New Philosophy Lectures

Author: Zhang Shiyi
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-05-01
Features: Classroom teaching is an art, and in the hands of renowned teachers, this art often presents a rich palette and radiates captivating brilliance. In contemporary China, academic works often wear a serious face, giving the impression of being stern, and as a result, academic works always struggle to achieve their ideal reception process, leading to a significant negative impact on the popularization of academia. Is academia truly only as people expect it to be? We wish to make some positive explorations and attempts. Thus, the series "Lectures by University Masters" was born. You may not have the opportunity to listen to these masters' lectures, but with such "lecture records" in hand, it is equivalent to attending famous lectures, which should help to some regrets. This book is a transcription of the author's lectures at Peking University, a summary of his nearly 20 years of reflections on philosophical issues, covering fields beyond philosophy itself, including aesthetics, ethics, and the philosophy of history. The author advocates combining China's traditional "Oneness of All Things" with the Western modern "Subject-Object" relationship, promoting a philosophy of Sino-Western integration. He believes that philosophy is a discipline aimed at elevating the human realm, the study of elevating the human realm; philosophy does not pursue a knowledge system or the general laws of external things as its ultimate goal, but rather discusses humanity's attitude toward the world and how people live in it. The content of this book is lively and easy to understand. If in the past, one had to struggle to enter the realm of philosophy, then this book allows you to experience how philosophy can enter your life in a simple and vivid way:
Opening Address
In his opening address to the course on the history of philosophy at the University of Heidelberg in October 1816, G.W.F. Hegel (1770–1831) said the following:
"For a period of time, people have been too busy with material interests and the trivialities of daily life, 'blocking our deep and sincere engagement in philosophical work and diverting our attention from the universal focus on philosophy.' Now the situation has changed. 'We can hope that, apart from political and other interests connected with daily reality, the scientific and free rational world will also revive.'" To counter the previous 'shallow and empty' trend of dismissing philosophy, we "should rescue philosophy from its isolated state" so that in "a more beautiful era," the "human mind" can "transcend daily interests" and "humbly accept the true, eternal, and sacred things, observing and grasping the highest with a humble attitude."
Hegel's words were spoken nearly two centuries ago, but they still hold great significance for us today. —Excerpt from Lectures on the New Philosophy
Fragment: Hegel on the Distinction of Artistic Value
In the history of aesthetics, the classification of art is generally based on tangible and intangible, silent and audible, speechless and spoken. Architecture, sculpture, and painting are considered tangible arts, while music and poetry are intangible arts; architecture, sculpture, and painting are silent arts, while music is an audible art; architecture, sculpture, painting, and music are speechless arts (here, music refers to instrumental music without lyrics), and poetry is a spoken art. As for the aesthetic value of these artistic genres, who is higher and lower, it is a matter of differing opinions, each with its own merits. Here, I will focus on Hegel's classification of art, which is the most systematic, detailed, and clear in the philosophy and aesthetics of his time. His classification standard is well-known: the higher an artistic genre, the greater the degree to which the spirit overcomes matter. The more an art form is constrained by matter, the less free its spiritual activity, and the lower its artistic value. Conversely, the more an art form is free from material constraints, the more it reveals the freedom of spiritual activity, and the higher its artistic value.
A building is constructed from large stones, making its materiality the most obvious and strongest, and thus its value is the lowest. Music and poetry, on the other hand, contain the least material components, especially poetry, which is rich in spiritual and conceptual elements, making its aesthetic value the highest. From architecture, sculpture, and painting to music and poetry, it is a process where materiality decreases and spiritual freedom increases, and thus a process where artistic genres progress from lower to higher.
If Hegel's classification is applied to tangible and intangible, silent and audible, speechless and spoken standards, it can be said that intangible is higher than tangible, audible is higher than silent, and spoken is higher than speechless. For example, music occupies only time and not space, making it intangible yet audible, and thus higher than tangible and silent painting, which occupies plane space. Of course, it is also higher than three-dimensional, tangible and silent architecture and sculpture. Another example is that music and poetry are both audible, but poetry differs from music. Music is an audible but non-verbal art, while poetry is a verbal art, so poetry is higher than music.
Clearly, Hegel's artistic classification, while expressing the idea of the spirit overcoming matter, also expresses an important related view: language is higher than form and general sound; language is more capable of expressing spiritual things than form and general sound. The last traces of materiality retained by the verbal art of poetry are sound. Sound is common to both poetry and music, but in music, sound directly evokes people's inner emotions, while in poetry, sound transforms into language, becoming a symbol for expressing ideas and concepts, and thus evoking inner emotions indirectly through ideas and concepts. The superiority of language over mere sound lies in the fact that language uses its unique spiritual medium—such as concepts and sensory perceptions—to express the richness and specificity of spiritual content more clearly and concretely through the specific statements of linguistic texts. Poetry, unlike music, which only vaguely and ambiguously expresses inner life, presents a more distinct and concrete picture.
