This chapter contains section titled: Wisdom: Theory of Dialectical Logic: Theory Transformed into Method Freedom: Theory Transformed into Virtue.

Feng Qi explored many areas of Chinese and Western, ancient and modern philosophy, but he was always most concerned with the idea of wisdom. The selections translated here are examples of his earliest and last work on this subject.

A major figure in the Anglo-American analytic tradition, Ernest Sosa is a pioneer of contemporary virtue epistemology. Engaging with his important work for the first time, a team of renowned scholars of Chinese philosophy bring Western analytic epistemology into dialogue with themes and issues in the history of the Chinese tradition in order to reveal multiple points of connection. Drawing on thinkers and texts from Confucianism, Daoism and Chinese Buddhism, chapters explore issues central to virtue epistemology, such as the reliabilist (...) and responsibilist divide, the distinction between virtues constitutive of knowledge and virtues auxiliary to knowledge, epistemic competence and the role of testimony. Including Sosa's constructive and systematic responses to each scholar's interpretation of his work, this volume demonstrates the value of cross-cultural dialogue, advancing the field of virtue epistemology and paving the way for further engagement between philosophical traditions. (shrink)

Explores the resources for contemporary ethics found in the work of the Cheng brothers, canonical neo-Confucian philosophers. Yong Huang presents a new way of doing comparative philosophy as he demonstrates the resources for contemporary ethics offered by the Cheng brothers, Cheng Hao (1032–1085) and Cheng Yi (1033–1107), canonical neo-Confucian philosophers. Huang departs from the standard method of Chinese/Western comparison, which tends to interest those already interested in Chinese philosophy. While Western-oriented scholars may be excited to learn about (...) Chinese philosophers who have said things similar to what they or their favored philosophers have to say, they hardly find anything philosophically new from such comparative work. Instead of comparing and contrasting philosophers, each chapter of this book discusses a significant topic in Western moral philosophy, examines the representative views on this topic in the Western tradition, identifies their respective difficulties, and discusses how the Cheng brothers have better things to say on the subject. Topics discussed include why one should be moral, how weakness of will is not possible, whether virtue ethics is self-centered, in what sense the political is also personal, how a moral theory can be of an antitheoretical nature, and whether moral metaphysics is still possible in this postmodern and postmetaphysical age. “This book presents the philosophical ideas of the Cheng brothers intelligently, convincingly, and powerfully. It is among the best books ever written on the Cheng brothers, including works in the Chinese language.” — Kam-por Yu, coeditor of Taking Confucian Ethics Seriously: Contemporary Theories and Applications. (shrink)

Synthesizing insights from a dynamic capability perspective and social network theory, this study identifies the factors influencing green innovation and examines the relationships between influencing factors, green innovation, and performance. This study uses structural equation modeling to test the research hypotheses. The results indicate that dynamic capability, coordination capability, and social reciprocity are significant drivers of green innovation, including green product innovation and green process innovation. Green product and process innovation have positive effects on environmental performance and organizational performance. These (...) findings are relevant to firms in quest of green management and innovation. (shrink)

Religious beliefs have often been taken either as absolutely foundational to all others or as ultimately founded on something else. This essay starts with an endorsement of the contemporary critique of foundationalism but sets its task as to search for the foundation of religious belief after foundationalism. In its third and main part, it argues for a Wittgensteinian reflective equilibrium as such a foundation. In this reflective equilibrium, religious beliefs are no more and no less foundational to, or founded by, (...) other beliefs and practices. To appreciate this perspective better, I argue,in the first part, that Kai Neilsen's charge of Wittgenstein as a fideist is not accurate, and, in the second part, that D. Z. Phillips's fideistic contentions are unWittgensteinian. (shrink)

