Chapter 5
A Comparative Examination of Rorty’s and Mencius’ Theories of Human Nature
Confucianism
and Rorty’s theory are quite different in many respects. For instance, Rorty’s
theory is mostly critical. It calls for the ending of an era. Confucianism is
mostly constructive. It aims at reviving a tradition. Rorty’s theory opposes
any form of universalism, whereas Confucians like to say “all under the
heaven.” Rorty puts high value on individual autonomy, and makes a sharp
distinction between the private and the public; yet Confucianism is known for
its strong emphasis on social responsibility and the inseparability of the family
and the state. The differences explain, and to a certain extent also justify, the
general impression that the two are opposite in their approaches.
However, a careful reading of Rorty shows
that they actually share some insights, and when they differ, they can often complement
each other. In this chapter, I will make a comparison between Mencius’ and
Rorty’s theories of human nature. As we shall find, the two are compatible and
even similar in certain aspects, and seen from their similarities, the differences
between the two become more interesting and revealing. Such an endeavor
involves both an effort to disentangle Mencius’ theory of human nature from the
common interpretation of it and an effort to suggest that, taking advice from
Mencius, Rorty may want to be more radically pragmatic than he already is; and,
taking advice from Rorty, Mencius may want to be clearer in laying out his
intentions and avoid being interpreted as a metaphysician.
I
Let
me first give a very brief summary of Rorty’s theory of human nature to set the
stage for our comparison of his view with Mencius’ view. Rorty writes:
The traditional philosophical way of spelling out what
we mean by “human solidarity” is to say that there is something within each of
us–our essential humanity–which resonates to the presence of this same thing in
other human beings.... Our insistence on the contingency, and our consequent
opposition to ideas like “essence,” “nature,” and “foundation,” makes it
impossible for us to retain the notion that some actions and attitudes are
naturally “inhuman.” (Rorty 1989, 189)
We
might as well say that Rorty’s theory of human nature is, paradoxically, that
he has no theory of human nature. He rejects any positive account of what
constitutes a human. In his view, humanity is “an open-ended question.” The
word “human” names “a fuzzy but promising project rather than an essence”
(Rorty 1999, 52). This is a view that he has reiterated many times in his
writings in different contexts. According to Rorty, the quest for knowing and
discussing “what is man” and to construct utopias on the basis of views about
human nature has, in the past two hundred yeas, come to be “outmoded.” This is
because “
We
have learned that we are far more malleable than Plato and Kant had dreamed....
The more we see a chance to recreate ourselves, the more we shall read Darwin
not as offering one more theory about what we really are but as providing
reasons why we do not need to ask what we really are. (Rorty 1998, 175)
Rorty
tells us that the best argument for putting Foundationalism behind us is:
it
would be more efficient to do so, because it would let us concentrate our
energies on manipulating sentiments, on sentimental education. That sort of
education gets people of different kinds sufficiently well acquainted with one
another that they are less tempted to think of those different from themselves
as only quasi-human. (Rorty 1998, 176)
In
contrast, assertions about human nature tend to make people indifferent to the
sufferings of those outside this range, the ones that are considered pseudo-humans
(see Rorty, 1998, 167-9).
Rorty says that the fundamental
premise of his book Contingency, Irony,
and Solidarity “is that a belief can still regulate action, can still be
thought worth dying for, among people who are quite aware that this belief is
caused by nothing deeper than contingent historical circumstance” (Rorty 1989,
189). Even though his theory is incompatible with any belief in an ahistorical
natural cut between human and animal, between rational and non-rational beings, he says that his
position “is not incompatible with urging that we try to extend our sense of
‘we’ to people whom we have previously thought of as ‘they’” (Rorty 1989, 192).
The way that Rorty links these two aspects of his theory, namely, the aspect of
denying any idea of human nature and the aspect of recognizing moral progress
toward greater human solidarity, is through “the ability to see more and more
traditional differences (of tribe, religion, race, customs, and the like) as
unimportant when compared with similarities with respect to pain and
humiliation—the ability to think of people widely different from ourselves as
included in the range of ‘us’” (Rorty 1989, 192). The similarities are not any
ahistorical common core or essence; they are concrete and historically
contingent.
