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The Exhibition Hall of the Museum of Chinese History in Beijing is home to a restored model of the first seismograph—Houfeng Didong Yi—an instrument for testing wind and earth movements. The inventor was Zhang Heng (78-140 AD), a famous scientist from the Eastern Han Dynasty (25-220 AD).

Though the original has long been lost, a history of over two thousand years ensures its memory.. Scholars have been endlessly trying to restore the seismograph’s real identity, as the restoration of the seismograph not only maintains the seismic-measuring apparatus, but also shows the progress of our ancestors in search of the great spirit of science by “Seeking Truth and Evading Emptiness”.

Zhang Heng’s Didong Yi

Zhang Heng, from Nanyang of Henan Province, was a studious inventor who was especially fond of astronomy, the calendar and mathematics.

In 132 AD, in the then national capital of Luoyang, Zhang Heng made the ancient seismograph to determine the direction of an earthquake. Contrary to popular belief at that time, Zhang Heng maintained that earthquakes were not signs of Heaven's anger but natural disasters.

The seismograph was made of fine copper, and was an urn-like instrument with a central pendulum. The instrument was cast with eight dragons on the surface (whose heads pointed in eight directions -east, south, west, north, southeast, northeast, southwest, and northwest), each one holding a copper ball in its mouth. Below the dragons were eight copper toads raising their heads and opening their mouths opposite the dragons' mouths. The inner side of the seismograph was ingeniously constructed: when an earthquake occurred, an earth tremor would cause the pendulum to lose balance and activate a set of levers inside. Then, one of the eight dragons outside the urn would release the bronze ball held in its mouth. The ball would fall into the mouth of the toad and give off a sound, letting people know when and in which direction an earthquake had occurred.

One day in 138 AD, the dragon facing west expelled its ball. As expected, an earthquake had occurred that day in Longxi (present-day Western Gansu Province) a thousand kilometers away. It was the first time that mankind had used an instrument to detect an earthquake. It was over 1,700 years later that a similar instrument was invented in Europe.

Zhang Heng also made the first water-driven celestial globe to measure the position of celestial bodies, which was carved with important astronomical phenomena. People could observe the movement of the sun, moon and stars. Zhang Heng was also a mechanical engineer, and made a flying "wooden eagle" and a "mileage-counting drum-cart".

People highly regard the great scientist Zhang Heng, often holding commemorative activities to show respect for him. A ring of hills on the moon was even named after him. Didong Yi replicas

The Didong Yi was first reconstructed by a Japanese scholar in 1875 based on the description of the device in Zhang's biography History of the Latter Han and archaeological research findings. The current well-known model was redesigned by noted Chinese museum researcher Wang Zhenduo in 1951. However, none of the replicas can detect an earthquake.

In 2005, Chinese seismologists and archeologists announced they created a new replica of Didong Yi, the world's first seismograph.

Seven scientists in seismology, archeology and mechanical engineering from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the National Museum and the China Earthquake Administration confirmed that the replica was a "historic step" towards complete reconstruction.

"What we are exhibiting is a scientific device, not a toy," said Tian Kai, deputy curator of Henan Museum. "If we put a seismograph that is unable to move or detect on exhibition," Tian said, "we will not only deceive our audience, but also show our apathy and irresponsibility towards our nation's splendid cultural legacy."

"As a treasure of our Chinese nation, Didong Yi is an attractive goal for reconstruction to scientists around the globe," Teng said. "If we can't get the job done, it will be our fault."

However, there has been some scholarly disagreement about the exact scientific principles applied on the seismograph and how precisely the instrument originally worked.

Some foreign seismologists argue that if Zhang Heng's seismograph worked on principles of inertia, then two (not one) "pearls" should fall out from the dragon’s mouths situated on opposite sides of the device.

Others hold that all the replicas are just reconstructed from guesses and imagination rather than from actual knowledge as to how the real device looked like. A few Western scholars even contend Zhang Heng's device was lost because it was never a reality.

Feng Rui, a China Seismological Networks Center research fellow who heads the restoration team, believes he and his colleagues can testify the existence of Zhang Heng's seismograph through collection of historical data and simulated analysis.

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China's exports plunged in May for a seventh month as the global downturn battered trade, while imports also dropped sharply, the government reported Thursday.

May exports fell 26.4 percent from a year earlier, the customs agency reported. That was sharper than April's 22.6 decline and far below March's 17.2 percent contraction.Chinese trade collapsed in late 2008 as the global economic crisis cut into demand for Chinese exports. The slump forced thousands of factories to close and threw millions of migrants out of work.

The government is trying to shield China from the downturn by pumping up domestic consumption with a 4 trillion yuan ($586 billion) earmarked for higher spending on public works construction and other initiatives.

May imports dropped by 25.2 percent, the agency said. That was worse than April's 23 percent fall and matched March's decline.The decline suggested Chinese demand for iron ore, industrial components and other foreign products is still weak.

