98 replies to this topic

[somechineseperson]

I want to ask you, where did you find the statement that Dao is the ultimate principle? This seem to be a heavy western(includeing Hindu) centric view of the Way(Dao). The ZhuangZi gives quite a good description of the way in Daoist philosophy. There is no such thing as an ultimate reality beyond this world, Dao is everywhere and already present, Humans are living in it, and every thing, including excrement has Dao in it. The whole cycle of the Universe and everything that changes with it IS Dao. It is a law, not an entity or a state of experience. You are already with Dao, there is no ultimate to speak of that transcend whats already present, its just that you have to realize you are already with Dao. Attaining the way means you realize the truth of the universe.

No the idea of the Supreme Ultimate and Ultimate Reality is not just a "western" concept (and Hinduism is in no way "western"). Are you saying there is no concept of the "other shore" in Chinese culture?

I suggest you broaden your knowledge of Chinese culture, don't just stay fixated on Zhuangzi. Read the Confucian Classics and their orthodox interpretations. You will see the description of Tian Li as the Ultimate Principle.

Zhuangzi is the ancient equivalent of a "hippie". If all Chinese people listened to him instead of following Confucianism, our nation would have fallen a long time ago.

What authority do you have to always seem to act as the "spokesman" for Chinese culture? Chinese culture is much much broader and deeper than your understanding.

Having the concept of an Ultimate Reality is a sign of complex civilisation. Only complex civilisations have such a religious concept, primitive tribal cultures don't. Your interpretation of Chinese culture reduces it to that of a primitive tribe.

Edited by somechineseperson, 06 January 2006 - 02:20 PM.

[somechineseperson]

"Yet the existence of God can be proven using logical argument. "

Umm, no it can't or else it would be a law. But its not. And the only people that buys the "prove" aer people who believe in it to begin with. You can't prove something with baseless assumptions, the only scientific prove is something that can be observed.
BTW, I can also use "logical" argument to argue for the supremacy of Dao, and ZhuangZi did so a few thousand years ago at the same time proving that its not something intelligent.
Besides your "prove" only talks about an ultimate, that ultimate doesn't even have to be an inteliggent entity.

No you don't really understand do you? The premise one needs is to agree with it is possible that God exists.

There is more to Truth than scientific truth. It is irrational to say that just because something can't be observed, then it definitely doesn't exist.

You are right in that one cannot prove the existence of a personal God, only God as the Ground of Being and Ultimate Principle. (Like the Confucian concept of Tian Li)

BTW, I can also use "logical" argument to argue for the supremacy of Dao.

So go on, prove it using logic. Go on.

or a rather rationalistic view that does not lean toward anything and weigh the evidence based on probability.

Some religions have better evidence than others.

And? All religion comes into the world sometime in history, people that are attached to time does not see this. Its odd that whenever there is a new religion that spawn up today, people think its a new age fad or a fraud and heretical cult. Its just that science today is advanced enough to consider most of these things which also occured in the past as nothing but unproven hypothesis.

I am a traditionalist. Tradition matters.

Lets use the excat argument you give.
Where/what is the justification for Any RELIGION? One cannot simply believe something because it sounds good. How do you know your principle is "the ultimate principle beyond all principles"?
Even if we are to play with your "logic" which you seem to be addicted to and cannot change, what make you think that just because God exist, its the Christian God thats true? In fact historical EVIDENCE show that other religions has far more emprirical evidence.

Logic is more foundational than science. Show some respect to logic.

There are justifications. You just refuse to consider them fairly.

Your understanding of Chinese culture is not original, but tinted with the western ideologies of naturalism and atheism.

Lixue or Neo-Confucianism does give such an interpretation of "Dao," if I'm not mistaken.

You are right, MengTzu. Don't listen to him. His understanding of Chinese culture has been distorted by western atheism.

Edited by somechineseperson, 06 January 2006 - 10:28 AM.

