The Useless Tree

John Mearsheimer, Taoist

      Just found this little piece in the Block Island Times (h/t War and Piece) about a talk given by a few international relations specialists at the Naval War College in Newport.  John Mearsheimer was one of the participants.  For those of you unfamiliar with his work, Mearsheimer is an IR "Realist," one who understands power as a reflection of military capabilities and who defines national interests in rather narrow material terms.  He was against the US invasion of Iraq, unconvinced that Iraq's military power really posed a threat to American vital interests. Mearsheimer then spoke about his time at West Point in the late 1960s. An English professor had assigned his class to read French existentialist Albert Camus' "The Plague." The instructor explained that he was using the book as an allegory for what was happening in Vietnam: the plague came and went of its own accord - and humans "operated under the illusion that they could affect the plague one way or another." Mearsheimer said he saw a similar dynamic afoot in Iraq.

      In any event, this is what he had to say:

Mearsheimer then spoke about his time at West Point in the late 1960s. An English professor had assigned his class to read French existentialist Albert Camus' "The Plague." The instructor explained that he was using the book as an allegory for what was happening in Vietnam: the plague came and went of its own accord - and humans "operated under the illusion that they could affect the plague one way or another." Mearsheimer said he saw a similar dynamic afoot in Iraq.

"There are forces that we don't have control over that are at play, and they will determine the outcome. I understand that's very hard for Americans to understand, because Americans believe that they can shape the world in their interests.

"But I learned during the Vietnam years when I was a kid at West Point, that there are some things in the world that you just don't control, and I think that's where we're at in Iraq."

 Forces beyond our control?  Recognize our inability to shape the world in our interests?  Operating under an illusion of effectiveness?

      Sounds like Tao to me....

Transracial Adoption: Confucius Agrees

      A good story in the NYT today about transracial adoption in the US, focusing on the complexities of white parents with black children. 

     As I read through it, it struck me that a Confucian point of view would conclude that the practice is generally good: what matters is not race, though that may pose some social challenges for the family, but the intention and behavior of the parents.  If they conscientiously do the right thing - or develop the sensitivity to know what the "right thing" is in various circumstances - they will be able to raise their children to be morally grounded persons.

     First, the numbers:

In 2004, 26 percent of black children adopted from foster care, about 4,200, were adopted transracially, nearly all by whites. That is up from roughly 14 percent, or 2,200, in 1998, according to a New York Times analysis of data from the National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect at Cornell University and from the Department of Health and Human Services.

     And now the challenges:

White families adopting black children are increasingly learning that the “love is enough” approach to adoption that families bring to the process is often met with skepticism.

Psychologists, researchers and adoptees themselves say many children adopted transracially in past decades suffered from philosophies focused on assimilation, with little or no acknowledgment of racial and cultural conflict.

Robert O’Connor, 39, who was raised by a white family in Rush City, Minn., recalled his struggles growing up in a small town with few other blacks. Throughout his youth, he said, he felt awkward around other blacks. He did not understand black trends in fashion or music or little things like playing the dozens, the oral tradition of dueling insults.

“I always felt like I had this ‘A’ on my forehead, this adoptee, that people could see from a far distance that I was different,” said Mr. O’Connor, who now researches transracial adoptions as assistant professor of social work at Metropolitan State University in St. Paul.

    As I was reading I was thinking "love is enough."  The passage above helped remind me of the social dynamics of race: even if the parents are doing the right thing, there will still be moments of tension and difficulty because of the externally generated social expectations about race and family that surround them.  Those forces should not stop adoptions - which should be determined by the needs of the individual children and parents involved - but should, as they are, be identified as issues for a multiracial family.

     So, why would a modern day Confucian agree that transracial adoption - and this would also include international adoption of, say, Chinese children by foreign parents - is generally acceptable?  Because what matters for Confucian morality is not some static (stultifying) notion of ethnic or national exclusivity, but behavior.  Becoming a noble-minded person, for Confucius, is not the birth right of any particular ethnic or national group.  In the Chinese world (can we call his time a "Chinese world"?  Had "China" then taken on all of the characteristics we associate with "Chinese" now?) of his time, very few people behaved in such a manner as to approach his ideal of Humanity".  In short, not all, indeed very few, Chinese persons were noble-minded.

