This article examines the evolution of the vocabulary “feudal (fengjian)” in early twentieth-century China. Despite having served as a symbol of local autonomy and countervailing against imperial authority as emphasized in the Confucian tradition, the term had descended into an object of scorn, oppression, and retrogression in the latter half of the twentieth century until today. An alternative interpretation toward the modern misuse of fengjian may be found by focusing and comparing the two seemingly unrelated and radically different portrayals of (...) fengjian by: political thinker Zhang Taiyan’s federalist ideology; and Marxist historian Guo Moruo’s manipulation of Chinese classics. Under the historical context surrounding the turmoil of 1920s China, this article argues that much more than a mistranslation, the redefinition of fengjian was an intentional slander to, through the ambiguity surrounding its definition, destroy the Chinese tradition of liberty and local autonomy, further justifying a unified, highly centralized Chinese nation-state. (shrink)

I argue that Smith proposed a new kind of imperialism, which we would describe as a species of ‘federalism,’ and that his plan influenced Bentham and Kant in their federal projects, although they seem to have been unaware of each other’s proposals. In what follows, I outline Smith’s position. I then describe Kant’s and Bentham’s debts to Smith in turn. This will also allow for greater clarity about the nature of early liberalism.

The paper presents a novel take on the character of South Africa’s governance structure. It argues that, insofar as it constitutionally recognises traditional authorities, figures who rule in accordance with idiosyncratic and localised customary laws, as well as instigate a cheek-by-jowl existence of an asymmetrical property law (where in the urban setting land is nominally bought or transferred for sale, but in traditional rural areas granted by the chief), manifest in the differentiated land laws brought about by the Communal Land (...) Rights Act of 2003, is more akin to, and necessitates a definitional alignment with, the federal system of government than a unitary one – or at least a weak “federalism with South African characteristics.”. (shrink)

For Hannah Arendt, the federal system is an effective mode of organizing different sources of power while avoiding sovereign politics. This article aims to contribute two specific claims to the burgeoning scholarship on Arendt's international federalism. First, Arendt's international thoughts call for balancing two demands: the domestic need for human greatness and flourishing and the international demand for regulation and cooperation. Second, her reflections on council-based federalism offer a nuanced position that views the dual elements of equality in (...) politics (intra-state and interstate equality) as neither contradictory nor reconciliatory but rather as ideal types along a continuum. This study shows that, through the unique form of federalism emphasizing the need to balance two demands of free politics with a clear acknowledgement of its precariousness, Arendt's thinking adds much-needed sensitivity to international discourse. (shrink)

Centripetalism is often perceived as a type of a political system for a multi-segmental, especially multi-ethnic, country in order to create among the members of the political elite of moderate, accomodative, and integrative political behavior cross-cutting segmental divisions which, reaching beyond group interests, depoliticize the segmental separateness and, in this manner, reduce their significance. One of the central institutions of centripetalism is decentralization leading to a division of large segments into smaller parts that inhabit different, ideally multi-segmental regions, thus inclining (...) regional political elites of different segments to collaborate. Although both Nigeria and Indonesia have similar centripetal territorial structures, only Nigeria is a federation. This paper focuses on Nigerian centripetal federalism and its link to the so-called federal character principle that is mostly consociational in substance. Krzysztof Trzcinski, Centripetal Federalism, in: 50 Shades of Federalism, ed. by Soeren Keil & Paul Anderson, Canterbury: Canterbury Christ Church University & Montréal: CRÉQC, 2020. (shrink)

The Quebec government recently (May 2021) announced that it wants to amend the Canadian constitution so that Quebec will be recognized as a nation. This is a bad idea.

