Introduction to the Special Theme "Daoist Philosophy Ⅱ:Contemporary Explorations in the Thought of the Laozi'

The present issue of Frontiers of Philosophy in China (FPC),"Special Issue on Daoist Philosophy Ⅱ:Contemporary Explorations in the Thought of the Laozi,"is a companion to a previous issue of FPC,"Daoist Philosophy and Philosophical Daoism:Conceptual Distinctions" (volume 12,no.1).Where that issue offered four original English-language articles on topics in Daoist philosophy mainly from Western perspectives,this issue presents four original Chinese-language articles in translation focused on topics in Daoist philosophy from the Chinese perspective.     

The Thought of Building a Human Community with a Shared Future: Inheritance and Innovation to Marx’ s Thought of Community

Marx’s thought of community has experienced three stages in logic and is rooted in the social fundamental contradictions between productive forces and universal communication in content. It reflects the evolution of history into world history and human’s free and all-round development tending towards the unity of individuals and communities. Faced with the profound changes never seen in a century, the thought of building a human community with a shared future inherits and carries forward Marx’s idea of community in three aspects, i.e., the practice of building a social community, the ultimate focus on human destiny, and the grand vision of promoting historical development in human society. In addition, under the historical context of socialism and capitalism coexisting, the thought of building a human community with a shared future creates and shows a new state of Marx’s idea of community in three aspects, namely, dimension remodeling, path reshaping, and value reinterpretation. It presents a new model for historical significance and human civilization of a world of openness, probability and promise to promote the transformation from the modern society to a human society.     

Dōgen’s Idea of Buddha-Nature: Dynamism and Non-Referentiality

Busshō, one of the central fascicles of Dōgen’s Shōbōgenzō, is dedicated to the problematic of Buddha-nature, the understanding of which in Dōgen’s thought is fairly different from previous Buddhist philosophy, but concordant with his views on reality, time and person. The article will present a close reading of several passages of the fascicle with comment in order to argue that Dōgen’s understanding of Buddha-nature is not something that entities have, but a mode of how they are, neither in itself nor for us, but in the total world-process. The relation between totality and particularity is not hierarchical, nor one of opposition, but conceived of a matter of perspective, which, as Dōgen shows, is both mediated and circumscribed by language. As a result, we can see that particularity of being is precisely what makes the totality of being accessible to every existent, not an obstacle to be overcome.     

From Community to Time–Space Development: Comparing N. S. Trubetzkoy,Nishida Kitarō, and Watsuji Tetsurō

I introduce and compare Russian and Japanese notions of community and space. Some characteristic strains of thought that exist in both countries had similar points of departure, overcame similar problems and arrived at similar results. In general, in Japan and Russia, the nostalgia for the community has been strong because one felt that in society through modernization something of the particularity of one's culture had been lost. As a consequence, both in Japan and in Russia allusions to the German sociologist Ferdinand Tönnies’ book Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft are frequent. In the end I associate the Japanese as well as the Russian ideas with neo-Darwinian versions of the theme of evolution as it has been developed by Henri Bergson, Gilles Deleuze, and Felix Guattari.     

Using Historical Knowledge to Reason About Contemporary Political Issues: An Expert–Novice Study

People often justify history's place in the curriculum by its relationship to citizenship, yet there is little research to help educators picture how people use historical knowledge for civic purposes. This expert–novice study used the think-aloud method to examine how eight political scientists and eight high school students employed historical knowledge to reason about a political issue. Findings indicated that detailed historical narrative played an important role for experts’ reasoning, and the experts used narrative to frame the issue, support their positions, and evaluate historical claims. Participating students used narrative as well, but their narratives were lacking in detail. They never used history to frame the problem, contextualize documents, or to support their positions, and they rarely used narrative to evaluate claims. These differences in how experts and novices use history to make sense of the present have implications for history instruction and research in history and civic education.     

Affective Reactions to the Thought of “God”: Moderating Effects of Image of God

Recent understanding of subjective well-being suggests that it consists of global judgments of life satisfaction, hedonic experiences, and beliefs about facets of one’s life. Traditionally, life satisfaction judgments have been the outcome of interest in studies examining the relationship between religiosity and well-being. Two studies were conducted to look at the interactive effects of personal religious beliefs, namely God images, and environmental stimuli, particularly priming the thought of “God.” The first study examines hedonic experiences, which is one of the information sources when constructing a well-being judgment. A second study attempts to replicate the findings with life satisfaction ratings. Results of the first study showed that one’s image of God as a controlling or non-controlling entity moderated the affective response to being primed to think about God. In particular, those who had a high controlling image of God had a negative affective reaction to the God prime. Results of the second study replicated the pattern of results using life satisfaction ratings as the dependent variable.     

Thought insertion: Abnormal sense of thought agency or thought endorsement?

The standard approach to the core phenomenology of thought insertion characterizes it in terms of a normal sense of thought ownership coupled with an abnormal sense of thought agency. Recently, Fernández (2010) has argued that there are crucial problems with this approach and has proposed instead that what goes wrong fundamentally in such a phenomenology is a sense of thought commitment, characterized in terms of thought endorsement. In this paper, we argue that even though Fernández raises new issues that enrich the topic, his proposal cannot rival the version of the standard approach we shall defend.     

