How Should One Live?: Comparing Ethics in Ancient China and Greco-roman Antiquity

352 Pages·2011·1.33 MB·English

by  R. A. H. King

How Should One Live?

How Should One Live?
Comparing Ethics in Ancient China
and Greco-Roman Antiquity
Edited by
R.A.H. King and Dennis Schilling
De Gruyter
ISBN 978-3-11-025287-3
e-ISBN 978-3-11-025289-7
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
How should one live? : comparing ethics in ancient China and Greco-Roman
antiquity / edited by R.A.H. King and Dennis Schilling.
p. cm.
“The papers published here were among those discussed in the Münchner
Kompetenzzentrum Ethik, Philosophy Department, Ludwig Maximilians
University, Munich and the Carl Friedrich von Siemens Stiftung Munich on
October 1st-3rd, 2007”—Acknowledgements.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-3-11-025287-3 (hardcover : alk. paper)
1. Ethics, Comparative. 2. Ethics, Ancient. 3. Ethics—China. 4. Ethics—Greece.
5. Ethics—Rome. I. King, R. A. H. II. Schilling, Dennis R.
BJ69.H69 2011
170.931—dc22
2010049853
Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek
The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche
Nationalbibliografi e; detailed bibliographic data are available in the Internet
at http://dnb.d-nb.de.
© 2011 Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin/Boston
Typesetting: Refi neCatch Ltd, Bungay, Suffolk
Printing: Hubert & Co. GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen
(cid:2) Printed on acid-free paper
Printed in Germany
www.degruyter.com
Acknowledgements
The papers published here were among those discussed in the Münchner
Kompetenzzentrum Ethik, Philosophy Department, Ludwig Maximilians
University, Munich and the Carl Friedrich von Siemens Stiftung Munich
on October 1st–3rd, 2007. The symposium was funded by the Fritz
Thyssen Stiftung für Wissenschaftsförderung and the Trebuth-Stiftung zur
Nachwuchsförderung in der Philosophie. Theres Lehn and Kathrin Messing
took minutes of the discussions.
This volume has been printed with fi nancial support from the Trebuth-
Stiftung zur Nachwuchsförderung in der Philosophie. Rebecca Ehrenwirth
made the General Index and the Chinese Index Locorum, David Meiβner
the Greco-Roman Index Locorum.
The editors would also like to thank Wilhelm Vossenkuhl, Hans van
Ess and Heinrich Meier for their support in organising the event, Gertrud
Gruenkorn at DeGruyter for her work bringing the book to press.
R.A.H. King, Dennis Schilling
August, 2010, Glasgow, Taoyuan

Contents
Part I Methods
1 Rudimentary remarks on comparing ancient Chinese and
Greco-Roman ethics .............................................................................3
R.A.H. King
2 Comparative ethics: some methodological considerations ..................18
G.E.R. Lloyd
Part II Ethical theory
3 Two kinds of moral relativism ............................................................25
Gerhard Ernst
Part III China
4 Harmony as a contested metaphor and conceptions of rightness
(yi) in early Confucian ethics. .............................................................37
Alan K. L. Chan
5 Why Mozi is included in the Daoist Canon – or, why there is more
to Mohism than utilitarian ethics .......................................................63
Paul R. Goldin
6 Coming to terms with dé (cid:5515): the deconstruction of ‘virtue’ and
an exercise in scientifi c morality .........................................................92
Robert H. Gassmann
7 Virtue ethics in ancient China: light shed and shadows cast .............126
Lee H. Yearley
viii Contents
Part IV Greece and Rome
8 Parrhesy and irony: Plato’s Socrates and the Epicurean
tradition .........................................................................................155
Michael Erler
9 The knowledge about human well-being in Plato’s Laches .............170
Jörg Hardy
10 Aristotle: ethics without morality? .................................................191
Johannes Hübner
11 Aristotle on friendship as the paradigmatic form of relationship ....208
Jan Szaif
Part V Comparisons
12 The Greeks and Chinese on the emotions and the problem
of cross-cultural universals and cultural relativism .........................241
G.E.R. Lloyd
13 Complexity and simplicity in Aristotle and early Daoist
thought ..........................................................................................259
David B. Wong
14 The ethics of prediction ..................................................................278
Lisa Raphals
15 Being and unity in the metaphysics and ethics of Aristotle and
Liezi ...............................................................................................304
May Sim
General index ........................................................................................323
Index of names ......................................................................................334
Index locorum - Chinese authors ...........................................................336
Index locorum - Greek and Roman authors ...........................................339
Part I
Methods