First, I’m reposting a discussion from the Ceiling blog.
Omitted above…
mist @ 2007-07-29 10:29
If contemporary people are only preserving tradition, then where are we to create the spirit of our age?
Ceiling @ 2007-07-30 00:11
I believe that tradition and creation should, in essence, be continuous.
Besides, what is being shouted about most fervently right now is the preservation of tradition, even more than the creation of spirit…… so I’m chiming in *_^
古 @ 2007-08-05 21:35
I recommend that Mist listen to a lecture by Wu Guosheng~
Which occasion of “creating the spirit of an age” has not taken preserving tradition as its basis? Confucius began by restoring the rites of Zhou; the Greek spirit began by extolling myth and heroes; the Renaissance obviously began with a revival; the Protestant Reformation began by returning to the Bible… Which opening-up of the spirit of an age has not, in the end, been grounded in tracing back to tradition? There are such cases, of course: China’s New Culture Movement and the Cultural Revolution both denied tradition, but what spirit of the age did they establish? Did they establish anything at all? Only a burst of uproar, and then “spirit” drifted into emptiness.
Where are we to go in order to create the spirit of our age? That question is easy to answer. There is only one place that is the fundamental basis for standing one’s ground, and that is “tradition.” We need to enter into tradition in order to create the spirit of our age.
What I said above was just a side remark. Happy birthday, Yali~!
mist @ 2007-08-06 12:02
Next semester I’m teaching the general history of science
“Tradition” is too vague a word. If no special explanation is given, then it is generally taken to include many aspects such as culture, everyday life, technology, laws, moral customs, and so on..
Do we need tradition as our point of departure? Pushed to the extreme, this is similar to the Zhu–Lu debate: “Before Yao and Shun, what books could there be to read?” That makes no sense.
Even if one were to throw away all Chinese tradition and Westernize wholesale, it would not necessarily be a bad thing. The New Culture Movement and the Cultural Revolution brought about a lot of clamor; the fault was not with those movements, but simply that they did not succeed in carrying them through. The so-called traditional spirit was so deeply rooted that the program those movements put forward could not be fully implemented. Tradition even has a tendency to strike back, giving rise to phenomena like “one country, three systems”.
ps, there is a sculpture beside the Grand Princess Building at Peking University that says, “Democracy and science, take that.” Perhaps it can be taken as a picture of the current situation. Compare it with the orthodox评价 of the New Culture Movement, and you can see just how badly the New Culture Movement failed.
“Before the May Fourth Movement, the New Culture Movement’s basic content was to promote Western bourgeois democracy, science, and so on; it was to use the new culture of the Western bourgeoisie to replace the old feudal culture. After the May Fourth Movement, the New Culture Movement’s basic content was to promote Marxism, to spread socialist and communist ideas among the working class, and to strive in a step-by-step way to educate the peasants and other masses with socialism”
mist @ 2007-08-06 12:07
Also, being anti-traditional does not mean opposing what has long existed and is correct,
for example, the Tiandihui in the past sought to overthrow the Qing and restore the Ming; one could hardly oppose eating just because the Manchus also eat.
Ceiling @ 2007-08-06 23:13
You two, please pay the debate-room rent, any amount will do—bg is fine.
Xiao Gu’s view should be fairly balanced, I think. I very much agree with mist’s questioning of the definition of tradition, and it has a lot of the style of our department. —But do you really think wholesale Westernization is feasible too? —All day long people are fighting over tradition, yet they do not know how far its scope extends. So in fact I would rather not mention the word at all, and go straight into the concrete issues.
Heh, that sounds more like discussing issues without discussing -isms.
Also, I really like Xiao Gu’s “by the way.” Thanks for remembering ：）
mist @ 2007-08-07 00:20
bgwhat about your liquor category?
Whether something is feasible is one thing; whether it is good is another ~ If everyone lived the European-American way, then in college there would be plenty of leisure to sit in cafés discussing problems ~
Ceiling @ 2007-08-07 08:46
Very good. Let’s go with the earlier agreement: you pay the bill~
Ah, by your seductive line I’m actually getting a little tempted by Westernization *_^
mist @ 2007-08-07 10:38
Haha~ don’t be tempted~ because it is written in the scripture: “lead us not into temptation.”
Ceiling @ 2007-08-07 14:28
But it is also written in the scripture, but with the temptation make also a way of escape so that we can bear it. *_^
mist @ 2007-08-07 19:08
Well said~
古 @ 2007-08-09 16:27
The term “tradition” is indeed a broad one, and I generally use it in its broadest sense. If one were to break it down and discuss traditional morality, traditional customs, traditional technology, and so on one by one, that would be another matter. What I advocate as standing on tradition is precisely that one can only talk from the broadest perspective; once one comes down to any concrete side of things, it becomes hard to say. By standing on tradition, I mean first standing on some firm foundation before you can climb upward. If there is no tradition, one can only stand in midair; perhaps for a moment you may feel light and airy and quite pleased, but afterward you will certainly fall heavily to the ground.
