science

One's Company

One's Company is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand One's Company rather than just read about it. In short: One's Company: A Journey to China (London: Cape, 1934) is a travel book by Peter Fleming, correspondent for The Times, describing his journey day-by-day from London through Moscow and the Trans-Siberian Railway, then through Japanese-run Manchukuo, then on to Nanking, the capital of China in the 1930s, with a glimpse of “Red China”. It was reissued (with News from Tartary) as half of Travels in Tartary.

Key takeaways

One's Company belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect One's Company to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of One's Company from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

One's Company: A Journey to China (London: Cape, 1934) is a travel book by Peter Fleming, correspondent for The Times, describing his journey day-by-day from London through Moscow and the Trans-Siberian Railway, then through Japanese-run Manchukuo, then on to Nanking, the capital of China in the 1930s, with a glimpse of “Red China”. It was reissued (with News from Tartary) as half of Travels in Tartary. Fleming's Preface opens with a self-deprecating observation:

The recorded history of Chinese civilization covers a period of four thousand years. The population of China is estimated at 450 million. China is larger than Europe. The author of this book is twenty-six years old. He has spent, altogether, about seven months in China. He does not speak Chinese.

When Fleming gets to China, the reader is rewarded with acid portraits of Chiang Kai-shek, pronouncements on “Red China” and the prospects of Communism (it could never take hold in China), life on the war fronts, and the nature of the Japanese empire. Nicholas J. Clifford observes: "If for Fleming... China remained something of a joke, the joke was less on the country than on the bemused traveler himself.... Even so, the humor ... can sometimes wear a little thin.... there was much about it that still had the aspect of a comic opera land whose quirks and oddities became grist for the writer rather than deserving any respect or sympathy in themselves." Paul French unsympathetically described it as "largely a litany of visits to places he didn't like — except England."

References

External links One's Company at the Internet Archive

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with One's Company

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what One's Company claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to One's Company before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about One's Company ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of One's Company

In research: One's Company appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses One's Company in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: One's Company is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1936 English-language non-fiction books, 1936 non-fiction books, Books about Central Asia, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for One's Company outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study One's Company in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what One's Company means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain One's Company out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is One's Company in simple terms?

Why does One's Company matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study One's Company?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on One's Company.