哲学 Synthesis Paper: 2A

哲学

老子

What is philosophy as demonstrated in Ancient Chinese Philosophy…

1. by Lao Tzu…

A. in the way he perceives the philosophical problem?

Lao Tzu deems that problems resulting in the lack or the absence of natural harmony is caused by the absence of the Tao. The Tao is that which bring things together and connects them. It is that which organises things and allows them to influence one another (Rawson & Legeza, 1963) and so without the Tao there will be disruptions in the process of nature that would inevitably result in natural disharmony. Lao Tzu also believes that this natural disharmony is caused by knowledge and desire and so for him, they are harmful because they drive man too seek out for what is not essential to them and allows knowledge and desire to control his life and his behaviour. Knowledge prompts man to discriminate and distinguish from is and what is not. Knowledge also influences our desires to the point that we are lead away from the middle ground. 

Both knowledge and desire cause disharmony because they are not natural: too much or too little. Being able to distinguish that which is pleasurable to the senses is also a keynote in understanding what knowledge is for Lao Tzu. What is natural is you know when to stop and when not to stop. Sleep when you are sleepy and wake up when it is time for you to wake up. For Lao Tzu, the problem is natural harmony which is caused by the absence of the Tao because of man’s want for knowledge and man’s indulgence of his desires. Additionally, for Lao Tzu, natural disharmony happens when man begins to attach himself to the material and the superficial, these that which are not natural. 

Man’s elevation in the society also causes natural disharmony. Lao Tzu believes that man should stay pure and keep away from the things that can harm him by not losing sight of the Tao. However, man’s success and prosperity often opens up another path for him to tread on- a path opposed to the Tao. When he takes this road, he attaches himself to his achievements and his properties and it gets into his head. He becomes gaudy and there is excess in his ways. He speaks even if he does not know and rushes here and there, quick on his toes, to claim things that he did and he did not do. And so man finds this very pleasurable to the senses and his desire goes overdrive, making him contrary to the man that he used to be when he was more simpler, more natural. The uncharted wood is no more and from this, natural disharmony occurs. 

Rawson & Legeza, 1973

…the aim is harmony: harmony between the components of the dialectic situation, leading to harmony between each man and his turbulent universe, and an ultimate tranquility. But harmony is impossible without ‘forces’ to harmonise, and of little value unless those forces are themselves at high power.

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Knowing the Way as Unlearning

Knowing the Way as Unlearning

老子

十一

~What does Lao Tzu mean by unlearning? How can this be knowing? How can unlearning take place?

~What is the importance of unlearning in the development toward sageliness? 

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Tao Te Ching, 20

Abandon all learning and there will be no sorrow.

People are difficult to govern because they have too much knowledge (Tao Te Ching, 65) and so it follows that we should empty our cup so that it should be filled: what we know and what we have learned, we should unlearn. The Tao requires us to decrease so as we could increase and the way to knowing the Tao is by unlearning. It is because we know too much, it is because our heads are filled with things of these and that that we become blinded with the illusion that it is necessary for us to have them. We see a lot of things in others that we don’t have and we are then filled with the desire that we want those things for us to possess. The Tao teaches us that any kind of desire, tangible and/or intangible, is not good for us. These desires, because of the very fact that they are desires, are hard to come by and so the harder that we strive to attain them, the more we bring ourselves closer to harm’s way. Therefore our desire to fill our heads with facts, numbers, and information are that which that makes us contrary to what we truly are. Knowledge only clouds the mind. It teaches us how to discriminate and become prejudiced. Knowledge is a disease that rots the mind. The sage know of this and so, he only seeks for what is needed for life and anything beyond it, the sage rejects. Because of this, the sage rests at the heart of the Tao.

It is only by truly unlearning that we are filled, that we can accumulate the things that which are genuinely essential to us and to our being. This knowledge that we seek only but blinds us from the way of the Tao. They dizzy our head with worldly contents and concerns that we forget how who we truly are and so it is only by depleting that we can come home again. We should decrease day by day until we are nothing, until we are empty. Therefore the sage strives to achieve a mental clarity will make nature profound in him and through this nothingness within his mind, he sees the path to the Tao.  

More often than not, our senses trigger desires and our knowledge about the object of our desires only heightens our need for them. So Lao Tzu warns us: Close the mouth. Shut the doors (Tao Te Ching, 52). If we truly know ourselves then it is easier for us to guard our senses and our mind. If we know who we truly are and if we are close to the Tao then there will be wards around us, wards that keeps away the things that are contrary to nature and the things that can pull us away from the Tao. Being aware of what is truly essential to us helps us retrain worldly desires and keeps us on the right path. If we know who we truly are then we know that we do not know. The sage who knows does not pretend. He is humble in his words and in his deeds and because he keeps the value of humility he is weak. He flows in the river of the Tao, freely, away from necessary desires. The sage is empty but he is full. 

Tao Te Ching, 56

Become one with the dusty world.

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No Knowledge, No Desires

老子

八

~What does Lao Tzu mean by “no knowledge, no desires’”? Is this realisable and desirable for humans?

~What role does such an ideal play in the philosophy of Lao Tzu?

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Tao Te Ching, 71

To know that you do not know is the best.

To pretend to know when you do not know is a disease.

The Apology, 21e

“…the fact that neither of us knows anything beautiful and good, but he thinks he does know when he doesn’t, and I don’t know and don’t think I do: so I am wiser than he is by only this trifle, that what I do not know I don’t think I do.”

