The Useless Tree

The Failure of American Society

   A depressing story out today:

 For the first time in the nation’s history, more than one in 100 American adults are behind bars, according to a new report.

Nationwide, the prison population grew by 25,000 last year, bringing it to almost 1.6 million, after three decades of growth that has seen the prison population nearly triple. Another 723,000 people are in local jails.

The number of American adults is about 230 million, meaning that one in every 99.1 adults is behind bars.

Incarceration rates are even higher for some groups. One in 36 adult Hispanic men is behind bars, based on Justice Department figures for 2006. One in 15 adult black men is, too, as is one in nine black men ages 20 to 34.

The report, from the Pew Center on the States, also found that one in 355 white women ages 35 to 39 is behind bars, compared with one in 100 black women.

    Over a year ago, I blogged about the US as the "world's leading jailer" and wondered then if some part of this problem - the fact that US society cannot seem to function peacefully without an appalling large number of people in jail - was due to a failure of Legalism.   You know: the harsh and unbending punishment of non-violent felons, especially drug felons, fills the jails.  But I am reading the Analects with my tutorial now, and that text brings other possibilities to mind.  Think about 2.3:

The Master said: "If you use government to show them the Way and punishment to keep them true, the people will grow evasive and lose all remorse.  But if you use Integrity to show them the Way and Ritual to keep them true, they'll cultivate remorse and always see deeply into things."

    Here Confucius is also rejecting Legalist approaches: punishment.  And that may be part of the US problem.  But the other side of the Confucian story is exemplary moral leadership.  Are leaders - not just political leaders, but social and economic elites as well - setting the best moral example for the rest of society.  Are they using Integrity and Ritual (which I read as conscientious attention to doing the right thing in all circumstances) to both guide themselves toward Humanity and inspire others to follow along that path?  Confucius would have us all look into ourselves and ask how each of us, in our daily performance of our Duties, might be contributing to immoral societal outcomes. 

       And Mencius would have something to say.  When people do bad things it is because they have been influenced by a negative environment.  Change the environment - which suggests changing social policies - and you can improve moral behavior throughout society:

Mencius said: “In good years, young men are mostly fine. In bad years they’re mostly cruel and violent. It isn’t that Heaven endows them with such different capacities, only that their hearts are mired in such different situations. Think about barley: if you plant the seeds carefully at the same time and in the same place, they’ll sprout and grow ripe by summer solstice. If they don’t grow the same – it’s because of the inequities in richness of soil, amounts of rainfall,or the care given by farmers. And so, all members belonging to a given species of things are the same. Why should humans be the lone exception… (11.7)

     The shamefully high prison population in the US is a sign of deep and extensive societal failure.  Confucians would tell us that there is much that can be done, in our personal lives as well as our social policies, to improve things.  But I despair that Americans will not heed their advice....

 

Once More Into the Breach: The New Legalists and the Tao Te Ching

     One more thing about the New Legalists (am I going on too much about this?  Probably.  But what the hell, it's kind of fun....): they want to enlist the Tao Te Ching in their efforts to construct a neo-traditionalist foundation for current Chinese nationalism.  The post a copy of all 81 passages here - and refer to it as a "Legalist classic."  And that raises this question: to what extent can Taoism be used to justify or legitimate nationalist political projects? 

     Not much.

     I know that Han Fei Tzu, in the early chapters of his book, used Taoism to create an image of the supreme ruler as "doing  nothing," remaining silent and aloof from immediate political affairs.  But that is just an image that screens the ruler's ruthless use of force to protect his position and prerogatives.  It is an un-Taoist appropriation of Taoism.  The historical fact of a Legalist-Taoist synthesis, therefore, should not be taken as a genuine philosophical affinity between the two.  The Legalists forced the two together; Taoists let it happen because they just don't play the same political game as the Legalists.  Maybe that tells us something about the vulnerability of Taoism to misuse by others, but it certainly does not suggest that Taoism inherently tends in a power-political direction.  It does not.

     And Taoism does not lead in the direction of nationalism, either.  Contemporary Chinese nationalists are very much concerned with military and economic strength, and are especially desirous of the forceful take-over of Taiwan.  Nationalists are also interested in national unity within China proper, which Legalists would have them secure through "clear laws and strict punishments."  None of which is consistent with a Taoist world view.

