Author, Quantum States, Quantum Entanglements: China, the U.S.,
and the Global Race for Quantum Supremacy (in progress)
National Endowment for the Humanities Fellow, Linda Hall Library (2023–2024)
Wilson Center Fellow (Nov. 2021–Aug. 2022)
Fulbright U.S. Scholar (Jan.–Oct. 2021)
Author, Imagined Civilizations: China, the West, and Their First Encounter (Johns Hopkins UP, 2013)
Author, The Chinese Roots of Linear Algebra (Johns Hopkins UP, 2010)
Professor, Dept. of History & Geography, Texas Southern University
Curriculum vitae (PDF)
| E-mail: | rhart@rhart.org |
| Roger.Hart@TSU.edu | |
| Web: | www.rhart.org |
I research the history of quantum information science (QIS)—comprising quantum communications, quantum computing, and quantum sensing—the field driving what the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) terms the Second Quantum Revolution.
More broadly, my research and teaching interests include history of science and technology, contemporary China, Chinese history, East Asian history, globalization, and critical theory. I am particularly interested in the global circulation of scientific knowledge in the broader context of world history.
The Second Quantum Revolution will be as transformative in the twenty-first century as the First Quantum Revolution was in the twentieth. Early twentieth-century breakthroughs in quantum physics led to the Third Industrial Revolution, giving rise to what is often referred to as the Digital Age, the Information Age, and the Network Society: early twentieth-century discoveries in quantum physics enabled the development of semiconductors, lasers, and atomic clocks, which in turn led to key breakthrough technologies including chips (integrated circuits), computers, optical fiber communication, and global positioning systems (GPS).
The Second Quantum Revolution will likely be the most important scientific revolution in the twenty-first century. The quantum internet, likely operational within a decade, will enable provably secure communication, rendering eavesdropping detectable and preventable. Quantum sensors, also likely operational within a decade, will enable ultra-precise measurements. Quantum computers, likely operational within two decades, will lead to exponentially more powerful computers, with each logical qubit in theory doubling computational power.
My research builds on my prior work in mathematics, history of science, contemporary China, Chinese history, and digital humanities. Generous support for my scholarship includes a Fulbright U.S. Scholar Award, Seoul National University (Jan.–Oct. 2021); a Wilson Center Fellowship with the Kissinger Institute on China (Nov. 2021–Aug. 2022); and a National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Linda Hall Library of Science, Engineering & Technology (2023–2024). During this period, I completed graduate-level study in quantum information science (QIS) and finished collecting and reviewing relevant primary and secondary research materials relevant to this field.
One innovative aspect of my research is an Advanced Python Data Analytics Platform that I developed to systematically collect, organize, and analyze data on QIS publications, scientists, institutions, funding, and awards. Built with state-of-the-art open-source technologies—Python, SQLAlchemy, Alembic, Jupyter, Voilà, and PostgreSQL—this platform currently houses data on over 83,000 publications and 97,000 scientists, enabling unmatched capabilities for conducting world-historical analysis of QIS data.
Another innovative aspect of my research is the focus on the globalization of twenty-first century science, and in particular China’s emergence as a scientific superpower. My analysis of QIS publications and scientists shows that China is now on par with, and growing exponentially compared to, the United States and Europe. These insights comport with findings from Nature Index, which reported in May 2024 that China has surpassed the United States in overall high-quality scientific output, and reported in November 2024 that “China’s status at the summit of the Nature Index remains unrivaled as the gap between it and the United States grows.” My current project focuses on quantum communication, including the development of the quantum internet, an area where advances in China have, in some respects, outpaced those in the United States.
I plan to continue research on the Second Quantum Revolution for the next twenty years, focusing first on the quantum internet, second on quantum computing, and third on topological quantum computing. The main result of my work on this first phase—the quantum internet—will be a research monograph tentatively titled Quantum States, Quantum Entanglements: China, the U.S., and the Global Race for Quantum Supremacy, which will trace the global circulation of science from European philosophical debates over quantum mechanics in the twentieth century to the rise of China’s quantum internet in the twenty-first century.
My current research builds on my first two research monographs, which demonstrate that linear algebra developed first in China (terminus ante quem first century CE) and then circulated across Eurasia from China to Europe between the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries CE, as succinctly summarized in my recent article “Ancient Chinese Origins of Modern Western Science; or, The Early History of Linear Algebra” (see below). These findings represent one of the most important discoveries in the history of Chinese science in recent decades: linear algebra, a key field of modern mathematics, has previously been asserted to be exclusively Western in origin; this also fundamentally revises our understanding of the global circulation of knowledge prior to the Scientific Revolution, demonstrating that the most significant mathematics of this period came from China to Europe, and not vice versa. Modern linear algebra is, incidentally, one of the foundations of quantum mechanics, through the “matrix mechanics” developed by Werner Heisenberg, Max Born, and Pascual Jordan in the 1920s.