This paper explores the relationship between federalism and individual liberty. It is shown that a complete treatment of the relationship between federalism and individual liberty should consider two countervailing effects. On the one hand, a federalist structure enhances individual liberty by enlarging the choice set of the citizens. On the other hand, however, a federalist system leads to institutional diversity, a fact that per se leads to higher exit costs, which a citizen must bear if he or she (...) decides to change jurisdictions. This effect on individual liberty is a negative one, since a consequence of every increase in the exit costs is a decrease of individual liberty. The optimum range of diversity of jurisdictions is shown to lie where the two effects counterbalance each other. (shrink)

"Chinese philosophy before our Christian era is emphasized in this nontechnical summary of Chinese thought. Professor Creel also deals with Confucianism, the ideas of Mo-tsu and Mencius, Taoism, Legalism, and their variations and adaptations. As an introduction for the general reader, this book stands among the best."—_China: A Resource and Curriculum Guide_ "There exists nowhere else such a well-written presentation of the main trends in Chinese thought in so brief a space. The text is not cluttered with (...) Chinese names and the pages are not weighed down with footnotes—but the references are there for those who want them, with suggestions for further readings. This is a book which can be understood by those who have never read anything else about China."—_The New York Times Book Review _. (shrink)

This article compares the use of Romantic metaphor with the Chinese literary device xiang 象 (which I translate as “thing-metaphor”) in regard to how they embody different metaphysical relations between humans and things. Whereas Romantic metaphor transports a physical thing to the immaterial realm of imagination, xiang is a literary device in which the material qualities of the thing, while creatively interpreted to generate human meaning, retain ontologically a strong physical presence. Xiang therefore epitomizes a theory of creation that (...) challenges the Western dualistic paradigm: that the poet creates not virtual copies of the thing, but meanings of the thing, and therefore our relationships with things. The article concludes with Heidegger’s discourses on metaphor to suggest that my discussion of thing-metaphor has universal applicability. (shrink)

In this paper I address the phenomenon of syncretism with respect to Chinese religions. An analysis of the syncretism that takes place between the three major Chinese religious traditions is first done in its personal and social dimensions. The social structure of Chinese religion is then used as a framework to understand how Buddhism and Daoism were made compatible with Confucianism. All this will serve as a background for the case study of Macau, where Chinese religious (...) syncretism is very much alive. Three popular religious festivals are celebrated annually and simultaneously on the eighth day of the fourth lunar month, namely, zuilongjie (醉龍節) Feast of the Drunken Dragon, tangongdan (譚公誕) Tam Kung Festival and fodanjie (佛誕節) Feast of the Buddha. (shrink)

In July 2017, China’s State Council released the country’s strategy for developing artificial intelligence, entitled ‘New Generation Artificial Intelligence Development Plan’. This strategy outlined China’s aims to become the world leader in AI by 2030, to monetise AI into a trillion-yuan industry, and to emerge as the driving force in defining ethical norms and standards for AI. Several reports have analysed specific aspects of China’s AI policies or have assessed the country’s technical capabilities. Instead, in this article, we focus on (...) the socio-political background and policy debates that are shaping China’s AI strategy. In particular, we analyse the main strategic areas in which China is investing in AI and the concurrent ethical debates that are delimiting its use. By focusing on the policy backdrop, we seek to provide a more comprehensive and critical understanding of China’s AI policy by bringing together debates and analyses of a wide array of policy documents. (shrink)

The Chinese Heart Sutra was traditionally considered a translation of an Indian Sanskrit text. In the late 20th century scholars began to question this tradition. The Heart Sutra reuses passages from other texts, principally the Large Prajñāpāramitā Sutra. The reused passages are extant in Sanskrit and Chinese source texts and this enables us to perform a unique form of comparative analysis to confirm what language the Heart Sutra was composed in. Jan Nattier examined about half of the text (...) – the 'core section' – and concluded it was composed in Chinese and 'back-translated' into Sanskrit. Nattier’s method has been extended to other parts of the text with the same result. This article details an exhaustive application of Nattier’s method to the Heart Sutra. Considering 22 points of comparison, many of them new, we find a pervasive pattern of features and bugs that definitively point to Chinese origins. (shrink)

In the Pre-Qin time, pursuing “Dao” was the main task in the scholarship of most of the ancient Chinese philosophers, while the Ancient Greek philosophers considered pursuing “Truth” as their ultimate goal. While the “Dao” in ancient Chinese texts and the “Truth” in ancient Greek philosophic literature do share or cross-cover certain connotations, there are subtle and important differences between the two comparable philosophic concepts. These differences have deep and profound impact on the later development of Chinese (...) and Western philosophy and culture respectively. Interestingly, while the modern Chinese philosophy has gradually accepted and established the Western conception of “Truth” on its way towards modernization, the “post-modern” Western philosophy is just undergoing a process of deconstructing its traditional concept of “Truth”, thus, in a certain sense, going closer to the traditional Chinese “Dao”. From a comparative, relative and dynamic perspective, there could possibly be a fusion of horizon between the Chinese “Dao” and the Western “Truth”. (shrink)