Away from the mundane and seemingly important life of the most, a self-realised man, like an infant, is unattached. He is aware of his predicament and so he refuses to bother himself with what is materially external to him. He lets it be and accept things as they come his way. He walks with no direction but he moves when it is time to move and rests when it is time to do so. A self-realised man is one who does not let material possession and egoistic virtues fulfil him but he is one who lets nature nurture and feed him. Because he takes no part does not imply that he is indifferent. It just means that he has no read-between-the-lines self-interest and because of this, he can see the clear picture from where he is. Involved but not quite, just grounded. 

A self-realised person is one who knows without going. He does not need to be out there to gain and accumulate things that will never make sense. As a person makes the Tao as his home and his ground, walking away to seek material knowledge will only blunder and dull the mind. And so he stays there, within the Tao, because he knows better than to reach for something that is against the Tao; because he knows better and his knowledge comes with experience and maturity. The knowledge is given to him by nature itself. Non-action is key. Therefore go back on what is knowledge for you. Go back and see what value you put upon that knowledge that you are trying to reach. Because if it is not the way of the Tao, one step forward is three steps backward. 

A self-realised person is one who is honest towards both the honest and the dishonest. He is one who tells the emperor that he has no clothes. He treats the liar with honestly because he does not discriminate between the black and the white. He sees people as they are and treat them consistently. And because he makes no distinction between the kind and the unkind he is true to anything and everything. Therefore there is true honestly and kindness in his actions: be the samaritan! 

And as the Tao is within me I do not court Death: And yet silence will soon descend on all these noisy, living, life-thirsty people (The Gay Science, Nietzsche, 1974, pg. 225). I do not collar my neck to life for it only calls upon Death, the tighter I tie myself to it. People who know better and value life with respect to the Tao accepts life and allows Time to unfold it as it is. Without provoking death nor clinging to life, a self-realised person knows that he is but a visitor in this world and that he too, shall pass. He is a child when he is a child. He is a man when he is a man. He does not interfere with nature and does not find ways to maintain his youth. He does not interfere with nature and does not find ways to fast-forward his life to the brink of death. Therefore, do not do things that are contrary to nature. Do not wallow in desire when you have no use for it in your life, and do remain humble: To know Tao and say you do not it is the best (He Shang Kung, Chan, 1963). 

Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Nietzsche, 1961

“You look up when you desire to be exalted. And I look down, because I am exalted.”

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Harmfulness of Knowledge and Desire

老子

二

~What does Lao Tzu mean by the harmfulness of knowledge and desires? What does he mean by knowledge and desire? Why does he consider them harmful?

~Is his analysis convincing? Is it valid?

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Factual knowledge, according to Rosen (2000), is dependent upon the individual’s own sense perfection, noting that “sensory apparatus differs from species to species”. It would appear, on first impressions, that Lao Tzu appears to take knowledge as something that is not good. However, what exactly is knowledge for him? How did he perceive it to be, that it made him frown upon it? Some people believes that by knowledge, Lao Tzu meant tools, tools that can either be used to do good or bad depending on the person “wielding” the tool. In addition to this, the tool is also limited. Like the tool, with both its good use and bad use, most things come in pairs— synonyms and antonyms, friends and enemies, positive and negative, and so on and so forth. Further into this, our own attitude towards things is greatly influenced by how we attribute to it. If I see something that I deem beautiful then I see another thing, my impulse would be to compare the two and choose that which is what I deem beautiful and what not. But this is only because this is what I think. It is, for me, but it may not be this way to you. And really, who are we to judge? 

Now Lao Tzu warns us about the five colours, five tones, five flavours, and about racing and hurting. These three categories with five different things has been interpreted as symbolic— the five colours in the Chinese tradition, the five Classical tones in a Classical Chinese music scale, and the five flavours. And Lao Tzu meant good in his warning, otherwise this things will lead us astray. “Too little of something is bad”, is what we always hear, “too much of something is not good”. So moderation is the key. Eat too little and you starve. Eat to much and your body will suffer. Eat normally is what is natural. Each and everyday we are always challenged by this problem. There are a lot of pretty things in the world and like a dragon drawn to shiny things, we are easily tempted and we forget. We give in to our desires and we overwork ourselves. We go loca over something— we go mad. 

And if we give in to our desire, or should I say, if we allow our desires to corrupt us, then shame on us. This, at least for me, can be easily explained in the context of drug addiction. The first try will bring you to a whole new world, a world full of wonder and everything good. You will begin to feel wonderful for everything around you becomes pleasant, and this sense of high inside you makes it all the more better until the fall. So to stop this fall from seeping in, you will then take another and another and another and another until it all feels better. But you will never be satisfied. You will never be contended because with greed, nothing is always enough. The more you take it, the more you need to increase the dose but nobody warned you: the higher you fly up in the sky, the lower you’ll fall down in the pits of the earth. Letting your desire sweep you away like a current instead of letting the Tao guide you along the way has a huge difference. With the Tao, you know you are safe, you know you are you, you know that you are enough, and most especially, you know where you’ll be heading to. With your desire, well let’s just say that you’re in for a surprise. 

The Dog and His Bone, Aesop’s Fables

A hound dog found a bone and held it tightly in his mouth. He growled and scowled at anyone who attempted to take it away. Off into the woods he went to bury his prize.

When he came to a stream, he trotted over the footbridge and happened to glance into the water. He saw his own reflection. Thinking it was another dog with a bigger bone, he growled and scowled at it. The reflection growled and scowled back.

"I'll get THAT bone too," thought the greedy dog, and he snapped his sharp teeth at the image in the water.

Alas, his own big bone fell with a splash, out of sight, the moment he opened his mouth to bite!

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