Apparently, the denial of a common core or essence of being a human
is quite at odds with Mencius’ theory of human nature and the general Confucian
view about what it is to be human. Mencius is well known for his assertion that
human nature is good. However, as I have indicated in a number of places, the matter is much more
sophisticated (see Ni 2003 and 2004). By saying that human nature is good, Mencius
is simultaneously making an empirical assertion, semantic stipulation, value
recognition, faith commitment, and gongfu
工夫instruction.
His theory of human nature is interwoven with all these five dimensions.
The most common understanding of Mencius’ theory of human nature is
from the empirical or existential dimension. According to this interpretation,
Mencius believes that humans are all born with a good nature, which consists of
the “four hearts” or “four incipient tendencies”: the heart of compassion, the
heart of shame, the heart of courtesy and modesty, and the heart of rights and
wrongs. His theory is typically looked at in contrast with Xunzi, who believes
that human nature is evil, since we all desire comfort and self-satisfaction,
and with Gaozi, who believes that human nature is neither good nor evil, since
we can be made to be either good or evil. The three early Chinese thinkers all
have their own reasons to support their particular views, and these reasons all
appear to be citations of empirical evidence. Mencius famously uses the example
of a child on the verge of falling into a well and argues that everyone, upon suddenly
seeing this, will have an immediate urge to save the child. Since this urge can
be felt by everyone, and it occurs spontaneously, prior to any utilitarian or
moral considerations, Mencius concludes that it reflects one’s true nature.
However, clearly Mencius is not unaware of the fact that humans are
also born with selfish tendencies. Why does he not consider these other
tendencies as parts of human nature also? One reason behind the difficulty in
settling the debate among Mencius, Gaozi, and Xunzi is that the three all have
different definitions of “human nature”—an issue that leads us to the semantic aspect
of the issue. According to Mencius, human nature is what differentiates us from
animals. Mencius says, on the one hand, that “men have the Four Hearts just as
they have their four limbs,” and on the other hand, that one who is devoid of
these incipient good tendencies “is not a human” (Mencius 2A6). These two sides show clearly
that this theory about human nature is both stipulative and descriptive. It is
descriptive in the sense that it begins with an empirical observation about whether
people do have those incipient tendencies or not. The question about whether we
are born with them and have a natural agreeable feeling toward them or are rather
conditioned by arbitrarily social conventions is to be answered by appealing to
experiences. Yet it is stipulative because, first of all, it is Mencius’ choice to take what is unique to humans
to be human nature, and this is obviously not the only way to interpret it. Gaozi,
for example, takes whatever we are born with as our nature, and Xunzi takes
what cannot be learned and cannot be acquired by effort as human nature (see
Xunzi, 1963, 158). If we follow Gaozi’s way of defining human
nature, then humans can certainly be said to be neither good nor bad, or both
good and bad, because humans are born with conflicting tendencies and can
therefore go toward different directions. If we follow Xunzi, then it does make
sense to argue that human nature is bad, because humans want to be fed when hungry,
want to be warm when it is cold, and want to rest after laboring. These are
wants are not learned and cannot be acquired. Yet, if we define human nature according
to Mencius, i.e. if we take what is unique about human beings, then even Xunzi might
agree that human nature is good.[1]
Mencius’
view about human nature is stipulative also because after the empirical
generalization, he takes a shift toward the opposite direction. It seems that
if our experience does find
exceptions, we should say that the people who are devoid of the tendencies are
not genuinely human, instead of modifying the description to say, “most people,
not every human being, have these tendencies.” Here experience appears to be no
longer a relevant factor for justifying the thesis. The thesis is no longer
disconfirmable. The matter becomes one of stipulative definition. The shift
from empirical generalization to semantic stipulation is actually a very common
practice in our use of language. The process is no different from the discovery
that water is H2O, which is empirical but then becomes stipulative.
As Putnam would say, if one finds a stuff on a twin-earth that looks just like
water, and the people on the twin-earth drink the stuff, use it to wash things, and to swim in it, but the stuff is not
H2O, one does not say that water may not be H2O; they
would instead say that the stuff on the twin-earth is not water! (I guess Rorty
will disagree and say that they may choose either way and that this is another case of historical
contingency.) The point relevant to our discussion about Mencius here is that
Mencius did not first make an empirical assertion and then use a stipulative
definition to make the empirical part vacuous and simply irrelevant. The empirical
part is still relevant historically and causally, and history and causality are
themselves not simply matters of stipulation; they are subject to empirical confirmation
as well.