In this postmodern era, God-talk is facing serious challenges. Is it still possible to have a meaningful concept of God after the demise of metaphysical realism? How can we make sense of the idea of absolute transcendence in a secularized world? In what sense can we still believe something as divine revelation when foundationalism is no longer taken for granted? While some believe that we can go about our old theological business as usual, others have entirely given up on the (...) hope of any intelligible theology. It is my hunch, however, that there are ways of doing theology that can take our postmodern conditions into serious account. In this article, I shall argue that, however anachronistic it might seem, Hegel's God-talk, seen through the lens of Heidegger's understanding of Being, provides one such possibility. (shrink)

Gilbert Ryle has made the famous distinction between intellectual knowing-that and practical knowing-how. Since knowledge in Confucianism is not merely intellectual but also practical, many scholars have argued that such knowledge is knowing-how or, at least, very similar to it. In this essay, focusing on Wang Yangming’s moral knowledge, I shall argue that it is neither knowing-that nor knowing-how, but a third type of knowing, knowing-to. There is a unique feature of knowing-to that is not shared by either knowing-that or (...) knowing-how: a person with knowing-to will act accordingly, while neither knowing-that nor knowing-how, whether separately or combined, will dispose or incline its possessor to act accordingly. (shrink)

Of the three main teachings in Chinese culture, Confucianism has exerted the most profound and lasting influence in China.While Confucianism (a term coined by Westerners) refers to a tradition (Ruism) that predated Confucius, it is most closely associated with Confucius (551-479 BCE), who determined its later development. Confucius' ideas are reflected in his conversations with students, mostly recorded in the Analects. However, this book also brings into discussion those sayings of Confucius that are recorded in other texts, greatly expanding our (...) perspective of the original Confucius. Scholars in the past, unsure about the authenticity of such sayings, have been reluctant to use them in discussing Confucius' view. However, recent archaeological findings have shown that at least some of them are reliable. Confucius: A Guide for the Perplexed is a clear and thorough account of authentic Confucius and his ideas, underscoring his contemporary relevance, not only to Chinese people but also to people in the West. (shrink)

Zhu Xi has been commonly and justifiably recognized as the most influential philosopher of Neo-Confucianism, a revival of classical Confucianism in face of the challenges coming from Daoism and, more importantly, Buddhism. His place in the Confucian tradition is often and also very plausibly compared to that of Thomas Aquinas, slightly later, in the Christian tradition. This book presents the most comprehensive and updated study of this great philosopher. It situates Zhu Xi’s philosophy in the historical context of not only (...) Confucian philosophy but also Chinese philosophy as a whole. Topics covered within Zhu Xi’s thought are metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, political philosophy, hermeneutics, philosophy of religion, moral psychology, and moral education. This text shows both how Zhu Xi responded to earlier thinkers and how his thoughts resonate in contemporary philosophy, particularly in the analytic tradition. This companion will appeal to students, researchers and educators in the field. (shrink)

An engagement between Confucianism and the philosophy of Richard Rorty.

Focusing on the Analects and the Mencius, this article attempts to provide a Confucian answer to "why be moral?"—a question about the motivation to be moral that is neither tautological nor self-contradictory, as some philosophers claim. The Confucian answer to this question is that to be moral is joyful. While one may find joy in doing non-moral and even immoral things, one ought to seek joy in being moral or at least in being not immoral, as being moral is uniquely (...) human. As the Confucian motivation for being moral is joy and therefore appears to be egoistic, Confucian joy lies in practicing the four cardinal virtues and so is altruistic. (shrink)

Moral relativism familiar in the Western philosophical tradition, according to David Lyons, is either agent relativism or appraiser relativism or appraiser group). As Lyons has convincingly argued, they are both problematic. However, in the ancient Chinese Daoist classic, the Zhuangzi, we can find a different type of moral relativism, which I call patient relativism. In the essay, I aim to argue in what sense Zhuangzi is a patient relativist and how patient relativism can avoid the problem of agent relativism and (...) appraiser relativism. (shrink)

