i was going to write about john stuart mill and utilitarianism.. but just couldn’t find the enthusiasm so i watched a jackie chan movie...
it made me think of the chinese take on utilitarianism I heard about.
chinese history is fairly complicated. there are many strata.. periods. developments. ideologically there have been three basic trends living with a fair degree of harmony. the dao.. (mystical native tradition).. the code of confucious (traditionalist, legalist) and the way of the buddha (occultist, divine). however, in an early period there was another ideology that lost purchase and has basically been swallowed up in oblivion.. this was the views of mo zi mohism.. there is an excellent movie around the idea from hong kong battle of wits 墨攻 (2006) starring andy lao. dir Jacob cheung.
the movie goes like this…
a mohist warrior arrives at a city to protect it from the onslaught of the army of zhao.. zhao was one of the warring states. it’s a complex story of the defense of the city, exploring many facets of human nature…it is basically about politics and attitudes to war… well worth the trouble even for the acting alone. it raises interesting concepts about conflict management and the roots of chinese tradition. though I guess it takes a fair degree of cinematographic licence.
as for the philosophy itself…
while confucious looked back on the zhao dynasty( 1122-1249) as a model of social organization(stability, orderliness), mozi preferred the former xia dynasty (2183-1752 bc )as a paradigm in view of its peace and equality.
in mohist thought, actions are judged with a view to their consequences : right if they increase benefit… which is a basic form of utilitarianism.
during the conflict of the waring states period it was totally drowned out by violent milirarism and bloodshed…. and fell out of popular textbooks on philosophy..
as for mozi.. he seems to have lived in the early fifth century bc. his ideas are preserved in the mozi text (partly lost)
he is so overshadowed by confucious that his ideas are seen in terms of the latters fundamentals. but while confucious ‘s whole thrust was strict conformity to ‘li’ 礼 教 traditional morality/ceremony, mozi looked to tian heaven and the natural order of the universe for a moral standard.
he repudiated offensive warfare and traditions he views as unjust and inutile.
he maintains a doctrine of universal love.
the confucianists must have hated him.
there has been some interest in his ideas under the current anti-confucianist regime.
talk about mill another day.. john stuart I mean..
t.f.
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