Confucian Ethics Human Bio

3 Credits · Level: Graduate, Undergraduate

While Confucianism is a broad term encompassing a considerable range of different conceptions of human nature and how to improve it, all of them share the basic view that morality concerns a view about human nature and its cultivation aimed at enhancing the welfare of self and society by producing people of humane and admirable character. Confucianism starts with a challenge to each and every person to improve themselves and to extend the scope of their moral concern from themselves and their immediate family and friends to neighbors, society, and eventually the world at large. The ultimate aim is to move from the individual to “all under heaven” and bring peace, prosperity, and happiness to all. In this class we shall ask, how accurate, plausible, and complete are the theories of human nature that underlie the ethical thought of different Confucian philosophers? Do such theories find any support from the best psychology and cognitive neuroscience of our day? Moreover, are the normative moral claims Confucians derive from their theories of human nature universally valid, merely one variation among many possible forms of society and culture, or without any normative force (i.e. incapable of justifying the moral claims they make)? In order to achieve the ends described in the previous paragraph, this course will describe, analyze, and evaluate the theories of the two most important early followers of Kongzi (Confucius): Mengzi (Mencius) and Xunzi from the perspective of both modern science and comparative philosophy. Our aims are on the one hand, to gain a more accurate and philosophically sophisticated understanding of their views and on the other hand to bring their views into constructive conversation with other thinkers and the insights of contemporary psychology, cognitive neuroscience, anthropology, and philosophy.