As many have noted, this piece does plenty of axe-grinding, conclusion-stretching, and fact-spinning, as well as simply getting a fair bit wrong. But for all of that it does convey a fundamental truth: there was a hell of a lot of established civilisation going on outside the general scope of Western History -- principally the Mediterranian basin.
In particular, China was home to a huge, advanced, and highly active culture. I'm only slowly becoming aware of this myself through recent reading. As I've just commented, I only discovered in the past year the work of British biochemist-turned-sinologist Joseph Needham. His Science and Civilisation in China, proposed as a brief 5-6 volume work in the early 1950s, continues to be developed to this day. Just reading the titles of the 24 completed volumes gives a sense of the scope of invention and discovery covered. There are at least two more volumes forthcoming.
Simon Winchester's The Man who Loved China gives the background for this story, and is highly recommended.
Again: while the particulars here are distorted, the underlying truth isn't: there was a phenomenal civilisation in China during the time of the Roman empire, and it easily rivalled, and quite possibly surpassed, Rome.
In particular, China was home to a huge, advanced, and highly active culture. I'm only slowly becoming aware of this myself through recent reading. As I've just commented, I only discovered in the past year the work of British biochemist-turned-sinologist Joseph Needham. His Science and Civilisation in China, proposed as a brief 5-6 volume work in the early 1950s, continues to be developed to this day. Just reading the titles of the 24 completed volumes gives a sense of the scope of invention and discovery covered. There are at least two more volumes forthcoming.
http://www.nri.cam.ac.uk/science.html
Simon Winchester's The Man who Loved China gives the background for this story, and is highly recommended.
Again: while the particulars here are distorted, the underlying truth isn't: there was a phenomenal civilisation in China during the time of the Roman empire, and it easily rivalled, and quite possibly surpassed, Rome.