THE BOOK OF CHANGES AS THE ORIGIN OF EARTH SCIENCE
《周易》乃地学之初

There have been several thousand years for the research on the Book of Changes (Zhou Yi) . And the Book of Changes has always been regarded as a book of divination by using the Eight Trigraphs, which was formed in Western Zhou Dynasty. On the basis of analyses, this paper puts forward that the Book of Changes was originally the faithful records of kinds of natural phenomena met by the ancients in their activity processes. The Book of Changes inquired the relationship of eight aspects, namely the sky, the earth, the thunder, the wind, the water, the fire, the mountain and the swamp. Some of them were conflicting and some interdependent. The Book of Changes also inquired the development and change of the above mentioned eight aspects and their relationship. The Book of Changes has been guiding significance for water conservancy project since the last 2 500 years. The Book of Changes originally was the diagrams without words and sentences. Later generations have given many interpretations to it. The interpretations became more and more complicated and that have gone far beyond the original intention of the ancients who compiled the Book of Changes . In authors′ opinion, actually the Book of Changes had collected kinds of natural phenomena and recorded their influences on human activities. At the same time, it also had explored the complicated interrelations of the natural phenomena, and inquired the process and mechanism of the development and change in the natural world. In this way, the authors regard the Book of Changes as the origin of Earth science.