Somaesthetics and Chinese Philosophy: Between Unity and Pragmatist Pluralism

Responding to three articles in a symposium dedicated to my research in somaesthetics, this paper explores a variety of themes connecting my theories with classical Chinese philosophy. The symposium topics discussed here range from the ontology of body-mind and world to the ethics of somaesthetic self-cultivation, and then to the somaesthetic meanings of our practices of erotics and of eating. The paper shows how the pragmatist orientation of somaesthetics reconciles values of unity with those of difference and how key ideas of somaesthetics intersect, in different ways, with both Confucian and Daoist thought.     

儒主道辅本道兼儒--论扬雄《法言》的思想特征

《法言》是扬雄拟《论语》而作的一部语录体散文著作,其目的是标举儒学以纠绳诸子。然而仔细品读《法言》,其中也不乏对道家思想的吸收和内化。前人的研究大多囿于儒家思想的角度,而对《法言》中的道家思想则有所忽略。实际上,儒道水乳融合、交互影响的特征贯穿了《法言》始末。把握这一线索,不仅有助于对扬雄一生思想、行事中的矛盾现象作出客观、准确的诠释,更全面地了解扬雄,而且有助于对整个汉代哲学史、思想史以及魏晋玄学的形成发展脉络等有更为清晰准确的认识。     

融通以达变:论钱穆先生对《易传》的诠释

钱穆先生在<易传>的研究上,先从文献入手,发表<论十翼非孔子作>以厘清孔孟旧儒与战国时代新儒的不同;其后发表<易传与小戴礼记中之宇宙论>讲述代表战国新儒思想的<易传>,虽然与孔孟旧儒不同,但仅限于天体宇宙论的建构方面,盖因此领域为道家所擅.<易传>作者吸收道家之长,融通道家宇宙论,转而建立属于儒家的宇宙论,这是值得肯定的转变.正如钱先生文中一再致意的:<易传>虽吸收道家宇宙论的思想,但并未背弃儒家人生论的精髓,所以在吸收过程中皆予以转化,换句话说,便是将老庄自然宇宙观变成儒家德性的宇宙观,以求合于传统儒家的人生哲学.     

Three Different Approaches to Virtue in Business- Aristotle,Confucius, and Lao Zi

The proposed paper presents an overview on the matter of virtue from different philosophical angles. It concentrates on three different schools of thought coming from the West and the East and their respective concepts of virtue. These schools of thought and the therewith-associated personalities and works discussed in this paper are Aristotelian virtue ethics, Confucianism and Daoism. The paper focuses specifically on the Nicomachean Ethics (NE) by Aristotle, the Analects belonging to Confucianism, and the Dao De Jing coming from Daoism. The paper is divided into three major parts. First, the concept of virtue of each school is outlined. In the second part, the concrete virtues as such according to each school are explained. In the third part, these virtues are then applied in specific business contexts like business practice, corporate culture and leadership, illuminating each school’s characteristic approach. The paper closes with a summary and conclusion. In the conclusion the paper outlines differences as well as similarities between Aristotelian and Confucian virtue ethics. Yet, the author generally takes a critical stance towards comparisons merely for the sake of finding similarities. Particularly between Aristotelian and Confucian virtue ethics there is a significant difference when it comes to the cultural and historical background of these schools, which should not be ignored. Besides, even within Chinese philosophy there are already significant differences when it comes to concepts and practice.     

《周易正义》之编撰

唐代为五经撰正义,为注疏统一之始。清儒服膺汉学,主翔实,故于《正义》多所讥诋,讥其虚浮。然唐时,儒玄合流,既已蔚为风气,孔氏《周易正义》之所以以形上学为纲纪者,亦非无故。此外,《周易正义》释义先以辅嗣为本,旁引汉魏南北朝诸说以供参证,有驳有断、有议有辩,与《书》《诗》《札记》诸疏之参据旧疏、杂出众手者不同。具体而言,《周易正义》调融南北,荟萃诸家,故用王而不固于王;参以玄言,故义理架构颇与老庄相通;渐染于浮屠,故排佛而用佛;发明义例、考辨意旨,自下新义,故有学术价值可言,尤宋人疑古开新之先导,非株守一先生说者可比。     