The tension between these two
aspects (description and decision) in Mencius’ theory is
evident in the following passage from Mencius,
where Mencius tells us that his affirmation of what is human nature entails a
choice with practical consideration in it:
It is due to our nature that our mouths desire sweet taste, that our eyes desire beautiful colors, that our ears desire pleasant sounds.... But there is also fate (ming 命) [whether these desires are satisfied or not]. The superior man does not say they are man’s nature [and insist on satisfying them]. The virtue of humanity in the relationship between father and son, the virtue of righteousness in the relationship between ruler and minister...— these are [endowed in people in various degrees] according to fate. But there is also man’s nature. The superior man does not [refrain from practicing them and] say they are matters of fate. (Mencius 7B24)
By
emphasizing the inborn goodness in human heart-mind, Mencius performs an action
in declaring that he recognizes the particular part
of us as the defining feature of being
human, and hence is affirming a particular value. Here
entails the Confucian answer to the problem of “is” and “ought,” or the “fact”
and “value” dichotomy. The four hearts are both claimed as inherent in every
human being as a fact and chosen as a value, a moral qualification that
separates human from animals. Since the growth and manifestation of the four
hearts need cultivation, it is not merely a
gift of nature, but also an achievement to attain. It is the human choice that makes the “is,” the
“fact,” a value to be retained and manifested.
When a
value is attached to a belief, it can become a conviction, like a faith. We do
not say that an event may have no cause simply because we do not observe any;
we believe that there must be a cause. We do not say that something can come
out of nothing simply because we do not see where it comes from; we believe
that it must come from somewhere. Similarly (though not exactly the same), when
someone displays no sign of compassion, Mencius would not say that the person
is a born sociopath.[2]
Commenting on Mencius’ remarks about those who lack the four hearts as not
human, Zhu Xi 朱熹
says, “This is to emphasize that they necessarily have them” (Zhu, Mengzi
Jizhu vol. 2, 14).
After Hume and Kant,
we all learned that experience will never offer us universality and necessity.
The necessity is again a human operation performed by Mencius. It is an expression
of his confidence about what humans are capable of and the confidence is so
strong that it can even disregard counter-evidence!
Still
another layer of meaning behind Mencius’ theory of human nature is that, by
recommending the choice of identifying ourselves with the four hearts, Mencius
is teaching people a method or gongfu
of how to become an exemplary person. When commenting on the above quoted passage about nature and fate (7B24),
Zhu Xi says,
These two kinds of tendencies are both in
our nature that are given to us by heaven. Yet ordinary people take the first
five [that our mouths
desire sweet taste, that our eyes desire beautiful colors, that our ears desire
pleasant sounds, etc.] as human nature, and when they do not have the desired
objects they insist on having them. They take the latter five [the virtue of
humanity in the relationship between father and son, the virtue of
righteousness in the relationship between ruler and minister, etc.] as fate,
once they do not have them, they give up. This is why Mencius speaks on what
needs to be emphasized with regard to each in order to advocate one and
discourage the other. (Zhu, Mengzi Jizhu
Daquan, vol. 14, 23)
The five layers of the theory so far outlined are
distinct from each other in their natures. We judge an empirical generalization
as either “true” or “false”; we judge a semantic stipulation as either “clear”
or “confused”; we judge a value recognition as either “good” or “bad,” “right”
or “wrong”; we judge a faith conviction as either “firm” or “not firm”; and we
judge a gongfu instruction to be
either “effective” or “ineffective.” Yet, they are all intertwined in Mencius’
theory of human nature. The theory cannot be judged simply as true or false
because it involves semantic stipulation. The stipulation is not arbitrary
because it entails a conscious choice of value. The choice of value in turn
strengthens the empirical generalization and turns it into a firm conviction.
Finally, the real motivation and the significance of the conviction are
revealed by Mencius’ intention to guide people in their practical lives.
II
From the sketch of Rorty’s and Mencius’ theories of
human nature, we may notice a few similarities between them.
