Guide to Traveling through the Northern Song Dynasty.

Chapter 1130 1125 [Scientific Discovery Automatically Adapts to Immortal Cultivation Theory]

When the situation in Japan changed, the retired emperor had already started his journey.

The first stop is Baishashan Tuna Academy in Gong County.

After the Qin Hui case, the couple Meng Zhao and Yu Shanwei moved here to live in seclusion and run a school.

The original nameless mountain was renamed Baisha Mountain in ancient books. Now it has developed into an unofficial academy that ranks among the best in the two capitals and surrounding areas.

Initially, the scale was small. In the first year, it only provided free education to children from surrounding villages and only taught some elementary knowledge.

In the second year, the first batch of school buildings were built, and two famous scholars and seven famous teachers were invited to teach. Although the number of formal students was small, their families were either rich or noble.

In the third year, the school expanded its enrollment and established a scholarship system to exempt students from poor families from tuition, accommodation and food expenses.

However, if you want to continue to receive financial aid, you must have excellent scores in the entrance examination. And every year when taking the exam, you must maintain an A grade in more than three subjects, and at least a B grade in the rest of the subjects. If you fail to meet the standard once, you will be placed on observation. If you fail to meet the standard twice, your financial aid qualification will be revoked.

In the fourth year, a great scholar was hired to teach, and the Shangshe (elite class) was opened to recruit scholars and juren who failed the imperial examinations.

To date, among the students who have studied at Yuxiu Academy, 67 have passed the imperial examination to become scholars, 33 have passed the imperial examination to become juren, and 14 have passed the imperial examination to become jinshi.

This ratio may seem strange, but it is actually easy to understand. For example, among the 14 people who passed the imperial examination, 10 of them failed the imperial examination and then came to Yuxiu Academy for further study.

But it is not a school that crams students for the imperial examinations. While it has strict daily management, its academic atmosphere is extremely free and open.

Every quarter, officials from the Hanlin Academy, professors from the Imperial College, or top scholars from the public would be invited to give lectures at the Yuxiu Academy.

Every six months, a group of scholars will be invited to the Yuixiu Academy for academic exchanges - even academic debates!

"Student Meng Zhao (Yu Shanwei) greets his mentor!"

The couple brought a few teachers and students down the mountain to greet them. They knew Zhu Guoxiang's temper and did not disrupt today's teaching activities. Most of the teachers and students were currently attending classes in the academy.

Zhu Guoxiang smiled and nodded, then went up the mountain with everyone else.

The magistrate and chief clerk of Gong County also came along, and asked the captain to bring officials with him, saying that they were there to protect the safety of the retired emperor.

The mountains here are not steep, so Zhu Guoxiang took his wife and children to enjoy the scenery along the way.

It seemed that they had heard that the emperor was coming, so the teachers taught very hard and the students studied very enthusiastically. Especially the children in the elementary school class, they read aloud at the top of their voices, and their clear voices could be heard from far away.

Yu Shanwei introduced: "The elementary school class is set up at the foot of the mountain, mainly for children from the two neighboring villages. They are free of tuition and can go home for food and accommodation. There are relatively few children from outside, and they must pay various fees. Those with excellent grades in the elementary school class can go to the mountain to study formally."

"It's a great thing as it benefits our neighbors." Zhu Guoxiang nodded in approval.

Meng Zhao said: "This is also to imitate what my mentor (Zhu Guoxiang) did in Daming Village and Wangchuan Valley."

After walking for a while, we saw a school building halfway up the mountain.

Yu Shanwei introduced: "There are outer dormitories and inner dormitories here. Students who have just come to the academy usually study in the outer dormitories. If they already have the title of scholar, they will go directly to the inner dormitories. If they already have the title of juren, they will go to the upper dormitories on the top of the mountain for further study."

Zhu Guoxiang stayed on the top of the mountain for a day and personally inspected the students' homework.

The next afternoon, a middle-aged man hurried over. He was urgently invited by Meng Zhao and his wife to give a lecture.

This person was dressed like a commoner, but he was wearing silk clothes: "Your servant Zhang Lixiu, I pay my respects to His Majesty the Emperor!"

"Are you an official?" Zhu Guoxiang asked.

Zhang Lixiu said: "I am from Kaifeng, and my family has been doing business for generations. At the age of 18, I entered the Kaifeng Imperial College Waishe (self-funded class), and after graduation, I obtained the status of a juren. I failed the imperial examination three times. Later, the court reformed the imperial examination system, and I passed the imperial examination and became a jiuguan. I also participated in the development of steam coin minting machines and steam water pumps. In the past... I had the honor of meeting His Majesty the Emperor twice."

Zhu Guoxiang laughed: "So we are acquaintances. Are you an official in the Ministry of Industry?"

Zhang Lixiu said: "My father passed away a few years ago, and I returned to Kaifeng to mourn. Although the court shortened the mourning period, I did not return to Beijing to resume my post. Now, although I have an official position, I do not have an official position."

"Why?" Zhu Guoxiang asked.

Zhang Lixiu explained: "During the period of mourning, I suddenly had an idea. In order to verify this idea, I traveled all over the country. I just came home not long ago and wrote a paper that has not yet been published. The content of today's lecture is exactly about this."

Zhu Guoxiang smiled and said, "Then I won't ask any more questions. I am waiting to listen to your lectures." He encouraged her, "You are doing great. You verify your ideas when you have them. You are willing to work hard and do not cling to your official position. This is how you should study."

The next morning, all the students from the upper dormitory came to listen to the lecture, and they could sit in the front row.