[MengTzu]

Alright, mod note:

It seems that the Chinese scholars, self-fashioned or not (I'm of the former category ), of this forum like to throw around the "you're looking through the Western lense" thing a lot. It's certainly an issue, no doubt; I myself have made that comment about others. But we need to be careful about what we mean, and be very specific lest this becomes one of those "you're a fascist" or "you're a socialist" type of accusation that serves no purpose but to paint somebody black.

Warhead here is clearly adamant about seeing everything Chinese in the Eastern lens, so it's a bit odd to say that his view is distorted by Western atheism. However, there is some truth to the statement: that his adamantly Eastern view is actually a reaction to some Western views, such as his insistence that Eastern philosophy and religion are rational, and his understanding of rationalism is often, ironically, that of the West.

In any event, let's be careful about not just slinging catchy phrases. Carry on.

[Borjigin Ayurbarwada]

""No the idea of the Supreme Ultimate and Ultimate Reality is not just a "western" concept (and Hinduism is in no way "western"). Are you saying there is no concept of the "other shore" in Chinese culture?""


If you bothered to read I wrote this "I want to ask you, where did you find the statement that Dao is the ultimate principle? This seem to be a heavy western(INCLUDING Hindu) centric view of the Way(Dao).

I suggest you broaden your knowledge of Chinese culture, don't just stay fixated on Zhuangzi. Read the Confucian Classics and their orthodox interpretations. You will see the description of Tian Li as the Ultimate Principle.

Funny, I like to say the same for you, stop reading Confucianism alone, there are a hundred schools in China, and Coonfucianism is merely one of them(even in Confucianism, there is hardly a transcending concept. have you read teh doctrine of the means? Thats perhaps the most secret teaching of Confucius, where do you find the transcendal cocnept in it? And don't give me the heaven BS again, you have yet to prove what the Confucian heaven even means. there are different definition for it, and you are doing selective reading, disgustingly. No Zhuang Zi isn't the only source I use, I've alerady read the Confucian sources,(the four books) none of them talk about a transcendent been by a long shot, as for the Wu Jing, Ithere is no prove whether they are even compiled by Confuius himself. Now going beyond teh simple confine of Daoism and Confucianism, have you read legalism? The Logicians? The Ming jia, the Ying Yang Jia, the and even the athiests? Talking about selective reading and a narrow perspective on Chinese culture.

Zhuangzi is the ancient equivalent of a "hippie". If all Chinese people listened to him instead of following Confucianism, our nation would have fallen a long time ago.

What authority do you have to always seem to act as the "spokesman" for Chinese culture? Chinese culture is much much broader and deeper than your understanding.

Having the concept of an Ultimate Reality is a sign of complex civilisation. Only complex civilisations have such a religious concept, primitive tribal cultures don't. Your interpretation of Chinese culture reduces it to that of a primitive tribe.

Prove it, you seem to know so much about ZhuangZi when SimaQian himself is in the fog regarding to his detailed life. Under what authority do you say Confucius represents Chinese culture, the man that needs to consult Lao Zi on his terms.
And no, antagonism and athiesm is what constitues a complex society, where human knows rationalistic thinking instead of superstition, and China has plenty of these people. Warring States has move beyond the Shang superstition of a divine God.

No you don't really understand do you? The premise one needs is to agree with it is possible that God exists.

There is more to Truth than scientific truth. It is irrational to say that just because something can't be observed, then it definitely doesn't exist.

You are right in that one cannot prove the existence of a personal God, only God as the Ground of Being and Ultimate Principle. (Like the Confucian concept of Tian Li)

Of course its possible so is bugs bunny. You can't even prove there is an ultimate, I don't know where you even get that statement from, its unscientific.

No the idea of the Supreme Ultimate and Ultimate Reality is not just a "western" concept (and Hinduism is in no way "western"). Are you saying there is no concept of the "other shore" in Chinese culture?

Read my lips, thats not what I said at all, I said thats not what Dao means. And thats all historical sources points to that.
You're insistence otherwise only show your amateur level in Classical
Chinese.

So go on, prove it using logic. Go on.

