Japan Geoscience Union Meeting 2016

Presentation information

Oral

Symbol M (Multidisciplinary and Interdisciplinary) » M-ZZ Others

[M-ZZ32] Geoscience Studies: historical, philosophical and STS studies

Sun. May 22, 2016 10:45 AM - 12:15 PM 301B (3F)

Convener:*Michiko Yajima(College of Humanity and Science, Nihon University), Shigeyuki Aoki(Center for Cultural Research and Studies, University of Aizu), Toshihiro Yamada(Chiba Prefectural Funabashi High School), Shigeo Yoshida(Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Faculty of Sciences, Kyushu University), Chair:Michiko Yajima(College of Humanity and Science, Nihon University), Toshihiro Yamada(Chiba Prefectural Funabashi High School)

10:45 AM - 11:00 AM

[MZZ32-01] Two records of observation in Fusihmi, Kyoto and change of feeling of night sky

*Harufumi Tamazawa1, Hisashi Hayakawa2, Kiyomi Iwahashi3 (1.Kwasan and Hida Observatories, Graduate School of Science, Kyoto University, 2.Graduate School of Letters, Kyoto University, 3.Center for Collaborative Research on Pre-modern Texts, National Institute of Japanese Literature)

Keywords:History of astronomy, Telescope, Perspective of science

On 1770 Sep 17, low-latitude aurora was observed in Japan, and recorded in various area of Japan. In the dialy of Higashihakura family worked as Goten-azukari (Administrator) of Fushimi-inari shrine in Yamashiro-no-kuni (present Fushimi
in Kyoto), that aurora was recorded in detail with the term “sekki” (which means red vaper, express red (low latitude) aurora). Various records of this aurora shows people caught magical meaning of a convulsion of nature, “fear”.
In Fushimi, Kyoto, on 1793 Aug 26, first “kanbounai” (night sky watching with the telescope) was held in Japan. Nankei Tachibana, the sponsor of this star party, and his friends, who were intellectual, caught scientific meaning of night sky, and therefore they enjoyed that party.
These two records of observation were written by intellectuals of those days, however one gave the phenomena in night sky magical meaning, and the other used night sky as content of amusement with the telescope, which is scientific tool. In twenty years between two events, there is a large change of sentence, and various reasons exist, including scientific understanding of astronomy.
In this presentation, we discuss how people’s sentence of sky change, with various background; geophysical feature, innovation of telescope of Japan, and so on.