A number of analytical philosophers have recently endorsed the view that the world itself is indeterminate in some respect. Intriguingly, ideas similar to the view are expressed by thinkers from Chinese Madhyamaka Buddhism, which may shed light on the current discussion of worldly indeterminacy. Using as a basis Chinese Madhyamaka thought, together with Jessica Wilson’s account of indeterminacy, I develop an ontological conception of indeterminacy, termed ontic indeterminacy, which centres on two complementary ideas—conclusive indeterminability and provisional determinability. I (...) show that OI is well-equipped to tackle several issues of worldly indeterminacy. My overarching aim is to present a viable and sustainable perspective on the subject of indeterminacy to enrich analytical philosophers’ insights into the intricate nature of reality. (shrink)

Detractors of Searle’s Chinese Room Argument have arrived at a virtual consensus that the mental properties of the Man performing the computations stipulated by the argument are irrelevant to whether computational cognitive science is true. This paper challenges this virtual consensus to argue for the first of the two main theses of the persons reply, namely, that the mental properties of the Man are what matter. It does this by challenging many of the arguments and conceptions put forth by (...) the systems and logical replies to the Chinese Room, either reducing them to absurdity or showing how they lead, on the contrary, to conclusions the persons reply endorses. The paper bases its position on the Chinese Room Argument on additional philosophical considerations, the foundations of the theory of computation, and theoretical and experimental psychology. The paper purports to show how all these dimensions tend to support the proposed thesis of the persons reply. (shrink)

According to the so-called Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, a language influences the mind of its user. This is more or less trivial, but the problems are in the details. It is difficult to make precise what those influences are, be it in general philosophical or in particular empirical-cultural terms. I will give an account of what I take to be basic aesthetic and grammatical features of the Chinese language compared with what we find in Western languages such as Latin or greek. (...) Then I will indicate what I take to be cultural differences and discuss whether these might be the result of differences in language structure. (shrink)

The ability to communicate in a specific language like Chinese typically indicates that the speaker understands the language. A counterexample to this belief is John Searle’s Chinese room experiment. It has been shown in this experiment that in certain circumstances we can communicate with a Chinese speaker without intuitively acknowledging that the Chinese language is understood in the conversation. In the present paper, we aim to present another counterexample showing that, in certain circumstances, we can communicate (...) using a specific language by converting its words to those of our natural language, and understand what is expressed using the language without understanding it. Using a specific conversion process introduced in the present paper, symbols and even sounds of a language like the Chinese language lose their original function and act as a tool to express one’s natural language. To better understand this, imagine the English language has another writing or phonological system in addition to its current writing system. (shrink)

Review of Van Norden's 'Classical Chinese for Everyone' from the perspective of a learner and non-specialist teacher of Chinese Philosophy.

The study of Chinese philosophy in the English-speaking world has largely focused on ethical and political theories. In comparison, Chinese metaphysics—here understood primarily as theories regarding the nature, components, and operating principles of reality—has been far less researched and recognized. In this essay, we examine various meanings of “metaphysics” as it has been used in denoting a branch of philosophy and make the case that metaphysics is an important part of Chinese philosophy. We argue for the need (...) to study Chinese metaphysics as a serious field of scholarship. We also present some most recent studies of Chinese metaphysics by leading scholars of Chinese philosophy who publish in the English-speaking world. This essay aims to show that not only that Chinese metaphysics is an appropriate and legitimate subject of scholarly research but it can also be a fruitful subfield of in the study in Chinese philosophy. (shrink)