    On laws and punishments, this excerpt from passage 57 of the Tao Te Ching clearly pushes against Legalist-nationalism:

The more prohibitions rule all beneath heaven
the deeper poverty grows among people.
The more shrewd leaders there are
the faster dark confusion fill the nation.
The more cleverness people learn
the faster strange things happen.
The faster laws and decrees are issued
the more bandits and thieves appear.

     Laws and decrees and prohibitions, the sinews of the bureaucratic authoritarian state, are, for Taoists, the problem, not the answer.

     On military power, the Tao Te Ching rather famously urges the avoidance of war and coercion (passage 31):

Auspicious weapons are the tools of misfortune.
Things may not all despise such tools,
but a master of Way stays clear of them.

The noble-minde treasure the left when home
and the right when taking up weapons of war.

Weapons are tools of misfortune,
not tools of the noble-minded.
When there's no other way,
they take up weapons with tranquil calm,
finding no glory in victory.

to find glory in victory
is to savor killing people,
and if you savor killing people
you'll never guide all beneath heaven....

    The text never says we should give up weapons altogether.  But its view of war is clearly suggests defense and not offense.  Thus, it might be justifiable to fight back if attacked, "when there's no other way."  But to launch an attack, say across the Taiwan Strait, would be seen, by Taoists, as unacceptable offensive action.

     Indeed, the Tao Te Ching suggests a long-term peaceful path to eventual accommodation between Taiwan and China (passage 61):

A great nation that puts itself below a small nation
takes over the small nation,
and a small nation that puts itself below a great nation
gives itself over to the great nation.

    Although Taiwan nationalists would be very uneasy with this prospect, from the PRC point of view it suggests that renouncing the use of force, and thus putting China "below" Taiwan, will serve longer term Chinese interests.  Is that what the New Legalists have in mind?  I suspect not, given the more militant tendencies of popular Chinese nationalism of the past twenty years or so.

     Indeed, Taoists would reject any claims of national necessity to territory or wealth or power.  None of that really matters, as passage 80 suggests.  Let me quote it in its entirety again:

Let nations grow smaller and smaller
and the people fewer and fewer,

let weapons become rare
and superfluous,
let people feel death's gravity again
and never wander far from home.
Then boat and carriage will sit unused
and shield and sword lie unnoticed.

Let people knot ropes for notation again
and never need anything more,

let them find pleasure in their food
and beauty in their clothes,
peace in their homes
and joy in their ancestral ways.

Then people in neighboring nations will look across to each other,
their chickens and dogs calling back and forth,

and yet they'll grow old and die
without bothering to exchange visits.

 Hard to see how that aligns with any expression of modern nationalism.

      In the end, the New Legalists really have no basis for their nationalist project - and I am reading them as nationalists.  Han Fei Tzu doesn't really work for their purposes (as suggested below) nor does Taoism.  That doesn't leave much, except poorly misconstrued historical assertions. 

      But maybe I'm wrong.  Maybe they aren't nationalists.  But I'll believe that only when they run an article that shows how, by the standards of both Taoism and Legalism, Taiwan is really not all that important to the well-being and future of China.

More on the New Legalists: The Philosophical Problems

    Picking up where I left off in the last post, I find various philosophical problems with the New Legalists.  I am reading them as nationalists who are appropriating ancient Legalist texts, together with some Taoist volumes, to fashion a neo-traditionalist legitimation for a contemporary Chinese assertion of power globally. 

    The question, then, is: how well does Legalism fit a modern nationalist project?  Not very well, it seems to me.

    First, the very idea of using Legalism as an expression of a tradition that can somehow inform the definition of state interests and the use of power today is, well, un-Legalist.  Han Fei Tzu, for one, is anti-traditionalist.  He was quite clear that old ideas and ancient traditions - especially Confucianism for him - were not important for a modern ruler.  Instead of looking to the past for ideas or wisdom, the ruler has to focus on immediate circumstances and not be bound or blind by outmoded thinking:

For the sage does not try to practice the ways of antiquity or to abide by a fixed standard, but examines the affairs of the age and takes what precautions are necessary. (96-97)

     This would call into question the entire New Legalist project.

