• Journal of Science and Technology Studies
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.159-183
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• 2012

In order to create a desirable science culture needed in our society, it is necessary to overcome the foreignness of science and technology and to overcome severance from tradition. In this context, this article attempts to understand the characteristics of our traditional science and to explore the possibility of forming a desirable science culture through astronomy, which is an example of traditional science. Thus, this article examined the general characteristics of astronomy that had appeared first in ancient civilization. It also focused on the fact that each civilization has its own unique cultural elements together with astronomical knowledge as a field of science in traditional astronomy. Calendar and lifa(曆法), which are considered science of time, are closely connected with people's daily lives and reveal cultural differences clearly among the subfields of astronomy. In all ancient civilizations, time was represented based on the movements of the sun and the moon, but how time should be concretely represented varied, depending on different cultures. As a result, various calendar system emerged. Throughout East Asia, including our country, the luni-solar calendar was used. The calendar in East Asia, unlike that in the West, was the one derived from the lifa, which was very complex and elaborate astronomical work. The characteristics of the luni-solar calendar can be clearly found in the seasonal customs that represent people's daily lives well; however, lots of so-called superstition are also included in the seasonal customs. For this reason, it is easy to misunderstand that our calendar system is unscientific, or to suspect that our overall traditional science lacks scientific aspects. However, proper understanding of the calendar and the lifa of East Asia can confirm that scientific aspects certainly existed in our tradition. This will be the vital link to tradition that will help overcome the foreignness of today's science and technology.