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A Cognitive Analysis of Confucian Self-Knowledge: According to TU Weiming’S Explanation

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A Cognitive Analysis of Confucian Self-Knowledge: According to TU Weiming’S Explanation A Cognitive Analysis of Confucian Self-Knowledge: According to TU Weiming’s Explanation ∗ CHI Chienchih I. Introduction Modern science and democracy, which have dramatically changed human life- styles, have both developed from the Western philosophical approach. Based on the new developments of cognitive science, however, we can now consider what we can learn from the Chinese philosophical approach. We can see that there are at least two different ways to obtain knowledge. The first is theoretical: we learn through factual statements and rules, such as “the Earth is round.” We learn this by being told. This type of knowledge is easily organized into a logical system. Scientific (also called factual or theoretical) knowledge is based on these logical systems. The second is practical: we learn through practice. Through practice, we may acquire new experiences, and based on these new experiences, we know something new.1 These two approaches involve different cognitive processes; neither of them can be used to obtain both types of knowledge. However, we can still use a scientific view to analyze both cognitive processes.2 Unlike Western philosophy, Chinese philosophy mainly adopts the second approach to obtaining knowledge. One of the main concerns in Chinese phi- losophy is about the self: how to develop oneself, how to know oneself, and even how to perfect oneself. Practice, not logical reasoning, is the primary route for achieving these goals. In one respect, Confucianism is considered to be a theory ∗ Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Kao Yuan Institute of Technology, 1821 Chung Shun Road, Luchu, Kaohsiung County 821, Taiwan; e-mail: [email protected]. Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy June 2005, Vol. IV, No. 2, pp. 267-282. © 2005 by Global Scholarly Publications. All rights reserved. ______________________________ 1 New experiences are not necessary for learning through practice. New connections between experiences may also make us learn something new. For example, a dog can learn a new thing by connecting the experience of seeing a red light and the experience of smelling food. However, in some sense, this kind of new connection can also be viewed as new experience. In this article, the term new experience is used to include this kind of new connection. 2 This distinction is known in computer science as the distinction between different ways to obtain declarative knowledge and procedural knowledge (see Miles and Moore) and in psychology as the distinction between explicit learning and implicit learning (see Reber). 268 Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy IV. 2 ________________________________________________________________ of self-perfection. For TU Weiming, self-knowledge is the Confucian way to make oneself perfect.3 He says, “To know oneself is simultaneously to perfect oneself ” (Tu 1985: 20). Without self-knowledge, one cannot perfect himself or herself. Tu says, “The possibility of perfecting oneself through the enlighten- ment of the mind without the mediating of carefully internalized methods of acquiring self-knowledge is limited” (Tu 1993: 105). According to this view, self-knowledge, or the process of coming to know oneself, can make one be- come a perfect or a profound person in the Confucian sense. How is this possible? From Tu’s point of view, to learn about the self is not only self-realization but also self-development: “Moral and spiritual self-development can be understood as a process toward an ever-deepening subjectivity” (Tu 1985: 27). This idea corresponds to an important paragraph in the first chapter of the Zhongyong, the Doctrine of the Mean: “What Heaven [Tian]) imparts to man is called human nature. To follow our nature is called the Way [Dao]. Cultivating the Way is called edu- cation” (Chan: 98). This passage is believed to describe a central Confucian thought. One of the main goals of Confucianism is to discover our nature. The learning process cultivates the Way that follows nature. As one discovers his or her nature, he or she becomes a profound (or a perfect) person.4 If we believe that there is this kind of self-knowledge that enables a person to become perfect, it is reasonable to believe that self-knowledge is not to be learned simply by being told. One of the main reasons is that a profound person, according to Confucianism, should be wise and virtuous; such a person knows how to do things properly in a certain situation. This ability can only be learned through (social) practice rather than through being told a set of facts and rules (see Dreyfus; Searle). Tu also claims that “one cannot simply convert to Confu- cianism and identify oneself as Confucian; one must become Confucian through self-transformation” (Tu, Hejtmanek, and Wachman: 10). The process of ac- quiring self-knowledge is