Cultivating a Good Life in Early Chinese and Ancient Greek Philosophy: Perspectives and Reverberations

Editors: 
Karyn Lai, Rick Benitez, Hyun Jin Kim

Publication date:
December 2018

Publisher:
Bloomsbury

Abstract:
This book engages in cross-tradition scholarship, investigating the processes associated with cultivating or nurturing the self in order to live good lives. Both Ancient Chinese and Greek philosophers provide accounts of the life lived well: a Confucian junzi, a Daoist sage and a Greek phronimos.

By focusing on the processes rather than the aims of cultivating a good life, an international team of scholars investigate how a person develops and practices a way of life especially in these two traditions. They look at what is involved in developing practical wisdom, exercising reason, cultivating equanimity and fostering reliability. Drawing on the insights of thinkers including Plato, Confucius, Han Fei and Marcus Aurelius, they examine themes of harmony, balance and beauty, highlight the different concerns of scepticism across both traditions, and discuss action as an indispensable method of learning and, indeed, as constitutive of self. The result is a valuable collection opening up new lines of inquiry in ethics, demonstrating the importance of philosophical ideas from across cultural traditions.

Table of Contents:

Introduction (Karyn Lai, Rick Benitez, Hyun Jin Kim)

Part I: Harmony, Balance, Beauty: Understanding Conceptions of Cultivation

1. Cultivation and Harmony: Plato and Confucius (Rick Benitez, University of Sydney, Australia)

2. Cultivating Noble Simplicity: Plato (L.M.J. Coulson, University of Sydney, Australia)

3. The Beauty Ladder and the Mind-heart Excursion: Plato and Zhuangzi (Wang Keping, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing)

4. Awareness and Spontaneity: Three Perspectives in the Zhuangzi (Lisa Raphals, University of California, Riverside, USA)

5. Understanding “Dao's Patterns”: Han Fei (Barbara Hendrischke, Sydney University, Australia)

Part II: Doubt, Predicament, Conflict: Cognitive, Affective and Epistemic Difficulties

6. Skepsis and Doubt: Ancient Greece and the East (Yasuhira Yahei Kanayama, Nagoya University, Japan)

7. Wisdowm and Cognitive Conflict: Outlines for Scepticism (Per Lind, Lund University, Sweden)

8. Understanding Fortune and Misfortune in a Good Life: 'Solon' and 'Confucius' (Hyun Jin Kim, University of Melbourne, Australia and Karen Hsu, University of Melbourne, Australia)

9. Emotion and Self-Cultivation: Marcus Aurelius and Mengzi (Jesse Ciccotti, Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong)

10. Dislodging Mundane Wisdom: the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi and the New Testament Gospels (Lauren Pfister, Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong)

Part III. Here, Now, Ever-after: How to Achieve and Practice a Good Life

11. Knowing How to Act: Aristotle (Sophie Grace Chappell, Open University, UK)

12. Learning to be Reliable: Confucius' Analects (Karyn Lai, University of New South Wales, Australia)

13. Auditory Perception and Cultivation: the Wenzi (Andrej Fech, Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong)

14. Cultivation and the Arts of Writing: Liu Xie (Will Buckingham, Open University, UK)

15. Death and Happiness: Han China (Mu-chou Poo, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong)