This article examines two syllogistic arguments contrasted in an ancient Chinese book, theMozi, which expounds doctrines of the Mohist school of philosophers. While the arguments seem to have the same form, one of them (theone-horse argument) is valid but the other (thetwo-horse argument) is not. To explain this difference, the article uses English plural constructions to formulate the arguments. Then it shows that the one-horse argument is valid because it has a valid argument form, the plural cousin of a standard (...) form of valid categorical syllogisms (Plural Barbara), and argues that the two-horse argument involves equivocal uses of a key predicate (the Chinese counterpart of ‘have four feet’) that has the distributive/nondistributive ambiguity. In doing so, the article discusses linguistic differences between Chinese and English and explains why the logic of plural constructions is applicable to Chinese arguments that involve no plural constructions. (shrink)

The Gongsun Longzi is often considered the only extant work of the Classical Chinese “School of Names”, an early intellectual tradition mainly concerned with logic and the philosophy of language. The Gongsun Longzi is a heterogeneous collection of five chapters that include short treatises and largely fictive dialogues between an anonymous persuader and his opponent, which typically revolve around a paradoxical claim. Its value as a testimony to Early Chinese philosophy, however, is somewhat controversial due to the intricate textual history (...) of the text and our limited knowledge about its intellectual backgrounds. This volume gathers contributions by leading specialists in the fields of Classical Chinese philosophy, philology, logic, and linguistics. Besides an overview of the scholarly literature on the topic and a detailed account of the reception of the text throughout time, it presents fresh insights into philological and philosophical problems raised by the Gongsun Longzi and other closely-related texts equally attributed to the “School of Names”. (shrink)

The Zhiwulun, chapter 3 of the Gongsunlongzi, attributed to the Sophist Gongsun Long, is generally interpreted as a theoretical treatise on the relations between words and things. A new reading proceeds from the hypothesis that the Zhiwulun, like the White Horse Treatise, is another logical puzzle. Its theme is the problem of pointing out things that do not exist in the world or, put in modern terms, the problem of negative existentials. The Zhiwulun is a dilemma whose purpose is to (...) show that the pointing that points at things that do not exist points without pointing. (shrink)

In this article I argue against Chad Hansen’s version of the “White Horse Dialogue” (Baimalun) of Gongsun Longzi as intelligible through writings of the later Moists. Hansen regards the Baimalun as an attempt to demonstrate how the compound baima, “white horse,” is correctly analyzed in one of the Moist ways of analyzing compound term semantics but not the other. I present an alternative reading in which the Baimalun arguments point out, via reductio, the failure of either Moist analysis; in particular (...) they point out how neither analysis accounts for ordinary, acceptable inferences like “There is a white horse; therefore there is a horse.” At issue for Gongsun Longzi is a fundamental problem with atomic terms: none of them seems capable of referring to a particular, “stand-alone” individual. (shrink)

Abstract Kung?sun Lung's thesis on ?White Horse [is] not Horse? has been solved by A. C. Graham on the basis of a part/whole logic and by Chad Hansen on that and a ?mass?noun? hypothesis. We present it as a case of reducing White Horse to its two most telling marks and then, on the basis of the good Sense (instead of Reference) in a Negative Logic?the pragmatics of locating X as the remainder left over when all non?X's have been removed?show (...) how a stable hand, receiving an order for White Horse would scan first for Horse by removing all non?horse shapes and then for White by removing all colours except White. This way we can prove how indeed ?A request for White Horse cannot be satisfied by Black and Brown that fills an order for Horse... (because) to exclude some colour [in the second scan] is not the same as to exclude yet no colour [in the first scan].? No part/whole or mass?sum is presumed. The whole discussion is set in the context of shifting criteria for judging name from Confucius to Hsun?tzu. (shrink)

Graham compares Kung‐sun Lung's “White Horse not Horse” [Graham, A.C. (1990) Studies in Chinese Philosophy and Philosophical Literature (Albany, SUNY Press)] loith the use of a synecdoche in English, “Sword is not Blade”. The Blade as part stands in here for the whole which is the Sword. But just as Sword as ‘hilt plus blade’ is more than blade, then via analogia, White Horse as ‘white plus horse’ is more than the part that is just ‘horse’. Graham had taken over (...) this Part/whole argument from Chad Hansen who argues that since Chinese does not require the word ma for ‘horse/horses’ to be used with prefixed articles or numerals, ma is a ‘mass‐noun’ similar to certain English mass‐nouns like ‘sand’ which also has no plural form unlike the count‐noun ‘horse’ [Hansen, Chad, (1983) Language and Logic in Ancient China (Ann Arbor, University of Michigan Press)]. Hansen then equates “White Horse is not Horse” to the Mohist argument for “Ox Horse is not Horse”. Ox‐Horse is a ‘mixed herd’ of Ox and Horse that is not (just) that part that is Horse. The same it is with the mass‐sum that is White Horse. It is like saying in English “White Sand is not Sand”. Sand being this spread of sand on the beach, it is more than just a patch of that beach that is white. But this attribution of a Part/whole logic to Kung‐sun Lung runs up against a basic dictum stated in his thesis on ‘Pointing and Thing’. There it is noted how all things can be pointed out except thing itself because the word “thing” leaves nothing to exclude for it to be stand out. Since that thesis is derived from the law of the excluded middle where a thing is either X or not X, it is not possible for Kung‐sun Lung to subscribe to a Part/whole logic which basically argues for a thing being both X and not X. (shrink)

