单选题 This was the 'China first'that inspired Joseph Needham to embark on what would be a more than 50-year mission to dispel a long-held view in the West that China had neither science nor made any contribution to modern science, and to persuade the world that China had been the home of the world's most advanced ancient civilisation by far. The underlined part "to dispel...and to persuade..." serves as a(n) ______