     One had to learn - arduously over many years - how to be noble-minded.  One had to work at it every day.  In one sense is it easy.  In the Analects he says that Humanity is right there next to us: it is plain to see the right and the good in the circumstances that surround us.  But, in another sense, it is very hard to attain: we must resist myriad temptations of greed and self-interest to find and do the right thing.

      So, morality is not a racial characteristic.  It is available to anyone who cares to work toward it.  If white parents can demonstrate good intentions and capabilities for raising black children, that is for the good.  They should be judged on their performance as parents, not their race.  And the same goes for black parents adopting white children, which, while statistically less common, should in no way be discouraged.

     Confucius was, ultimately, a cosmopolitan.  He was less interested in defending the racial "purity" of China or any other place, and more interested in developing the ethical sensibilities of people in various cultural contexts (it was the Warring States period after all) to find and perform the right thing.

UPDATE: The Asia Pages has some thoughts on this same NYT article from a Korean perspective. 

Global Disability

     I did not realize that the United Nations is negotiating an international convention to define and protect the rights of disabled persons around the world. Thomas Schindlmayr's op-ed in today's International Herald Tribune brought this to my attention.  He makes a variety of valuable points: that disabled people can contribute much to society; that developing accommodations to bring more disabled people into the work force is not terribly expensive; and that the new convention will not place undue burdens on governments with limited resources.

      While I agree with all of this, I am a bit uncomfortable because, as I have long argued (especially in the last chapter of Aidan's Way), we should not have to justify the value of disabled persons in utilitarian terms.  That is, instead of demonstrating value based on the positive effects a disabled individual has on others, we should simply recognize the value of the disabled person in and of himself.  My worry is that if we get into the consequentialist game - accepting some standard of sufficient positive effect as the basis for defining "value" - some individuals will invariably fall below the threshold and, perhaps, be deemed less valuable.

    Schindlmayr understands this when he says: "In fact, the single most effective measure - changing perceptions toward persons with disabilities - costs virtually nothing and would make a huge difference."  But we need to push further on what those perception are.  Disabled people are not only productive and positively effective, they are, by their very presence and nothing more, integral members of the human family.   Even those most profoundly disabled individuals, like my Aidan, have as much value and meaning as the most "productive" person.

     I have often cited Chuang Tzu's notion of everything "moving as one and the same" in Way to bolster my anti-utilitarian position.  I am happy to say I have found more help in the Lieh Tzu:

However, although the shapes and energies of things differ, they are equal by nature, none can take the place of another, all are born perfect in themselves, each is alloted all its needs. (99).

     All are born perfect in themselves.  Their worth is not gauged by their effects on society.  Let's put that in the preamble of the new international convention on disabilites.

Modern Love: The Form of this Body

       This week's "Modern Love" column is a very poignant piece, by Jennifer Glaser, reflecting on her boy friend's untimely death.  He was dying of leukemia and they made love as they could until the illness separated them physically.  She found that the sex gave meaning to the time they had together:

We flirted, canoodled, talked about sex, and had sex when he was sick because, well, sex wasn’t death. It was the antithesis of death, and damn if it didn’t feel good to forget for a while that nothing we could dream up could act as an effective talisman against the iceberg floating into our sights.

     The carnality of it all leads her to something like celebration, with a hint of "I Sing the Body Electric:"

Eulogies praised his imagination, writing prowess, generosity and warmth. I praised those qualities, too. But, praise be the body, I told them. It is only in such praise that I could give my boyfriend back what leukemia took from him, trace the contours of what he had lost: his material form, with its capacity for messy emissions, spontaneous erections, parted lips, enveloping bearhugs and leg cramps — beautiful all.

     The contrast of the physical form of the body and death is also to be found in Chuang Tzu.  Here he echoes Glaser's celebratory tone:

We're cast into this human form, and it's such happiness.  This human form knows change, but the ten thousand changes are utterly boundless.  Who could calculate the joys they promise? (87)

       Our physical form is a process of constant transformation: we grow, we develop, we strengthen, we come into our own.  These are the joyous changes, opening up for us exhilarating facets of our humanity, sex included. 

    But, of course, not all of the changes bring joy.  There is another side to the physical story, as Glaser knows all to well.  Here is Chuang Tzu's take:

Once we happen into the form of this body, we cannot forget it.  And so it is that we wait out the end.  Grappling and tangling with things, we rush headlong toward the end, and there's no stopping it.  It's sad, isn't it?  We slave our lives away and never get anywhere, work ourselves ragged and never find our way home.  How could it be anything but sorrow? (20)

     We are trapped in our material form, doomed to inescapable demise.   Inevitable physical deterioration means that we can only "wait out the end."