Philosophy of action in the context of Classical China is radically different from its counterpart in the contemporary Western philosophical narrative. Classical Chinese philosophers began from the assumption that relations are primary to the constitution of the person, hence acting in the early Chinese context necessarily is interacting and co-acting along with others –human and nonhuman actors. This book is the first monograph dedicated to the exploration and rigorous reconstruction of an extraordinary strategy for efficacious relational action devised (...) by Classical Chinese philosophers in order to account for the interdependent and embedded character of human agency –what the author has denominated “adapting” or “adaptive agency” (yin 因). As opposed to more unilateral approaches to action also conceptualized in the Classical Chinese corpus, such as forceful and prescriptive agency, adapting requires great capacity of self and other-awareness, equanimity, flexibility, creativity, and response, which allows the agent to co-raise courses of action ad-hoc: unique and temporary solutions to specific, non-permanent, and non-generalizable life problems. Adapting is one of the world’s oldest philosophies of action, and yet it is shockingly new for contemporary audiences, who will find in it an unlikely source of inspiration to deal with our current global problems. This book explores the core conception of adapting both on autochthonous terms and by cross-cultural comparison, drawing on the European and Analytic philosophical traditions as well as on scholarship from other disciplines, opening a brand-new topic in Chinese and comparative philosophy. (shrink)

Translating Chinese Classics in a Colonial Context: James Legge and His Two Versions of the Zhongyong, by Hui Wang, Peter Lang Content Type Journal Article Pages 166-167 Authors Paul Boshears, Europäische Universität für Interdisziplinäre Studien/The European Graduate School Journal Comparative and Continental Philosophy Online ISSN 1757-0646 Print ISSN 1757-0638 Journal Volume Volume 4 Journal Issue Volume 4, Number 1 / 2012.

What powers do to several states of the United States have individually to enter into environmental agreements with other sovereign nations? In this article, the author reviews the power that states may have generally and then specifically regarding environmental agreements. Several traditional tools of analysis have historically been used including the constitutional doctrine of pre-emption, cooperative federalism and the foreign affairs doctrine. Some newer tools of analysis are also offered including the revival of the treaty-compact and the author's own (...) concept of "de-emption". The United States Senate's explicit refusal to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, coupled with the consequent state initiatives to control greenhouse gasses - especially the documents concluded between New Jersey and the Netherlands, provide rich examples of these tools in contemporary action. (shrink)

According to the principle of internal-external consonance (Wexler,2006), an individual's internal neuropsychological structures match key features of his or her external culture. We propose that the Chinese self, which is rooted in a culture of human relatedness under the influence of Confucianism, is a good example of this principle because recent brain imaging studies have found neural evidence that mirrors its cultural root. We also discuss the future direction of research on the neural basis of Chinese self.

In this essay, we will follow Tang Junyi’s lead in exploring issues related to Chinese diaspora and Chinese philosophy. While we largely endorse Tang’s call for overseas Chinese to establish themselves in their adopted lands, we will argue for a more nuanced view on the identity of Chinese people outside China: they are not marginalized individuals scattered out of “homeland” China, rather they are people legitimately established in their own respective countries. In this connection, we will (...) also advance a view of future Chinese philosophy as a world philosophy that takes roots in China as well as in the world at large. In our view, although Chinese immigrant thinkers in the past century have played a major role in promoting Chinese philosophy outside China, the importance of such a role is likely to decline along with the success of Chinese philosophy becoming a world philosophy. (shrink)

The yin yang model of thinking is most essential to the Chinese cosmology, ontology and outlook on life. This paper is a systematic discussion of such a dialectical way of thinking and its significance. It starts with investigating the origin and the meaning of terms “yin” and “yang”, and explains the later developed yin yang doctrine; it then shows how greatly and profoundly the yin yang model of thinking has influenced Chinese philosophy and Chinese character. It concludes (...) that Chinese naturalistic, dialectical, and optimistic attitudes toward the world and life are all based on the yin yang model of thinking and that the yin yang doctrine is the starting point for anyone to understand Chinese people and their philosophies. (shrink)

Alison L. LaCroix is Assistant Professor of Law at the University of Chicago Law School, where she specializes in legal history, federalism, constitutional law and questions of jurisdiction. She has written a fine, scholarly volume on the intellectual origins of American federalism. LaCroix holds the JD degree (Yale, 1999) and a Ph.D. in history (Harvard, 2007). According to the author, to fully understand the origins of American federalism, we must look beyond the Constitutional Convention of 1787 and (...) range over the colonial, revolutionary, and founding periods including developments in the early republic. LaCroix questions both the idea that American federalism originated, all at once, at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 and the idea that republican ideology (with its strong emphasis on legislative power) was the single dominant framework of eighteenth-century American political thought. Versions and elements of federalist or con-federative ideas were also long present and in a process of development. (shrink)

A criticism of Searle's Chinese Room thought experiment.