I did, using the same prove you used with your God. excpet it isn't really logic at all. Which is my point if you have not understood. I can even use your logic to prove a bugs bunny.

Some religions have better evidence than others.

And unfortunately, Christianity isn't the one with the most evidence.

I am a traditionalist. Tradition matters

The Yi Guan Dao are modernists, and they don't give a dman what you are, so you can keep your criticisim to your self and respect their believe.

You are right, MengTzu. Don't listen to him. His understanding of Chinese culture has been distorted by western atheism.

Please, with your limited knowledge? My reading of classiclal sources is heaven next to your molehole.
This statement already shows your shallow knowledge in Chinese culture and confine it to confucianism.

Athiesm IS NOT A WESTERN INVENTION AT ALL. IT IS A PART OF CHINESE CULTURE IN THE VERY BEGGINING, it also exist in Inidia in the form of Lokayata and some Ajikivas.

It is a human trait, not a cultural element.

Have you read "Sheng Mie Lun" by Fang Zheng? Do you even know it exist? Obviously not, considering your above statement. It is a materialistic argument that there is no heaven that makes choice for people, everything is random just like "the leaves of a tree falling to different directions", there is no after life, the spirit to the body is just like "a flower to a bowl of dirt, when the dirt is gone the flower dies" You need to dig the multi aspect and variety of Chinese culture body, your one pointedness and selective reading is a joke.
The fact is athiesm is Chinese and nothing western about it, in fact China and India probably have these elements way before the west.

Especially before the later supersitious Middle Aged Europeans.

Warhead here is clearly adamant about seeing everything Chinese in the Eastern lens, so it's a bit odd to say that his view is distorted by Western atheism. However, there is some truth to the statement: that his adamantly Eastern view is actually a reaction to some Western views, such as his insistence that Eastern philosophy and religion are rational, and his understanding of rationalism is often, ironically, that of the West.

Rationalism is not a western development at all. In fact I've learned far more about rational thinking when reading the ZhuangZi, it has influenced me in not taking anytnhing for granted, even the most basic cultural influence.

[MengTzu]

Rationalism is not a western development at all. In fact I've learned far more about rational thinking when reading the ZhuangZi, it has influenced me in not taking anytnhing for granted, even the most basic cultural influence.

I actually didn't say that rationalism is a Western development. What I said is that your idea of "rational" is very Western -- very empirical and skeptical. I'm not saying that this sentiment didn't exist in the East, but the way you valorize such sentiment is typically modern and Western, and you portray Zhuangzi and the others in such light.

Zhuangzi also taught appreciation of the mysterious, entertaining thought about absurd paradoxes, etc, yet, among many things, the skeptic seems to define your portrayal of him. This is why I believe you are influenced by the dry empiricism of a modern Western sentiment. I don't think any of us who have received a modern education (even those in Asia) can escape the Western lens entirely -- the only people who are free of it is probably the Taoist priests who never left the temples in the mountains.

And certainly, somechineseperson is even more entrenched in the Western lens. Now we speak of the Western lens like its a bad thing -- it's not. It's a view of construct, and it's as valid as any construct. We just have to keep it in mind that a construct is a construct.

Besides, even if history didn't happen the way it did, and Chinese thinking becomes the norm of the world, we'd still be critiquing ourselves for seeing through the Chinese lens. Why? Because any construct we have now is inevitably a hindsight. Even if we use Western lens to see Western history, we can still be self-critical and say that our views are distorted by hindsight.

The fact is athiesm is Chinese and nothing western about it, in fact China and India probably have these elements way before the west.

Especially before the later supersitious Middle Aged Europeans.

Warhead, this is one of the "tell tale" hint of your modern Western influence. As noted by me and another mod (I won't name who), this seems to be your conviction: that Eastern philosophy is abundantly rational. Now I'm not denying that. What I'm saying that the many attendant terminologies and paradigms you use in portraying Eastern philosophies often demonstrate that dry, empirical sentiment of modern Western thought. That is what I meant by your Western lens, in addition to what I already explained above. In your presentation, Eastern culture is valorized in an image that is prized by modern thinkers -- rational, skeptical, secular -- the agnostic aspects (like atheism) of Eastern culture shines through as defining aspects of the East in your presentation. But any casual study of Eastern culture reveals that it is much more multi-faceted; your focus on some aspects, the aspects which are conform to sentiments now admired and valued by the modern West, appears to be a modern Western influence.

