Liu Xie (, ca. 465–522
Life
A native of today's
Zhenjiang, Liu's traced his ancestry to
Shandong.
He was orphaned in his youth and chose not to marry, either because of poverty or conviction (or both). Liu studied
Buddhism with
Sengyou and helped edit
at the Dinglin Monastery (定林寺) until his death during the
Liang Dynasty.
It was during his time editing Buddhist scriptures that he wrote his
The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons.
He later became a private secretary to Xiao Hong, brother of the Liang emperor Xiao Yan.
Liu also wrote The Great Enlightenment ( Hong Ming Ji) and On the World ( Shijie Ji), both of which are lost.
Psychology experiment
Liu Xie conducted a psychology experiment by asking his subjects to draw a circle on a piece of paper with one hand, while the other hand tried to simultaneously draw a square. This test was to measure the level of distraction that could be managed by his subjects. As Liu observed, his students, who were the subjects of his experiment, struggled to perform both tasks simultaneously. What Liu's experiment had demonstrated was that by doing two experiments at once will mean that neither experiment is done correctly.
-
Yang, Mingzhao, "Liu Xie". Encyclopedia of China (Chinese Literature Edition), 1st ed.
External links