To build a tall building and go up a flight of stairs, one must first find a piece of ground; not only that, one must also dig three feet into the earth to build the foundation. The deeper the foundation is laid, the higher the building can rise. Tradition is just such a thing.
Standing on tradition places no other demand on us; it simply asks that we value tradition and hold it in reverence.
What is this claim based on: “The New Culture Movement and the Cultural Revolution brought about clamor; the fault was not with those movements, but simply that they did not succeed in carrying them through”? If they were not at fault, then why were they unable to carry them through successfully? In fact, as you said, it was because “the so-called traditional spirit was so deeply rooted that the program those movements put forward could not be fully implemented.” Not only the spirit of tradition, but also traditional customs, traditional worldviews, the traditional technological environment, and so on. The key is that no transformation can truly detach itself from tradition. You attribute their failure to the remnants of “tradition,” whereas I precisely want to attribute their failure to their disregard for tradition—they were unable to face up to the fact that we can never completely escape tradition; they failed to recognize that innovation always proceeds on the basis of tradition. They imagined that they could shake off tradition and build a marvelous castle in the air; that is the most fundamental mistake of these movements! When they kept losing their direction, they kept shifting the blame onto “tradition”; whenever trouble arose, they would once and for all make “the remnants of tradition” the scapegoat, yet they never knew how to reflect on their own impatience and superficiality. This is a vicious cycle, and in the end they become less and less able to know where they should begin, and where they should go.
As for Westernization, I myself rather like it. But why have our Westernization movements all failed so badly? Precisely because we did not stand on tradition—Western culture’s sources lie in the two classical civilizations of Greece and Rome; modern civilization did not arise out of thin air. Without the spirit, ethics, culture, customs, technology, philosophy, and so on handed down by the Western tradition, there would be no foothold for modern Western civilization. Yet our past Westernization movements often paid attention only to learning the science and technology of modern the West, and the modern political and economic systems of the West. But if one does not trace them back to their tradition, and inquire into the rational spirit, faith, law, spirit of freedom, and so on behind modern Western civilization, then one can only learn those superficial things, while in essence learning something neither fish nor fowl—neither Chinese nor Western. That is the main reason why Westernization in the past failed. In the final analysis, it is still a matter of disregard for tradition.
mist @ 2007-08-09 17:00
My view of tradition is still, “Before Yao and Shun, what books were there to read?” It is true that we are situated under a tradition already given, but that does not mean tradition is a necessary factor in the development of civilization. For in the early stages of civilization, there was no tradition to inherit; they could only, through all kinds of groping and trying, create their own culture by themselves.
Ceiling @ 2007-08-10 02:45
What Xiao Gu says is still just the expression of one school of thought, and this school of thought has long been familiar to us in my department. I mean no offense by saying this; it is just that I am no longer satisfied with sharp or mild viewpoints. I’ve heard too much of that. I think what is needed is a detailed clarification and argumentation.
About what mist said, the only thing I can think of at present is this: even if it is true that in the so-called early stage of civilization there was no tradition, then according to your account, tradition may indeed not be a necessary factor for the occurrence of civilization, but as for the matter of civilization’s development, one can hardly make a hasty conclusion. In addition, the words civilization and culture are actually just as broad and vague. I still do not incline to speaking of this kind of issue in such general terms, especially since this kind of issue has long been discussed to death on CCTV and Phoenix. Nothing truly concrete has been seriously worked out, even just in academia. And that is indeed a very difficult thing.
Gu @ 2007-08-11 12:21address
Hehe, the example Mist gives precisely shows the opposite fact. “In the early stages of civilization, there was no tradition to inherit” — why only in the early stages of civilization? In fact, once there is civilization, there is “tradition,” and vice versa. Only when a group begins to possess memory of its ancestors, begins to have accumulated knowledge handed down from its forebears, and has sacrifices to and worship of its ancestors, etc., can one say that it has “civilization.” Without “tradition,” there is no civilization. Can you produce a counterexample? The emergence of “tradition” is a common feature of those groups that “create their own culture through all kinds of groping and trying.” To abandon tradition is nothing less than to abandon civilization; at best, it is a return to a barbaric age. And if one is to reconstruct a new culture, one still has to find a new tradition.
