuanzhang could not have only six children in his life!
If the number of children doubled, he, Old Zhu, would not dare to think about where the court would get so much money to pay for the clan.

You know, judging from the current tax revenue of Ming Dynasty, the annual income of the imperial court will definitely not exceed 2000 million shi.

The 2000 million taels, starting with military expenses, official salaries, government operations, and disaster relief, etc., there is not much left over...

Old Zhu's complexion was a bit dark, so even if he conquered the world, in fact, he wanted to let the Zhu family live the good life he imagined, but it was actually a dream.

His simple, old farmer's dream was shattered,
Before he even had time to crown the children kings, Zhang Yi ruthlessly shattered his fantasy.

"It seems that Uncle Huang also understands the power of arithmetic..."

Zhang Yi stopped counting and looked at Lao Zhu with a smile. Lao Zhu was in a daze, and Zhu Biao was not much better.

They used to coax Zhang Yi to know more about Daming, but when Zhang Yizhen revealed it to them, they found that they couldn't accept it.

Moreover, the method Zhang Yi disclosed was not an illusory prophecy, a heavenly book.

But just did a simple math problem!
But the cruel thing is, using mathematics to calculate the fate of the country for Daming is more heart-wrenching than some illusory scriptures.

"That is to say, if the emperor enshrines the clan in the way you assume, it will become the cornerstone of bringing down Ming Dynasty?"

"This is not if..."

Zhang Yi giggled, Lao Zhu and Zhu Biao looked at each other in blank dismay.

Not if, Zhang Yi is almost saying that this is what will happen in the future, Zhu Biao stares at Zhu Yuanzhang, only seeing Zhu Yuanzhang's reaction is far more intense than others, and he can understand what he thinks.

"Algorithms will never deceive people, that's why it is the source of all [arts]. An official who manages a piece of land on behalf of the emperor will encounter a lot of problems that need to be calculated every day, let alone the Ministry of Households, which is in charge of the world's money and food. In places where the chief officer's arithmetic level can largely determine the work efficiency...

There is also the emperor himself, if he has a certain foundation in mathematics, it is not easy to deceive him in the accounts made by the people below.

But my Huaxia method of selecting talents has long been missing this important piece.

It is true that after high school, many people can re-learn mathematics as a parent official, and they can barely be qualified for jobs in departments such as the Ministry of Households and the Ministry of Industry.

But throughout the dynasties, those who were able to enter high school and raise people were rare in their teens and common in their 20s. On the contrary, Jinshi over the age of 30 is the mainstream...

If these people get married early, they may become grandfathers in a few years. Can they be expected to make any progress in re-learning mathematics?
This thing should have been picked up from a child,
So I said, if I am asked to advocate how to reform the imperial examination, I will definitely add mathematics to it! "

Zhu Yuanzhang lowered his head and began to seriously consider this question. If Zhang Yi didn't have the math problem to measure the fortune of the country, his recognition of mathematics would definitely not be so high.

Dao and art,
In the long history of China, it has always been to elevate the way and despise the art...

But if the technique is used well, the things that can be done can even be compared to immortal gods.

"Your eyes can deceive you, your ears can deceive you, even your relatives, your wife can deceive you, but you can't do math, because if you don't know it, you won't...

This is the difference between art and Tao. Tao is the sage's understanding of the world. They try to explain the nature of the world with their understanding!So the sage Confucius had the Analects of Confucius, the Buddha preached the Tao under the bodhi tree and passed down the Buddhist scriptures, and Lao Tzu went west to Hanguan, leaving five thousand words of the Tao...

Even in later generations, my family's ancestor enlightened Taoism with the Tao Te Ching, passed down the Five Dou Rice Religion, Bodhidharma established Zen Buddhism, and Cheng Zhu, in order to save the decline of Confucianism, Neo Confucianism came out!

The so-called Tao is an attempt by the sages to explain the nature of the world. In fact, have we ever thought about a question,
That is the way they explain the world, is it necessarily the truth? "

Zhang Yi tentatively asked a question, and Zhu Yuanzhang and Zhu Biao stared at him.

What does this kid mean by saying this?
Does he want to question the truth of those sages?
This is apostasy!
"What is that technique?"

Zhu Yuanzhang asked.

(End of this chapter)