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Classes (Lei 類) and Individuals

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Dao Companion to Chinese Philosophy of Logic

Part of the book series: Dao Companions to Chinese Philosophy ((DCCP,volume 12))

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Abstract

This chapter explores the basic thought about classes and individuals, two core concepts in ancient Chinese logic, by analyzing the MohistCanons and the “Rectification of Name” in the Xunzi. It also discusses the relevant studies by sinologists and shows that ancient Chinese thinkers already had a very clear and deep understanding about classes, which played an important role in the early texts and later development of ancient Chinese logic. We will also point out that these two concepts are significant for recognizing the nature and characteristics of ancient Chinese logic.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Here, we need to pay more attention to the difference between Xunzi’s compound name and the Mohist collective name, because both of them were called “jianming” 兼名 in classical Chinese language. For example, the name “white horse” is a compound name in the Xunzi, while not a collective name in the Mohist Cannons.

  2. 2.

    Among them, the most serious critiques are provided by Christoph Harbsmeier, Chris Fraser and Yiu-ming Fung, etc. Harbsmeier tried to provide some examples in ancient Chinese classics to overthrow the Mass Noun Hypothesis. (Harbsmeier 1998: 312–319) Chris Fraser thought that nouns in ancient Chinese could also refer to individuals, such as the private name in the Mohist Canons (Fraser 2006: 58–107). Yiu-ming Fung criticized that Hansen’s hypothesis was only an epitaxial explanation of nouns while not processing the connotation, and when the hypothesis was used to interpret the chapters “On White Horse”(白馬論) and “On the Hard and White” (堅白論) in the Gongsun Longzi, it would distort the meaning in the text and had a result of treating Gongsun Long’s view as a violation of logic rule (Fung 1993: 161–174).

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Philosophy, Renmin University of China, Beijing, China

    Wujin Yang

  2. Department of Philosophy, Xidian University, Xi’an, China

    Wanqiang Zhang

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  1. Wujin Yang
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  2. Wanqiang Zhang
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Correspondence to Wujin Yang .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy, Tunghai University, Taichung, Taiwan

    Yiu-ming Fung

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Yang, W., Zhang, W. (2020). Classes (Lei 類) and Individuals. In: Fung, Ym. (eds) Dao Companion to Chinese Philosophy of Logic. Dao Companions to Chinese Philosophy, vol 12. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29033-7_12

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