炼丹术是一种炼制长生不老之药的方术。它伴随着我国封建社会的萌芽而兴起,几乎延及我国整个封建社会时期,经历了近两千年的复杂、漫长的发展过程。我国炼丹术传入阿拉伯及欧洲,又发展为炼金术。长期以来,炼丹术是研究我国和世界化学史的一项众所瞩目的课题。在批林批孔运动推动下,我国广大工农兵和科技工作者遵照毛主席关于“古为今用”的教导,积极开展了儒法斗争和我国古代科学技术发展的研究工作,其中也涉及到了炼丹术的问题。本刊1974年第6期发表的“炼丹术的教训”一文,对炼丹术与我国古代化学发展问题,提出了一些看法。最近,本刊编辑部约请北京市部分高等院校和科学研究单位的十余位同志,进行了座谈,对炼丹术的发生、发展和消亡的历史过程与儒法斗争的关系,以及炼丹术对我国古代化学发展所起的作用等问题展开了热烈讨论。下面简要介绍讨论中几个主要发言的基本论点和主要内容,以及对某些论点的不同意见的讨论。 Alchemy is a technique of refining immortality. With the emergence of the feudal society in our country, it rose to almost the entire period of feudal society in our country and experienced a complicated and long development process of nearly two thousand years. Alchemy in China came to Arabia and Europe, but also developed into alchemy. For a long time, alchemy is a subject of great concern for studying the history of chemistry in our country and the world. Driven by the pro-Lin campaign, the workers, peasants and soldiers and scientific and technological workers in our country actively followed the Confucian and legal struggles and the research work on the development of science and technology in ancient China in accordance with Chairman Mao’s teachings on “using ancient as present and present”, and also touched upon the work of alchemy problem. Published in 1974, No. 6, “the lesson of Alchemy,” a text on alchemy surgery and the development of ancient China’s chemical problems, put forward some views. Recently, our editorial department has invited more than a dozen comrades from some institutions of higher learning and scientific research institutes in Beijing to conduct discussions and discuss the relationship between the historical process of the occurrence, development and disappearance of alchemy and the struggle between Confucianism and law, China’s ancient chemical development played a role in such issues launched a lively discussion. The following is a brief introduction to the basic arguments and main contents of several key speeches in the discussion, as well as the discussion of dissenting opinions of certain arguments.