I hope I'm not being offensive in any of this. Like I said, somechineseperson is even more Western-lensed than you are, and like I said, I don't think it's a bad thing. My thinking is filled, too, with Western presuppositions.

Addendum: you guys have been going at it a lot, and as usual, things start to dwindle, and unfortunately, the ad hominem tends to come from your side, warhead (it has already begun, like telling him he has "limited knowledge"). Please be careful.

[Borjigin Ayurbarwada]

""No the idea of the Supreme Ultimate and Ultimate Reality is not just a "western" concept (and Hinduism is in no way "western"). Are you saying there is no concept of the "other shore" in Chinese culture?""

No, find me a single source of the time that claimed Dao is an ultimate reality that transcend this world. Every source including the Confucian cannons very well indicate it is very much part of every person and THIS WORDLY. The most they mention is that Dao is the source but there isn't a single source that mention its outside of reality nor is there terms like "worship of the Dao" or even paying "homage to the Dao". Thats look at the character Dao itself, it means nothing more than a path, something to be followed, cultivated, observed, or used. And these terms are everywhere in the classical sources. To say its some other worldly phenomenon that needs to be transcended is unfounded and erroneous in the interpretation of Dao.

In fact Confucius himself mention that a sage depends on no other source than himself, so you can stop interpreting him as somebody depending or worshipping on a "God-heaven" like source. This he clearly mentioned in the Doctrine of teh Means chapterXXXII: " It is only the individual possessed of the most entire sincerity that can exist under heaven, who can adjust the invariable relations of mankind., establkished the gerat fundamentalvirtues of humanity, and know the transforming nurturing operations of heaven and earth; shall this individual have being or anythhing beyond himself on which he depends?""..Such individual is equal of heaven"

I actually didn't say that rationalism is a Western development. What I said is that your idea of "rational" is very Western -- very empirical and skeptical. I'm not saying that this sentiment didn't exist in the East, but the way you valorize such sentiment is typically modern and Western, and you portray Zhuangzi and the others in such light.

I never said I'm not influenced by Western thought, rationalism is science, and science is progress based on facts not culture, it doesn't matter where it originated, the fact is, it is the most rational, and thus most scientific and therefore the most probability of correctness in this world. There is nothing wrong with using empirircal model.
HOWEVER, what Somechinese person uses is clearly baseless, and unempirical, it depends on his personal emotion and preference, and it is most likely wrong by sheer empirical probability.

Zhuangzi also taught appreciation of the mysterious, entertaining thought about absurd paradoxes, etc, yet, among many things, the skeptic seems to define your portrayal of him. This is why I believe you are influenced by the dry empiricism of a modern Western sentiment. I don't think any of us who have received a modern education (even those in Asia) can escape the Western lens entirely -- the only people who are free of it is probably the Taoist priests who never left the temples in the mountains.

And have I denied the mysteries? I'm NOT an athiest in the sense of denying them, because THAT IS IRRATIONAL itself. I never aimed at totally escaping western lens, why do you think I would? I only try to escape those that has no scientific evidence to back up, empirical evidence is not confined to any culture particularly just because one found them first, it is a science that people use as society progress.

And certainly, somechineseperson is even more entrenched in the Western lens. Now we speak of the Western lens like its a bad thing -- it's not. It's a view of construct, and it's as valid as any construct. We just have to keep it in mind that a construct is a construct.

