A provocative defense of a forgotten Chinese approach to identity and difference Historically, the Western encounter with difference has been catastrophic: the extermination and displacement of aboriginal populations, the transatlantic slave trade, and colonialism. China, however, took a different historical path. In Chinese Cosmopolitanism, Shuchen Xiang argues that the Chinese cultural tradition was, from its formative beginnings and throughout its imperial history, a cosmopolitan melting pot that synthesized the different cultures that came into its orbit. Unlike the West, which (...) cast its collisions with different cultures in Manichean terms of the ontologically irreconcilable difference between civilization and barbarism, China was a dynamic identity created out of difference. The reasons for this, Xiang argues, are philosophical: Chinese philosophy has the conceptual resources for providing alternative ways to understand pluralism. Xiang explains that “Chinese” identity is not what the West understands as a racial identity; it is not a group of people related by common descent or heredity but rather a hybrid of coalescing cultures. To use the Western discourse of race to frame the Chinese view of non-Chinese, she argues, is a category error. Xiang shows that China was both internally cosmopolitan, embracing distinct peoples into a common identity, and externally cosmopolitan, having knowledge of faraway lands without an ideological need to subjugate them. Contrasting the Chinese understanding of efficacy—described as “harmony”—with the Western understanding of order, she argues that the Chinese sought to gain influence over others by having them spontaneously accept the virtue of one’s position. These ideas from Chinese philosophy, she contends, offer a new way to understand today’s multipolar world and can make a valuable contribution to contemporary discussions in the critical philosophy of race. (shrink)

This chapter contains section titled: The Cosmic Community Social and Individual Autonomy The World Out of Balance Multiple Communities, Multiple Identities Renewing the Cosmic Community.

This book presents a reading of Martin Heidegger's philosophy as an effort to strike a middle position between the philosophies of Plato and Friedrich Nietzsche. Duane Armitage interprets the history of Western philosophy as comprising a struggle over the meaning of "being," and argues that this struggle is ultimately between materialism and idealism, and, in the end, between atheism and theism. This work therefore concerns the question of the meaning of the so called "death of God" in the context of (...) contemporary Continental Philosophy.. (shrink)

This paper argues that the ‘processual holism’ of Chinese metaphysics explains its characteristic attitude towards non-humans such as animals and demons. As all things are constantly in process and form a continuum, it follows that ontological distinctions between ‘species’ become impossible to delimit. The distinctions one makes are instead understood as perspectival and provisional. These metaphysical assumptions explain the lack of interest in the Chinese tradition for classifying the distinctions between humans and non-human. We see many examples of the different (...) schools of philosophy espousing the view that the distinction between humans and non-humans is tenuous, precarious and subject to change. A key implication that follows is that the Chinese worldview saw no ontological distinction between those considered as ‘Chinese’ and as ‘non-Chinese.’ The unavailability of ontological distinction as an explanation for the existence of difference means that phenomena that are perceived as anomalous, such as ghosts and spirits, are attributed to the perspective of the human agent; anomaly/difference is not understood as ontological. (shrink)

Through a key passage from the Book of Changes, this paper shows that Ernst Cassirer’s philosophy of symbolic forms shares similarities with the canonical account of symbolic formation in the Chinese tradition: the genesis of xiang, often translated as image or symbol. xiang became identified with the origins of culture/civilisation itself. In both cases, the world is understood as primordially meaningful; the expressiveness of the world requires a human subject to consummate it in a symbol, whilst the symbol in turn (...) gives us access to higher orders of meaning. It is the self-conscious creation of the symbol that then allows for the higher forms of culture. For both the Xici and Cassirer, symbols and the symbolic consciousness that comes with it is the pre-condition for the freedom, ethics and the cultivation of agency. As for both the Xici and Cassirer, it is human agency that creates these symbols, it will be argued that the Xici is making a Cassirerian argument about the relationship between human agency, symbols and ethics/freedom. (shrink)