The connection between Chinese sexism and Confucianism has been a subject of study on the condition of Chinese women in the West since the rise of feminist consciousness in the 1970s. However Confucianism in feminist scholarship is inescapably construed as a misogynous ideology that is incapable of self-rectification in regards to the issue of gender parity. Hence, conceptually the eradication of Confucianism becomes the necessary condition for the liberation of Chinese women, and the adoption of Western ideology (...) let it be Marxist-socialism, Liberalism, or Existentialism is then a logical next step for Chinese women. Yet, such a dichotomization of the West as a superior moral subject and the East as a passive object victimized by their "sexist" tradition is nevertheless an oversimplification of the condition and the liberation of women in the developing world. In the end, it is essentially a neo-colonial discourse in a feminist disguise. This dissertation sets itself up to accomplish two tasks: first, it is to obtain a conceptual clarity of what constitutes Confucianism and its connection with dominant sexist, social practices; second, it is to go beyond a mere critique of Confucianism and feminism as an ally of Chinese patriarchal family structure and Western imperialism respectively, and to lay a foundation for a future construction of a gender theory based on Confucianism as a theoretical ground to explain the cultural construct of Chinese women and to conceive an alternative ethical ground for women's liberation. Eventually, the whole project can be seen as an act of self-affirmation of my ethnic identity as a Chinese and an act of reconciliation with my feminist identity in the modern world. (shrink)

研究早期中国哲学的学者均普遍认为，缺乏作者和思想学 派的资料，对以哲学为本的研究非常不利。就着这个观点，本文提出异议: 汉学研究所提供的文献、文学、语言、历史的知识，可融贯于早期中国哲学 的研究，并产生良好的影响。蒋韬在 2016 年提出了“汉学挑战”的论述。就此，本文论证，汉学正好 提供一个机会，结合不同的研究方法及角度，从而更有效地处理具体的哲 学议题。我以自己对“命”的研究为例，解释如何以多个文本为基础，梳理 哲学问题，做“没有作者的哲学”，并显示:融贯汉学研究所提供的各种方 法、知识、研究工具，不仅无损哲学研究，更为其注入新气象。我采取了“后学科”的研究角度:受到前学科文化(例如早期中国文 化)的启发，“后学科”的角度在提问时，往往从整体出发，不囿于各个学科 的既定模式和分类;并开辟新路向，容纳创意，追寻意义，以产生可行的新 联系。 Some scholars of early Chinese philosophy see the knowledge provided by Sinology as a challenge to the development of sound philosophical enquiry. What Sinology tells us about the historical context and the textual, material, and intellectual culture of the period is considered detrimental for engaging in philosophical research, reason why these scholars believe that Chinese philosophy must separate itself from Sinology. I argue that Sinology does (...) not offer a challenge but an opportunity to engage with a multitude of approaches and methods to more efficiently address philosophical problems and questions. I offer my own research as an example of how to integrate the knowledge and analytical tools offered by Sinology in a philosophical study of early China. Focusing on the most crucial Sinological challenge--the challenge to the notions of “book” and “author"--I show that using the methods and knowledge provided by other disciplines does not jeopardize but, much to the contrary, invigorates and revitalizes philosophical research. My perspective is post-disciplinary: inspired by pre-disciplinary cultures such as early China, post-disciplinarity engages inquiry holistically, suspending the patterns and categories established by discrete disciplines, forging new paths for creativity and the search of meaning, and allowing new viable connections to emerge. (shrink)

In this essay I offer an alternative perspective on how to organize class material for courses in Chinese philosophy for predominately American students. Instead of selecting topics taken from common themes in Western discourses, I suggest a variety of organizational strategies based on themes from the Chinese texts themselves, such as tradition, ritual, family, and guanxi (關係), which are rooted in the Chinese tradition but flexible enough to organize a broad range of philosophical material.