I have been developing an ethics that I initially identified in the text of the Zhuangzi and which I have characterized in different ways under different names. First, in contrast to the moral Golden Rule, which asks us to do unto others as we would like to have done unto us, I call it the moral Copper Rule: do unto others as they would like to have done unto them. Second, in contrast to the ethics of commonality, I call it (...) ethics of difference. Ethics of Commonality is a general term I use to include the moral Golden Rule, Kantian ethics, and even Rorty’s anti-Kantian ethics... (shrink)

IntroductionThe idea of neutrality is one of the trademarks and also one of the most controversial ideas of contemporary liberalism as a political philosophy. One part of this idea is that, in determining the political principle of justice, the state should be neutral with respect to individuals’ religious and metaphysical conceptions of the good or the lack thereof. In their argument against political liberalism, communitarian philosophers such as Alasdair MacIntyre and Charles Taylor have argued the opposite: the political conception of (...) justice must be embedded in some type of religious or metaphysical conception of the good. In contrast to these communitarians, regarded as radical perfectionists, a number of other philosophers, notably George Sher, Thomas Hurka, Joseph Raz, and Derek Parfit, have adopted a moderate version of perfectionism by shifting to a different battlefield against the liberal idea of neutrality. In addition to religious and metaphysical conceptions of the good, .. (shrink)

Daniel Bell's The China Model: Political Meritocracy and the Limits of Democracy is a significant contribution to contemporary political theory. I am very much in sympathy with his ideal of political meritocracy, although I would disagree with him on the degree to which it is realized or practiced in China today; for me, the reality is as distant from Bell's ideal of political meritocracy, if I understand it correctly, as it is from democracy. However, in the present comment, I will (...) not exploit this disagreement. Instead, I will try to make two friendly amendments to his political meritocracy as an ideal, with which I have a lot of agreements. In the Introduction to the book, Bell discloses that "I developed an... (shrink)

As virtue ethics has developed into maturity, it has also met with a number of objections. This essay focuses on the self-centeredness objection: since virtue ethics recommends that we be concerned with our own virtues or virtuous characters, it is self-centered. In response, I first argue that, for Zhu Xi’s neo-Confucianism, the character that a virtuous person is concerned with consists largely in precisely those virtues that incline him or her to be concerned with the good of others. While such (...) an answer is also available to the Aristotelian virtue ethics, I argue that Zhu Xi’s neo-Confucianism can better respond to the objection on two deeper levels: (1) a virtuous person is not only concerned with others’ external well-being but also their virtuous characters, and (2) a virtuous person’s concern with others’ wellbeing, both internal and external, is neither self-indulgent nor self-effacing. (shrink)

In this paper I shall first examine an apparent paradox in Confucius? view on whether everyone is perfectible through education: on the one hand, he states that education should be provided to all, on the other hand, he says that common people cannot be made to know things. To understand this apparent paradox, I shall argue that education for Confucius is primarily moral education, as he teaches his students to become virtuous persons. So the apparent paradox is really one about (...) whether virtue can be taught. I shall argue in the last section that while Confucius? answer to the question is affirmative, he does not think that virtue can be taught in the same way as theoretical knowledge or technical skills are taught. For Confucius, the most effective way to teach people to be virtuous is through personal example. (shrink)

: Here a moral principle called the "Copper Rule" is developed and defended as an alternative to the Golden Rule. First, the article focuses on two problems with the Golden Rule's traditional formulation of "Do (or don't do) unto others what you would (or would not) have them do unto you": it assumes (1) the uniformity of human needs and preferences and (2) that whatever is universally desired is good. Second, it examines three attempts to reformulate the Golden Rule—Marcus Singer's (...) general interpretation, Allan Gewirth's rationalization, and R. M. Hare's imaginative role reversal— to show why they all fail to save the Golden Rule from difficulty.Third, the rich resources of the Chinese Confucian-Daoist philosophical traditions are appropriated to develop a "Copper Rule" as an alternative moral principle: "Do (or don't do) unto others as they would (or would not) have us do unto them." This moral principle not only avoids the two problems, but also has additional advantages.Finally, the "Copper Rule" is defended against three objections or counterarguments: what if people ask you (forexample) (1) to kill someone else, (2) to kill them, or (3) to kill yourself? The appropriate response is merely to trace the implications of the "Copper Rule" rather than add any ad hoc arguments. (shrink)

It has been widely observed that virtue ethics, regarded as an ethics of the ancient, in contrast to deontology and consequentialism, seen as an ethics of the modern (Larmore 1996: 19–23), is experiencing an impressive revival and is becoming a strong rival to utilitarianism and deontology in the English-speaking world in the last a few decades. Despite this, it has been perceived as having an obvious weakness in comparison with its two major rivals. While both utilitarianism and deontology can at (...) the same time serve as an ethical theory, providing guidance for individual persons and a political philosophy, offering ways to structure social institutions, virtue ethics, as it is concerned with character traits of individual persons, seems to be ill-equipped to be politically useful. In recent years, some attempts have been made to develop the so-called virtue politics, but most of them, including my own (see Huang 2014: Chapter 5), are limited to arguing for the perfectionist view that the state has the obligation to do things to help its members develop their virtues, and so the focus is still on the character traits of individual persons. However important those attempts are, such a notion of virtue politics is clearly too narrow, unless one thinks that the only job the state is supposed to do is to cultivate its people’s virtues. Yet obviously the government has many other jobs to do such as making laws and social policies, many if not most of which are not for the purpose of making people virtuous. The question is then in what sense such laws and social policies are moral in general and just in particular. Utilitarianism and deontology have their ready answers in the light of utility or moral principles respectively. Can virtue ethics provide its own answer? This paper attempts to argue for an affirmative answer to this question from the Confucian point of view, as represented by Mencius. It does so with a focus on the virtue of justice, as it is a central concept in both virtue ethics and political philosophy. (shrink)

This paper addresses one of the three main themes of Neville's The Goodness Is One, Its Manifestations Many: Whether Confucian ethics can be appropriately characterized as a virtue ethics. It first examines some unique features of virtues ethics, concluding that Confucian ethics may be plausibly regarded as a virtue ethics. Then it shows that virtue ethics is immune to the two diseases that Neville worries about: subjectivism and individualism. Finally, it argues that what Neville regards as salient features of Confucian (...) ethics, (1) situationism, (2) attention to knowledge and skills beyond virtues, and (3) consequentialism of principle, can all be kept intact when it is characterized as a virtue ethics. (shrink)

It has been widely observed that virtue ethics, regarded as an ethics of the ancient, in contrast to deontology and consequentialism, seen as an ethics of the modern (Larmore 1996: 19–23), is experiencing an impressive revival and is becoming a strong rival to utilitarianism and deontology in the English-speaking world in the last a few decades. Despite this, it has been perceived as having an obvious weakness in comparison with its two major rivals. While both utilitarianism and deontology can at (...) the same time serve as an ethical theory, providing guidance for individual persons and a political philosophy, offering ways to structure social institutions, virtue ethics, as it is concerned with character traits of individual persons, seems to be ill-equipped to be politically useful. In recent years, some attempts have been made to develop the so-called virtue politics, but most of them, including my own (see Huang 2014: Chapter 5), are limited to arguing for the perfectionist view that the state has the obligation to do things to help its members develop their virtues, and so the focus is still on the character traits of individual persons. However important those attempts are, such a notion of virtue politics is clearly too narrow, unless one thinks that the only job the state is supposed to do is to cultivate its people’s virtues. Yet obviously the government has many other jobs to do such as making laws and social policies, many if not most of which are not for the purpose of making people virtuous. The question is then in what sense such laws and social policies are moral in general and just in particular. Utilitarianism and deontology have their ready answers in the light of utility or moral principles respectively. Can virtue ethics provide its own answer? This paper attempts to argue for an affirmative answer to this question from the Confucian point of view, as represented by Mencius. It does so with a focus on the virtue of justice, as it is a central concept in both virtue ethics and political philosophy. (shrink)

