Author: 胡翌霖

Deng Xiaomang: Lectures on Hegel’s Dialectic

Philosophy & Thought2006.01.24
Deng Xiaomang: Lectures on Hegel’s Dialectic
Deng Xiaomang: Lectures on Hegel’s Dialectics, Peking University Press, October 2005 The immediate consequence of finishing this book is that the image of Mr. Deng Xiaomang in my mind has taken a big hit! Of course, Mr. Deng’s views and arguments are relatively profound, and the rigor and perseverance he showed in translating the Three Critiques have always made me admire him. However, the problem is that this book is a lecture transcript of his course for undergraduates, and I think the simplistic critical style he displays when teaching undergraduates and beginners is irresponsible. In particular, as for his appraisals of Chinese culture, the simplistic denigration he practices is very…
philosophy book reading notes Hegel
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2006年1月24日
Selected Diary Entries of Kierkegaard

Life & Notes2006.01.23
Selected Diary Entries of Kierkegaard
[Denmark] Søren Kierkegaard: Selected Kierkegaard Diaries, selected and edited by [Denmark] Peter P. Rohde, translated by Yan Kejia and Yao Beiqin, Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences Press, 1996 Kierkegaard is one of the philosophers of irrationalist currents whom I admire rather more. What I admire in him chiefly are his “three stages of life” and his view of religion (it seems that a thinker’s attitude toward religion is what most determines how much I like him; only after that comes his attitude toward science). Of course, admiring a thinker’s ideas does not in the least mean agreeing with them. I take a reserved attitude overall toward the excerpts below that…
philosophy book reading notes faith
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2006年1月23日
Zhao Tingyang: “On Possible Life”

Philosophy & Thought2006.01.23
Zhao Tingyang: “On Possible Life”
Zhao Tingyang: “On Possible Life—A Theory Concerning Happiness and Justice,” Renmin University of China Press, July 2004 I originally bought this book because I was drawn to its title—I happened to be thinking about some questions concerning what ethics is, and “On Possible Life” seemed able to express my own view of ethics, which instantly brightened my eyes. But after reading it, I found that although Zhao Tingyang’s book is indeed a monograph on ethics, his understanding of “possible life” is very different from what I had imagined. Zhao Tingyang’s book is still quite interesting. I saw that Ji Xianlin and Li Zehou gave it rather high praise, but after…
philosophy book reading notes
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2006年1月23日
Cao Tianyuan (Capo): “Does God Play Dice? — A History of Quantum Physics”

History of Science & Scholarship2006.01.16
Cao Tianyuan (Capo): “Does God Play Dice? — A History of Quantum Physics”
Cao Tianyuan (Capo): “Does God Play Dice?—A History of Quantum Physics,” Liaoning Education Publishing House, January 2006 Taking a hard-seat train home is really quite nice. I slept for six hours, read for six hours, and the whole night passed in a rather fulfilling way. That night I happened to finish this idle read. I have always not read popular science books on the cutting edge when they’re written by Chinese authors, but this one was an exception. What attracted me was the advertising copy on the cover: “A popular science book of super influence, hailed as ‘China’s A Brief History of Time’; strongly recommended by Dong Guangbi, Jiang Xiaoyuan,…
philosophy book reading notes quantum mechanics
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2006年1月16日
A fortunate chat with Professor Li Deshun

Life & Notes2006.01.14
A fortunate chat with Professor Li Deshun
Alas, I’m so tired today, I won’t record it…… Latest comments Me 2006-01-14 21:52:45 [reply] Just jot down a few odds and ends: We were told to assemble at nine in the morning. I wasn’t properly awake; ZW had a nosebleed; CG sprained his wrist. It seemed everyone was having a pretty rough time. LY overslept; at first, when we texted and called, he didn’t respond at all, and I even thought something had happened to him, like he had chipped a front tooth or something. In the end, we confirmed it was because he had stayed up all night and only gone to sleep at six. We didn’t bring…
philosophy everyday life Kant Confucius
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2006年1月14日
Some Discussions on Politics and Education

Culture & Public Commentary2006.01.12
Some Discussions on Politics and Education
Last night we started with “exposing and criticizing” someone, and talked about a lot of issues. It was quite interesting, but unfortunately TSP did not participate, and I don’t know how to make a chat transcript. So let me just sort out my own views on some of the issues we discussed yesterday. First, there is the question of moral cultivation. I think that no matter whom one is facing, or what situation one is in, some basic moral cultivation should be maintained. Of course, we can say that in some specific circumstances, when emotions run high, saying something excessive or doing something excessive is understandable. But this “understanding” cannot…
culture education politics human nature
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2006年1月12日
Ice Skating Is So Fun~~

Life & Notes2006.01.09
Ice Skating Is So Fun~~
RT Latest Comments mist 2006-01-10 20:54:16 [Reply] What a comfortable fall 🙂
everyday life kinaesthesia
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2006年1月9日
On the South China Tiger Incident

Life & Notes2006.01.08
On the South China Tiger Incident
http://hps.phil.pku.edu.cn/bbs/read.php?tid=282 Lately it’s felt a bit like repressed feelings have suddenly burst out in one concentrated explosion, with momentum gushing up from the stomach~ Maybe it’s borrowed from Schopenhauer’s stimulation? As for the South China tiger affair, I’d long wanted to say a few things, but had never managed to get them out. Taking the repost on the forum, and riding this surge of momentum, I finally can’t keep quiet anymore. This is a joke post—surely I can see that, can’t I? Of course I can. The moment I saw “reposted from XX forum” and “repost MP,” I knew it was only a joke, and a really brilliant one at…
everyday life internet public sphere responsibility
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2006年1月8日
I Am a Realistic Idealist, or an Ideal Realist (A Supplement to the Previous Essay and the Debate It Sparked)

Life & Notes2006.01.07
I Am a Realistic Idealist, or an Ideal Realist (A Supplement to the Previous Essay and the Debate It Sparked)
I just debated with ZW for more than an hour. It’s already started to have a bit of the flavor of “directing the realm from the mountaintop” (just kidding—don’t take it seriously), and although I did get something out of it, I’m exhausted. Because my personal political views are very easy to misunderstand—easy to mistake for “counterrevolutionary” or “fool-the-masses”—but perhaps it’s not a misunderstanding after all. If revolution is understood as a revolution against China as it exists in reality, then I am a resolute “counterrevolutionary.” Of course, someone may say: as social development reaches a certain stage, there is always the possibility that revolution will become necessary; so am…
philosophy faith autobiography politics
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2006年1月7日
Two Marxist-Philosophy Short-Answer Questions I Didn’t Want to Answer by the Book + A Supplement to Short Answer Question 5 in Marxist Philosophy (Part II)

Philosophy & Thought2006.01.05
Two Marxist-Philosophy Short-Answer Questions I Didn’t Want to Answer by the Book + A Supplement to Short Answer Question 5 in Marxist Philosophy (Part II)
1．What is the dialectical view of negation? Illustrate it with the attitude one should take toward cultural tradition. First let us look at what the dialectical view of negation is not: In The Poverty of Philosophy, Marx satirized Proudhon’s vulgar use of dialectics. Marx said, “Let us see what Monsieur Proudhon has made of Hegel’s dialectic when he applies it to his economic theory… Monsieur Proudhon thinks that the good and the bad sides, the advantages and the disadvantages, together make up the contradiction inherent in every economic category. What needs to be done is to preserve the good side and eliminate the bad side.” —What we see here is…
philosophy book reading culture notes
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2006年1月5日