In this response to comments on my article, “The Chimera of Relativism,” in the same issue of *Common Knowledge* , by cognitive neuroscientist Andreas Roepstorff, classicist G. E. R. Lloyd, and anthropologist Martin Holbraad, I illustrate and reinforce Lloyd's cautions regarding the hazards of intercultural—here, Chinese-Western—comparisons in studies of culture and cognition. Examination of a foundational study in East-West cultural/cognitive differences cited by Roepstorff indicates extensive conceptual and methodological problems in that tradition of research. Although Holbraad champions a more (...) radical relativism than that offered in my work, the moves he urges have either been present in my work from the beginning or are both dubiously radical and otherwise undesirable. (shrink)

The Oxford Handbook of Chinese Philosophy is a collection of essays on important texts and figures in the history of Chinese thought. The essays cover both well-known texts such as the Analects and the Zhuangzi as well as many of the lesser-known thinkers in the classical and post-classical Chinese tradition. Most of the chapters focus on thinkers or texts in one of three important historical movements: Classical ("pre-Qin") Chinese philosophy, Chinese Buddhism, and the Confucian response (...) to Buddhism ("neo-Confucianism" broadly construed). (shrink)

What should we make of claims by members of other groups to have moralities different from our own? Human Rights in Chinese Thought gives an extended answer to this question in the first study of its kind. It integrates a full account of the development of Chinese rights discourse - reaching back to important, though neglected, origins of that discourse in 17th and 18th century Confucianism - with philosophical consideration of how various communities should respond to contemporary (...) class='Hi'>Chinese claims about the uniqueness of their human rights concepts. The book elaborates a plausible kind of moral pluralism and demonstrates that Chinese ideas of human rights do indeed have distinctive characteristics, but it nonetheless argues for the importance and promise of cross-cultural moral engagement. (shrink)

This paper is a follow-up of the first part of the persons reply to the Chinese Room Argument. The first part claims that the mental properties of the person appearing in that argument are what matter to whether computational cognitive science is true. This paper tries to discern what those mental properties are by applying a series of hypothetical psychological and strengthened Turing tests to the person, and argues that the results support the thesis that the Man performing the (...) computations characteristic of understanding Chinese actually understands Chinese. The supposition that the Man does not understand Chinese has gone virtually unquestioned in this foundational debate. The persons reply acknowledges the intuitive power behind that supposition, but knows that brute intuitions are not epistemically sacrosanct. Like many intuitions humans have had, and later deposed, this intuition does not withstand experimental scrutiny. The second part of the persons reply consequently holds that computational cognitive science is confirmed by the Chinese Room thought experiment. (shrink)

examines Hegel’s analysis of honor and recognition in the chivalric culture, and contrasts that to the xia tradition’s engagement with Buddhism, Daoism, Confucianism, and Chinese Legalism.

Ion, one of the earliest of Plato’s dialogues, is also considered as one of the philosopher’s less important philosophical works. It is also viewed as one of the earliest texts on the philosophy of art that distinguishes between techne and artistic creation, with the latter representing a form of divine inspiration which occurs outside the awareness of its creator. Here I will offer an alternative interpretation that is based on the dissociation of the poet from his reciter. The latter, by (...) operating as a medium, functions similarly to the ignorant in Chinese but possessor and user of a perfect manual, in Searle’s Chinese room. Furthermore, I propose that art, in Plato’s view, may represent a form of creative achievement with significance that exceeds the sum of the specific disciplines it deals with. (shrink)

Chinese international students who studied in the United States received “double stigmatization” from American and Chinese authorities because of the “political othering” tactic during COVID-19. The research used a phenomenological approach to examine why and how specifically the transnational identity of Chinese international students in the United States shifted during the double stigmatization. The researcher conducted a total of three rounds of interviews with 15 Chinese international students who studied in the United States and returned to (...) China between 2018 and 2020, which culminated in 45 interviews through a longitudinal study to probe the transnational identities of this population before and during the double stigmatization; the study also examined how the mindsponge mechanism worked during the identity shifts and the interplay among stigmatization, transnational identity shifts, and the mindsponge mechanism. The study concluded that before COVID-19, Chinese international students had been stigmatized in both China and the United States. (shrink)

