EDWARD'S LECTURE NOTES:
More notes at http://tanguay.info/learntracker
C O U R S E
Chinese Thought: Ancient Wisdom Meets Modern Science
Edward Slingerland, University of British Columbia
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C O U R S E L E C T U R E Mozi and Materialist State Consequentialism Notes taken on March 28, 2017 by Edward Tanguay |
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Mozi (468-391 BCE)
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the "zi" means master
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Mozi = Master Mo
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Laozi = Master Lao
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lived after Confucius (551-479 BCE)
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lived before Mencius (390-310 BCE)
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one of the principal interpreters of Confucianism
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The Mozi
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expounds the philosophy of Mohism
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structured much like the Analects
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collected after he died
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may have penned some of the chapters
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disciples were organized more like an army
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organized into cells
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each of the cells had its own master
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each cell could have sub-cells which had their own masters
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after Mozi died, each of the three Mozi lineages fought among themselves to determine who was the most orthodox one
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there are three versions of the same chapters
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each chapter has a theme, and a title that tells you what the chapter is about
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chapters are reasonably well-argued argument
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structured around themes in a coherent way
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writing style
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plodding and repetitive
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how do we know x, this is how we know x
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it's dry in English and it's dry in Chinese
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it's bad classical Chinese style
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the Daodejing is beautifully poetic
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has a mystical language
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the Analects are also a very high level of literary achievement
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the Mozi is dry
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in the Hanfeizi chapter, there is a defense of the style
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that it is deliberate
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they are rationalists
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they want you to follow this rational argument
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they don't want you to be distracted by fancy rhetoric
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Mozi and his followers were self-educated people
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they are not coming from a hereditary elite
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didn't learn classical Chinese at an early age
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Mozi was probably a carpenter
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uses many craft metaphors
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one of his innovations was using these metaphors of crafts and applying it to philosophy
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very pragmatic
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doesn't seem to need for elaborate music or funerals
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Mozian consequentialism
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the ethical thing to do is decided by weighing its consequences
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weigh the consequences of behavior x
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these good things happen
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these bad things happen
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different types of consequentialism, vary on:
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which types of consequentialism you want to maximize
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which perspective you are varying it from, i.e. consequences for whom
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kinds of consequentialists
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happy consequentialists
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maximize happiness and well-being
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this is vague
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most contemporary consequentialists in the West
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GDP consequentialists
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maximize Gross Domestic Product
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anything that increases it is good
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anything that decreases it is bad
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theistic consequentialists
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anything that increases devotion to diety is good
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anything that decreases devotion to diety is bad
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consequences for whom
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the individual
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the city
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the state
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combination
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action x could maximize material wealth for you personally, but not for the state
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Mozi is a materialist, state consequentialist
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the goal is to maximize material well-being for the state
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well-being for him meant physical goods
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food
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shelter
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believes that people are only motivated by material motives
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even if they talk about idealistic concepts
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"If an official has a high-sounding title but a meager stipend, he can hardly inspire the confidence of the people."
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the only thing that is going to motivate people to be part of your government is a proper salary
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use money to motivate people and inspire respect
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differences to Confucius
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love of the Way
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you can and should endure material privations in order to align yourself with the Way
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even starving to death was a good if you had the Way
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rejection of wu-wei as an ideal
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Mozi is a rationalist ethicist
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favors cold cognition
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ethics is about thinking rationally in a cold way and in engaging in cognitive control
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he's deeply suspicious of hot cognition
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it will lead to chaos
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he feels this is what the problem was with the Warring States
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Confucius
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we are born rough
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our hot cognition is going to lead to chaos
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it needs to get reshaped by Confucian culture
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the key is to transform our hot cognition into something beautiful
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Laozi
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our hot cognition has been messed up by society
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if you're able to read, you are literate and part of the elite, and hence already too messed up
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we have to repress these added desires that we have been taught, forget them, get rid of them, to get back to the hot cognition that we would have if we were in touch with our nature
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Mozi
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hot cognition is itself the problem
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but you can't change it
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what you can do is harness it with cold cognition, i.e. reasoning, to make it behave in ways that are rational
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we won't change our basic motivation but will apply external systems of punishments and rewards to get people to make certain choices
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in this way using cost and benefit analysis to engineer the kind of society and behavior that is more rational
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you don't need to change your inborn psychology, but be institutionalized exteriorly through reason
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and we will rely on their rationality to understand the benefits of the Mozian Way