The article proposes an account of the prevailing classical Chinese conception of reasoning and argumentation that grounds it in a semantic theory and epistemology centered on drawing distinctions between the similar and dissimilar kinds of things that do or do not fall within the extension of ‘names’. The article presents two novel interpretive hypotheses. First, for pre-Hàn Chinese thinkers, the functional role associated with the logical copula is filled by a general notion of similarity or sameness. Second, these thinkers’ basic (...) explanation of reasoning is that it is a process of moving from a comparison of whether something is similar to a ‘model’ or ‘standard’ to a judgment about whether that thing is part of a certain kind. Classical texts treat judgment as the attitude of predicating a ‘name’ of something, or, equivalently, of distinguishing whether something is the kind of thing denoted by a certain term. Reasoning is treated as a process of considering how some acts of term predication, or drawing distinctions, normatively commit one to making further, analogous predications or drawing further, analogous distinctions. Inference is thus understood as the act of distinguishing something as a certain kind of thing as a result of having distinguished it as similar to a relevant ‘model’ or ‘standard’. The article concludes by summarizing the consequences of the proposed account of early Chinese semantic and logical theories for the interpretation of other areas of classical Chinese thought. (shrink)

This ambitious book presents a new interpretation of Chinese thought guided both by a philosopher's sense of mystery and by a sound philosophical theory of meaning. That dual goal, Hansen argues, requires a unified translation theory. It must provide a single coherent account of the issues that motivated both the recently untangled Chinese linguistic analysis and the familiar moral-political disputes. Hansen's unified approach uncovers a philosophical sophistication in Daoism that traditional accounts have overlooked. The Daoist theory treats the imperious intuitionism (...) that alienates critical thinkers as a feature of Confucianism alone. Freed from the view that Confucianism is the core of Chinese thought and from myopic Confucian interpretations, Chinese thinkers emerge as unmistakably philosophical. (shrink)

The article assesses Chad Hansen's arguments that both early and later Moist texts apply only pragmatic, not semantic, terms of evaluation and treat “appropriate word or language usage,” not semantic truth. I argue that the early Moist “three standards” are indeed criteria of a general notion of correct dao 道 , not specifically of truth. However, as I explain, their application may include questions of truth. I show in detail how later Moist texts employ terms with the same expressive role (...) as “ is true.” Thus, contra Hansen, the Moists can justifiably be said to have a concept of semantic truth. (shrink)

Y a-t-il eu des sophistes chinois? C'est en rassemblant et en examinant les textes et les témoignages qui nous sont parvenus au sujet de Hui Shi et de Gongsun Long, deux penseurs chinois des IVe et IIIe siècles avant notre ère, et en mettant en relief les contrastes entre ces derniers et ce qui nous reste des Protagoras, Gorgias, Hippias, Prodicos et Antiphon que l'auteur cherche à répondre à cette question. Le travail se divise ainsi en cinq parties essentielles. La (...) première offre une discussion approfondie de la méthode comparée en philosophie en vue de jeter les bases méthodologiques de l'enquête. La deuxième détaille l'enjeu philosophique de la comparaison: la sophistique correspond-elle à un stade d'évolution de la pensée ou cherche-t-elle à résoudre des problèmes philosophiques précis? Viennent ensuite deux monographies à caractère doxographique, la première consacrée à une analyse du problème des noms et de la philosophie de la rhétorique chez les sophistes grecs, l'autre à la collection, la traduction et l'interprétation des fragments de Hui Shi et de Gongsun Long. La partie finale reprend la question de départ à la lumière des résultats obtenus à travers l'examen des textes. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and (...) made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is on the one hand to remind the Western reader of some aporias of Chinese antiquity, and on the other hand to show that a logic of sorts or of types similar to that which has been proposed to explain the relation between categories (in the mathematical sense of the term) and logic brings much light on these aporias. This should be contrasted with older traditional explanations using conventional syllogistics or feeling satised with too simple (...) explanations such as the confusion between inclusion and identity. The article is based on preceding papers of the Author, but stresses the basic unity of the solutions which were proposed there. (shrink)