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STRONG Asian currencies pushed Shanghai up 83 notches to rank as the 28th most expensive city in the world for foreign staff, according to a survey by ECA International.

Beijing advanced 78 notches to rank at 26 and Hong Kong became the 29th most expensive city from last year's 98th position, ECA International said today. ECA is an international human resources consultancy.

"The strengthening of Asian currencies is the dominant factor contributing to the region being more expensive for visitors than it was 12 months ago," said Lee Quane, regional director of ECA Asia.

"In that period, the yuan has continued to strengthen against the US dollar. Many Western currencies, including sterling, the euro and the Swiss franc, have weakened. As a result, people coming from these economies into Asia will notice a considerable difference in costs compared with 12 months ago," he said.

Tokyo remains the most expensive location in Asia, due largely to the appreciation of the yen against other major currencies, according to the survey which is conducted twice a year comparing a basket of commonly purchased consumer goods and services in over 370 locations worldwide.

Of the 15 Chinese cities featured in the survey, Beijing is the most expensive and the others all ranked in the top 30 positions in Asia.

As well as currency fluctuations, falling inflation in many countries and, in particular, the collapse of petrol prices from the record highs of last year, had an impact on the cost of living rankings.

Price inflation has slowed down in many Asian cities compared with a year ago, but it has fallen more dramatically in many Western countries where growth has been lower.

"Whereas Asian economies cushioned their citizens against rising fuel and food costs in 2008 through subsidies and price controls, Western governments did not," says Quane. "Consequently, the effect of lower prices is being felt more in the West than in many parts of Asia."

Living costs for international assignees are affected by inflation, availability of goods and exchange rates, all of which can have a significant impact on expatriate remuneration packages.

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Most of the time when you read stories about the much reviled Chinese hacker it's in the context of some cyberattack perpetrated on some website that has stupidly dared to hurt the feelings of the Chinese people. But really, what are Chinese hackers doing most of the time: well, duh, same thing everybody else is: trying to make some moolah.

But how much money we hear the anxious parents of deadbeat teenagers say. Well, we recently came across an article about a 17 year-old hacker that could make 50K RMB/month. And the hacker interviewed for that article claims that this is only an "average" amount. Hackers, the bulk of whom in China seem to be (based only on anecdotal evidence) between the ages of 17 and 35, work both as individuals and in "teams", offshoots of their hacker societies and networks that have become increasingly commercialized and profit-oriented.

Some operate as individual getihu, using their reputation to take on various projects and generate multiple sources of income. Take Shanghai hackeress Yingcracker who not only cracks software for people but also makes money developing hacker software (which she then sells, ironically enough) as well as training courses for young and aspiring hackers. A 2-3 month course in Oday (some technical thing that helps you crack stuff) with her costs 4000 rmb in tuition and is, we surmise, a distance based online education. YIngcracker claims that she can pull 15k a month, though we don't know of what statistical significance that figure is: is it an average, or all time record?

Of course, the bread and butter of hacking is attacking computers, breaking into company websites and personal emails. etc. We just read an article where a reporter goes "undercover" and asks hackers, who advertise all over the place, about the various services they offer. For example: breaking into a regular free email account costs 500 RMB but a VIP email account will cost you more.

Slightly higher on the value chain are large bundles of QQ accounts, which a lot of Chinese people us as their IM of choice and which is closely tied to both the real adn virtual Chinese economies. People sift through the high value ones and then bundle and sell off the remainder, and it so it goes, sold and resold, all the way down the chain.

Successful hacking requires more than Bruce Willis shouting at you or getting someone to give you head while you hack (yes we mean you, Hugh Jackman). You need resources, namely other computers. In Chinese hacker lingo, an unsuspecting computer that has been taken over by hackers is called a "rou ji" (meat chicken? is there an English equivalent or analog?) and once you get, say, 100,000 of these, you've got a veritable "zombie" army of computers ready to do your nefarious bidding. There are even some that are reputed to have over 300,000 computers at their beck and call. To "rent" 5000 of these zombies costs 5000 rmb each time. This business model has supposedly generated millions of RMB in hacker revenue per year. Of course, some of their major projects still involve attacking thousands of foreign websites, notably in the Japan and the US, and which, for most hackers, are much harder since they are generally more security conscious and better protected.

Finally, let's not forget that this isn't all about a grey economy populated by shadowy figures with code names: it's all very Infernal Affairs like: you can't always tell the good guys from the bad guys. Sometimes they switch roles: the security experts become hackers, and the hackers get hired as security experts. One of the founder of the "Red" hacker networks, one Li Yong, has worked as security consultant for several companies, while others have reputedly taken on similar contracts from investors both China and abroad.

Well, that's it for now. By the way, have you considered running OS X or Linux as an alternative to Windows? Might want to consider it.

Posted by jialilyus at 01:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

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