The Freedom of Thought: Patočka on Descartes and Husserl

Pato?ka highlights the central role of Cartesianism in our tradition of thinking. Yet, today, brain scientists often claim to have overcome Cartesian dualism. In this paper, I argue that the Cartesian conceptions of human nature and sensory perception remain presuppositions of brain science, where perception is largely equated with thinking. Equating perception and thinking means that thinking is a determined process, which leads to an erosion of critique. Critique, and the freedom of thought it entails, is essential to Descartes, Husserl and Pato?ka. I examine the differences, as well as the relationship, between Descartes method of doubt, Husserl’s phenomenological epochē and Pato?ka’s universalization of the epochē. I also show how Descartes’, Husserl’s and Pato?ka’s way into critique present different ways to understand self, things and the world. In conclusion, I suggest that Pato?ka presents a promising way to critique mechanistic understandings of thinking by rethinking both subject and object.     

Playing Princess: Preschool Girls’ Interpretations of Gender Stereotypes in Disney Princess Media

Through their 11 official princesses, Disney circulates powerful and consistent messages regarding gender norms and roles. Inspired by the princesses’ ubiquity in the lives of young girls, we examined how preschool girls interpreted gender-role stereotypes in Disney Princess media both through their pretend play behaviors and their discussions of the princesses. Participants included 31 3- to 5-year-old girls who represented an array of racial/ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds and who came from four classes at two preschools in rural New England. Data collected from a variety of methods, including pretend play observations, semi-structured interviews, and parent questionnaires revealed participants’ stereotypical beliefs about the princesses and their adherence to gendered behaviors when enacting the princesses. Thematic analyses identified four themes that defined the participants’ princess play: beauty, focus on clothing and accessories, princess body movements, and exclusion of boys. The implications of gendered princess play are discussed in relation to the social cognitive theory of gender development and differentiation. Based on the outcomes of our study, parents and educators might reconsider the type and amount of media they provide their children, acknowledging the effects of these images on their children’s behaviors and understandings of gender.     

The Events of 1648–1649: Contemporary Reports and the Problem of Verification

Writing the history of the events of 1648–1649 has been especially difficult. The chronicle sources used by modern historians to unravel the course of the war, irrespective of whether the author was a Jew, a Pole, or a Ukranian, privilege argument over accuracy. Their priority is to justify national ideologies, and they are replete with motifs, topoi, and symbols that do not easily strip away. One motif is that of the “wars of mercenaries,” in which elements typical of professional soldiery appear to cut across religious or even national lines. Two additional topoi, “the purification of the land” and the “syndrome of the overturned world,” repeat constantly, both describing what must be either done or reversed to achieve national deliverance. To take the chronicles at face value is to risk simply reproducing the topoi, if not the myths, of the chronicles themselves. Yet the chronicles do convey the framework of ideas within which authors desired their accounts to be read: a framework that is perennially a cosmic one of purification and total renewal. By the same token, it is from this point, and this point only, that an actual reconstruction of events may begin. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Tapti Maitra: Advaita Metaphysics: A Contemporary Perspective—No. 18 of Contemporary Researches in Hindu Philosophy & Religion

Journal of Indian Council of Philosophical Research -     

Echoes of Tsültrim Lodrö: An Indigenous Voice from Contemporary Tibet on the ‘Buddhism and Science Dialogue’

This paper seeks to find a place for the intellectual voices of an indigenous movement of ‘Buddhist modernism’ that recently took shape in eastern Tibet. It presents how a prominent leader of this movement, Tsültrim Lodrö (tshul khrims blo gros, b. 1962), articulates Buddhism in response to modern discourses of rationality and science. In particular, since the ‘dialogue’ between Buddhism and science in recent years has largely been a series of monologues, this paper seeks to open up the conversation in order to shed light on the nature of this dialogue and what is at stake in this conversation. I will discuss Tsültrim Lodrö’s most recent work on philosophy and science with the aim to shed light on the nature of the current Buddhism and science discourses through considering the contributions of this influential contemporary Tibetan.     

Plotinus’ Account of the Cognitive Powers of the Soul: Sense Perception and Discursive Thought

This paper focuses on Plotinus?? account of the soul??s cognitive powers of sense perception and discursive thought, with particular reference to the treatises 3. 6 [26], 4. 4 [28] and 5. 3 [49] of the Enneads. Part 1 of the paper discusses Plotinus?? direct realism in perception. Parts 2 and 3 focus on Plotinus?? account of knowledge in Enneads 5. 3 [49] 2?C3. Plotinus there argues that we make judgements regarding how the external world is by means of discursive reasoning. This latter claim, however, is in tension with what Plotinus argues elsewhere regarding our perceptual apprehension of the external world (3. 6 [26] 1; 4. 4 [28] 23). This puzzle is addressed in Part 3 of the paper, which investigates Plotinus?? view that there exist some sense perceptions of which we are unaware. Finally, Part 4 looks at Plotinus?? understanding of Plato??s famous wax block analogy, in 5. 3 (49). The overall conclusion of the paper is that Plotinus?? account of knowledge is radically different from that of the Cartesian tradition.