Kung Fu Panda may be smarter than it looks:

Finally, he comes to a painting depicting an ancient exploit by kung fu heroes. He exclaims: “I’ve only seen paintings of this painting!”

For many centuries of Chinese industry, the great paintings of the past were faithfully copied by the great painters of each successive age. The earliest versions of many of these classics have been lost to the ravages of time — we know them only through their reproductions.

Joseph Needham was an avid nudist, an accordion player, and a participant in “a wife-approved decades-long affair with the love of his life, a Chinese woman named Lu Gwei-djen.” In his new book, Simon Winchester confronts the “Needham question.”