thus also the process of self-development (or 3 Tu also uses personal knowledge to discuss Confucian teachings. For Tu, personal knowledge is different from self-knowledge. Personal knowledge is knowledge about a person not only about the self. Tu writes, “If I express the view that I know the person, I mean to suggest that I have some personal knowledge of what the person is” (Tu 1986: 19). Personal knowledge involves self-knowledge. To know a person requires some “know-how,” not just the art of human interaction, but also analogical thinking, empathetic appreciation, self-knowledge, and a host of other inter- nalized skills (Tu 1986: 19). Self-knowledge is thus necessary to acquire personal knowledge and personal knowledge has more contents than self-knowledge. However, personal knowledge does not have to be knowledge about other people. We also possess our own personal knowledge. In this sense, personal knowledge is close to self-knowledge. However, in Confucianism, our own personal knowledge cannot be separated from our knowledge of others: “the quest for one’s own personal knowledge must be understood as an act of service to the community as well” (Tu 1993: 41). In addition, he says, “self-knowledge reveals not one’s own private desires, feelings, and thoughts but the uniqueness of being human, which is shared by all members of the human community” (Tu 1993: 93). In this sense, self-knowledge is much closer to personal knowledge. It is interesting to discuss the differences and similarities between self-knowledge and Confucian personal knowledge, but in order to avoid confusion I will only focus my discussion in this paper on self-knowledge, although some of Tu’s explanations of personal knowledge are helpful for the discussion of self-knowledge. 4 Like Buddha in Buddhism, a profound person is the highest status in Confucianism. A profound person is supposed to possess self-knowledge and bring people peaceful life. Chi: A Cognitive Analysis of Confucian Self-Knowledge 269 ________________________________________________________________ self-transformation) which is learned through practice rather than simply through reading or hearing. In addition, since only the perfect person really knows himself or herself, self-knowledge is hidden from normal people. When we say that self-development or self-transformation is to acquire self-knowledge, the process of self-development or self-transformation is not a process of changing oneself, but a process of revealing one’s true self, which is supposed to be the deepest human nature. The goal of this article is to ask what kind of knowledge this is and how it possibly works. According to Tu’s explanation, I will analyze Confucian self-knowledge in its cognitive respect. Based on this analysis, I will discuss whether self-knowledge accurately describes our true self, as Tu suggests. II. TU Weiming on Confucian Self-knowledge Tu claims that the primary focus of Confucianism is self-knowledge, which is a way to make oneself a profound person. In his view, self-knowledge “is basically an understanding of one’s mental state and an appreciation of one’s inner feeling” (Tu 1985: 19). Because a profound person possesses wisdom and virtues that can be learned not simply by being told, but by a process of self-development through practice, we can say that self-knowledge is knowledge about one’s own mental states that is learned through practice. However, not all mental states are the self-knowledge that Tu indicates, because he emphasizes the true self that is hidden to most people. Only the knowledge of those mental states that reveal the true self can be properly called self-knowledge. We can thus say that Confu- cianism is a theory that can only be learned through a certain type of practice, by which we discover our true selves. Here, we find a fundamental difference be- tween Confucianism and Western philosophy. The most important philosophical knowledge in Confucianism can only be learned through practice, rather than through arguments or theories. Although virtue ethics in Western philosophy, especially in Aristotle, also mentions practice (through practice to develop vir- tues), the knowledge that can only be learned through practice does not play a fundamental role in his theories and arguments. However, if we ignore self-knowledge in Confucianism, we lose sight of one of its essential element. What kind of knowledge could Confucian self-knowledge be? Why can it only be learned through practice? Tu suggests, “self-knowledge is neither know- ing-that nor knowing-how; it is, in essence, an objectless awareness, a realization of the human possibility of intellectual intuition” (Tu 1985: 20). According to Tu, self-knowledge is a third kind of knowledge, which can be obtained through intellectual intuition. In order to understand the process of gaining self-knowledge, we must connect the concept intellectual intuition to the concept self-knowledge. In doing so, we need another concept, inner experience. Tu says, “self-knowledge is a form of inner experience” (Tu 1985: 23).
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