1. The Chinese Roots of Linear Algebra (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010, xiii + 286 pp., doi:10.1353/book.487)
Chinese Roots of Linear Algebra demonstrates that the essentials of the methods used today in modern linear algebra were not first discovered by Leibniz or by Gauss: the essentials of these methods—augmented matrices, elimination, and determinantal-style calculations—were known by the first century CE in China. This is the first book-length study in any language of linear algebra in imperial China; it is also the first book-length study of linear algebra as it existed before 1678, the date Leibniz, a Sinophile, began his studies. The central thesis of the book is that it was the visualization of problems in two dimensions as arrays of numbers on a counting board and the “cross multiplication” of entries that led to general solutions of systems of linear equations not found in early Greek mathematics. I began this research under a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship at the School of Historical Studies, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, and completed it under an ACLS/SSRC/NEH International and Area Studies Fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies. More information on this research is available on the digital history website below. Selected reviews:
“A pivotal work in the history of non-Western mathematics that will revolutionize people’s understanding of the origins of techniques previously viewed as Western inventions.” —Choice
“A beautifully written scholarly book in an area where books are scarce. Hart’s scholarship is impeccable and his precision is a delight. The Chinese Roots of Linear Algebra will be essential reading for those interested in the history of Chinese mathematics.” — John N. Crossley, Emeritus Professor, Monash University; co-author, with Kangshen Shen and Anthony W.-C. Lun, of The Nine Chapters on the Mathematical Art: Companion and Commentary (Oxford University Press, 1999); and co-translator, with Anthony W.-C. Lun, of Chinese Mathematics: A Concise History (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1987).
“[T]he study is carried out with an unprecedented degree of precision, erudition, and expertise, mathematical and sinological, superseding by far everything previously written on the subject by historians of Chinese mathematics. . . . But above all, the conclusions obtained by the author challenge those previously admitted in a convincing way.” —Zentralblatt MATH Database, Jean-Claude Martzloff, Directeur de recherche D.R.T.2.C., Centre de recherche sur les civilisations de l’Asie orientale, Collège de France, author of Recherches sur l'œuvre mathématique de Mei Wending, 1633–1721 (Paris: Collège de France, Institut des hautes études chinoises, 1981), A History of Chinese Mathematics (New York: Springer, [1997] 2006), and Le calendrier chinois: structure et calculs, 104 av. JC–1644 (Paris: Champion, 2009).
“The Chinese Roots of Linear Algebra . . . is based on an astounding combination of erudition and expertise in both Chinese history and the practice and history of linear algebra. . . . Hart’s book is a unique and standout contribution to the history of science in what have been called ‘non-Western’ cultures.” --New Books Network: East Asian Studies, Carla Nappi, Andrew W. Mellon Chair, Department of History, University of Pittsburgh, author of The Monkey and the Inkpot: Natural History and Its Transformations in Early Modern China (Harvard University Press, 2009).
“[A] really meticulous display of philology and mathematical reconstruction. . . . It seems likely that Hart’s thoughtful, meticulous book will be the precursor to much fruitful study not only of pre-modern Chinese mathematics but also the roles of literacy and notation in its transmission.” –Journal of the American Oriental Society, David Prager Branner, Grove School of Engineering, City College of New York, author of Problems in Comparative Chinese Dialectology (Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 2000).
“The Chinese Roots of Linear Algebra is a very useful and thought-provoking book.” —Loci: Convergence, Frank Swetz, Emeritus Professor of Mathematics and Education, Pennsylvania State University, author of The Sea Island Mathematical Manual: Surveying and Mathematics in Ancient China (Pennsylvania State University Press, 1995) and Legacy of the Luoshu: The 4,000 Year Search for the Meaning of the Magic Square of Order Three (Chicago: Open Court, 2002).
