GETTING HOT UNDER THE COLLAR

Ihave a degree in history, so I know everything about you. I have memorized your place and date of birth, how to pronounce your name and am even familiar with your more stellar accomplishments and theories.

Yes, Aristotle and Zhang Heng … I’m talking to you two.

The Greek philosopher Aristotle (384-322 BC) posited that the cosmos were composed of terrestrial and celestial realms, and on Earth — the realm that most concerned him — there were four core components: earth, wind, fire and water.

Readers from Kentucky and Guiyang, Guizhou province, may be familiar with firewater — perhaps in the form of bourbon or baijiu.

But today we’re more concerned with the former — fire — as it seems to be taking center stage in Beijing, as July has just passed the infernal inferno known as its Ides.

Surrounding our Hellenic thinker’s era like temporal bookends was China’s Warring States Period (475-221 BC), during which two scholars — Gan Shi and Shi Shen — invented the armillary sphere, which was improved upon in the Eastern Han Dynasty (AD 25-220) by Zhang Heng, who himself devised a metallic sphere of concentric rings that helped illustrate cosmological theory.

Zhang argued, politely of course, without getting too hot under the collar, that the universe resembled an onion, Andrew Pasek with Earth at the center and water-filled celestial layers wrapped around, all supported by qi — which means the life force both holding together and innervating everything in the cosmos, and also means anger or rage.

Let’s surmise that the human body is a microcosm of the cosmos, with a balance between the forces of qi — as well as the four Aristotelian components — key to maintaining health and an ideal core temperature.

As Beijing currently endures the hottest weather seen in … 10 months, perhaps it’s best to better manage our qi (i.e. life force or anger management) rather than giving birth to more, or sheng qi, which means being teed off or hot under the collar during the ongoing scorching summer.

I’m both exothermic and thermophobic, both of which are legal and PC character traits, by the way.

Therefore, for the record I would just like to dispel two common misconceptions.

No. 1: Using home air conditioners leads to the grippe or consumption.

When the mercury flirts with 40 C — or when earthly temperatures seem positively mercurial — high-pressure system poltroons like you and me make due with mercurial miens — and consumption can increase, especially during the World Cup with cold Tsingtao on tap.

No. 2: There’s nothing more refreshing than a glass of boiling water on a hot summer’s day. In principle — you’re trying to sweat even more to cool the core.