First, we find that Mencius’ theory of human nature is compatible with
Rorty’s denial of human nature as a natural core or essence. The quote from Mencius 7B24 reveals that the Mencius’
intention behind his theory of human nature is not to offer us a scientific
discovery or a metaphysical doctrine of human beings as a natural kind. If his
intention were to make these kinds of assertions, he would more likely choose
to side with Xunzi or Gaozi, because compared to other natural tendencies, the
four hearts are no more ubiquitous, and, where they are found, they tend to be
more frail and obscure, than the other tendencies. 7B24 shows that the theory
is actually more a recommendation of value and a methodological instruction
about how to obtain the value. Even though it is often stated in the form of a
description of fact, it can be viewed, in Rorty’s terms, as a “redescription”
or a creation of a “taste” by which Mencius wishes we can be judged, and, more
importantly, as a method of reaching an ideal. Contemporary
new Confucian scholar Tang Junyi 唐君毅says
that
Initially, I followed Song and Ming
Confucians’ teachings...thinking that only because human heart-mind is good is it possible for everyone to become
Yao and Shun [sages].... However, recently I suddenly came to the
realization that the intent behind Mencius’ teaching about human nature to be
good is to teach people to follow the goodness that they originally have, come
up with a resolution themselves, and uphold the eternal ideal.... Hence I
became aware of the spirit of the entire teachings of Mencius–-it contains a
way of stimulating everyone’s resolution to rise up from the low and to establish themselves....This way,
to put it simply, can be named the way of establishing people. (Tang, 212)
This denial of foundationalism does
not mean that the theory has to be free from any descriptive feature. Like
Mencius, Rorty’s
recognition of our sensitivity to the pain and humiliation, whether of
ourselves or of others, is also simultaneously a description, or “redescription,”
of fact, and a choice and recommendation of value. For Rorty, such sensitivity
does exist as a fact, though not as a universal natural mark of our essence of being
human. He recognizes that “most of us define ourselves, at least in part, by
our relations to members of our family. Our needs and theirs largely overlap; we
are not happy if they are not” (Rorty, 1999, 78). He recognizes that some desires and feelings
come more naturally than others do to humans. He further recognizes or chooses
to value those who have broader sympathy as morally more developed than those
who have a narrower scope of sympathy: “Moral development in the individual,
and moral progress in the human species as a whole, is a matter of re-making
human selves so as to enlarge the variety of the relationships which constitute
those selves” (Rorty 1999, 79). The difference between Rorty and Mencius on
this issue is not whether there is, as a matter of purely scientific discovery,
a core or human essence; rather, it is on whether we should choose to value
some natural tendencies as our defining feature in our redescription.
Another striking similarity between
Mencius’ theory of human nature and Rorty’s is that neither of them places the
respect for reason and abstract moral principles as the motive for morality.
Both of them take instead what is concrete and particular in our feelings, the
feeling of compassion (Mencius) or pity for pain and remorse for cruelty
(Rorty), and sensitivity to shame (Mencius) or humiliation (Rorty), as the
motive for morality. These tendencies are the kind of likes and dislikes that,
when attended closely, will naturally draw our approval. The “four hearts” in
Mencius are all feelings rather than thoughts, concrete rather than abstract.
They are, as Rorty would say, closer to Hume’s and Dewey’s position of taking
sentimentality as central to the moral consciousness, which is contrary to the
ethical traditions of Plato and Kant. The view that takes reason as an essential
component of humanity conceals the fact that “we figure out what practices to
adopt first, and then expect our philosophers to adjust the definition of
‘human’ or ‘rational’ to suit” (Rorty 1989, 194, note 6), but Mencius’ theory
of human nature does not conceal the fact—its definition of “human” or
“rational” is his way to suit his choice of what practices to adopt!
Since both Mencius and Rorty focus
on concrete feelings or sentiments, they pay special attention to the function
of stories and poems in awakening people’s sensitivity to others’ pains and
humiliation. Unlike abstract metaphysical notions, stories and poems work
directly with emotions and sympathy. When Mencius approaches the kings, he uses
stories, analogies, and quotes from poems to direct their attention to their
feeling of compassion, sense of shame and dignity, etc. From there he shows
them how the manifestation of these feelings can lead them to their ideals. Likewise,
Rorty urges us to read more novels and journalistic reports, to listen to the
poets, etc., to help us remain sensitive to pain and humiliation.