In A Philosophical Defense of Culture, Shuchen Xiang draws on the Confucian philosophy of "culture" and Ernst Cassirer's philosophy of symbolic forms to argue for the importance of "culture" as a philosophic paradigm. A defining ideal of Confucian-Chinese civilization, culture (wen) spans everything from natural patterns and the individual units that make up Chinese writing to literature and other refining vocations of the human being. Wen is thus the soul of Confucian-Chinese philosophy. Similarly, as a philosopher who bridged the (...) classical age of German humanism and postwar modernity, Cassirer implored his and future generations to think of humankind in terms of their culture and to think of the human being as a "symbolic animal." The philosophies of culture of these two traditions, very much compatible, are of urgent relevance to our contemporary epoch. Xiang describes the similarity of their projects by way of their conception of the human being, her relationship to nature, the relationship of human culture to nature, the importance of cultural pluralism, and the role of the arts in human life, as well as the metaphysical frameworks that gave rise to such conceptions. Combining textual exegesis in classical Chinese texts and an exposition of Cassirer's most important insights against the backdrop of post-Kantian philosophy, this book is philosophy written in a cosmopolitan mode, arguing for the contemporary philosophical relevance of "culture" by drawing on and bringing together two different but strikingly similar streams in our world tradition. (shrink)

Through a key passage (Xici 2.2) from the Book of Changes, this paper shows that Ernst Cassirer’s philosophy of symbolic forms shares similarities with the canonical account of symbolic formation in the Chinese tradition: the genesis of xiang (象), often translated as image or symbol. xiang became identified with the origins of culture/civilisation itself. In both cases, the world is understood as primordially (phenomenologically) meaningful; the expressiveness of the world requires a human subject to consummate it in a symbol, whilst (...) the symbol in turn gives us access to higher orders of meaning. It is the self-conscious creation of the symbol that then allows for the higher forms of culture. For both the Xici and Cassirer, symbols and the symbolic consciousness that comes with it is the pre-condition for the freedom, ethics and the cultivation of agency. As for both the Xici and Cassirer, it is human agency that creates these symbols, it will be argued that the Xici is making a Cassirerian argument about the (ethical) relationship between human agency, symbols and ethics/freedom. (shrink)

This book critiques the postmodernism and Continental philosophy of Heidegger and Nietzche through the lens of the mimetic theory of Rene Girard.

Martin Heidegger's radical and, for that, controversial reflections on language were not simply a passing interest in his thinking, but a fundamental, career-long concern arguably as significant to him as his study of being. This book traces the intimate connection between language and being in Heidegger's philosophy, and shows how they cannot be understood apart from one another. It discusses why Heidegger's undervalued philosophy of language is increasingly important, how it figures in the wider context of his work, and how (...) it is to be approached and understood for our times. This includes the significance to Heidegger of being, the logos principle, etymology, phenomenology, mysticism, and poetry. Illuminating a difficult yet highly significant area in Heidegger's thinking, Williams provides an insightful and authoritative interpretation of the topic. (shrink)

On January 1, 1958, in the journal Democratic Critique, Zhang Junmai, Mou Zongsan, Tang Junyi, and Xu Fuguan published the "Manifesto on Chinese Culture for the World: Our Common Understanding of Chinese Scholarship Research and of the Future of Chinese Culture and World Culture."1 This manifesto is commonly seen as the founding statement of the New Confucianism movement. Section 2 of the manifesto, "Three Motives, Approaches, and their Shortcomings in the Study of Chinese Culture in World Scholarship," claimed that Chinese (...) culture had not been understood by three kinds of people who had approached it, namely, Christian missionaries, sinologists, and students of present world history. For the New Confucians, the... (shrink)

In this work of philosophy, theology, and intellectual history, Duane Armitage offers a clear interpretation of Heidegger’s enigmatic theology as uniquely Pauline and Lutheran. He argues that the real impetus, aim, and structure of Heidegger’s philosophy of religion as well as his philosophy as a whole, are rooted in Pauline (and Lutheran) ontology. He thus demonstrates that continental philosophy of religion, and, to an extent, continental philosophy as a whole, is indebted to St. Paul and Martin Luther. This examination also (...) shows how much of continental thinking itself is traceable to Heidegger’s onto-theological critique and hence to Luther and St. Paul. Armitage argues that St. Paul and Luther remain the un-thought origins of postmodern thinking on religion, and perhaps postmodern thinking in general. (shrink)

In the ethical texts, Aristotle claims that all instances of choice (prohairesis) must be preceded by deliberation, but it is not clear why he believes this. This paper offers an explanation of that commitment, drawing heavily from the De Anima and showing that the account emerging from there complements that of the ethical texts. The view is that the deliberative faculty has the capacity to manipulate reasons combinatorially, while the perceptual/desiderative faculty does not, and choice requires the combinatorial manipulation of (...) reasons. (shrink)