     I assume that the New Legalists, while critical of globalization, would still want to maintain China's economic power.  And that would require, it would seem, some reliance on private entrepreneurs (who, of course, require exposure to the world economy to maintain their dynamism...but that is another problem).  Unless they believe that North Korea and Cuba are the preferred economic models for China's future.  The problem is, Legalists are not too fond of merchants and private business interests.  Here's Han Fei Tzu again:

An enlightened ruler will administer his state in such a way as to decrease the number of merchants, artisans, and other men who make their living by wandering from place to place, and will see to it that such men are looked down upon. (116)

     The main problem is political: the primary concern of Legalism is maintaining the power of the single supreme leader.  Private business interests pose a threat insofar as the wealth that is so generated can become a source of political influence independent of the single supreme leader.  Dynamic industrial/post-industrial economies cannot be centrally controlled and they inevitably create a plethora of powerful private interests.  If the New Legalists are really serious about their Legalism they will have to limit economic forces within China as well as between China and the world-economy.  All I can say is: good luck guys!

     Perhaps the biggest problem they face in fitting Legalism to modern nationalism, however, is the anti-populist, anti-demotic sensibility of Legalist thought.  It is all about maximizing the power of the single ruler.  It is not about serving the "people."  The people are simply fodder for the power of the state, and the power of the state is what the single ruler must control above all else.  Han Fei Tzu, in his anti-Confucian fever, rejects Mencian populism:

Nowadays, those who do not understand how to govern invariably say, "You must win the hearts of the people!"  If you could assure good government merely by winning the hearts of the people, then there would be no need for men like Yi Yin and Kuan Chung - you could simply listen to what the people say.  The reason you cannot rely upon the wisdom of the people is that they have minds of little children. (128)

...

The ruler seeks for men of superior understanding and ability precisely because he knows that the wisdom of the people is not sufficient to be of any use. (129)

     And just in case we didn't get the point, he says:

For the people, in their stupid and slovenly way, will groan at even a small expenditure and forget the great profits to be reaped by it. (95)

     Is is just me, or does a nationalist slogan of "the people are infantile, stupid and slovenly" fall flat politically?

     And if the New Legalists are thinking about projecting their (mis)understanding of the politics of the Warring States period onto the international politics of the twenty-first century, they should probably keep this in mind:

Neither power nor order, however, can be sought abroad - they are wholly a matter of internal government. (HFT, 114)

      There are other questions about how their use of Taoism - or their desire to use Taoism - for nationalist ends might work, and that will be a topic for yet another post.

The New Legalists: Distorting Chinese History and Chinese Philosophy for Nationalist Ends

    I have stumbled upon a website, The New Legalist, (Chinese version here, with much more stuff) and am dismayed at the distortions I find there.

    It seems to be the product of people with a fairly unremarkable nationalist, anti-globalization, anti-Westernization mindset.  They are searching not only for a new basis for critique but also for a distinct non-Western cultural foundation upon which to build a new global presence for China.  I say this is unremarkable because it has traces of the Say No nationalists of the 1990s.  Indeed, its underlying cultural anxiety traces back to the 19th century and the worries then about the balance between Western knowledge and Chinese "essence," the old ti/yong distinction. 

     It is novel, however, in that, instead of the usual reach for Confucianism as the new and distinctively Chinese cultural foundation, these guys go for the Legalism. 

     Let me say right up front that I absolutely believe that ancient Chinese thought can provide novel and important insights to modern life.  It is something I think and write about almost every day.  China today, of course, is vastly different from ancient China; indeed, contemporary China is more similar to contemporary America than it is to ancient China.  The past really is a different country, one that is very far away.  Yet even in our fraught modern times, ancient thought is useful and interesting.  Americans, as well as contemporary Chinese, can learn much about themselves and their world from the ancient texts.

     When nationalism enters the picture, however, when the past is put to work to legitimize the political interests of contemporary ruling groups and states, serious problems arise.  Perhaps we are always doomed to misinterpret or misuse the past, but nationalist appropriations are almost always the most dangerous, because they can be invoked to rationalize war and killing; that is what nationalists tend to do, whether American or Chinese or Serbian or whatever...