This book is invaluable as a synopsis of some of the work of one the greatest philosophers of recent times. There is much value in analyzing his responses to the basic confusions of philosophy, and in the generally excellent attempts to connect classical Chinese thought to modern philosophy. I take a modern Wittgensteinian view to place it in perspective. -/- Those wishing a comprehensive up to date account of Wittgenstein, Searle and their analysis of behavior from the modern two (...) systems view may consult my article The Logical Structure of Philosophy, Psychology, Mind and Language as Revealed in Wittgenstein and Searle (2016). Those interested in all my writings in their most recent versions may download from this site my e-book ‘Philosophy, Human Nature and the Collapse of Civilization Michael Starks (2016)- Articles and Reviews 2006-2016’ by Michael Starks First Ed. 662p (2016). -/- All of my papers and books have now been published in revised versions both in ebooks and in printed books. -/- Talking Monkeys: Philosophy, Psychology, Science, Religion and Politics on a Doomed Planet - Articles and Reviews 2006-2017 (2017) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071HVC7YP. -/- The Logical Structure of Philosophy, Psychology, Mind and Language in Ludwig Wittgenstein and John Searle--Articles and Reviews 2006-2016 (2017) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071P1RP1B. -/- Suicidal Utopian Delusions in the 21st century: Philosophy, Human Nature and the Collapse of Civilization - Articles and Reviews 2006-2017 (2017) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0711R5LGX -/- . (shrink)

The Turing Test (TT), the Chinese Room Argument (CRA), and the Symbol Grounding Problem (SGP) are about the question “can machines think?” We propose to look at these approaches to Artificial Intelligence (AI) by showing that they all address the possibility for Artificial Agents (AAs) to generate meaningful information (meanings) as we humans do. The initial question about thinking machines is then reformulated into “can AAs generate meanings like humans do?” We correspondingly present the TT, the CRA and the (...) SGP as being about generation of human-like meanings. We model and address such possibility by using the Meaning Generator System (MGS) where a system submitted to an internal constraint generates a meaning in order to satisfy the constraint. The system approach of the MGS allows comparing meaning generations in animals, humans and AAs. The comparison shows that in order to have AAs capable of generating human-like meanings, we need the AAs to carry human constraints. And transferring human constraints to AAs raises concerns coming from the unknown natures of life and human mind which are at the root of human constraints. Implications for the TT, the CRA and the SGP are highlighted. It is shown that designing AAs capable of thinking like humans needs an understanding about the natures of life and human mind that we do not have today. Following an evolutionary approach, we propose as a first entry point an investigation about the possibility for extending a “stay alive” constraint into AAs. Ethical concerns are raised from the relations between human constraints and human values. Continuations are proposed. (This paper is an extended version of the proceedings of an AISB/IACAP 2012 presentation). (shrink)

He (和), or harmony, has traditionally been a central concept in Chinese thought, and to this day continues to shape the way in which people in China and East Asia think about ethics and politics. Yet, there is no systematic and comprehensive introduction of harmony as has been variously articulated in different Chinese schools. This edited volume aims to fill this gap. The individual contributions elaborate the conceptions of harmony as these were exemplified in central Chinese schools (...) of thought, including Daoism, Confucianism, Legalism, Mohism, Buddhism, and trace their impact on contemporary Chinese philosophy. The volume explores the various meanings and implications of harmony so as to consider its relevance as a value and virtue in the modern world. It provides an accessible but substantial introductory work for readers interested in learning about pertinent core concepts and theories in Chinese thought, as well as engages specialists in Chinese philosophy by explicating its implications for ethical, political, epistemological, and metaphysical reflection as the basic point of reference. (shrink)

"[..] flowing with the waters, halting with the mountains. In the images of light and wind the ephemeral is inscribed. Time is part of space. The scene performs." -/- The essay "Chinese Landscape Aesthetics: the exchange and nurturing of emotions" by Claudia Westermann included in "New Horizons: Eight Perspectives on Chinese Landscape Architecture Today" introduces ideas of landscape in traditional Chinese thought. Following the etymology of the Chinese terms for landscape and recognizing that their conceptual focus (...) is on the exchange and nurturing of emotions, which is not captured by the English term 'landscape,' one may gain a new understanding of contemporary works of Chinese landscape architecture. (shrink)