Related to this feature of the Rortian
and the Mencian theories is the recognition of locality and differentiation of
relationships as the natural starting point, though the locality and
differentiation are in need of expansion. For the Confucians, it is love with
gradation, starting from one’s own parents, children, teachers, immediate
community, to more distant relationships. Similarly, Rorty says that, in cases
such as the misery of the lives of the young blacks in American cities,
Do we say that these
people must be helped because they are our fellow human beings? We may, but it
is much more persuasive, morally as well as politically, to describe them as
our fellow Americans–-to insist that
it is outrageous
that an American should live without
hope. The point of these examples is that our sense of solidarity is strongest
when those with whom solidarity is expressed are thought of as “one of us,”
where “us” means something smaller and more local than the human race. (Rorty 1989,
191)
Furthermore,
both Rorty and Confucians, including Mencius, advocate broadening our sense of
“us” as far as possible. The following quote from Rorty reminds us of Confucian
sayings like “treat the aged of your own family in a manner befitting their
venerable age and extend this treatment to the aged of other families; treat
your own young in a manner befitting their tender age and extend this to the
young of other families” (Mencius 1A7),
and “all within the Four Seas are brothers” (Analects, 12.5). Rorty writes:
The right way to take
the slogan “We have obligation to human beings simply as such” is as a means of
reminding ourselves to keep trying to expand our sense of “us” as far as we
can. That slogan urges us to extrapolate further in the direction set by certain
events in the past–-the inclusion among “us” of the family in the next cave,
then of the tribe across the river, then of the tribal confederation beyond the
mountains, then of the unbelievers beyond the seas.... This is a process which
we should try to keep going. We should stay on the lookout for marginalized
people–-people whom we still instinctively think of as “they” rather than “us.”
(Rorty 1989, 196)
Rorty
advises us to set aside notions of unity and readymade completeness, and
embrace the Deweyan notion of selfhood “in process of making” (Rorty 1999, 77).
This openness to progress is seen clearly in Mencius and in Confucianism in
general, as the need for self-cultivation is central to
the Confucian teaching. “The ideal limit
of this process of enlargement is the self envisaged by Christian and Buddhist
accounts of sainthood—an ideal self to whom the hunger and suffering of any
human being (and even, perhaps, that of any other animal) is intensely painful”
(Rorty 1999, 79). Clearly, Rorty
could have added Confucian sainthood to his list as well.
Having identified several similarities between Rorty’s
and Mencius’ theory of human nature, we can now turn to their major differences
and try to assess their comparative advantages and disadvantages. One major difference between the two is that while
Mencius makes a clear effort to separate the four hearts from other tendencies
of the heart-mind and to make the four hearts recognized as our human nature,
Rorty takes care to separate his view about human sensitivity of pain and
humiliation from any theory of human nature. He repeatedly emphasizes that this
sensitivity is not a core self or human essence: “Every human being has
convictions about what matters more and what matters less, and thus about what
counts as a good human life. But such convictions need not—and should not—take
the form of a theory of human nature” (Rorty 2004, 21). So it seems that though
Rorty and Mencius have both made recommendations, they are of different sorts.
Rorty is saying: “I recommend you to be sensitive to others’ pain and
humiliation, but I don’t mean that this is the only way you are supposed to be.
You can make your own choice. My recommendation is a historically contingent
point of view, even though I happen to believe that this view is better, and
more useful for coping with the world.” Mencius is saying: “I recommend you to
cultivate your four hearts—oh, yes, they are there, believe me. This is the way
you are supposed
to be. It is better for you not simply because I happen to believe so, but it
actually is.” Rorty’s recommendation is free from any metaphysical and ahistorical
assertions about what is human—at
least this seems to be his own conception; yet Mencius’ is heavily hinged on such a view, even
though deep down his intention is to make a recommendation. As I have explained in the previous section,
Mencius’ theory is not so much a metaphysical assertion about what humans are;
it is more a determination and recommendation, which shows itself in the form
of a metaphysical assertion. It is not a creation of an abstract principle, but
the identification and promotion of certain concrete feelings. However, a recommendation cannot be
free from a self-conception, a conception of who you are and who you should be.
The point may seem confusing or even self-contradictory, but once we realize that the self-conception is an
act of performance rather than cognition, we can see that there is no
confusion. The “fact” that Mencius recognizes is one that is established by the
performance, somewhat like the announcement from a priest “I hereby pronounce you husband and wife,”
or the judgment from
an umpire “the ball is out!” or the instruction from a coach that “you are a
goalie!” While these performative statements may appear in the form of description, they
are not subject to being judged as either true or false. Rorty’s sweeping
rejection of theories of human nature makes one suspect whether it is partly
the result of a simplistic dichotomy created by epistemology—that a claim either
has a truth value or is simply created. There is either a tribunal to decide
the matter to be true or false, or there is none, and if the latter, then it is
nothing more than being contingent. Mencius’ theory shows a third way. It is
neither true nor false, and for this reason, it can be ahistorical—one can make
an unconditional announcement or recommendation. Nor is the statement simply
contingently created. The word “creation” contains the connotation of being
arbitrary, being random, yet a recommendation needs to have a rational basis of
being effective.
However, Rorty would
say that my doubts about theories of human nature “are doubts about causal
efficacy, not about epistemic status.” “[S]ince no useful work has been done by
insisting on a purportedly ahistorical human nature, there probably is no such
nature, or at least nothing in that nature that is relevant to our moral
choices” (Rorty 1998, 172). More recently, he seems to have changed his tone a
little bit. He says that theories of human nature “are supposed to be
normative—to provide guidance. They should tell us what to do with ourselves.” For
this reason, “philosophical and religious theories of human nature flourished
because they stayed clear of empirical details. They took no chances of being
disconfirmed by events.... Despite their lack of predictive power and empirical
disconfirmability, such theories were very useful—not because they were
accurate accounts of what human beings, deep down, really and truly are, but
because they suggested perils to avoid and ideals to serve” (Rorty 2004, 18).
Yet he believes that in the last two centuries, these theories have become
“outmoded,” have “fallen into deserved disrepute,” and the hope to deduce our
ideals from these theories “is a Platonic fantasy that the West has gradually
outgrown” (Rorty 1998, 174, and Rorty 2004, 19, 21). The
theories may be historically contingent, but the question here is whether the
theories that maintain an ahistorical human core should be treated as contingent, or what the practical consequences
of this treatment will be. So the difference between Rorty and Mencius becomes:
Is Rorty right in maintaining that theories of human nature, including Mencius’
theory, have all become practically useless?
A number of responses may be generated by the question. One is whether
Rorty is too sweeping to reject all
theories of human nature, without even looking into a sophisticated theory like
Mencius’, which is woven with not just
one but five layers, as we outlined in section one. Another is, as many
philosophy educators will protest, that Rorty’s claim amounts to a denial of
any real effectiveness of their teaching of theories of human nature, “real” in
the sense of having transforming effects on the students they teach. Still another is that some people (at
least one—I myself) can testify that Mencius’ theory has had a useful impact on
their lives.
I would like to dig a little deeper into something that
hopefully can bring all these responses together. To see the point, we may review a debate about Mencius and Gaozi, as Rorty’s
view resembles the
latter in some ways.
One major argument that Mencius uses against his contemporary,
Gaozi, who maintains that human nature is neither good nor bad, is that his
theory, when used to guide our personal cultivation, will result in letting people make no disturbance of the
neutral heart-mind that knows no difference between good and bad. This is a
pragmatic consideration—it is not arguing whether Gaozi’s view is true or
false, but about the practical consequences of the acceptance and application
of the theory. Some
of Mencius’ Song
and Ming followers, especially Zhu
Xi and the Cheng brothers, continued Mencius’ effort and took pain to anchor morality on a more metaphysical ground. It is interesting
to look at the debate between Zhu
Xi on the one hand and Wang Yangming 王陽明 and Lu Xiangshan 陸象山 on the other.
Zhu and the Cheng brothers classify human nature—the four hearts—with li 理, the cosmic principle.
The reason that Wang Yangming and Lu
Xiangshan disagree with Zhu and the Cheng brothers is that their theory is too
metaphysical. They argue that once the four hearts are taken as a metaphysical principle, they
become objects of rational or intellectual cognition, and are no longer
concrete feelings of the heart-mind. “What Master Zhu says about investigation
of things is to find the cosmic principle in things,” says Wang
Yangming. “This is to look for eternal principles in everything and every
event. By using one’s own heart to look for principles in things and events, he
separates the heart and the principle”
(Wang, vol. 2, 9). Wang believes that “the heart is that which is
able to see, to hear, to speak, and to move.... This is human nature, the
cosmic principle. Only because of this human nature can there be productivity. The
principle of productivity of the human nature is called human-heartedness” (Wang, vol. 1, 61). This is also why Xu
Fuguan criticizes Zhu Xi for uprooting the four hearts from the human heart-mind and
consequently making moral goodness collectible only from external sources. Yet Zhu Xi
complains that Lu and Wang render Mencius’
theory no different from that of Gaozi, for they make no distinction between
whatever comes to the heart-mind from the four incipient tendencies. Zhu says,
We
Confucians cultivate human-heartedness, appropriateness, ritual propriety, and
wisdom [of which each of the four incipient tendencies is the root of, respectively].... What they
cultivate are merely the observing, listening, speaking, and acting abilities. There is no
distinction, no rights and wrongs in his vision of the ambiguous things and
events. (Zhu, Yuzhuan Zhuzi Quanshu, vol.
60, p. 19)
Zhuzi Yulei
records that when Lu Xiangshan
died, Zhu Xi took his disciples
to mourn Lu. After he had shed tears, he was silent for a while
and then said: “What a pity that Gaozi is now dead” (Zhu, Zhuzi Yulei,
vol.124, 20).[3] However,
as Huang Zongxi 黄宗羲 points out, Lu believes that
“the heart is the principle.” This is the very opposite of Gaozi, since Gaozi
believes that principles of right and wrong are learned from without (Huang, vol 2, 57-8).[4] The
interesting point is: in this sense, we may say that Zhu Xi himself is guilty of being Gaozi, for
he turned moral principles into something extrinsic.
The problem presents a dilemma: If we take the four hearts merely as
contingent feelings, no different from any other tendencies of the heart-mind,
we would have no ground for morality;
yet, if we uproot the four hearts from the heart-mind and give them a special
classification as some kind of cosmic principle, we would end up making them abstract and arbitrary, no
longer attached to the very concrete feelings of the human heart. In keeping
himself away from the second horn of the dilemma, Rorty falls into the need to
get off the first horn, a situation indicated by the fact that he continuously
finds himself needing to separate his view from relativism. Yet looking at
Mencius’ theory from the value recognition and gongfu instruction perspective, we can say that the problem occurs
only when we take the issue itself intellectually and existentially. If we take the uplifting of the four hearts as an
act of decision, a conscious choice, and a performance of encouragement to
become a person of the four hearts, we can retain both the concreteness of the
feelings and the sacredness that demands our unconditional devotion.
Coming
back to Rorty’s position, I think Mencius would say that Rorty’s
theory is helpful in the sense of guarding us from metaphysical abstractions;
yet it needs something to uplift the sensitivities of pain and humiliation to a
category that can differentiate them from other contingent feelings. Here,
Mencius’ approach seems to be more pragmatic than Rorty’s. For even though
there is no epistemological ground for claiming that there is a core or essence
of human being, in order to effectively cultivate and expand our four hearts or
our sensitivity to others’ pain and humiliation, Mencius would say that we need
to identify the four hearts as special, as something that qualifies us as humans (as long as we do not turn them into metaphysically abstract
principles). Claiming the four hearts as human nature is in fact more a method
of guiding people toward an end than a description of a metaphysical discovery.
However, for the sake of practical purpose, we need to define, ahistorically,
what a human being is or is supposed to
be! Looking at American society today, a
sensitive heart can hardly be undisturbed
by seeing that many young people are depressed and losing their orientation. In
a society where children are constantly told: “Just be yourself,” many young
people do not know who they are! They turn to drugs and other destructive means
to release their frustration, thinking that it is fine for me to be just the
way I want to be. To them Rorty’s sweeping rejection of theories of human
nature will not help. It only deepens their sense of the meaninglessness of
life. Certainly reading novels and reports about the cruelty and pain of other
people will help wake up these people’s sensitivity, but without a theory of
human nature like Mencius’, it is hard to see how one is able to win the battle
when one’s sensitivity to others’ pain and one’s own selfish inclinations are
in conflict. Why should I care for people I do not even know? Why should I keep
enlarging my sense of “we,” if this is not recognized and encouraged as who I
should be?
Does Mencius’ theory face the danger Rorty points out: any theory of human nature will entail
the assertion that some people are merely quasi-humans and hence be excluded
from humane treatment? Rorty’s warning can be compared to Spinoza’s view that all determination implies
negation. It is a very powerful and liberating point,
which is not to be taken lightly. However, as Hegel points
out in response to Spinoza, any negation has to be assertion as well; for
otherwise the negation would be “formless abstraction” in which even the negation is not there (Hegel, 113). If Rorty’s view that there is no human nature is
meaningful and productive, from which some usefulness can be found, it has to
be an assertion about human beings as well. The very view that we have no
essence is an assertion that we are, like Gaozi
says, malleable beings. Our way of life is inevitably affected by our view
about who we are and what the world is. A person who believes him/herself as
having no essence, as a malleable being, is more open to new ideas and ideals,
less dogmatic, and more likely to change his/her own view than those with more
definite convictions. The painful side, however, is
that these people are also more likely to have no principle of right and wrong,
no aim, and cannot find meaning in their lives.