      The New Legalists are nationalists who have seized upon and distorted the most brutish features of "Chinese culture:" Legalism.  It is true, of course, that Legalist thought has long been a central element of Chinese statecraft.  It is the intellectual apparatus that defined the centralized bureaucratic state that proved so resilient over the long stretch of history.   But we must always keep in mind the human cost of the consolidation and reproduction of that state.  Quite simply, Legalist rulers were quite willing to kill untold numbers of Chinese people to maintain and continue their autocratic hold on power.  They also oversaw the destruction of significant amounts of Chinese culture in their obsessions to hold on to power.  Just ask the Mohists (which we cannot because the Qin essentially wiped them out as an intellectual force).  What might China have been if the Mohists had survived and thrived?

      The fundamental inhumanity of Legalism is best illustrated by the brevity of the Qin dynasty, which lasted only about 15 years, a fleeting moment in Chinese history.  The extreme brutality of Legalist rule, in its purest Qin form, was unsustainable.  It was only after the Han dynasty emerged and backed off Qin's totalitarianism (though keeping a good dose of Legalist statecraft) that the centralized bureaucratic state could find its bearings. 

     As to the aesthetic destructiveness of the Legalist Qin one of the best demonstrations is to be found in the Shanxi Provincial History Museum in Xian.  When I was there a couple of years ago I was amazed at the extraordinary Zhou bronzes.  Beautiful, detailed work; supreme craftsmanship.  But when I reached the end of the long case of Zhou artwork, I turned to look for the next part of the permanent exhibit and there, across the hall, was a display of flat, crude pots and cups huddled up against an array of weaponry.  It was Qin, the time when all art was turned to the megalomaniacal purposes of the power-crazed ruler, when all craftsmen were forced to build a fantasy underground army to protect Qin in the next life.  Thousands upon thousands of people were sacrificed to the ersatz glory of the ruler.  Beauty was trampled under power.  And the people soon rose up and overthrew him. 

      That is the history that the New Legalists want us to embrace; but that is not quite how they tell it.  Here is there take on Qin's extermination of intellectual life:

The First Emperor of Qin  is said to have burned Confucian books and buried alive Confucian scholars (It's not true according to famous Chinese history book Shih-chi by Ssu-ma Ch’ien).

      Perhaps they mean to suggest that only the burying of scholars alive did not happen.  But careful scholarship tells us that (see Baumler comment here), while the actual burying of scholars alive is in doubt, the fact of extensive persecution of intellectuals and destruction of texts is certain.  We can quibble over whether the corpses of the scholars  were cold or not but we cannot deny Qin's assault on Chinese culture. The New Legalists are trying to prettify an ugly history.

      Here's another example:

Throughout human history, the Chinese civilization is the only one which has not flourished by force of gunboat conquest and colonial expansion but through free interracial marriages and free migration, i.e., through the unity of blood and land. It has been powerful at times, but never an empire——it has been a highly-civilized organic social body. A convincing evidence of the natural development of the Chinese civilization is the fact that so far the distances between Shaanxi, the location of its origin, and China’s current borders in all directions are roughly equal.

      This is unadulterated rubbish.  Of course, the centralized Chinese state conquered and expanded by means of military force.  The Han did it; the Ming did it; the Qing (who I guess, since they were Manchu and not Chinese, don't count for the New Legalists) did it.  "Free interracial marriages and free migration."  Yeah, sure.  Ask the Uighurs or the Tibetans.  All one big happy Chinese family.   And, additionally, the notion that "Chinese civilization" sprung up, fully formed, in Shaanxi, and then expanded outward, is fiction.  Someone needs to tell these guys to read what the archeologist's and historians have to say about the ancient Chinese interaction sphere.

      I do not mean to suggest that Chinese civilization is somehow bad or different than others.  Quite to the contrary, I would argue that Chinese civilization, while it has its own unique features and inventions, was similar to other large-scale political formations in its use of both military force and cultural hegemony to secure compliance to the state within a given territory.   There is no need to white-wash that reality.