      This seems quite depressing.  But, Chuang Tzu is not really so pessimistic.  There is a way out, and it is pretty much what Glaser and her boyfriend did: give yourself over to physical reality and live as fully as you can within those limitations.  Here is Chuang Tzu, speaking through a character whose body is falling apart in old age and infirmity. 

"Why should I resent it?" [he] replied. "If my left arm's transformed into a rooster, I'll just go looking for night's end.  If my right arm's transformed into a crossbow, I'll just go looking for owls to roast.  And if my butt is transformed into a pair of wheels and my spirit's transformed into a horse, I'll just ride away! I'd never need a cart again!

"This life we're given comes in its own season, and then follows its vanishing away.  If you're at ease in your season, if you can dwell in its vanishing, joy and sorrow never touch you.  This is what the ancients called 'getting free'."

     None of us ever really escape the sorrow of losing a loved one.  But it sounds like Glaser and her boyfriend came pretty close to "getting free."

A Filial Yankee

     Not too many stories satisfy both my interest in ancient Chinese philosophy and my allegiance to the New York Yankees.  But this piece in today's NYT, about the formidable Yankee pitcher, Chien-Ming Wang (or Wang Chien-Ming for purists), fits the bill.

     Wang is from Taiwan and has imbibed some elements of Chinese culture.  It seems he was adopted but he did not discover this until he had to file papers for a baseball competition:

“We were going out to a competition and needed our personal documents,” Wang said, explaining that meant the names, relationships and birthdates of family members. “When I got my documents, I learned who my biological parents were. My parents didn’t tell me.”

Wang found out then that his biological father was the man he knew as his uncle, Ping-Yin Wang. Wang’s parents had no children of their own and offered to raise him. They later had a daughter, Hsiu-Wen Wang, who is two years younger.

    Such arrangements are not uncommon at all.  What is not mentioned in the article, but which I bet is the case, is that his biological father most likely already had at least one son, and heir, and felt secure that his family name would be carried on in the next generation, as per Confucian practice.  Gaining an heir by adoption, as Wang's sociological parents did, is perfectly respectable and acceptable in Chinese culture.

     And it seems like the parents who raised him did a good job; Wang has a clear sense of filial responsibility:

“I felt I had to work even harder in order to help two sets of parents,” he said, adding later, “Most of my money I send home to let my parents manage. The rest I use for living expenses in America.”

In the off-season, Wang and his wife, Chia-Ling, live with the parents who raised him. He loves his mother’s cooking, he said, but the overriding reason is cultural.

His parents, who manufactured metal products like spoons and lunch boxes, have been retired for about 10 years. In Taiwan, Wang explained, it is customary for sons to stay at home and take care of their parents. Long after learning his personal background, Wang remains very close with the parents who raised him.

“In Taiwan there’s a saying: ‘Raising a child is more important than giving birth. Raising a child is greater,’ ” Wang said.

 I haven't heard that saying before.  Does anyone know it in Chinese?  Whatever the case, I think the sentiment is correct: having a child is much more than giving birth.  The real work comes after, for years and years.

    So, three cheers for the filial Yankee, Wang Chien-Ming!

Slouching Toward Transparency

     Back in February I wrote a short piece (about 1000 words) about how the PRC government is losing its battle against the free flow of information.  I sent it to the LA Times, where I have published a bunch of articles over the past few years, but they did not take it.  I did not update it because, when Aidan died, my attention was turned to other matters.

     I post it here, below the jump because, even if the examples are a bit dated, I believe the argument may still hold up.  There is no ancient Chinese philosophy in it, just contemporary political analysis.  What do you think: is the PRC government actually becoming more informationally transparent, even as it tries to maintain its censorship regime?

Beijing Weekend: Women are Better Confucians than Men

    I imagine there might be some dissent from some of my male readers out there.  But, the more I think about it, the more it seems true to me that women, in their attention to social relationships, are generally better Confucians than men.  You can read it at China Daily here, or keep reading it below.  Comments and criticisms are welcome!

Sun Tzu and the Airplane Bomb Plot

        Today we have what appears to be a significant victory against global terrorist networks: the arrest of a ring of people in Britain who were preparing to blow up airplanes.   It is noteworthy that this was the result of good police work:

London's Deputy Police Commissioner, Paul Stephenson, said 21 people had been arrested in London, southeastern England and Birmingham, England's second-largest city, after a months-long investigation into what he said was a plan for "mass murder on an unimaginable scale."

