Download or read book Confucianism and the Philosophy of Well Being written by Richard Kim and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-01-21 with total page 165 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Well-being is topic of perennial concern. It has been of significant interest to scholars across disciplines, culture, and time. But like morality, conceptions of well-being are deeply shaped and influenced by one’s particular social and cultural context. We ought to pursue, therefore, a cross-cultural understanding of well-being and moral psychology by taking seriously reflections from a variety of moral traditions. This book develops a Confucian account of well-being, considering contemporary accounts of ethics and virtue in light of early Confucian thought and philosophy. Its distinctive approach lies in the integration of Confucian moral philosophy, contemporary empirical psychology, and contemporary philosophical accounts of well-being. Richard Kim organizes the book around four main areas: the conception of virtues in early Confucianism and the way that they advance both individual and communal well-being; the role of Confucian ritual practices in familial and communal ties; the developmental structure of human life and its culmination in the achievement of sagehood; and the sense of joy that the early Confucians believed was central to the virtuous and happy life.

Download or read book Confucian Perfectionism written by Joseph Cho-wai Chan and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2015-12-29 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since the very beginning, Confucianism has been troubled by a serious gap between its political ideals and the reality of societal circumstances. Contemporary Confucians must develop a viable method of governance that can retain the spirit of the Confucian ideal while tackling problems arising from nonideal modern situations. The best way to meet this challenge, Joseph Chan argues, is to adopt liberal democratic institutions that are shaped by the Confucian conception of the good rather than the liberal conception of the right. Confucian Perfectionism examines and reconstructs both Confucian political thought and liberal democratic institutions, blending them to form a new Confucian political philosophy. Chan decouples liberal democratic institutions from their popular liberal philosophical foundations in fundamental moral rights, such as popular sovereignty, political equality, and individual sovereignty. Instead, he grounds them on Confucian principles and redefines their roles and functions, thus mixing Confucianism with liberal democratic institutions in a way that strengthens both. Then he explores the implications of this new yet traditional political philosophy for fundamental issues in modern politics, including authority, democracy, human rights, civil liberties, and social justice. Confucian Perfectionism critically reconfigures the Confucian political philosophy of the classical period for the contemporary era.

Download or read book The Path written by Michael Puett and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2016-04-05 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For the first time, an award-winning Harvard professor shares his wildly popular course on classical Chinese philosophy, showing you how ancient ideas—like the fallacy of the authentic self—can guide you on the path to a good life today. Why is a course on ancient Chinese philosophers one of the most popular at Harvard? Because it challenges all our modern assumptions about what it takes to flourish. Astonishing teachings emerged two thousand years ago through the work of a succession of Chinese scholars exploring how humans can improve themselves and their society. And what are these counterintuitive ideas? Transformation comes not from looking within for a true self, but from creating conditions that produce new possibilities. Good relationships come not from being sincere and authentic, but from the rituals we perform within them. A good life emerges not from planning it out, but through training ourselves to respond well to small moments. Influence comes not from wielding power but from holding back. Excellence comes from what we choose to do, not our natural abilities. In other words, The Path “opens the mind” (Huffington Post) and upends everything we are told about how to lead a good life. Its most radical idea is that there is no path to follow in the first place—just a journey we create anew at every moment by seeing and doing things differently. “With its…spirited, convincing vision, revolutionary new insights can be gleaned from this book on how to approach life’s multifarious situations with both heart and head” (Kirkus Reviews). A note from the publisher: To read relevant passages from the original works of Chinese philosophy, see our ebook Confucius, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi: Selected Passages, available wherever books are sold.