     But that is what the New Legalists are doing.  It is rather strange, really.  They take the most brutal element of China's vast intellectual legacy and try to gussy it up.  They are obviously drawn to Legalism's political realism, but they want to divert our attention away from precisely that same thing. 

     There are certain philosohical distortions as well.  The use of Legalism, which is staunchly anti-traditionalist, as the foundation for neo-traditionalist state legitimation strikes me as contradictory.  And then the enlistment of Taoism, and especially the Tao Te Ching, in this same project.  Wow.  That opens them up to all sorts of trouble: making Taoism serve nationalist ends.  But it's getting late - maybe I'll expand on those ideas tomorrow....

Is the Tao Te Ching Democratic?

    Another question from my tutorial (thanks Andrea!). 

    To begin an answer we must address all the caveats.  No, I do not mean "democracy" as it is currently practiced in the West.  Yes, I understand that the context of the Tao Te Ching was not at all democratic as we generally think of the term.  Yes, I know that the text itself, in referring to "Ruler" and "Sage" presumes something like a monarchy or autocracy.  Yes, I  know that  asking the question  opens me to charges of anachronistic misreading.  But I still think we can ask the question, just as Manyul asked something similar of Confucius last week. 

     What, then, do I mean by "democracy" here?  How about a rather general sensibility that the "people" (i.e. general public, not confined to the socio-economic elite) should play a significant part in the constitution and practice of government.  Something like Lincoln's "government of the people, by the people, for the people."  Does the Tao Te Ching put forth, or even prefer, this kind of idea?

     Let's take them one at a time, easiest to hardest.

     "For the people" seems quite straightforward.  Throughout the text, the writers complain about and criticize leaders who use their power to serve their own interests.  Rapacious power-holders are responsible for creating human conditions that contradict the natural unfolding of Way.  Passage 75 always strikes me as strongest in this regard:

The people are starving,
and it's only because you leaders feast on taxes
that they're starving.

The people are impossible to rule,
and it's only because you leaders are masters of extenuation
that they're impossible to rule.

the people take death lightly,
and it's only because you leaders crave life's lavish pleasures
that they take death lightly,

they who act without concern for life:
it's a wisdom far beyond treasuring life.

    Governments that are alienated from the people and do not allow for people to secure their own livelihoods and manage their own affairs are bad governments.  In short, government should be "for the people."

     How about "of the people"?  To me this means that government should not be external to the "people" but should grow organically from the community and society that surrounds it.  The Tao Te Ching, it seems to me, demonstrates a strong preference for the simplest, least intrusive forms of "government."  The less government the better.  In this manner it does have some sympathy for the notion that people should be allow to rule themselves, with little interference.  And if people are self-governing, then government, such as it is, is "of the people."  That is what comes through in passage 80, which I have always read as an idealistic image of the best Taoist socio-political circumstance:

Let nations grow smaller and smaller
and the people fewer and fewer,

let weapons become rare
and superfluous,
let people feel death's gravity again
and never wander far from home.
Then boat and carriage will sit unused
and shield and sword lie unnoticed.

Let people knot ropes for notation again
and never need anything more,

let them find pleasure in their food
and beauty in their clothes,
peace in their homes
and joy in their ancestral ways.

Then people in neighboring nations will look across to each other,
their chickens and dogs calling back and forth,

and yet they'll grow old and die
without bothering to exchange visits.

    Notice that there is not mention of "rulers" or "sages" here.  People, average people, are running their own lives.  We might even say they are ruling themselves, since the means of coercion ("weapons") are still available, albeit rare and superfluous.  The continuing presence of weapons implies that there is some understanding of where they are and when they might have to be brought out, and these are key questions of political rule, in the Weberian sense (i.e. determining when and how to deploy the legitimate means of coercion).  Perhaps I am making too much of this, but I will stand by this passage as an ideal, maybe utopian, image of popular self-rule.   And in that regard it goes to something rather like government "of the people."