For centuries, outside business organizations have sought to enter into business relationships with indigenous populations, often benefitting both parties. However, the power imbalance that foreign settlers had over indigenous peoples often led to exploitative relationships whereby the indigenous people were marginalized and at times treated inhumanely. While the nature of trade and relationships has changed over time, the special status that native tribes enjoy in U.S.A. continues to attract attention from business enterprises. In the past few years, various organizations have (...) found it advantageous to their business interests to engage in transactions with Native American tribes. Three specific examples are described: Allergan transferred patent rights to a tribe to circumvent a U.S. patent review panel; Tesla opened a store and service center on native land in New Mexico to get around the state’s dealership laws; and Lume Cannabis Co. opened retail stores on native lands in Michigan near communities that had decided to not license recreational cannabis stores. All three examples raise questions over the ethics of buying access to native sovereignty. Students are asked to apply ethical theories to try and identify what distinguishes ethical and unethical transactions. (shrink)

Alain Badiou has claimed that Quentin Meillassoux's book After Finitude (Bloomsbury, 2008) "opened up a new path in the history of philosophy." And so, whether you agree or disagree with the speculative realism movement, it has to be addressed. Lacanian Realism does just that. This book reconstructs Lacanian dogma from the ground up: first, by unearthing a new reading of the Lacanian category of the real; second, by demonstrating the political and cultural ingenuity of Lacan's concept of the real, and (...) by positioning this against the more reductive analyses of the concept by Slavoj Zizek, Alain Badiou, Saul Newman, Todd May, Joan Copjec, Jacques Ranciere, and others, and; third, by arguing that the subject exists intimately within the real. Lacanian Realism is an imaginative and timely exploration of the relationship between Lacanian psychoanalysis and contemporary continental philosophy. (shrink)

The overwhelming motif of nineteenth century anti-Semitic discourse is the metaphor of the Jew as a ghost. In all cultures, the ghost represents the antithesis of what is categorically human: it represents the other par excellence. By using the heuristic of the ghost to interpret how Enlightenment discourse has dealt with the other, this article will argue that the Enlightenment model of the self and its relation to others was a contributing factor to Modern Racism. Enlightenment discourse on subjectivity finds (...) its counterpart in Confucian notions of subjectivity. By looking at how ghosts are understood within Confucian discourse and how they are evoked in popular literature, I argue that Confucian philosophy’s model of subjectivity contributed to the success of the Chinese empire’s assimilation project. (shrink)

This article argues that Cassirer’s thinking about the relationship between the different symbolic forms is best elucidated via the paradigm of “organic harmony.” Although Cassirer did not use the term himself, the harmonious cooperation between the parts found in the organic world provided him with a welcome alternative to traditional accounts of order (i.e., identity or hierarchy). This article gives three examples of “organic harmony” from which Cassirer drew inspiration: Goethe’s idealistic morphology, Wilhelm von Humboldt’s account of language, and Herder’s (...) account of history. Through “organic harmony” we can make better sense of and better articulate the pluralism of Cassirer’s PSF. Finally, this article shows how the motif of organic harmony is the normative moment in Cassirer’s own challenge to twentieth-century fascism and argues that the Cassirerian emphasis on finding a coherence which does justice to the uniqueness of particulars—harmony—is an ethical injunction relevant for our times. (shrink)

This article argues that Cassirer’s thinking about the relationship between the different symbolic forms is best elucidated via the paradigm of “organic harmony.” Although Cassirer did not use the term himself, the harmonious cooperation between the parts found in the organic world provided him with a welcome alternative to traditional accounts of order (i.e., identity or hierarchy). This article gives three examples of “organic harmony” from which Cassirer drew inspiration: Goethe’s idealistic morphology, Wilhelm von Humboldt’s account of language, and Herder’s (...) account of history. Through “organic harmony” we can make better sense of and better articulate the pluralism of Cassirer’s PSF. Finally, this article shows how the motif of organic harmony is the normative moment in Cassirer’s own challenge to twentieth-century fascism and argues that the Cassirerian emphasis on finding a coherence which does justice to the uniqueness of particulars—harmony—is an ethical injunction relevant for our times. (shrink)