This study aimed to explore the rhetorical moves of article abstracts in Taiwanese Chinese philosophy journals. The most common theory for the discourse analysis of research abstracts is proposed by Hyland（2000）. Most of the research abstracts in the field of social sciences and natural sciences are composed of Hyland’s five rhetorical moves: introduction, purpose, method, results, and conclusion. Therefore, the question to be explored in this research is how to compose the rhetorical moves of abstracts of Chinese philosophy (...) journal articles. What is the frequency and order of each rhetorical move in the abstract of each paper? Do they reflect some particular type of distribution? Are there any rhetorical moves that occur exceptionally rarely? Does the abstract of research articles in Chinese philosophy journals apply the framework of the same five rhetorical moves? What are the conventions of the philosophy writing community reflected in the rhetorical moves of abstracts of academic journal articles in philosophy? -/- To answer the above questions, this research collected the abstracts of 18 papers from the representative Chinese philosophy journal "SOOCHOW JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHICAL STUDIES " in Taiwan in the past five years (2017-2021) and used the five moves of Hyland（2000） one by one to answer the above questions. The rhetorical moves of each abstract were analyzed and presented in tables to show the frequency, order, and type of each rhetorical move. -/- The results of this study found that "method (M)" and "conclusion (C)" are not the rhetorical moves that constitute the abstract of articles in Taiwanese philosophy journals, but the rhetorical move "purpose (P)" is "necessary" to appear. In the Purpose move, the subject is usually "this article"; the verbs are "argue" or "inquire." Although "introduction (I)" is a "conventional" move, the total number of words in the introduction is the highest in the whole abstract. This study also shows rhetorical move variation of the abstracts of philosophy journal articles, reflecting the writing culture and conventions of the academic philosophy community. -/- Finally, this study proposes three teaching guidelines for abstract writing of academic papers in philosophy, which will be useful for philosophy scholars and graduate students to consult when writing and submitting abstracts of philosophy in conference or journal papers. -/- Keywords: philosophy, journal article, abstract, discourse analysis, rhetorical move . (shrink)

Searle’s Chinese Room Argument (CRA) has been the object of great interest in the philosophy of mind, artificial intelligence and cognitive science since its initial presentation in ‘Minds, Brains and Programs’ in 1980. It is by no means an overstatement to assert that it has been a main focus of attention for philosophers and computer scientists of many stripes. It is then especially interesting to note that relatively little has been said about the detailed logic of the argument, whatever (...) significance Searle intended CRA to have. The problem with the CRA is that it involves a very strong modal claim, the truth of which is both unproved and highly questionable. So it will be argued here that the CRA does not prove what it was intended to prove. (shrink)

China has overtaken Japan as the world's second-biggest economy. In a remarkably short span– less than fifteen years– the United States economy has experienced a relatively huge decline vis-à-vis China on a nominal GDP basis.

The debate about truth in Chinese philosophy raises the methodological question How to recognize "truth" in some non-Western tradition of thought? In case of Chinese philosophy it is commonly assumed that the dispute concerns a single question, but a distinction needs to be made between the property of /truth/, the concept of TRUTH, and the word *truth*. The property of /truth/ is what makes something true; the concept of TRUTH is our understanding of /truth/; and *truth*· is the (...) word we use to express that understanding. Almost all human beings over the age of 2 have the concept of TRUTH, and therefore, the question whether some tradition has the concept of TRUTH is moot, but that doesn't imply that every language has a (single) word for *truth*. Furthermore, recognizing *truth* is complicated by the conceptual neighbors of TRUTH. What distinguishes *truth* from its neighbors is disquotationality. Theories of /truth/ similarly need to be distinguished from theories about adjacent notions. If a theory is more plausibly interpreted as a theory of /justification/, then it is not a theory of /truth/. (shrink)

This paper is an attempt to describe the rationale behind recent Chinese Political-Legal Reforms. The article proposes an alternate to the “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics”.