   "By the people" may be the most difficult.  It suggests some sort of governing institution that is open to control and management by the people.  To the extent that the Tao Te Ching pushes against institutions, and certainly against bureaucracy, this idea drifts away from Taoist sensibilities.  Indeed, the text puts forth a fairly clear sense of distinction between rulers and people, between sages and those many of us who are prone to take "twisty paths" that lead away from Way.  Can everyone be a sage?  Can everyone be a "true emperor"?  I think not, at least not from the text of the Tao Te Ching.  It takes a person of a certain character and predisposition to open himself, or herself, to Way.  It is not clear at all, beyond passage 80, that sufficient numbers of people will actually be able to follow Way to allow for the ideal outcome.  Much in and about the text pushes in the other direction.

    Of course, I never expect straightforward and unambiguous answers from the Tao Te Ching.  That's not the way it works as a book.  So, hey, two out of three ain't bad.  I think we can find some resonances there with the ensemble of ideas that we associate, loosely, with the notion of "democracy."

     This is not to say that it is a "democratic" text.  Rather, just that there are hints and traces there.  It is also not to suggest that China, somehow, might have developed more of a democratic tradition historically if it had stuck to its Taoist orientations and avoided the Confucian-Legalist synthesis.  That's way too big a historical leap to be feasible or, even, interesting.

    Let's just say that it contains some democratic intimations.  It offers a critique of tyrannical power and suggests a certain faith in popular self-rule.  And it tells rulers to subordinate themselves to and follow popular interests (a la passage 66):

So, wanting to rule over the people
a sage speaks from below them,
and wanting to lead the people
he follows along behind them,

then he can reign above without weighing the people down
and stay ahead without leading the people to ruin.

     Is this merely enlightened despotism?  Or could it equally apply to a leader who subjects himself and his rule to popular scrutiny and judgment?  If the people reject his rule as too heavy and out of tune with where they would lead him, shouldn't he heed the will of the people?  He certainly shouldn't force the issue in order to hold onto power. 

    I'll open it up to you, readers.  I know that many will find it easy to knock down this idea but, what the heck, it's a nice day here today, how about it: what about the Tao Te Ching is democracy-like, and what isn't?

Is the Tao Te Ching Consequentialist?

    In my tutorial, which has been working through the Tao Te Ching of late, a student (thanks Raff!) suggested that the text is consequentialist.  I was initially taken aback, but, upon further reflection was drawn to the possibilities of the question.

    First of all, for anyone who wants a quick backgrounder on consequentialism, this Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry is a good staring point. 

     I have confronted this issue before, in Aidan's Way, where in chapter 9, "Mastering Uselessness," I use Chuang Tzu - and especially his story of the useless tree - against Peter Singer's utilitarianism.  So, it seemed a fairly clear open and shut case, when I read the student's suggestion, that Taoism is not consequentialist.

      But then I looked at the text.  And it is true that some passages, perhaps many, suggest a consequentialist sensibility; that is, there is an implicit assertion that allowing Way to express itself would create better outcomes or consequences than obstructing its expressions.  Conversely, taking "twisty paths" or "mountain roads" (i.e. paths through life that turn away from the open and broad avenue of Way) diverts us into unnecessary, humanly-created badness.  Yes, Way is all inclusive and envelops the "bad" along with the "good," but the text certainly tells us that some human actions are un-Way-like, and that "masters of Way" can avoid such actions. 

    Here's a couple of concrete examples from the text.

    Passage 22 (from the Hendricks translation), excerpt:

Therefore the Sage holds on to the One and in this way becomes the shepherd of the world.
He does not show himself off; therefore he becomes prominent.
He does not put himself on display; therefore he brightly shines.
He does not brag about himself; therefore he receives credit.
He does not praise his own deeds; therefore he can long endure.

 Sure seems like the phrases that come after "therefore" are consequences that create a positive value for the actions (nonactions) that precede them.

      Here's another example, an excerpt from passage 3, which is what caught my student's eye:

By not elevating the worthy, you bring it about that people will not compete.
By not valuing good that are hard to obtain, you bring it about that people will not act as thieves.
By not displaying the desirable you bring it about that people will not be confused.

     There are many such consequentialist-seeming passages, which reasonably provoke the question: is the Tao Te Ching consequentialist?