Peter Clarke, chief of the London police department's anti-terrorism branch, said the investigation reached a "critical point" Wednesday night, requiring immediate disruption of the plot, the arrests and the imposition of heightened security measures.

      Bravo for them.  What this demonstrates is the subtlety of the "war" on terrorism.  It is something more complex and fluid than your standard notion of conventional war, with one army facing off against the other on a clearly defined battlefield.   It requires a sophisticate coordination of all available means of resistance - and that means it is as much a police-investigative effort as a military effort, a point that neo-con war hawks have long derided.

   The hyper-militarized US disaster in Iraq stands in stark contrast to the pain-staking police work of the British investigators.  We are squandering enormous resources in a hapless effort to avoid Bush's complete embarrassment, while contributing, politically, to the reproduction of al-Qaeda's strategy.  And the same can be said for the Israel-Hezbollah war: it simply plays into the narrative created by bin Laden, et al.  If we were smart, we would do everything in our power to impose a cease-fire.

     As regards the broader effort against al-Qaeda, what is needed is a more focused strategy that targets specifically the people who are trying to pull off the terrorist spectacles and that attends to the larger political-media battle of images and ideas.  Strategy and tactics must be tailored to the circumstances surrounding the necessity of war.  Sun Tzu (Sun Zi) gets at this idea here:

The ultimate in disposing one's troops is to be without ascertainable shape.  Then the most penetrating spies cannot pry in nor can they wise lay plans against you.

It is according to shapes that I lay the plans for victory, but the multitude does not comprehend this.  Although everyone can see the outward aspects, none understands the way in which I have created victory.

Therefore, when I have won a victory I do not repeat my tactics but respond to circumstances in an infinite variety of ways.

Now an army may be likened to water, for just as flowing water avoids the heights and hastens to the lowlands, so an army avoids strengths and strikes weaknesses.

And as water shapes its flow in accordance with the ground, so an army manages its victory in accordance with the situation of the enemy.

And as water has no constant form, there are in war no constant conditions.

Thus, one able to gain the victory by modifying his tactics in accordance with the enemy situation may be said to be divine.

    We must understand the form of the enemy and shape our responses accordingly.  Division-sized invasions are less relevant than stealthy surveillance and careful targeting of specific individuals.

Why Joe Lieberman Should Not Run As An Independent

    From The Analects (1.16):

The Master said: "Don't grieve when people fail to recognize your ability.  Grieve when you fail to recognize theirs.

    Are you listening Joe?  Confucius is telling you to give it up.  It's not about you anymore Joe.  You lost.  Ned is okay. The people said "no."  Take a long vacation and do some soul-searching (reading the Chinese classics is quite enlightening).   And if you need another passage from the Analects to get you started, try 4.14:

The Master said: "Don't worry if you have no position: worry about making yourself worthy of one.  Don't worry if you aren't known and admired: devote yourself to a life that deserves admiration."

     Don't worry, Joe.  The country can get along without you.  Take a break.  Read a book.  Spend a little more time with the family....

Confucian Psychiatry

    I saw this obituary in the NYT today:

Dr. Jean Baker Miller, a psychiatrist who disputed traditional notions of social roles and developed a theory that serves as a foundation for treating women’s depression and other disorders through the building of fruitful relationships, died on July 29 at her home in Brookline, Mass. She was 78.

...

Dr. Miller developed her premise under what she called relational-cultural theory and explained it in an influential book, “Toward a New Psychology of Women” (1976).

The theory holds that isolation is one of the most damaging human experiences and is best treated by reconnecting with other people. Dr. Miller proposed that social competition helped provoke psychological illness and that the therapist’s role was to foster an atmosphere of empathy and acceptance for the patient, even at the cost of the therapist’s neutrality.

     I don't know much about psychiatry, but this strikes as what it would look like if a Confucian did it (do Confucians do it?).

“Increasingly,” said Dr. [Amt] Banks, who also teaches at Wellesley and Harvard, “neurobiology is telling us about the importance of relationships, that we are all hard-wired to connect with each other. In that sense, to be disconnected is to be wounded.”

   Couldn't you hear Confucius saying basically the same thing?  We are wounded when we are isolated from our closest loving social relationships.