I have never watched CCTV, Phoenix, or anything like that; I am merely speaking casually. Valuing tradition cannot provide a practical, workable academic methodology; it is only an attitude and a perspective. Some things do not require “detailed clarification and argumentation.” It is like when we say “reverence for nature”: if one really were to argue through how many advantages and disadvantages there are in revering nature, how to operate it, how to implement it, then one would instead be drifting away from what is truly important and falling into the trap of utilitarianism. Of course, the truly concrete thing lies in whatever it is we devote ourselves to doing: whether writing papers, conducting surveys, doing news, making television, or even running businesses and managing things, all of these must inevitably be infused with basic attitudes and stances. There is no need to conspicuously “promote tradition” or “inherit tradition,” and so on. So long as one identifies with a certain basic attitude and perspective, they will automatically permeate every aspect of the work we do. If one always has to deliberately do something to inherit and carry forward tradition, then it is instead no longer concrete.
Ceiling @ 2007-08-11 22:00
🙂 I think what I specifically meant was not to question the view that tradition should be valued (otherwise wouldn’t I become a rebel in the philosophy department? Of course I am not saying that mist is a rebel *_^), but rather that the issue of “valuing tradition” should be divided into finer distinctions, instead of having one’s view simply summarized and that being the end of it. I do not think that here, as distinct from one’s understanding of management, once one identifies with some idea, it will naturally make it effective in practice. On this kind of issue, “identification” can vary greatly in degree. I really feel that right now we have not even figured out what tradition actually is, so to say this sort of thing sounds too much like shouting slogans. And there is also the most basic question: in ourselves, how are the traces of tradition preserved? I have always been searching, with great difficulty, for the truly Chinese things in myself. In the end, it still comes down to what lies in a person.
mist @ 2007-08-12 04:37
~It’s okay~ I have always played the role of the black sheep~~
Gu @ 2007-08-12 17:02
I oppose a pragmatist, positivist, or logicist approach to “tradition.” To say that we want to talk about tradition, first we must figure out what tradition is, then list what traditions there are, find out where tradition is, what observable and verifiable manifestations it has, explain how to inherit tradition, in what respects to inherit tradition… Yet once one really begins to analyze and argue, one no longer knows where “tradition” is. Not to mention the extreme vagueness of the semantics, but to analyze “tradition” into various elements and then sift out the essence and discard the dross is something I have always opposed. If one analyzes it to the end, there is fundamentally nothing that is tradition—either one says that everything must necessarily be tradition, or one says that everything can only be modern, just as if one analyzes the word “past,” either one says that the past is also the past of the present, or one says that the present is nothing other than the present of the past. After such a strict analysis, “the past” disappears, “tradition” disappears; what matters is only the present, only modernity. So our age brands itself as “modern” precisely because, under the mindset of technical rationality and positivism, “the past” or “tradition” has been dissolved, or reduced to a subordinate appendage of the “present.” Yet “tradition” is not an object of analysis, but the basis of analysis. Every person is compelled to live in tradition, and every issue is always understood and discussed within some tradition or another. Our “crisis” is not that we have already cut ourselves off from tradition—that is impossible—but that we try to cut ourselves off from tradition. It is like the ecological crisis: it is not that we have already severed ourselves from the earth—if we could really leave the earth, there would be no environmental crisis. Precisely because we try to break free from the earth’s constraints (to conquer her, to stand above her) while still living on the earth, this paradox forms the crisis. If, as Mist imagines, people could truly break away from tradition and conjure up a new era out of thin air, then the struggle between tradition and modernity would be nothing more than a struggle between stubborn conservatism and progressive reform. But here it is not merely a question of old versus new, because in fact the disagreement is not between preserving the old and innovating, but about how exactly to innovate,
Where are the “traces” of tradition? They are everywhere. Our habits of life, diet, etiquette, thought, language, and so on are all permeated by tradition. Of course, some of these trace back to ancient China, and some must be traced to the West. In this regard I am certainly different from many traditionalists (so-called), just as I am different from those who advocate “environmental protection.” Environment, ecology, nature—do they need us to “protect” them? To speak of protecting the environment or caring for nature is a paternalistic way of acting. Only toward the weak, the younger generation, or one’s own property and collectibles do we speak of “caring for” and “protecting.” We are in no position whatsoever to be “protectors” of nature or ecology. On the contrary, we are nourished and protected by them at every moment. The ecological crisis is not a crisis of ecology itself, but a crisis of us human beings. What is being destroyed is not nature’s powerful vitality, but the relationship between human beings and nature. Similarly, “tradition” does not need to be “protected” by us. The logic behind the ancient city of Pingyao is actually “protecting tradition,” and the method is to put the so-called “tradition” into a glass display case; such a method has the opposite of the intended effect. Although I too have previously used phrases like “protect traditional culture,” what I have recently come to think is that what needs to be protected is not tradition itself, but our relationship with tradition.
What I emphasize is reverence for tradition and valuing tradition. As for which things are truly Chinese and which are Western, I do not care. Mahayana Buddhism is undoubtedly one of China’s traditional cultures, but it also came from India; Christianity is Europe’s tradition, but it also came from the Middle East; the ancient Greek and Roman culture revived by the Renaissance was also, for Europe at that time, something imported from elsewhere… Traditionalism is not necessarily nationalism. Whether Chinese or Western, so long as it is in our lives, it is our tradition.
