标签：philosophy talk

Philosophical Commentary [Episode 2] “What Nice Weather” (Part I): The True Is the Point of Emphasis

Philosophy & Thought2015.08.12
Philosophical Commentary [Episode 2] “What Nice Weather” (Part I): The True Is the Point of Emphasis
The previous installment may still have been a bit too academic in style, so this time I’ll try to speak a little more casually, offering only some prompts and not taking responsibility for digging too deeply. Today I’ll start from an ordinary phrase: “The weather is really nice.” Originally I wanted to write “Beauty, the weather is really nice today,” and discuss truth, goodness, beauty, heaven, earth, and humanity, but it felt like that would involve too much, so I narrowed it down to this one sentence and will talk only about “truth” and “goodness.” “Truth, goodness, and beauty” seem like the most solemn and sacred of all “big words,”…
philosophy phenomenology environment language
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2015年8月12日
Philosophical Ramblings [Episode 1]: Freedom Is Like Treating Someone to a Meal

Enlightenment & the Spirit of Freedom2015.08.07
Philosophical Ramblings [Episode 1]: Freedom Is Like Treating Someone to a Meal
Since I wanted to launch the “Philosophy Commentary” column, I had long been bursting with topics I wanted to write about, but when it came time to write, I no longer knew where to begin. Might as well start with an old topic: “freedom.” As for freedom, I have already written many articles discussing it; in fact, everything that needed saying has more or less already been said. But related discussions often involve the similarities and differences between freedom and equality, as well as specific issues such as freedom of speech, and they are not written in a very accessible way either. Here, I want to offer a popular-style commentary…
philosophy China freedom language
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2015年8月7日
Philosophical Commentary and Quips [Column Introduction] Philosophy and Life

Philosophy & Thought2015.07.28
Philosophical Commentary and Quips [Column Introduction] Philosophy and Life
I have always used the “history-thought-poetry” classification system, corresponding to three kinds of textual form: reflection, record, and lyricism. This classification system is logically sound, but for me personally it is not very practical: some categories have especially many articles, while others remain in a state of abandonment year after year. Recently I have been thinking about building a classification system centered on “columns,” no longer subdividing things into specific directories. If you need to search, just use keywords. But we can also establish some “columns”; not every article has to belong to one. The articles under a column would be selected pieces or serialized pieces with a specific theme….
philosophy everyday life game philosophy talk
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2015年7月28日
Human-Centricity or Humble Solipsism? — A Discussion of Whether Heidegger’s Philosophy Is a Philosophy of Subjectivity

Phenomenology & Heidegger2013.04.01
Human-Centricity or Humble Solipsism? — A Discussion of Whether Heidegger’s Philosophy Is a Philosophy of Subjectivity
Jing Qi reposted an article by Ran Shi, “Is Heidegger’s Early Philosophy a Philosophy of Subjectivity?,” as well as the related discussion—among the participants were Jing Qi, Ran Shi (who is this, anyway? His blog is rather interesting), Professor Meng Qiang, and Professor Li Zhangyin, among others. I also chimed in. My comments leaned toward Ran Shi, and were also endorsed by him, but as always I was still set in opposition to Jing Qi (which, of course, is a very good thing). For the context of the discussion before and after, you can go look on Jing Qi’s or Ran Shi’s blog; I won’t reproduce it here. I’ll simply…
philosophy Heidegger Aristotle environment
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2013年4月1日
When Reading a Philosopher, One Must Pay Attention Not Only to What He Says on the Surface, but Also to the Emotions and Intentions Lurking Behind His Words.

