Qi Feng

This book is an abridged version of Feng Qi’s two major works on the history of philosophy, The Logical Development of Ancient Chinese Philosophy and The Revolutionary Course of Modern Chinese Philosophy. It is a comprehensive history of Chinese philosophy taking the reader from ancient times to the year 1949. It illuminates the characteristics of traditional Chinese philosophy from the broader vantage point of epistemology. The book revolves around important debates including those on “Heaven and humankind” (tian ren天人), “names and actualities” (mingshi名實), “principle and vital force” (liqi理氣), “the Way and visible things” (daoqi道器), “mind and matter/things” (xinwu心物), and “knowledge and action” (zhixing知行). Through discussion of these debates, the course of Chinese philosophy unfolds. Modern Chinese philosophy has made landmark achievements in the development of historical and epistemological theory, namely the “dynamic and revolutionary theory of reflection”. However, modern Chinese philosophy is yet to construct a systematic overview of logic and methodology, as well as questions of human freedom and ideals. Amid this discussion, the question of how contemporary China is to “take the baton” from the thinkers of the modern philosophical revolution is addressed.

This is a philosophical book about the idea of human freedom in the context of Chinese philosophy on truth, the good, and beauty. The book shows that there is a coherent and sophisticated philosophical discourse on human freedom throughout the history of Chinese Philosophy in aesthetics, ethics, and epistemology. Feng Qi discusses the development of freedom in light of the Marxist theory of practice. In the history of philosophy, the relation between thought and existence, which is fundamental to philosophy, has stimulated many debates. These debates, though they have assumed diverse forms in Chinese and Western philosophy, have eventually concentrated on three inquiries: the natural world (the objective material world); the human mind; and the concepts, categories, and laws that are representative forms of nature in the human mind and in knowledge. In Chinese philosophy, the three inquiries are summarized using three notions: qi (气 breath, spirit), xin (心 heart), dao (道 the Way). What relationship do the three notions have with each other? This book explores the way to human freedom through the divergent paths in Chinese philosophy. This book’s investigation of human activities brings the typical Chinese philosophical discourse from the cosmological realm into the realm of human beings as individuals. In this regard, the three inquiries can be described as being about real life, ideals, and individuals.