Neither is more powerful than the other, and both are needed in equal amounts for harmony to exist. Yang (the white section of the symbol) represents the sun, masculine energy, and things that are more out in the open. Soft and hard depend on what kinds of molecules a thing is made of.Īlso, there is no reason to believe that the pattern of yearly shadows on the planet has any connection to most of the other things that go on in the universe. Yin (the black section of the symbol) represents shadows, feminine energy, and generally the more mysterious side of things. Light and dark depend on the presence or absence of photons. The temperature of things depends on the movement of their atomic particles. Modern science has found other explanations for such things as hot and cold, light and dark. Yang was thought of as the basis for things hot, hard, light, dry, active, and male.Īccording to legend, the Chinese emperor Fu Hsi (2852-2738 BCE) said that the best state for everything in the universe is a state of harmony represented by a balance of yin and yang.

Taoists thought of yin as the basis for things cool, soft, dark, moist, still, passive, and female. Yin and yang stand for the two sides of things, like mountains and valleys, or the inside of a bowl (whose shape is concave) and can't exist without the outside of the bowl (whose shape is convex). Yin may mean shadow, softness, silence, cold, passive, femininity whereas yang may portray light, hardness, noise, hot, active and masculinity. Yang begins at the winter solstice and indicates the beginning of the period when daylight dominates over darkness and thus is associated with the sun. The symbol doesn’t signify any religious philosophy but is based on the observation of nature which can be interpreted in several ways to explain the coexistence of good and bad in everything. The yin-yang symbol is usually thought of along with the ancient Chinese religion called Taoism. In fact, some have suggested that the yin-yang symbol closely approximates a graphical representation of the daily change of a pole's shadow length during the year. Nor did they know that the Earth revolves around the Sun. The ancient Chinese knew nothing about atoms or molecules. Yin and yang are ideas found in Chinese stories written long before the rise of modern science. The symbol for yin-yang comes from the yearly pattern of shadows cast by a long pole stuck straight up in the ground.Īncient Chinese sky gazers found that as the Sun appears to move over the Earth, the shadow of the pole is a little longer or shorter each day, depending on what time of year it is.

Surrounding the swirling yin and yang in the taiji. Soon the yang will change to yin and back again - as day and night are inseparable and interdependent. Thousands of years ago, the Chinese words yin and yang referred to the shady and sunny sides of a hill or valley. In Chinese the sun is named ti yng ‘great yang’ and so day is ‘yang’ and yet there are still places of shadow while yin (‘night’) still has the light of moon and stars. In a nutshell: Yin-yang is an ancient Chinese idea that stands for the two sides of things that complement each other. The Galileoscope From Abracadabra to Zombies

Sonic and shadow yin and yang symbol