“[A] challenging, inspiring book that is full of most valuable, new historical insights” —East Asian Science, Technology, and Medicine, Prof. Dr. Eberhard Knobloch, Universitäts- und Akademieprofessor, Institut für Philosophie, Literatur-, Wissenschafts- und Technikgeschichte, Technische Universität Berlin, author of Der Beginn der Determinantentheorie: Leibnizens nachgelassene Studien zum Determinantenkalkül (Hildesheim: Gerstenberg, 1980) and “Unbekannte Studien von Leibniz zur Eliminations- und Explikationstheorie,” Archive for History of Exact Sciences 12, no. 2 (1974): 142–73
“The Chinese Roots of Linear Algebra chronicles the linear problems of ancient China in the Nine Chapters and supplies new insights about their solution. . . . Hart’s provocative book deserves to be in every college and university collection.” —Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society, Joseph F. Grcar, author of “How Ordinary Elimination Became Gaussian Elimination,” Historia Mathematica 38, no. 2 (2011): 163–218.
“[I]t is hard to doubt his conclusions. . . . This book is a worthy addition to the complete history of mathematics.” Charles Ashbacher, MAA Reviews, MathDL (Mathematical Association of America, Mathematical Sciences Digital Library).
Audio interview: “The Chinese Roots of Linear Algebra” with Professor Carla Nappi, July 27, 2012.
2. Imagined Civilizations: China, the West, and Their First Encounter (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2013, x + 374 pp., doi:10.1353/book.23819)
Imagined Civilizations reexamines the advent of the Jesuits in seventeenth-century China, which has often been celebrated as the “first encounter” of two great civilizations, “China” and “the West.” Recent studies have argued that recognition of the superiority of Western science led a select group of concerned Chinese officials to convert to Catholicism. These studies have been based primarily on the prolific writings of the Jesuits themselves. Imagined Civilizations focuses on China, using Chinese primary sources, and the historical protagonists are the Chinese, who were in a position of considerable power over their Jesuit collaborators. The approach is microhistorical: instead of viewing this as a “first encounter,” this study critically analyzes how the protagonists imagined “the West” to further their purposes. The result is a perspective startlingly different from that found in previous studies based on Jesuit sources: while the Jesuits claimed them as converts, these Chinese officials represented the Jesuits as “men from afar” who had traveled to China to serve the emperor. The writings of the Jesuits, they argued, preserved lost doctrines from ancient China. Adopting these doctrines would help the dynasty return to the perfected moral order of ancient China, which they imagined existed in “the West,” where for over a thousand years there had been no wars, rebellions, or changes in dynasty. The extravagant claims of the superiority, newness, and practical efficacy of Western Learning (Xi xue 西學) made by these Chinese officials, who had little knowledge of Chinese sciences, were in historical context bids for patronage through memorials in which they fashioned themselves as statesmen with novel solutions to late-Ming crises.
Video lecture: “Imagining Civilizations: China, the West, and Their First Encounter,” presented at UCHRI's Seminar in Experimental Critical Theory VII, University of Hawaii at Manoa, August 1st, 2011.
“Ancient Chinese Origins of Modern Western Science; or, The Early History of Linear Algebra,” Multicivilizational Exchanges in the Making of Modern Science: Needham’s Dialogical Vision, ed. Arun Bala, Raymond W. K. Lau, and Jianjun Mei (Palgrave Macmillan, 2024).
“Tracing Practices Purloined by the ‘Three Pillars,’” Korean Journal for the History of Science 34, no. 2 (2012): 287–358.
“Quantifying Ritual: Political Cosmology, Courtly Music, and Precision Mathematics in Seventeenth-Century China,” revised version included in Hart, Imagined Civilizations.
“The Great Explanandum,” essay review of The Measure of Reality: Quantification and Western Society, 1250–1600, by Alfred W. Crosby, American Historical Review 105, no. 2 (April 2000): 486–493.
“Translating the Untranslatable: From Copula to Incommensurable Worlds,” in Tokens of Exchange: The Problem of Translation in Global Circulations, edited by Lydia H. Liu (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2000), 45–73. Earlier version published as “Translating Worlds: Incommensurability and Problems of Existence in Seventeenth-Century China,”Positions: East Asia Cultures Critique 7, no. 1 (spring 1999): 95–128. Reprinted in Han yi Ying lilun duben 汉译英理论读本 [Theoretical Reader on Translating Chinese into English], ed. Yu Shiyi 余石屹 (Beijing: Science Publications [Kexue chubanshe 科学出版社], 2008).
“Beyond Science and Civilization: A Post-Needham Critique,” East Asian Science, Technology, and Medicine 16 (1999): 88–114. Earlier version published as “On the Problem of Chinese Science,” in The Science Studies Reader, edited by Mario Biagioli (New York: Routledge, 1999), 189–201. Translated into Chinese by Wan Yiji 万一己, in Zhongguo kexue yu kexue geming 中国科学与科学革命 [Chinese Science and Scientific Revolution], ed. Liu Dun 刘钝 and Wang Yangzong 王扬宗 (Shenyang: Liaoning jiaoyu chubanshe 辽宁教育出版社, 2002).