A reconstruction of contemporary Confucianism as a form of knowledge

Traditional Confucianism might be likened to a great tree, with various branches and trends of thought emerging from common roots. Continuing with this metaphor, Confucianism as a form of knowledge might be regarded as a main branch, and the resulting form of Confucianism constitutes the main body of Chinese learning. Due to modern society’s transformation, Confucianism as a form of knowledge has begun to disappear and the form of Confucianism which has its own discourse system and problem consciousness has become a disconnected tradition and an object of study of all the branches of learning in modern times. It is important for the present-day development of Confucianism that we break the rigescent modern academic system, propagate Confucianism as a form of knowledge, and rebuild the Confucian form of knowledge. __________ Translated from Hebei Xuekan 河北学刊 (Hebei Academic Journal), 2005(4) by Yan Xin     

Tricking or Benefitting the People? Guanzi on Objective Government and Subjective Preferences

This paper discusses Guanzi’s philosophy regarding how the state should levy taxes. As Guanzi writes, people react individually to what they perceive as taxes, whereas government wants people not to react at all and simply pay the levies. Based on a philosophical analysis of human action, Guanzi suggests introducing a consumption tax on salt and iron. First, people have no way of evading them; second, because of the implicit character of the tax, people will not notice it. Therefore, these taxes will not influence behavior. This paper uses this discussion as a case study in order to show how Guanzi’s philosophy differs from other forms of Legalism. It will be shown that Guanzi is foremost a pragmatic thinker willing to use Confucian and Legalist elements, amalgamating them into policy-advice. The paper, however, does not discuss issues of Sinology as they relate to the text of the Guanzi, taking the text instead as a philosophical body.     

The Semantics of Wisdom in the Philosophy of Tang Junyi: Between Transformative Knowledge and Transcendental Reflexivity

In this article, I offer a provisional analysis of the philosophical semantics of “wisdom” in the thought of the New Confucian thinker Tang Junyi. I begin by providing some pointers concerning the concept of wisdom in general and situating the discourse on wisdom in comparative philosophy in the context of the later Foucault’s and Pierre Hadot’s historical investigations into ancient Graeco-Roman philosophy as a mode of spiritual self-cultivation and self-transformation. In the remainder of the paper, I try to describe and think through what Foucault identifies as a “Cartesian moment,” in which self-knowledge becomes the ultimate precondition for the ethico-spiritual project of “caring for the self,” in Tang’s approach of wisdom. In the course of my argument, I outline the complex relation between his vision of a renewed Confucian mode of religious practice on the one hand and his philosophical presuppositions concerning the transcendental status of subjectivity and the reflexivity of consciousness on the other.     

Prolegomenon to a Theory of Philosophical Transposition,with Reference to Confucianism in America

What factors shape the movement of systems of thought from one historical‐cultural context to another? This paper provides a preliminary answer to this question by constructing an analytic framework drawn from the sociology of philosophy, and it uses this framework to consider the prospects for the contemporary transposition of Confucianism from China to America. The central, though still provisional, conclusion is that while global power dynamics matter, the particular conditions of the “philosophical fields” of both the original and the recipient locations are of primary importance in determining the extent and significance of any particular case of philosophical transposition. Therefore, due to the dynamics of the philosophical fields in both countries, it is unlikely that Confucianism will gain greater intellectual and political influence in the United States.     

仁学与人类文明

仁是儒学的核心。仁的基本精神或要义可以概括为七点 :仁的第一义是“生” ,第二义是“爱或博爱” ,第三义是“理” ,第四义是“全” ,第五义是“公” ,第六义是“一” ,第七义是“通”。生是万物存在的根据和始点 ,爱是生命的守护神并赖以同一的基础。只有公和仁爱 ,万物才能同一 ,万物同一了 ,无隔相通了 ,天下才会和谐而美满。这些既可视作仁学的内在逻辑 ,也是仁学具有普遍意义的超越之处。