      I think I still have to answer "no," even though I now see more clearly the traces of consequentialism in the text.  My primary reason for still saying no is the centrality and significance of wu-wei in the text.  I like Hinton's translation of the term as "nothing's own doing."  We could also invoke his translation of ziran: "occurence appearing of itself."  While I agree that these terms do not necessarily demand absolute nonaction, they do suggest that our understanding and judgment (yes, I believe the text is ultimately providing us with an ethical framework of sorts, even as it swears off formalized ethics) should focus not on the consequences of human action but, rather, on the radical reduction of the consequences that human action creates.  We need to get out of the way of Way. 

    There is a consequentialist quality to that advice (if we get out of the way of Way, then things will unfold naturally and that is preferable to the effects of humanly-created action).  But the goal is to ultimately erase consequences, at least in their human form.  An old Maoist turn of phrase comes to mind here: the Tao Te Ching is waving the consequentialist flag to defeat consequentialism. 

     It could also be argued that the general avoidance of formalized ethics weakens the consequentialist claim.  But I would not go so far as to say there is no moral message in the text.  At the very least it is asking us to relinquish conventional definitions of "good" and "bad" and understand them anew in the broader context of Way.

      But that's just me.  And I may be too much influenced by Chuang Tzu along these lines.  What do you think: is the Tao Te Ching consequentialist?

Go to Dunhuang - Now!

    Dunhuang, the oasis city in Gansu province and home to the magnificent Mogao Caves, filled with extraordinary Buddhist sculpture and paintings, may be less accessible in the future.  That, at least is what I get from this story:

China plans huge investment to protect Mogao Grottoes

08:30, February 14, 2008

China has approved a 36-million-U.S. dollar protection scheme for the Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes, a listed World Heritage Site in the northwest Gansu Province.

The plan, approved by the National Development and Reform Commission, includes the construction of a digital display hall that can hold 800 visitors and facilities for consolidation, erosion prevention, security and visitor services, the Gansu Provincial Cultural Heritage Bureau said.

    Around 70 percent of the investment will come from the central government and the rest from the province.

The 1,600-year-old Mogao Grottoes boast more than 2,000 colored sculptures and 45,000 square meters of frescoes. The site received World Heritage designation in 1987.

"The completion of the service facilities is expected to help reduce the stay time of visitors inside the grottoes," said Wang Xudong, vice president of the Dunhuang Academy, the sole institute authorized to protect, research and manage the Dunhuang grotto treasures.

    Vapor and carbon dioxide exhaled by visitors can erode the frescoes and sculptures, according to experts.

    The number of domestic and overseas tourists to the Dunhuang grottoes has reached 500,000 annually and continues to rise.

"The small grottoes are often packed with visitors, which poses a severe threat to the preservation of the frescoes and sculptures inside," Wang said.

     It is probably right and good that they come up with better ways of viewing the caves, but being able to stand in them and see their beauty up close is breath-taking.  If you haven't been there, I would urge you to go as soon as possible, before the new digital display hall is used as a means to limit access to the caves themselves.

     Nowhere in China offers a better contrast with the flat and uninspired art of Qin Shi Huangdi.  The devotional pursuits of thousands of monks over hundreds of years produced much greater beauty than the hapless minions enslaved by Qin to manufacture his army for the next life.   Give me Dunhuang any day....

     The International Dunhuang Project has a page of links.  This one has some photos of cave paintings.

   

The Tao Te Ching Against the Second Amendment

    Perhaps that is too strong.  The Second Amendment to the US Constitution is famously ambiguous (so maybe Taoists would then be comfortable with it!): does it secure an individual's right to bear arms or the right of the various states to maintain militias?  A case working its way through the Supreme Court might focus the issue, but will not end the controversy.

     In any event, the horrible shootings last week at Northern Illinois University have got me to thinking about gun rights and Way. 

     Generally, the Tao Te Ching is against violence and coercion.  I know, some amount of violence is to be expected as a natural part of Way.  But a certain number of violent acts (we really cannot be more precise and maintain a Taoist sensibility) are the result of calculated human action that violates Way.  People who kill take on the role of the "master carpenter" and achieve nothing but to bloody their own hands (74).

      What is more interesting are the passages that have to do with weapons.  Yes, weapons are "tools of misfortune" and a "master of Way stays clear of them" (31); but the text does not call for an absolute ban or abolition of weapons.  The enigmatic ending of passage 36 stands out in this regard:

Fish should be kept in their watery depths:
a nation's hone instruments of power
should be kept well-hidden from the people.