The discrepancy between measures of preferred and actual participation in decision making was used as a measure of ecological dissonance for an organization and then used to assess its relationship to job satisfaction, job involvement, job alienation, and job formalization. Questionnaires were administered to 143 faculty and staff members of Mississippi State University. Correlational analyses indicated mild relationships between the measures of ecological dissonance and job satisfaction, job involvement, job alienation, and job formalization, thus providing support for ecological dissonance theory (...) (see Miller, Topping, & Wells-Parker, 1989). It was concluded that ecological dissonance in participation in decision making was a predictor of workers’ job satisfaction, job involvement, job alienation, and job formalization. (shrink)

Photography in Colorado was encouraged as early as 1861, when newspaper editor William Byers wrote in the Rocky Mountain News, "Secure the shadow, ere the substance perish," and roused the citizenry to take photographs of their families, friends, landscape, homes, and mills in order to document their lives and share them with others. The revised edition of Colorado: A History in Photographs draws on this rich legacy, portraying Colorado's history in images taken from the frontier era to the present, all (...) accompanied by a vivid, updated narrative. Presenting a broad view of countless aspects of life in Colorado and including 270 black-and-white photographs, this book will inform, entertain, and inspire all those who delight in learning more about the history of the Centennial State. (shrink)

Currently, there are two bottleneck problems in the research of college students’ entrepreneurial intention and entrepreneurial behavior: lack of comprehensive and systematic theoretical framework and empirical analysis to reveal the role path that affects entrepreneurial intention, and most studies ignore the gap between entrepreneurial intention and behavior. Based on the literature review, this study adopted the Theory of Planned Behavior as the theoretical framework introduced entrepreneurial situational factors and entrepreneurial implementation intention, and constructed a two-step extended entrepreneurial intention–behavior model. The (...) structural equation was constructed using AMOS24.0 to empirically analyze the antecedent variables of college students’ entrepreneurial intention and the factors influencing entrepreneurial behavior. The empirical results showed that expected material possessions, expected social reputation, expected self-evaluation, mission and responsibility, and career development are the antecedent variables of entrepreneurial attitude. Support from families and friends, college teachers’ views, and the role models are antecedent variables of entrepreneurial subjective norms. Professional ability, entrepreneurial ability, entrepreneurial experiences, and personality traits are the antecedent variables of entrepreneurial perceived behavior control. In the formation stage of college students’ entrepreneurial intention, attitude, subjective norms, perceived behavior control, and entrepreneurial situational factors have significant impacts on the formation of college students’ entrepreneurial intention, while entrepreneurial intention, perceived behavior control, and entrepreneurial situational factors have significant impacts on the transformation phase of entrepreneurial behavior. Entrepreneurial implementation intention plays an intervening role between entrepreneurial intention and behavior of college students. (shrink)

Three times in Book 1 chapter 13 of the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle says desire partakes of reason in a way. There is a consensus view in the literature about what that claim means: desire has no intrinsic rationality, but can partake of reason by being blindly obedient to the commands of reason. I argue this consensus view is mistaken: for Aristotle, adult human desire has its own intrinsic rationality, and while it is to be obedient to reason, it is not (...) blind obedience, for when reason tells desire to obey, it includes an explanation supporting its order which desire can at least potentially understand. Thus, the nature of human desire, and also of the characteristic interaction of desire and reason, is much different than it is standardly taken to be. (shrink)

Negativity in Psychoanalysis examines the role of negativity in psychoanalytic theory and its application in clinical settings. While theories around negativity and death drive have become routinized within philosophical interpretations of Freudian and Lacanian psychoanalysis, they often mask an inherent positivity. This volume assembles highly esteemed psychoanalytic theorists and clinicians for an in-depth discussion on the topic. It features comprehensive introductions to Freudian and Lacanian perspectives, alongside contemporary clinical and cultural issues. The book also investigates how psychoanalytic negativity influences and (...) is influenced by social, theological, and philosophical dialogues. This work will prove invaluable for practicing psychoanalysts and those in training, while also appealing to academics and scholars in critical and cultural theory, continental and post-continental philosophy, and sociology, especially those whose research intersects clinical and theoretical traditions. (shrink)

