Ranie B. Villaver

Critical thinking (CT) in the Philippine basic education curriculum may be said to be clearly evident in the inclusion of “Trends, Networks and Critical Thinking in the 21st Century”. The course is required in the senior high school HUMSS track. CT in Philippine education is likely based or patterned upon U.S.’s “teaching for thinking” program. In Lipman’s survey (2003), the program transitioned to “teaching for critical thinking.” The Philippines was a U.S. colony from 1898 to 1946. This historical and yet colonial reason for teaching CT appears mitigated by a seeming universal recognition of the necessity for teaching critical thinking in schools in every culture. Such recognition appears clear, for example, in Noddings (2016). Despite the existence of such a reason, however, there appears a need to supplement it with ones other than from the perspective of the west. The perspective referred to is that of Confucian ethics. Confucian ethics gives attention to good, sound reasoning (Lai 2006), which suggests an emphasis on CT. Given that, Confucian ethics likely promotes teaching of CT. The proposal here is that in the consideration of reasons or views for teaching CT in the country, a non-western point of view, that of Confucian ethics, be given a hearing.

ABSTRACT In the English language contemporary literature, there are mainly two philosophical approaches to interpretation of the Zhuangzi’s Happy Fish debate. The two approaches to the famous passage are the logical, which focuses on analysis, and the non-analytic, which focuses on context. The approaches are in tension with one another since one implies that the other is wrong. This paper suggests that the view that Zhuangzi holds an externalist view of justification according to the debate (here abbreviated as ZE) reconciles the approaches. ZE is the interpretation that says that in the debate, Zhuangzi is an externalist, in particular, a process reliabilist, because he takes sense perception as means to attaining knowledge. ZE reconciles the two approaches in that in each of them ZE is implicit. Ultimately, this paper not only offers a perspective about the two approaches, it also offers a view about the debate.

In this paper, we offer two further issues or questions for consideration in thinking about orientation in or stance about technology. We do this in the light of the Zhuangzi’s Primitivist attitude towards technology. The Primitivist is one of the five authorial voices identified in the Zhuangzi. The Zhuangzi is a Chinese philosophical classic named after Zhuang Zhou or Zhuangzi (399?-295? B.C.E.). Fundamentally, we suggest that the Primitivist attitude of resistance towards technology might be said to highlight the point that effects of technology to xing 性 (nature; human nature), thus to individual self, and the natural environment are important considerations in thinking about stance regarding technology. We hold that a reflection on technological orientation would on the whole benefit from a recognition and consideration of two more issues.

This paper takes behavioural propriety as the source of ritual or the ritualistic in indigenous philosophy in the Philippines. Filipino understanding of behavioural propriety is seen in what have been identified as elements or features of indigenous philosophy in the country. These features are stored in pre-hispanic era (pre-16th century CE) maxims or proverbs and myths. In this paper, I engage conception of behavioural propriety in Filipino philosophy with that in Confucian philosophy. In Confucian philosophy, it is “li” 禮 which relates to ritual. Li encompasses ritual propriety and behavioural propriety. It is originally about ritual or ceremony and, as understood in contemporary scholarship, it has the general meaning of proper conduct; it refers first and foremost to rules of proper conduct. In this paper, I address the question of what each understanding offers for the enrichment of the other. I suggest that importantly, Confucian understanding of li offers the view of behavioural propriety as having an ennobling function, and that Filipino understanding of behavioural propriety offers a perspective on the debate in Confucianism about whether it is ren 仁 or li that is more fundamental in Confucius’s thought. A point that appears to be present in the Filipino understanding is that propriety in behaviour cannot be separated from humaneness (ren). The point comes from the view in the proverbs that a person of ren is necessarily a person of li. Accordingly, the perspective which the Filipino understanding offers proposes the view that behavioural propriety is a necessary condition for humanity (ren).

Mencius portrayed Yang Zhu as an egoist. But the seeming consensus of scholars is that Yang Zhu was not an egoist. Despite that, however, a passage in the Lüshi chunqiu, a third century BCE text, appears to confirm Mencius’s characterization. It says that Yang Zhu valued self. In this paper, I examine the meaning of guiji. Specifically, I investigate on the term ji to reveal the meaning of guiji and elaborate on its possible implications. Ultimately, I show that with Yang Zhu’s possible conception of self, guiji does not necessarily mean egoism