Download or read book Contemporary Confucian Political Philosophy written by Stephen C. Angle and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2013-04-17 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Confucian political philosophy has recently emerged as a vibrant area of thought both in China and around the globe. This book provides an accessible introduction to the main perspectives and topics being debated today, and shows why Progressive Confucianism is a particularly promising approach. Students of political theory or contemporary politics will learn that far from being confined to a museum, contemporary Confucianism is both responding to current challenges and offering insights from which we can all learn. The Progressive Confucianism defended here takes key ideas of the twentieth-century Confucian philosopher Mou Zongsan (1909-1995) as its point of departure for exploring issues like political authority and legitimacy, the rule of law, human rights, civility, and social justice. The result is anti-authoritarian without abandoning the ideas of virtue and harmony; it preserves the key values Confucians find in ritual and hierarchy without giving in to oppression or domination. A central goal of the book is to present Progressive Confucianism in such a way as to make its insights manifest to non-Confucians, be they philosophers or simply citizens interested in the potential contributions of Chinese thinking to our emerging, shared world.

Download or read book The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Well Being written by Guy Fletcher and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-07-30 with total page 1231 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The concept of well-being is one of the oldest and most important topics in philosophy and ethics, going back to ancient Greek philosophy. Following the boom in happiness studies in the last few years it has moved to centre stage, grabbing media headlines and the attention of scientists, psychologists and economists. Yet little is actually known about well-being and it is an idea that is often poorly articulated. The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Well-Being provides a comprehensive, outstanding guide and reference source to the key topics and debates in this exciting subject. Comprising over 40 chapters by a team of international contributors, the Handbook is divided into six parts: well-being in the history of philosophy current theories of well-being, including hedonism and perfectionism examples of well-being and its opposites, including friendship and virtue and pain and death theoretical issues, such as well-being and value, harm, identity and well-being and children well-being in moral and political philosophy well-being and related subjects, including law, economics and medicine. Essential reading for students and researchers in ethics and political philosophy, it is also an invaluable resource for those in related disciplines such as psychology, politics and sociology.

Download or read book Theorizing Confucian Virtue Politics written by Sungmoon Kim and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2020 with total page 253 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Makes Mencius' and Xunzi's political thought accessible to political theorists, philosophers and scientists with no expertise in classical Chinese or sinology.

Download or read book Confucianism and American Philosophy written by Mathew A. Foust and published by SUNY Press. This book was released on 2017-03-15 with total page 196 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A comparative analysis of Confucianism and the American Transcendentalist and Pragmatist traditions. In this highly original work, Mathew A. Foust breaks new ground in comparative studies through his exploration of the connections between Confucianism and the American Transcendentalist and Pragmatist movements. In his examination of a broad range of philosophers, including Confucius, Mencius, Xunzi, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Charles Peirce, William James, and Josiah Royce, Foust traces direct lines of influence from early translations of Confucian texts and brings to light conceptual affinities that have been previously overlooked. Combining resources from both traditions, Confucianism and American Philosophy offers fresh insights into contemporary problems and exemplifies the potential of cross-cultural dialogue in an increasingly pluralistic world. “Authoritative and insightful, this book fills two lacunae in East-West comparative studies. First, it rounds out several general thematic connections by taking a broad view, rather than focusing narrowly on just one figure from each tradition. And, in so doing, it sheds much needed light on Confucian comparisons that have been previously understated or completely unnoticed.” — Christopher C. Kirby, editor of Dewey and the Ancients: Essays on Hellenic and Hellenistic Themes in the Philosophy of John Dewey

Download or read book Confucianism written by Daniel K. Gardner and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2014 with total page 153 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume shows the influence of the Sage's teachings over the course of Chinese history--on state ideology, the civil service examination system, imperial government, the family, and social relations--and the fate of Confucianism in China in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, as China developed alongside a modernizing West and Japan. Some Chinese intellectuals attempted to reform the Confucian tradition to address new needs; others argued for jettisoning it altogether in favor of Western ideas and technology; still others condemned it angrily, arguing that Confucius and his legacy were responsible for China's feudal, ''backward'' conditions in the twentieth century and launching campaigns to eradicate its influences. Yet Chinese continue to turn to the teachings of Confucianism for guidance in their daily lives.

Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Political Leadership written by R. A. W. Rhodes and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2014-05-29 with total page 905 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Political leadership has made a comeback. It was studied intensively not only by political scientists but also by political sociologists and psychologists, Sovietologists, political anthropologists, and by scholars in comparative and development studies from the 1940s to the 1970s. Thereafter, the field lost its way with the rise of structuralism, neo-institutionalism, and rational choice approaches to the study of politics, government, and governance. Recently, however, students of politics have returned to studying the role of individual leaders and the exercise of leadership to explain political outcomes. The list of topics is nigh endless: elections, conflict management, public policy, government popularity, development, governance networks, and regional integration. In the media age, leaders are presented and stage-managed--spun--DDLas the solution to almost every social problem. Through the mass media and the Internet, citizens and professional observers follow the rise, impact, and fall of senior political officeholders at closer quarters than ever before. This Handbook encapsulates the resurgence by asking, where are we today? It orders the multidisciplinary field by identifying the distinct and distinctive contributions of the disciplines. It meets the urgent need to take stock. It brings together scholars from around the world, encouraging a comparative perspective, to provide a comprehensive coverage of all the major disciplines, methods, and regions. It showcases both the normative and empirical traditions in political leadership studies, and juxtaposes behavioural, institutional, and interpretive approaches. It covers formal, office-based as well as informal, emergent political leadership, and in both democratic and undemocratic polities.

Download or read book The Confucian Philosophy of Harmony written by Chenyang Li and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-10-30 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Harmony is a concept essential to Confucianism and to the way of life of past and present people in East Asia. Integrating methods of textual exegesis, historical investigation, comparative analysis, and philosophical argumentation, this book presents a comprehensive treatment of the Confucian philosophy of harmony. The book traces the roots of the concept to antiquity, examines its subsequent development, and explicates its theoretical and practical significance for the contemporary world. It argues that, contrary to a common view in the West, Confucian harmony is not mere agreement but has to be achieved and maintained with creative tension. Under the influence of a Weberian reading of Confucianism as "adjustment" to a world with an underlying fixed cosmic order, Confucian harmony has been systematically misinterpreted in the West as presupposing an invariable grand scheme of things that pre-exists in the world to which humanity has to conform. The book shows that Confucian harmony is a dynamic, generative process, which seeks to balance and reconcile differences and conflicts through creativity. Illuminating one of the most important concepts in Chinese philosophy and intellectual history, this book is of interest to students of Chinese studies, history and philosophy in general and eastern philosophy in particular.

Download or read book A History of Six Ideas written by W. Tatarkiewicz and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 396 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The history of aesthetics, like the histories of other sciences, may be treated in a two-fold manner: as the history of the men who created the field of study, or as the history of the questions that have been raised and resolved in the course of its pursuit. The earlier History of Aesthetics (3 volumes, 1960-68, English-language edition 1970-74) by the author of the present book was a history of men, of writers and artists who in centuries past have spoken up concerning beauty and art, form and crea tivity. The present book returns to the same subject, but treats it in a different way: as the history of aesthetic questions, concepts, theories. The matter of the two books, the previous and the present, is in part the same; but only in part: for the earlier book ended with the 17th century, while the present one brings the subject up to our own times. And from the 18th century to the 20th much happened in aesthetics; it was only in that period that aesthetics achieved recognition as a separate science, received a name of its own, and produced theories that early scholars and artists had never dreamed of.

Download or read book Confucian Bioethics written by Ruiping Fan and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2006-04-11 with total page 314 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume explores Confucian views regarding the human body, health, virtue, suffering, suicide, euthanasia, `human drugs,' human experimentation, and justice in health care distribution. These views are rooted in Confucian metaphysical, cosmological, and moral convictions, which stand in contrast to modern Western liberal perspectives in a number of important ways. In the contemporary world, a wide variety of different moral traditions flourish; there is real moral diversity. Given this circumstance, difficult and even painful ethical conflicts often occur between the East and the West with regard to the issues of life, birth, reproduction, and death. The essays in this volume analyze the ways in which Confucian bioethics can clarify important moral concepts, provide arguments, and offer ethical guidance. The volume should be of interest to both general readers coming afresh to the study of bioethics, ethics, and Confucianism, as well as for philosophers, ethicists, and other scholars already familiar with the subject.