This paper argues that Confucianism had an antiessentialist conception of selfhood. This understanding of self means that they did not have, and could not have had, a concept of “race” in the sense that one's essence determines one's becoming. In the Confucian canon, the embodiment of cultural norms/performance of culturally appropriate actions defines one's human-ness. This account of human agency in becoming human can be seen in the Confucian explanation of moral failure. This assumption of human agency also means that (...) the Confucian understanding of hierarchy is social as opposed to ontological and that differences between peoples are understood to be a result of culture–custom variation. (shrink)

This paper argues that Confucianism had an antiessentialist conception of selfhood. This understanding of self means that they did not have, and could not have had, a concept of “race” in the sense that one's essence determines one's becoming. In the Confucian canon, the embodiment of cultural norms/performance of culturally appropriate actions defines one's human-ness. This account of human agency in becoming human can be seen in the Confucian explanation of moral failure. This assumption of human agency also means that (...) the Confucian understanding of hierarchy is social as opposed to ontological and that differences between peoples are understood to be a result of culture–custom variation. (shrink)

As considerações de Merleau-Ponty sobre a historicidade são significativas, tanto como um relato fenomenológico, quanto como um relato existencial de nossa situação histórica. Naturalmente, estes aspectos de seu trabalho não se excluem mutuamente, mas se entrelaçam. E cada aspecto contribui para o sentido da crise da historicidade humana. Primeiro consideraremos a crise fenomenológica da historicidade – ou seja, consideraremos a crise da historicidade fenomenologicamente. Esta é a tentativa de revelar as condições da possibilidade da história a partir da história ou (...) da estrutura de nossa situação histórica – onde a posição de Merleau-Ponty se afasta da fenomenologia husserliana. Em seguida, consideraremos a crise existencial de historicidade – ou seja, consideraremos a crise de historicidade existencialmente. Esta é a tentativa de compreender o imperativo de que as coisas são importantes para nós historicamente. Finalmente, vamos indicar brevemente a importância destes aspectos de nossa historicidade como um entrelaçamento crítico. Este entrelaçamento crítico revela a intrusão mútua do “como” e do “porquê” de nossa historicidade, que Merleau-Ponty descreve no final de sua carreira como uma existência chiasmática dentro da carne do mundo. O cruzamento crítico como interrogatório de nosso ser histórico fornece o “quem”, “o quê”, “quando” e “onde” de nossa historicidade. (shrink)

Duane Cady views warism and pacifism as polar extremes on a continuum that embraces a full spectrum of ethical positions on the morality of war and peace. Realizing that he could not intellectually defend the notions of just-war theory, he found that he was a reluctant pacifist. In this new edition of From Warism to Pacifism, Cady continues to expose the pervasive, subconscious warism that is the dominant ideology in modern Western culture. He explores the changes over the last twenty (...) years—from the end of the Cold War to the ongoing “war on terror,” as well as Barack Obama winning the Nobel Prize for Peace. Like racism and sexism, the uncritical presumption that war is morally justifiable, even morally required, misguides our attitudes and institutions. In its place, Cady proposes the development of a positive concept of peace. Citing common objections to pacifist values, he describes peace as something more than the mere absence of war and demonstrates that pacifism is a defensible position. (shrink)

Ben shu yi "zhou xin shi dai" Zhongguo wen hua ren wen xing te zheng xing cheng ji qi dui Zhongguo zhe xue te zhi de su zao wei qie ru dian, zai xi tong shu li ru xue xin xing lun de ji ben zhu ti he li shi fa zhan, jie shi qi te zheng de ji chu shang, cong dao de yu sheng ming, dao de shi jian deng fang mian dui tang jun yi dao de xing (...) shang xue jin xing le shen ru de yan jiu. (shrink)

Many authors have argued that Aristotle does not stay true to his official account on which every instance of choice must be preceded by deliberation, and it is a good thing that he does so because his official account has catastrophically bad theoretical implications. I argue that Aristotle does not deviate from his official account, and that the official account does not have the decisively bad implications others have claimed it to have. These objectionable entailments only obtain on a certain (...) conception of what deliberation is like, and I argue that this conception is not Aristotle’s. Once Aristotle’s own conception of deliberation is understood, the terrible putative entailments clearly do not follow from the official account, and so textually Aristotle remains consistent while conceptually he remains plausible. (shrink)