Besides, even if history didn't happen the way it did, and Chinese thinking becomes the norm of the world, we'd still be critiquing ourselves for seeing through the Chinese lens. Why? Because any construct we have now is inevitably a hindsight. Even if we use Western lens to see Western history, we can still be self-critical and say that our views are distorted by hindsight

I never said its a bad thing, where did you even get that? In fact empirical evidence is the greatest thing the West contributed to this world, but it is a science, not culture. Anything thats rational I use. And I do not follow the negative parts of it, such as denying anything that cannot be proven.
What I don't want to use, is unsceintific view of Chinese history through western lens. Such as philosophical and religious views.

Warhead, this is one of the "tell tale" hint of your modern Western influence. As noted by me and another mod (I won't name who), this seems to be your conviction: that Eastern philosophy is abundantly rational. Now I'm not denying that. What I'm saying that the many attendant terminologies and paradigms you use in portraying Eastern philosophies often demonstrate that dry, empirical sentiment of modern Western thought. That is what I meant by your Western lens, in addition to what I already explained above. In your presentation, Eastern culture is valorized in an image that is prized by modern thinkers -- rational, skeptical, secular -- the agnostic aspects (like atheism) of Eastern culture shines through as defining aspects of the East in your presentation. But any casual study of Eastern culture reveals that it is much more multi-faceted; your focus on some aspects, the aspects which are conform to sentiments now admired and valued by the modern West, appears to be a modern Western influence.

Wait, but I never said Chinese culture is abundantly rational. Not even close, Chinese culture is actually quite supersitious at least for the average peasant. But my point is THERE IS PLENTY OF RATIOANLISM as well as ATHIESM, which Somechineseperson think is an western invention when its clearly not.

[MengTzu]

I never said I'm not influenced by Western thought,

Good.

Wait, but I never said Chinese culture is abundantly rational. Not even close, Chinese culture is actually quite supersitious at least for the average peasant. But my point is THERE IS PLENTY OF RATIOANLISM as well as ATHIESM, which Somechineseperson think is an western invention when its clearly not.

Sure. My point, though, was that you valorize some aspect over others, the aspects which you valorize are also what modern Western thought values, hence this is a Western influence. That's all I was saying. Carry on.

[NtGuild]

Wth. DO you guys do arguments in such a way? Well, mayb just for me, but i find it ridiculous to be hovering over the same point and this is not even in the topic!

[MengTzu]

Wth. DO you guys do arguments in such a way? Well, mayb just for me, but i find it ridiculous to be hovering over the same point and this is not even in the topic!

Yes, but it's all in good humor, until somebody starts getting personal, then the moderators (such as myself) step in and crack down.

[urofpersia]

Yes, but it's all in good humor, until somebody starts getting personal, then the moderators (such as myself) step in and crack down.

Hi Mengtzu,

I would like to suggest taking out the posts which are not about IGuanDao and place them in a more appropriate thread. That will keep this thread focused on Iguandao. Someone in future might have something to add to the topic and I am concern whether they will be 'thrown off' by the direction of the thread thus far.

Cheers

[Borjigin Ayurbarwada]

Sure. My point, though, was that you valorize some aspect over others, the aspects which you valorize are also what modern Western thought values, hence this is a Western influence. That's all I was saying. Carry on.

Yes, but would you not agree, that empirical data needs to be valorized over others?




All of my beliefs are based on the weight of probability.

[MengTzu]

Yes, but would you not agree, that empirical data needs to be valorized over others?

I personally agree, insofar as empirical evidence is possible. I'm also influenced by modern Western thought in this regard.

All of my beliefs are based on the weight of probability.

I strive for this as well.

[BlueDragonMagik]

Dao as the ultimate principle. Wow! I never think of that. ... What makes the Dao the ULTIMATE principle? ...

[MengTzu]

Dao as the ultimate principle. Wow! I never think of that. ... What makes the Dao the ULTIMATE principle? ...

I think it might be confusing to speak of "ultimate." What is meant is that Dao is the principle for all things. It is "ultimate" in the sense that there is no principle beyond that (there is no principle for Dao). As we can reduce no further than Dao, Dao is the final (final in the line of reduction) and therefore ultimate (ultimate = final.) That's what is meant.

[浪淘音]

no, 玄 is the ultimate principle. all that is, is not