Download or read book Confucian Ethics written by Kwong-Loi Shun and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2004-09-13 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A comparative study of the Confucian and Western view of the self.

Download or read book The Philosophy of Well Being written by Guy Fletcher and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-04-14 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Well-being occupies a central role in ethics and political philosophy, including in major theories such as utilitarianism. It also extends far beyond philosophy: recent studies into the science and psychology of well-being have propelled the topic to centre stage, and governments spend millions on promoting it. We are encouraged to adopt modes of thinking and behaviour that support individual well-being or 'wellness'. What is well-being? Which theories of well-being are most plausible? In this rigorous and comprehensive introduction to the topic, Guy Fletcher unpacks and assesses these questions and many more, including: Are pleasure and pain the only things that affect well-being? Is desire-fulfilment the only thing that makes our lives go well? Can something be good for someone who does not desire it? Is well-being fundamentally connected to a distinctive human nature? Is happiness all that makes our lives go well? Is death necessarily bad for us? How is the well-being of a whole life related to well-being at particular times? Annotated further reading and study and comprehension questions follow each chapter, and a glossary of key terms is also included, making The Philosophy of Well-Being essential reading for students of ethics and political philosophy. This title is also suitable for those in related disciplines such as psychology, politics and sociology.

Download or read book The Ethics of Confucius and Aristotle written by Jiyuan Yu and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-05-24 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As a comparative study of the virtue ethics of Aristotle and Confucius, this book explores how they each reflect upon human good and virtue out of their respective cultural assumptions, conceptual frameworks, and philosophical perspectives. It does not simply take one side as a framework to understand the other; rather, it takes them as mirrors for each other and seeks to develop new readings and perspectives of both ethics that would be unattainable if each were studied on its own.

Download or read book The Wrong of Rudeness written by Amy Olberding and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2019-07-01 with total page 201 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In a time of fractious politics, being rude can feel wickedly gratifying, while being polite can feel simple-minded or willfully naïve. Do manners and civility even matter now? Is it worthwhile to make the effort to be polite? When rudeness has become routine and commonplace, why bother? When so much of public and social life with others is painful and bitterly acrimonious, why should anyone be polite? As Amy Olberding argues, civility and ordinary politeness are linked both to big values, such as respect and consideration, and to the fundamentally social nature of human beings. Being polite is not just a nicety--it has deep meaning. Olberding explores the often overwhelming temptations to incivility and rudeness, and the ways that they must and can be resisted. Drawing on the wisdom of early Chinese philosophers who lived through great political turmoil but nonetheless avidly sought to "mind their manners," the book articulates a way of thinking about politeness that is distinctively social. We can feel profoundly alienated from others, and others can sometimes be truly terrible, yet, as the Confucian philosophers encourage us to see, because we are social, neglecting the social and political courtesies comes at perilous cost. The book considers not simply why civility and politeness are important, but how. It reveals how small insults can accumulate to damage social relations, how separating people into tribes undermines our better interests, and how even bodily and facial expressions can influence our lives with others. Many of us, in spite of our best efforts, are often tempted to be rude, and will find here tools for fighting that temptation.

Download or read book Virtue Ethics and Confucianism written by Stephen Angle and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-07-24 with total page 330 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume presents the fruits of an extended dialogue among American and Chinese philosophers concerning the relations between virtue ethics and the Confucian tradition. Based on recent advances in English-language scholarship on and translation of Confucian philosophy, the book demonstrates that cross-tradition stimulus, challenge, and learning are now eminently possible. Anyone interested in the role of virtue in contemporary moral philosophy, in Chinese thought, or in the future possibilities for cross-tradition philosophizing will find much to engage with in the twenty essays collected here.