The “Book of Changes” plays a leading role in the development of prognostication in China. As a specialist on I Ching research, Visiting Fellow Wenzhi Zhang (Center for Zhouyi and Ancient Chinese Philosophy, Shandong Unviersity, IKGF Cooperation Partner) explains in a dialogue with Xiaokun Song (IKGF) with the help of a concrete example – a question on the Consortium’s future of the IKGF – how the book was and remains used in Asian culture and how it is possible to draw conclusions from milfoil divination.

At the IKGF, Agostino Paravicini Bagliani has worked on the possibilities and methods of life prolongation at the papal court. In his interview with Klaus Herbers, he illustrates the functions and aims of his home institution, SISMEL, in Florence, and elucidates the transformation of humanities to deal with topics like alchemy, divination and astrology. Naturally, the then upcoming conference on divination and practical sciences in Arabic sources (January 2014) in cooperation with International Union of Academies is envisioned.

An Interview by Nikola Chardonnens with Prof. Natascha Gentz

Chinas encounter with the Western World, the reception of European Modernity and Chinese conceptual history among others, these are the topics addressed in the research of the director of the Asian Studies Department of the University of Edinburgh, Natascha Gentz. In conversation with Nikola Chardonnens, she emphasizes the unique atmosphere at the Consortium, oscillating between topicality and interdisciplinarity - a combination that inspired her research greatly.

In the discussion led by Lothar von Falkenhausen, three eminent scholars of Early Chinese history meet. Three fields of specialty are involved: early material culture and archaeology (von Falkenhausen), early Chinese philology and oracle bone inscriptions (Kenichi Takashima) and early intellectual history (Michael Puett). Together, the three scholars debate on the Shang and Zhou dynasties: while Ken Takashima focuses on divinatory texts of the 13-11 centuries B.C. and their diction, Michael Puett considers the Western terms of “Fate, Freedom and Prognostication” in the context of Early China. In cooperation with both, Lothar von Falkenhausen attempts better to understand and classify the divinatory material objects of early Chinese archeology.

In the discussion led by Lothar von Falkenhausen, three eminent scholars of Early Chinese history meet.