China thinks it invented everything.

There is no evidence to suggest that China had any scientific evaluation of chemistry other than trial and error until such practices were introduced to them. Gunpowder was not invented but discovered by chance and improved through trial and error and most of these improvements and the development of the first firearms were made in the middle east.

They didn't invent woodblocks and thus weren't the first to print using woodblocks. Printing with woodblocks is not the same as printing with a printing press.
http://touregypt.net/featurestories/fabrics.htm

The chinese did invent a way of using wood pulp to make paper, but this is just 1 material in a long line of materials which were discovered could be used to make paper. The first material was papyrus, thus only the ancient Egyptians can claim the title "invented paper".
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=papyrus&meta=

The compass was invented by the Olmecs before 1000 BC and it may have been invented seperately later by europeans. For 100s of years the compass never entered the middle east, yet just a few decades after it's first appearance in europe in 1180 the muslims began to use it. The Chinese can neither claim they invented it first or that they gave it to the rest of the world, only that they invented it seperately.
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=olmec+compass&btnG=Google+Search&meta=
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=%22european+compass%22+%22independent+invention%22&meta=

China is a rich ancient culture and has nothing to be ashamed of so I can see the allure to people who have no achievements of their own to claim the achievements of "their" culture. As depressing as it might be to see people stoop to this level of delusion to appease their anxieties, there is nothing more ridiculous than having to lie about your culture to aggrandize yourself more. There are no further depths of self pity.

Perhaps I can shed light on this subject OP. This might sound strange, but please, read through without skipping.

It is impossible to know who truly created anything.
It may have been a silly hypothesis given by an amateur to which a master turned into a theory. To who gets the credit? Such a question is rhetorical since they both have parts in the situation. This should illuminate the idea that knowing exactly who made an idea possible is completely up to chance or, in my example, not useful, knowable, or logically applicable. Now, this uncertainty should be enough to cause any intelligent individual to disregard the type of question entirely.

Now, this situation is applicable in just the very instant the possibility arises in every situation I can conceive. This doesn't even consider the obfustication further down the road when perhaps credit is stolen, as is rumored with Einstein, or that someone's work wasn't really so original, as is the case with Dr. King. It also doesn't consider the effects of what happens to information over hundreds of years. Disaster often causes this....

So you see...

History is a fickle thing. To say the Chinese did or didn't do something is entirely pointless as the question of who invented what is impossible to consider logically. What is important is whats happening now.

Yadda yadda trolls