Translation, Mencius "Pulling up Sprouts"

This essay is part of my series exploring the validity of the existence of “Classical Daoism” or Daojia 道家, “(Early) Daoism.” “Wuwei” is commonly taken to be a Daoist concept. My treatment of Wuwei differs from Edward Slingerland’s metaphorical interpretation of the term and focuses less on the psychological perspective that discerns notions of purposeless or effortlessness in wuwei and more on the wisdom of restraint and non-interference.

Mysticism and quietistic self-cultivation practices have long been associated with the classical Daoist texts of Laozi 老子 and Zhuangzi 莊子. The concern with longevity has primarily been associated with the figure of Laozi and the religion that deified him. In the 19th and first three quarters of the 20th centuries, Western scholars regularly described Laozi and Zhuangzi as mystics or quietists. In the past thirty years, however, these texts have been analyzed and interpreted more for their philosophy than for their religious practices or a broader holistic understanding of the spiritual and philosophical content. My hope is to give both the philosophical and religious or spiritual aspects their due.

This dissertation examines the particle ye 也 in the IV century BCE Chinese Guodian manuscripts by providing a synchronic analysis of its functions and a diachronic hypothesis relating all functions to focus marking.

HKU Theses Online (HKUTO), 2001

This dissertation is an account of the most famous disagreement in early Chinese philosophy. The disagreement is usually thought to have taken place between Mencius (c. 385-303 BC) and Xunzi (c. 310-230 BC) (the two most prominent Confucians of the Warring States period), and to have concerned the goodness or badness of human nature. I give a novel interpretation of the dispute, and a fully-worked out account of its history. I argue that ren zhi xing 人之性 (or "people's xing") is not a near analogue of human nature, and that the dispute unfolded over a short period between Xunzi and members of a Mencian school operating decades after Mencius's death. I try to show that if we read Mencian and Xunzian discussions of the issue as contemporary documents, we can see them interacting in surprisingly precise ways. This allows me to portray the specifically philosophical character of the dispute in much tighter focus than has previously been possible. My interpretation of the concept of xing stresses its links with nature, health, and spontaneity. A person's xing is a locus of continuity with nature that sustains normal physiological and psychological functioning, including in particular the proper functioning of her sense organs and the appropriate production of emotions and desires. This functioning might also involve certain sorts of behavior; if it is a person's xing to behave in a particular way, then she will behave that way as reliably and as thoughtlessly as she desires food when hungry. Xing is vulnerable, and can be damaged by either deprivation or over-indulgence. This damage undermines a person’s spontaneity in a way that renders her unhealthy. The dispute concerned the extent to which virtue could be made to participate in the spontaneous economy sustained by xing. Mencius's followers argued that the right sort of self-cultivation could nurture a natural growth that would preserve xing while developing virtue. Xunzi argued that no serious course of moral improvement could limit itself to natural development. Both parties made several attempts to incorporate a theory of xing into their moral and psychological views. By distinguishing between chronological layers of their texts, I am able to trace developments in their views and interactions between them. Though I focus on these Confucian philosophers, I suggest that the dispute was originally provoked by primitivist philosophers whose texts have been preserved in the Zhuangzi, which is usually considered a Daoist anthology. I follow scholars such as Herbert Fingarette, Robert Eno, and Chad Hansen in attributing a "performance model" of action to early Chinese philosophers. In detailed interpretations of central statements of Mencian and Xunzian psychology, I show how they stressed ability rather than desire. I build on this conclusion to dispute accounts that make reasoning or moral intuition central to the dispute over people’s xing.

Iura, 2022

l'élaboration du premier noyau du droit naturel chez les Romains à l'époque républicaine et la réflexion plus mûre qui allait prendre forme dans les siècles suivants, et que nous lisons sous une forme plus aboutie dans les Institutiones d'Ulpianus 22 .

Revista Venezolana De Gerencia, 2018

Este articulo tiene como proposito describir las caracteristicas singulares que presenta el capitalismo academico en el sistema de educacion superior chileno. Para este efecto se recurre a fuentes secundarias de informacion, realizando una revision reflexiva de la literatura pertinente contenida en revistas indexadas y libros de corriente principal, lo que permite dilucidar que es el capitalismo academico, que es la gobernanza y como es posible asumir la gobernanza del capitalismo academico desde una perspectiva conceptual. Se examina brevemente la evidencia sobre el sistema universitario chileno, del cual se destaca la existencia de multiples mercados y la respuesta de las universidades a ese entorno competitivo mediante cambios en su organizacion y funciones. Se concluye que el comportamiento estrategico de las universidades chilenas esta determinado fundamentalmente por los requerimientos de los mercados y las politicas y regulaciones publicas a que aquellos se hallan sometidos dentro de una variedad de capitalismo academico de alto privatismo

Fighter Magazine, 2023

Bushido and bullfighting share many points in common, and there are quite distinct parallels between the ethical code of the samurai warrior and that of the bullfighter.