This thesis discusses the proper relationship between religion and politics, not as two kinds of institutions in a society but as two sets of beliefs within and among belief systems: people's religious ideas of the good human life and their political ideas of a right society, in a religiously plural context. ;It starts its discussion by critically examining two most important positions on this issue in contemporary public discourses: the liberal idea of priority of the right to the good and (...) the communitarian idea of priority of the good to the right . The problem with the liberal view is that its idea of a politics neutral to all religions is merely an illusion. The problem with the communitarian one is that it will lead to either political sectarianism or religious pluralism. ;The thesis therefore aims to develop an alternative position, which is centered around the idea of multiple reflective equilibria. According to this idea, instead of a dichotomy, religious goodness and political rightness, along with many other ideas people may have, are mutually enriching, critical, and transformative, both within an individual's belief system and among different individuals' belief systems. In a religiously plural society, it searches for a universal political idea of the right that is kept in a reflective equilibrium with plural religious ideas of the good. (shrink)

An accessible introduction to Confucian moral philosophy.

_A wide ranging consideration of the work of contemporary ethicist David Wong._.

In this article, I present a neo-Confucian answer, by Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi, to the question, "Why should I be moral?" I argue that this answer is better than some representative answers in the Western philosophical tradition. According to the Chengs, one should be moral because it is a joy to perform moral actions. Sometimes one finds it a pain, instead of a joy, to perform moral actions only because one lacks the necessary genuine moral knowledge—knowledge that is accessible (...) to every common person as long as one makes the effort to learn. One should make the effort to learn such knowledge—to seek joy in performing moral actions—because to be moral is a distinguishing mark of being human. This neo-Confucian answer seems to be egoistic, as its conception of motivation for morality is based on self-interest: to seek one's own joy. However, since it emphasizes that one's true self-interest is to seek joy in things uniquely human, which is to be moral, self-interest and morality become identical; the more a person seeks one's self-interest, the more moral the person is, and vice versa. (shrink)

Analects 13.18 continues to be the central focus of a prolonged debate among contemporary scholars in the mainland China. The newest stage of this debate is initiated by Liao Mingchun of Tsinghua University and Liang Tao of Renmin University of China, respectively, and responded to by Guo Qiyong and his students. There are three main issues involved in this new round of debate: whether the Chinese character yin in this passage means nondisclosure, as has been traditionally interpreted, or rectification; what (...) the precise meanings of the Chinese character zhi appearing three times in the passage are; and whether it is legitimate to supplement this passage, in light of the recently unearthed ancient Chinese texts, with something to the effect that sons take responsibility for the wrongdoings committed by their parents. (shrink)

Toleration has been almost universally regarded as an indispensable virtue one ought to have when encountering people of races, religions, languages, cultures, genders, and sexual orientations different from one’s own. This is unfortunate, however, because toleration includes objection as one of its necessary components: to tolerate an object means to have objection to it though without interfering with it. However, it is wrong to think we have, and it is wrong for us to have, objection to people simply because of (...) their races, religions, languages, cultures, genders, and sextual orientations different from us. The proper virtue we ought to cultivate in this context is respect as advocated in the Zhuangzi, which is fundamentally different from respect that has sometimes been associated with the very conception of toleration. (shrink)

This article attempts to see whether value can be independent of fact. I argue that, in this regard, the two traditional models of ethics, Kant's deontology and Bentham/Mill's utilitarianism are both faulty. In comparison, while contemporary Aristotelian virtue ethics does seem more promising, I argue that such a version of virtue ethics is still deficient. The main purpose of this article is to develop an alternative version of virtue ethics, what I call neo-Confucian ontological virtue ethics, drawing on Cheng Hao (...) and Cheng Yi's identification of virtue and nature, which provides a negative answer to our question without committing the 'naturalist fallacy'. (shrink)