     The fish metaphor suggests that it is natural to keep weapons from the people; that only sages should know where they are and, implicitly, when they might be brought out and used.  This passage thus seems to rationalize (I won't say justify) a Legalist concentration of power.  But I do not believe that a Legalist reading here is in keeping with the spirit of the text.

     Rather, I understand the writers of the Tao Te Ching to have a certain pragmatic strain in their thinking.  Is is possible to abolish all weapons?  Is is practical to demand that each and every one be destroyed and never be used again?  No.  Weaponry is a product of the human mind and as long as their are human minds there will be weaponry.  So, instead of a total ban, the Tao Te Ching seems to be advocating strict limitations on the possession and use of weaponry.  They need to be "hidden" - i.e. not sold widely and easily so that a troubled young man with a history of mental illness can just walk in and buy the guns he will use to kill his classmates.

    Indeed, thinking about the NIU case highlights the simultaneous inevitable and preventable qualities of these sorts of events.  The diversity of human experience in Way, the variations among individuals and among groups, generates an impulse to violence for a wide variety of reasons.  People will lash out at others - for irrational as well as apparently rational reasons.  Given this inevitable quality of humanity, it makes a certain sense not to have a lot of guns lying around.  Weapons translate what might have been a punch into a deadly shot.  That, I think is the Tao Te Ching's position.

       The text also understands violence and weaponry in a broader socio-cultural context.  In passage 80, which describes something close to a Taoist utopia, weapons are not completely absent:

Let nations grow smaller and smaller
and people fewer and fewer,

Let weapons become rare
and superfluous,
let people feel death's gravity again
and never wander far from home.
....

     "Nations smaller" and "people fewer" is a direct rejection of the logic of the Warring States period, in which rulers vied with each other to increase their state's territory and population to bolster larger and more powerful armed forces.  Just give all that up, the text is saying.  People will fear death if their lives are comfortable and peaceful; if life is hell they might prefer to die.  So the text is telling the putative ruler to make sure each person has a sufficient subsistence, enough food to eat and clothes to wear  and shelter.  The assumption here is that there is some minimum of material goods that will satisfy most people.  And when that is achieved, then weapons will be come rare and superfluous: people will have no recourse to violence because they will be satisfied with their immediate circumstances. They will be happy in their localities not want to go anywhere else.

     Yes, this is idealistic (I read it as utopian), but it suggests a general ideal toward which contemporary public policy can strive: work to secure a basic standard of living for all people to diffuse the impulse to violence and limit access to guns so as to prevent those individuals who might have recourse to violence from hurting others in an un-Way-like fashion.

      In the end, the Tao Te Ching might not be against the Second Amendment, but it would certainly side with those who interpret it as allowing for significant limitation on an individual's right to bear arms.

A Great New Blog

     Just found a new Chinese philosophy blog: Manyul Im's Chinese Philosophy Blog.   Some great discussions going on there by people who really know their texts. 

Whole 'lotta Confucians Out There

    Or at least the family tree of the man himself is growing in leaps and bounds:

JINAN: Confucius, or more precisely his descendants, are alive and kicking in China, as well as the rest of the world. And his updated family tree is set to triple the size of his descendants.

The work of registering new members to the family tree of the revered Chinese thinker and educator was finished last year, and now they number more than 2 million.

But the actual number of Confucius descendants living across the world is more than 3 million, 2.5 million of which are on the Chinese mainland.

     A big chunk of the most recent growth in the officially registered family line is due to a more enlightened view of descent:

The new list, for the first time, will include overseas and female descendants of the great philosopher.

 Including women as decedents does wonders for the numbers no doubt.

      This is a fun exercise for the family but it should be pointed out that, philosophically, there is no reason why any one, regardless of family line or gender or nationality, cannot be a Confucian.  The system of thought is not bound by any particular cultural context.  Confucian himself understood his system of ethics to express "civilization," not nation or ethnicity.  When I read Mencius I am struck by the universalizing tone of his challenges to power.   They speak across time and space.

   We can all be Confucians, if we do the right thing.....