History of Science & Scholarship2009.06.19
When Reading a Philosopher, One Must Pay Attention Not Only to What He Says on the Surface, but Also to the Emotions and Intentions Lurking Behind His Words.
When reading a philosopher, one must pay attention not only to what he says literally, but also to the emotions and intentions lurking behind his words. This is where the key and the pleasure of interpreting philosophical texts lie. Of course, if we are to interpret a text by means of the text itself, extracting what the philosopher said is only the most elementary procedure. But if your interpretation is merely a straightforward paraphrase of the philosopher’s views, then what is the point of such an interpretation anyway?—and by “point” I always mean both “meaning” and “interest.” If you can express a philosopher’s thought in a more concise and lucid…
philosophy scholarship Aristotle intentionality
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2009年6月19日
Reflections Inspired by Feeling

Life & Notes2009.06.17
Reflections Inspired by Feeling
Philosophy should be weaving a web, not forging chains. It should establish connections rather than draw chasms; it should move toward a more open world rather than bury itself in a closed cave. So the philosopher does not want, before himself or before others, to draw a trench or dig a pit, pressing for a decision: jump down—are you coming over, or not coming over? Philosophers like to probe and reflect, but they never force. By probing, I mean that when we step into a new world, we are not content to linger at the threshold, but must also gaze into the far distance, then move forward—and keep going; by…
philosophy everyday life intentionality philosophy talk
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2009年6月17日
Treating Concepts as Toys and Glasses as Toys

Philosophy & Thought2009.05.17
Treating Concepts as Toys and Glasses as Toys
In the last part of the previous essay, “Philosophy and Poetry,” I had originally wanted to mention “taking concepts as toys rather than regarding them as higher or lower,” but in the finished version I ended up deleting it because the writing never naturally flowed there. It just happened that a later chat touched on the related topic, so I’m putting it here as a supplement. At first I felt that the analogy between eyeglasses and language was not very convincing, but after thinking it over, it seems to be a pretty good analogy, actually rather interesting. Like eyeglasses, many concepts, pieces of knowledge, articles of faith, and so on…
philosophy language meaning philosophy talk
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2009年5月17日
There Are No Experts in Philosophy

Philosophy & Thought2009.01.01
There Are No Experts in Philosophy
I said very early on—sophomore year, maybe freshman year?—something like, “I don’t want to be an expert; I want only to be a master.” At first it was just something said privately among friends, but then it spread, and so I could only regard it as public speech. Of course I have always been able to stand behind that sentence. It is based on how I situated myself and on my understanding of philosophy. Over these years I have, I think, come to understand philosophy more deeply, and so now I can offer some more penetrating interpretation of what I said back then. First, we need to ask: what exactly…
philosophy culture scholarship experts
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2009年1月1日
The Joy of “Dissatisfaction”

Philosophy & Thought2008.10.12
The Joy of “Dissatisfaction”
In my philosophy, “love” is an extremely central concept. A detailed exposition of this concept has not yet been worked out; but to give a preliminary indication, one may say that before we get to the level of “overflow” and “outpouring,” that is, before speaking of “giving” or “offering oneself,” the most primitive and basic meaning of “love” is after all “desire” and “need,” and its root is “dissatisfaction.” What I want to talk about here is precisely this “dissatisfaction.” People usually regard “dissatisfaction” as a bad state, associating it with pain and resentment; correspondingly, “satisfaction” is seen as a good state, associated with comfort and happiness. Yet I say:…
philosophy pursuit love emotion
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2008年10月12日
The Philosopher’s “Manifest” and “Hidden”

Philosophy & Thought2008.10.10
The Philosopher’s “Manifest” and “Hidden”
In the comments received not long after the posting of “Pinned Post 2,” one mm mentioned that I was “a manifest type” rather than “an implicit type,” and so on. The specifics can be seen directly in that post, so I won’t repeat them here. Typical feminine-style comments are headache-inducing, because they are hard to deal with. As that mm said, “…more intuitive”: once a comment is made “from intuition,” then it becomes very hard to criticize. Only when a theory is built on “reasons” is it possible to inspect and criticize it, because “reasons” are public, whereas “intuition” is always private; I cannot criticize another person’s “intuition.” In addition,…
philosophy culture scholarship public sphere
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2008年10月10日