Students from the inner and outer dormitories had to fight for their seats. Those who were slow sat at the back and couldn't hear what was being said on the stage.

Zhu Guoxiang naturally sat in the front row.

Zhang Lixiu took out some experimental equipment and placed a glass tube filled with mercury upside down in a water tank. The mercury dropped a few centimeters and then stopped. The space of these few centimeters was a vacuum, and the atmospheric pressure could be calculated.

Zhu Guoxiang and his students had proposed and verified the relevant scientific knowledge as early as ten years ago.

Zhang Lixiu stood on the stage and said: "Some students who love physics should have known about atmospheric pressure and vacuum. But is the atmospheric pressure the same everywhere in the world?"

When this question was raised, Zhu Guoxiang smiled.

The teachers and students in the audience didn't think much about it. They certainly thought that the atmospheric pressure was the same everywhere.

Zhang Lixiu continued, "After I mourned for my father, I sailed south. Every time I arrived at a place, I measured the atmospheric pressure there. I climbed the highest mountain and went into the deepest valley. I also went to the coastal provinces and measured the atmospheric pressure on the seashore. I went from the east to the west, and also went to the newly established Yunnan and Guizhou provinces, and then went to the Tubo tribes in the far west..."

"Based on the field measurement data, I can draw a conclusion: the atmospheric pressure is strongest at the seaside, and weakest at the Tibetan side! On an extremely high mountain, the atmospheric pressure is strongest at the foot of the mountain, and weakest at the top of the mountain!"

Everyone was stunned, and Zhu Guoxiang laughed even more happily.

Zhang Lixiu also expressed his own views: "As we all know, water flows to lower places. When rivers flow into the sea, the terrain at the source of the rivers is higher, while the terrain at the sea is the lowest. Add to that the difference in air pressure between the top of a mountain and the bottom of a mountain, and then can we infer that: the higher the place, the weaker the air pressure; the lower the place, the stronger the air pressure."

The Yuxiu Academy focused on the imperial examinations, but placed more emphasis on common subjects (the Four Books and Six Classics and mathematics) because the students all wanted to become officials who governed the people.

There are also specialized subject teaching here (physics, chemistry, astronomy, geography, literature, history, epigraphy, etc.), but the number of students willing to delve into it is relatively small.

A physics teacher raised his hand and asked, "If what you said is true, if people can fly into the sky, the higher they fly, the thinner the air will be?"

"Yes!"

Zhang Lixiu said: "People need to breathe to live. There should be a kind of air in the air that is necessary for people to continue to live. This can also explain why it is so difficult for people to breathe in the Tibetan tribes where the terrain is extremely high. People cannot move vigorously there. They will have difficulty breathing if they run a few more steps. I have an follower who died inexplicably in Tibet."

The teachers and students who were more familiar with physics began to think seriously after hearing this.

Zhang Lixiu suddenly picked up the chalk and drew the sun, the earth and the planets on the blackboard: "Is there a possibility? The closer we are to the center of the earth, the more air there is. The farther we are from the center of the earth, the thinner the air is. As the altitude rises, the air becomes less and less until there is no air at all."

The person who was most shocked this time was the teacher who studied astronomy and geography.

A teacher asked, "Your Excellency, you mean that the earth is surrounded by air, and outside it is completely vacuum?"

"Yes!"

Zhang Lixiu has spent several years conducting field measurements and has developed his own set of opinions: "We who study physics and astronomy already know that the sun, the earth and the five planets all have gravity. The sun has the greatest gravity, so the earth and the five planets revolve around the sun."

"And air is also some kind of invisible but tangible entity. The earth's gravity attracts the air, and because air is flowing, more air is attracted to the ground, so the air in the high altitude is naturally thinner."

"I guess the air is the shield of the earth, protecting it from the sun. The herdsmen I saw in Tibet had very red faces and their skin was very rough. My entourage and I visited the various tribes of Tibet for seven months, and our faces were all sunburned. The sun there is not very strong, but it feels like a needle prick after being exposed to it for a long time. Could it be because the air is thin and the sun can directly hit people's skin?"

The more they listened, the more mysterious it sounded, but they couldn't refute it because they had never even been to Tibet.

Zhu Guoxiang became more and more satisfied, but soon he was speechless.

Zhang Lixiu started talking about yin and yang: "The interaction of yin and yang gave rise to all living things on earth. These yin and yang energies exist in the air. The pure yang energy in the sun is too fierce, and the living things in the world cannot face it directly, so the air needs to protect the earth like a shield. This is the process of yin and yang harmonizing, and the yin and yang energies exist in the air. The cultivators in the world can absorb and refine the essence in the air, thus achieving the effect of prolonging life."

Zhu Guoxiang looked embarrassed. How did the physics lecture end up talking about yin and yang and cultivation?

Then, Zhang Lixiu began to talk at length about the creation of yin and yang, and his discussion went so off-topic that it almost went out of the solar system.

Zhu Guoxiang had to interrupt: "Do you have any other findings?"

Zhang Lixiu finally returned to science. He asked his followers to bring a large number of fossils: "In the past few years of traveling around the provinces, I think what Shen Mengxi said is reasonable. The earth has undergone tremendous changes, and the mountains, rivers, and oceans are all changing. I even found the remains of shells that should have lived in the ocean in the Tibetan land, where the terrain is extremely high and breathing is difficult. There are quite a lot of them, and they are embedded in the rocks in piles."

Zhu Guoxiang was satisfied again, as long as they didn't talk about metaphysics.

(End of this chapter)