“Dui xiandaixing de shuangchong fouding queren: Habeimasi de chaoyan shili lilun de zixiang maodun” 對現代性的雙重否定確認：哈貝馬斯的超驗勢力理論的自相矛盾（上，下） [Modernity by Contradiction: Habermas’s Paradoxical Theory of Transcendental Power, Parts I and II, in Chinese]. Xueren 學人 [The scholars] 6 (1994): 425–43 and 8 (1995): 385–402.
1. Early History of Linear Algebra Digital History Project (http://rhart.org/algebra/, in progress).
In order to help my technical research on the early history of Chinese linear algebra reach a broader audience, I am developing a digital history project to demonstrate the solutions to linear algebra problems in imperial China. (Note: this website is currently in its preliminary stages of development.)
I have presented over fifty lectures on my work at various scholarly forums. In addition, I have also organized or co-organized several academic conferences and seminar series, including the following:
“Disunity of Chinese Science” (University of Chicago, May 10–12, 2002);
“Rethinking Science and Civilization: The Ideologies, Disciplines, and Rhetorics of World History” (Stanford, May 21–23, 1999);
“Critical Studies: Writing Science” (Stanford University, 1998–1999);
“Intersecting Areas and Disciplines: Cultural Studies of Chinese Science, Technology and Medicine” (UC Berkeley, February 27–28, 1998).
Before coming to Texas Southern University, I held the following positions (in reverse chronological order): Visiting Professor, Templeton “Science and Religion in East Asia” Project, Science Culture Research Center, Seoul National University; Assistant Professor, Department of History, University of Texas at Austin; Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of History, University of Chicago, in the Fishbein Center for the History of Science; National Endowment for the Humanities Fellow at the School of Historical Studies, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton; Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow and Visiting Assistant Professor in the Program in History and Philosophy of Science, Stanford University; Postdoctoral Fellow, Fairbank Center for East Asian Studies, Harvard University; Postdoctoral Fellow, Center for Chinese Studies, UC Berkeley; Visiting Fellow, Department of the History of Science, Harvard University. I received my Ph.D. from the Department of History, UCLA. I earned my M.S. from Stanford in mathematics and B.S. from MIT in mathematics, studying the mathematical foundations of quantum physics. I have spent a total of eight years teaching, studying and researching in China.
HIST 630: “Critical Race Theory 2.0” (Spring 2025).
HIST 461: “Contemporary China” (Spring 2025, offered yearly).
HIST 531: “Critical Race Theory” (Fall 2024).
HIST 362: “History of Modern China” (Fall 2024, offered yearly).
HIST 131: “World History I” (Fall 2024).
HIST 533: “Introduction to Science and Technology Studies” (Spring 2023).
HIST 1302: Social & Political History of the U.S. since 1877 (Spring and Fall 2022)
HIST 132: “World History II” (Fall 2020, Spring 2022).
HIST 361: “History of Imperial China” (Fall 2020, previously offered at the University of Texas).
CHNS 131 “Elementary Chinese I” (Spring 2020)
CHNS 232 “Intermediate Chinese II” (Fall 2019)
“Contemporary Critical Theory: Science, Language, and Culture” (spring 2012; previously offered at Stanford, University of Chicago, and University of Texas).
“East Asia to 1800” (fall 2010, offered yearly).
“History of Chinese Medicine” (fall 2010, previously offered spring 2008).
“Traditional China” (spring 2011, offered yearly).
“History of World Science to 1650” (spring 2011, offered yearly).
“Cultural History of Late Imperial China” (fall 2009, previously offered in 2008).
“Chinese Science, Technology, and Medicine” (fall 2006, previously offered at Stanford).
“Global Interconnections” (MDV 392M and MDV 685L, a team-taught course organized by Prof. Geraldine Heng, spring 2004)
“Imagined Unities: Nations, Civilizations, Modernities” (spring 2003; previously offered at Univ. of Chicago).
“Cultural History of Ming China” (spring 2002).
“An Introduction to Sources in the History of East Asian Science, Technology, and Medicine” (Univ. of Chicago, winter 2001).
“The Scientific Revolution: History and Counter-History” (Univ. of Chicago, spring 2001).
“Chinese Medicine: Interdisciplinary Studies” (Stanford, spring 1999).
“Cultural History of Chinese Science, Technology, and Medicine” (Stanford, winter 1998).