标签:China

  • On the “Naturalness” of Laozi and Zhuangzi

    Life & Notes

    On the “Naturalness” of Laozi and Zhuangzi

    Recently I helped a new first-year junior sister look over a paper, and in passing I jotted down a question here. This question is rather naive, but many people still make this mistake. Quite naturally, like many beginners and even some scholars who comment on Laozi and Zhuangzi only in part, she understood “自然” as the “自然” in “自然界” (“nature” as the natural world). But in ancient China and ancient Greece, the word “自然” did not have this meaning at all (see my earlier article “Ancient Greek Natural Philosophy and the Scientific Spirit”). Exactly what the word meant in ancient Greece may still require detailed textual verification, but in ancient…

    阅读全文
  • [Repost] Do We Need a Revival of Faith? (Xu Youyu)

    Life & Notes

    [Repost] Do We Need a Revival of Faith? (Xu Youyu)

    http://vip.bokee.com/20070924389448.html I happened upon this article quite by chance, and several passages are quite interesting. I might as well repost it here, and in passing introduce Xu Youyu’s blog as well—Xu Youyu’s blog was also discovered by me in a very accidental way, in a very accidental place, though now I only go there once in a great while… The blog column on “Blog China” really is a mess; not to mention all the clutter on the right side of the page, the articles themselves are full of all kinds of inexplicable automatic links that one has to check. The comments are also far too chaotic; in this state, it…

    阅读全文
  • On the Peng Yu Case

    On the Peng Yu Case

    About the Peng Yu case has recently become quite popular online; you can find it anywhere if you search casually, so I won’t quote much here: “On September 5, the Gulou District Court in Nanjing delivered its ruling in the Peng Yu case, deciding that Peng Yu should compensate the plaintiff for 40% of her losses, amounting to 45,876 yuan. The judgment said, ‘From common sense, it is more likely that Peng Yu collided with the old woman. If Peng Yu had not knocked down the old woman, he would have had no need at all to send her to the hospital.’ Once the verdict was announced, public opinion across…

    阅读全文
  • Three Years of Undergraduate Transcripts

    Life & Notes

    Three Years of Undergraduate Transcripts

    Hmm… Although I’ve really been living rather lazily and decadently, I still feel pretty clear-conscienced about my studies~ I’ve never been good at exams, so this kind of record wasn’t easy to get~ (At least allow me a little self-comfort in front of those tough classmates and terrifying juniors and sophomores…) Academic Year Semester Course No. Grade Course Type Course Name Credits Grade Point 04-05 1 00131440 93 Major Required Advanced Mathematics for the Liberal Arts I Advanced Mathematics C for Arts ( I) 4.0 4 04-05 1 00831610 97 University Required Basics of Computer Application for the Liberal Arts (1) Basis of Computer Application (1) 3.0 4 04-05 1…

    阅读全文
  • On the Problem of Wealth Inequality in China

    On the Problem of Wealth Inequality in China

    The problem of China’s rich-poor gap is both a sharp short-term issue and the most crucial issue in the long-term strategic picture; how to handle this problem is vitally important to China’s economic and political future. What needs to be addressed is the problem of the rich-poor gap, not the elimination of the rich-poor gap. The rich-poor gap cannot be eliminated, neither in theory nor in reality; all one can do is figure out how to face it. China’s rapid economic development has, to a very large extent, been driven by a huge rich-poor gap, and the paradox is this: if the poor want to become a little richer, they…

    阅读全文
  • On the “Ungrateful Poor College Student” Incident

    On the “Ungrateful Poor College Student” Incident

    A little while ago I saw a piece of news online saying that five poor college students in Xiangfan had their funding canceled because they were “ungrateful.” Today I happened to see a follow-up report on TV, and I can’t help writing a few words. At first, when I heard the two words “ungrateful,” I thought: just how badly had they behaved, and how much embarrassment had they caused the benefactors, that those female entrepreneurs would angrily give up their sponsorship? But after watching for a long time, I found it was only that after receiving the money they never took the initiative to write letters or make phone calls…

    阅读全文
  • Cooking, cooking~

    Cooking, cooking~
    Life & Notes

    Cooking, cooking~

    Today I finally cooked for myself for the first time~ I said I was going to learn to cook during summer vacation, but I really didn’t learn much at all; at most, when Mom or Grandma was cooking, I just watched from the side, and I didn’t even do that very many times. Anyway, cooking isn’t something all that hard, so I’ll just figure it out myself when the time comes~ Today I finally did it myself, so let’s start with something simple: washing rice and cooking rice doesn’t seem to have much difficulty. It looks like I controlled the water-to-rice ratio pretty well too; the rice came out neither…

    阅读全文
  • This Issue’s Music: The Legend of Sword and Fairy Original Soundtrack, Battle Music

    Life & Notes

    This Issue’s Music: The Legend of Sword and Fairy Original Soundtrack, Battle Music

    I first saw people playing the earliest Chinese-language 95 version of *Xianjian* at someone else’s home, and afterward I bought the just-released 98 “Romantic Edition” myself. *Xianjian* is the only RPG I’ve played no fewer than three times (I can’t remember exactly how many times), and even now I’m still willing to play through it again.  The most recent time I replayed *Xianjian* was when the TV drama adaptation aired and I simply couldn’t stand it anymore, so I played it again. Let me stress once more: absolutely do not watch the *Xianjian* TV drama, or if you do, do not connect it with *The Legend of Sword and Fairy*…… …

    阅读全文
  • On Protecting Tradition and What Tradition Is, and So On

    On Protecting Tradition and What Tradition Is, and So On

    First, I’m reposting a discussion from the Ceiling blog.     http://ariela.ycool.com/post.2668095.html 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?…

    阅读全文
  • Back in Shanghai~

    Life & Notes

    Back in Shanghai~

    Yesterday, while eating dinner, I decided to head back to Shanghai, and now I’m here. The renovation is already in its latter half; most of the design decisions that needed to be made have already been made. What’s left is just watching that gang of renovation workers dragging their feet. I’ve left Mom there to supervise the work, and I’ve come back to visit family~~ Why is Shanghai so hot!!!!!!!!! BTW: please don’t send me text messages recently; my phone is with my mom~ Latest Comments mist 2007-08-02 17:29:53 Anonymous 124.17.16.85  A junior sister asked me to pass a message to you. I think I’d better just post her original…

    阅读全文