////——
After saying all this and that, I am after all still only at the level of the broad-strokes view and slogan-shouting that Ceiling speaks of; for the moment I can only be like this. Still, the slogans I shout are at least carefully chosen—I do not shout “return to tradition,” nor do I shout “protect tradition,” but rather “revere tradition,” “embrace tradition,” and, more importantly, “cherish tradition.”
So, what exactly is “tradition”?
For these questions, I cannot give a response that would satisfy analytic philosophers and logicists; “tradition” cannot be reduced. Still, I can explain it by means of metaphor or other routes.
“Tradition” is often linked with “history”; those who look down on tradition often also do not care about history. For example, Mist would also say: want “knowledge,” but not “history.” Yet for human beings, what does “knowledge” mean? On what foundation is knowledge built, and to what end does knowledge aim? The tradition of modern rationalism (in the broad sense) believed that knowledge itself is the end, and that the foundation of knowledge lies within knowledge itself. In other words, modern people began to separate knowledge from history, believing that human beings could possess absolute knowledge beyond history; the success of mathematics deepened modern people’s conviction.
However, this conviction is precisely what we profoundly doubt. The effort of logicism to seek once and for all a transhistorical foundation for knowledge has already failed—a closed theoretical system cannot justify itself, cannot found itself. In the final analysis, even mathematics is hard-pressed to detach itself from history and still be self-sufficient. Much less so any knowledge that hopes to stand apart from history: logic and mathematics, for example, do indeed appear eternal and beautiful in one sense, but in another sense they are all impoverished—they cannot provide people with meaning and value.
Moreover, only those who ignore history can disregard the relationship between history and knowledge; historians, by contrast, have begun to recognize the issue: the rise of historicism, and Kuhn’s introduction of it into the philosophy of science, means that people have gained a new understanding of the relationship between history and knowledge. History is no longer something unrelated to knowledge, nor is it merely part of knowledge—that would be better put as knowledge being part of history—but rather the point of support for knowledge.
From one perspective, as the foundation of knowledge, “tradition” is something broader than “history.” If “history” is to a community as “memory” is to an individual, then “tradition” is like a person’s temperament and habits. Here, still unlike the modern creed about knowledge, we believe that “knowledge” is not only those things expressed in writing; even written, formulaic knowledge can only be understood through human linguistic capacity. And the various “skills,” including linguistic capacity, are also the foundation of knowledge. Yet the acquisition of “skills” is not like a computer, which “remembers” by means of input devices and storage devices. Skills have to be acquired through imitation and repeated practice. What makes the acquisition of skills possible, and thereby also makes the establishment of knowledge possible, is what Wittgenstein called custom and institution.
For these elements that make knowledge possible, including custom, institution, and history, we may use the word “tradition” as an umbrella term.
History and tradition are not only the footing of knowledge; in another sense, they also provide knowledge with meaning.
For an individual, which is more important: knowledge, or memory? If there were a technology that could make a person gain the knowledge of an entire encyclopedia, at the cost of erasing that person’s various memories of the past, how many people would be willing to try it? How many people would be willing to wipe out even their painful recollections? Of course, people do forget the past—forgetting is crucial both to human growth and to the accumulation of knowledge. Yet forgetting is one thing, obliteration is another.
Many analytic philosophers also believe that “memory,” or memory plus character or responsiveness to stimuli, is a key element in determining the “identity” of a person. For example, the reason why the present “me” is still last year’s “me” is because we possess continuous memory. In any case, even if we do not say that “memory” is the “I,” at the very least we believe that “memory” is crucial to the “I.” For a nation, history and tradition are like memory and personality; they are crucial.
Of course, selfless modernists despise the “nation” itself; perhaps they think that abolishing the individuality of nations and homogenizing the world is the best possible thing. There is no need to say much more here about the struggle between plurality and unity. But it should be noted that, whether homogenization or pluralization, a new civilization should not and cannot be built in midair. The wonderful world that people long for, detached from history and tradition, is after all a castle in the air, a mirage.
So where exactly is “tradition”? When I have time later, I will discuss it in detail with Pingyao Ancient City as a case study. Here I can simply say this: “tradition” may be found among the forces that impede our “advance.” That’s right, “tradition” is a kind of resistance: it obstructs our single-minded rush forward; it is a stumbling block on the road ahead, a fetter under our feet… Yet resistance is also a driving force, and fetters are the basis of freedom. Birds fly in the sky; air is both a resistance to flight and, without air, flight would be impossible. Humans walk on the ground, vehicles travel on the ground; friction is both a resistance and a propelling force. Without resistance, we would either be unable to move even a single step, or else, once set in motion, would lose control at once, until we smashed our heads bloody.
August 19, 2007
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