It sounds great to
believe that every person is a poem. It is quite condescending to say that
one’s own view is the privileged, and even more intolerable to exclude others
from the human club simply because they do not show certain features that one
considers being
essential to a human. However, Rorty does not reject the view that
humans need guidance, and he believes that his view is superior, that his view
represents adulthood, and that the views he rejects are childish (what else can
“outgrown” mean if not this?). On the other hand, if Rorty’s view does not exclude
anyone from the human range, nor does Mencius’ view,
because Mencius has a firm belief that everyone has the four hearts. Instead of
rejecting people the privilege of being human, he would treat everyone with
compassion and believe that these people, if guided properly, are able to
develop their inherent compassion as well. Confucianism
has never generated crimes that Serbian murderers and rapists committed against
Muslims, or the Crusaders against infidels, or Nazis against Jews. The
traditional discrimination against women and “barbarians” in
Mencius’
method is, as Mencius himself puts it, “to cultivate the heart-mind with a
straightforward way (yi zhi dao yang qi
xin 以直道養其心).” His
way of cultivating the heart-mind is to establish the will (zhi 志). When the will is established, the qi 氣 or vital energy will follow. As Yang
Rubing 楊汝賓says, these three, namely the cultivation of the
heart-mind, the establishment of the will, and the
cultivation of qi, come together
simultaneously rather than sequentially (see Yang, 155). They are related to each other
like the Buddhist conditional arising—when you have one, you have the others.
To cultivate the heart-mind with the straightforward way is to establish the
will, to have the full confidence that one has the good nature, is capable of
becoming good and should be good. This goodness does not consist of abstract
moral concepts, but rather very concrete moral feelings that everyone is able
to tiyan 體驗 or bodily experience. This is like the popular method of raising
children in
In
comparison, Rorty’s method is more therapeutic in the sense of curing a
disease, and Mencius’ method is more therapeutic in the sense of increasing
one’s overall wellness of being. Rorty’s method helps one not to fall into the
trap of any metaphysical abstraction and is able to help people fight against
religious or any other form of fanaticism. With Rorty’s help, people will not be puzzled by the metaphysical question “Is human nature really
good?” They will stop asking the unsettling
question “Who holds the truth, Mencius, Xunzi, or Gaozi?” However, it does not seem to be open-minded to say that Mencius’ theory of nature is outmoded
and useless. Without help from Mencius, Rorty’s theory is inadequate for leading people
to anchor a sense of sacredness of one’s mission inside oneself. In a world
that is “disenchanted” and increasingly absurd, a world in which people have
difficulty finding any meaning of life, Mencius’ theory has its own great advantages. It allows one to have a full
commitment to the four hearts, and engage in the activity of practicing the
good deeds in accordance with the four hearts without blind worship of any
external idols or abstractions.
To
conclude this chapter, I would suggest that we should take Rorty’s advice and
avoid turning Mencius’ theory of human nature into metaphysical abstractions.
On the other hand, Rorty may want to consider Mencius’ approach and the
practical effects of his theory of human nature.[5]
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[1] Xunzi also says
that “what makes humans human is not that they have no hair on their foot. It
is that they make differentiations. Animals have fathers and sons, but make no
differentiation between fathers and sons; they have males and females, but make
no differentiation between men and women” (Xunzi,
1988, vol. 1, 79. My
translation).
[2] According to
[3] This record may not be
reliable, since next to the passage the recorder Hu Yong put a note, saying that it was obtained from another
person named Wen Qing. This kind
of note is not seen in other passages. The note indicates that even the recorder
was not sure that the story is true. The point of quoting this here, however,
is not dependent on whether it is true or not. It is rather to show that Lu and
Wang’s view was conceived to resemble that of Gaozi.
[4] This may
actually be Huang’s teacher Liu
Zongzhou’s 劉宗周view, since the title of this book is called “Mencius Explained by My Master.”
[5] I would like to thank Dr. Huang Yong for his
helpful comments on an earlier version of the paper. These comments not only helped me to avoid a few
mistakes, they also inspired me to give a more thorough treatment of the
subject.