This essay discusses how Confucianism can deal with two related issues of virtue ethics and moral responsibility: praise and blame. We normally praise a person because the person has done something difficult, but a virtuous person does the virtuous things effortlessly, delightfully, and with great ease. Thus the question arises regarding whether such actions are indeed praiseworthy. We can blame a person for doing something wrong only if the person does it knowingly. However, according to virtue ethics, anyone who has (...) genuine moral knowledge acts virtuously, and anyone who does not act virtuously, or acts viciously, only because the person does not have the genuine moral knowledge. Thus the question arises regarding whether such actions are blameworthy. (shrink)

Gender plays an important role in various aspects of second language acquisition, including lexicon learning. Many studies have suggested that compared to males, females are less likely to experience boredom, one of the frequently experienced deactivating negative emotions that may impair language learning. However, the contribution of boredom to gender-related differences in lexicon learning remains unclear. To address this question, here we conducted two experiments with a large sample of over 1,000 college students to explore the relationships between gender differences (...) in boredom and lexicon learning. In Experiment 1, a cohort of 527 participants completed the trait and state boredom scales as well as a novel lexicon learning task without awareness of the testing process. In Experiment 2, an independent cohort of 506 participants completed the same novel lexicon learning task with prior knowledge of the testing procedure. Results from both experiments consistently showed significant differences between female and male participants in the rate of forgetting words and the state boredom scores, with female participants performing better than male participants. Furthermore, differences in state boredom scores partially explained differences in the rate of forgetting words between female and male participants. These findings demonstrate a novel contribution of state boredom to gender differences in lexicon learning, which provides new insights into better language-learning ability in females. (shrink)

In this chapter, we examine the neo-Confucian Cheng Brothers’ Mencian hermeneutics in two senses. On the one hand, we show that they adopt a Mencian hermeneutics in their approach to Confucian classics, which gives the priority to the fundamental principles underlining a classic over its literal meaning. On the other hand, to illustrate this Mencius hermeneutics, we focus on Cheng Brothers’ interpretations of the Mencius. Thus, in contrast to the common criticism of Cheng Brothers’ hermeneutics in particular and neo-Confucian hermeneutics (...) in Song and Ming dynasties in general, especially by some Confucians in Qing dynasty, that it tends to impose their own philosophical ideas upon the text of Mencius while ignoring clear textual evidence, we argue that the Cheng Brothers’ interpretations of the Mencius is indeed authentically Mencian. (shrink)

There is an increasing awareness that we are living in a global village, which demands a global ethics. In this article, I shall explore what contributions Confucianism, particularly its conception of love, can make. It has often been claimed that Confucian love is love with distinction, as a natural feeling, and as merely human love and so it is inferior to the Christian love, which is universal, commanded, and based on divine love. Drawing on the resources of the Cheng brothers' (...) neo-Confucianism, I shall explore how Confucianism can make creative responses to such criticisms and thus make a unique Confucian contribution to the emerging global ethics. (shrink)

This paper sees Charles Taylor's moral discourse as a version of liberal communitarianism, an attempt to reconcile liberalism and communitarianism, by examining his three transcendental arguments: the liberal transcendence from the parochial to the universal; the communi tarian transcendence from the instinctual to the ontological; and the theistic transcendence from the good to God. While this liberal communi tarianism absorbs some great insights from both liberalism and communi tarianism and overcomes some of their respective weaknesses, it fails to avoid their (...) common dichotomy of the good and the right because Taylor's fundamentally communitarian commitment leads him to believe that there must be a universal ontological (religious or metaphysical) idea of the good as the foundation for any needed universal social and political idea of the right. (shrink)

Jiwei Ci's Moral China in the Age of Reform is a landmark in our attempt to understand, diagnose, and provide solutions to the moral crisis in post-Mao China. It is difficult not to be deeply impressed by the perceptive observations, provocative claims, and sophisticated arguments Ci presents in this book. In my brief comment, I shall think with Ci on the relationship between the democratic and liberal components of a liberal democratic society on the one hand and that between the (...) right and the good on the other.Ci makes the claim that in the very idea of liberal democracy the liberal component has priority over the democratic component. What he means by this is that "members of a modern society … pursue... (shrink)