For example, when you listen to the violin or symphony of Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai without knowing the lyrics, you can only have vague and ambiguous inner feelings and emotions, but you cannot clearly understand its story. Therefore, only the verbal art of poetry possesses the highest aesthetic value. In Hegel's view, language, compared to the marble used in architecture, the plaster used in sculpture, the colors used in painting, and the sounds used in music, is more capable of expressing the richness and specificity of spiritual content. Hegel's idea clearly implies that language can also express the meaning of things. Since, according to Hegel's fundamental view, the universe and all things form a spiritual whole—the "Absolute Spirit"—and language is the perfect expression of spiritual content, then the meaning of all things in the universe must be closely related to language.
Thus, we can fully say that Hegel's ideas paved the way for the contemporary Western philosophy that holds the view that both humans and all things derive their meaning from language. Of course, it cannot yet be said that it has reached the explicit conclusion of Heidegger's "The world is only where language is." Hegel said: "Language has permeated everything that is intrinsic to humans, penetrating everything that makes humans what they are." This passage by Hegel indicates that he recognized that the intrinsic nature of humans is language, coming close to Heidegger's argument that "human existence is based on language." However, Hegel did not elaborate on this idea, nor did he reach the conclusion that all things in the universe are open and meaningful because of language. His belief that music, painting, sculpture, and architecture are inferior to poetry because they are not language shows that he had not yet reached the conclusion of contemporary Western philosophy.
In fact, all things in the world possess linguistic qualities. There is no self-existing world outside of language, and no independent existence apart from language. This view is not only advocated by the philosophers of the contemporary Western humanistic trend but is also held, to some extent, by certain analytic philosophers in the United States and Britain in different ways. In the life world where humans and all things are integrated, not only do humans have language, but all things also have linguistic qualities, though other things are "speechless speech." Artworks all possess linguistic qualities. When I say "linguistic qualities," I use the word "quality" to indicate "speechless speech." Hegel's view that tangible architecture and sculpture are inferior artistic genres shows that he did not understand "speechless speech" and did not recognize that architectural art also has linguistic and poetic qualities. As for Hegel's so-called higher artistic genres—music and painting—these, in my view, can even more clearly reveal their nature as verbal art. For example, modern abstract painting emphasizes the formation of beautiful melodies and rhythms through the width of points and lines, the density of organization, the speed, weight, order of brushstrokes, and subtle changes in color, transforming a tangible and silent painting into an intangible and audible music, which is closest to verbal art. Many famous Western abstract paintings can be said to be both tangible and silent paintings and intangible and audible music. Their paintings are music painted.
As for Chinese painting, which emphasizes poetry within painting, this can more directly illustrate the verbal artistic quality of painting. Whether it is abstract painting or Chinese painting with poetry, I believe they are both "speechless speech." Traditional Chinese art, in addition to emphasizing poetry within painting, also emphasizes painting within poetry. Hegel recognized this point as well, referring to the higher artistic genres as including the lower ones, such as poetry within painting, poetry within music, and music within painting. However, Hegel did not see that his so-called lower artistic genres, such as painting and music, also contain the higher artistic genre of verbal art, containing poetry. Hegel did once say: "Poetry is the universal art," because poetry requires "imagination" (Phantasie, imagination is not merely the general simple concept itself [Vorstellung], but a concept processed by art), and imagination is the common foundation of all artistic genres. These words of Hegel seem to suggest that all artistic genres are poetic and possess linguistic qualities. However, Hegel believed that in poetry, imagination requires the expression of concepts through language and the beautiful combination of language, rather than through marble, plaster, colors, and the sounds of music. Therefore, in the final analysis, in Hegel's view, the linguistic quality of poetry remains something that other lower artistic genres—architecture, sculpture, painting, and music—lack. Thus, we can still say that Hegel did not understand that all other artworks, beyond poetry, also possess linguistic and poetic qualities.
Going further, I believe that not only do all artistic genres possess the nature of verbal art, but even natural beauty has linguistic qualities. In the world where humans and all things are integrated, beautiful nature is also speaking, of course, in the form of "speechless speech." I am certainly not an idealist, and I do not deny that nature exists independently of humans. But the question is how nature manifests itself to humans. Different natural objects reveal different meanings and implications to humans, meaning that different natural objects speak differently to humans; the same natural object speaks differently to different people; for a person without a head or mind, natural objects are silent; for a person without aesthetic awareness, natural beauty does not exist; for people with different aesthetic tastes, the same natural object manifests as different natural beauties, meaning that the same natural object speaks differently to people with different aesthetic sensibilities. I even believe that natural objects like flying sand and stones can possess the beauty of verbal art, depending on how the poet presents them. According to Hegel's view, inorganic matter is fundamentally incapable of possessing natural beauty.
In short, to say that nature is beautiful, to say that nature is beautiful, means that nature reveals beauty to people with poetic sensibilities, meaning that nature is speaking, speaking in the form of "speechless speech."
A Ci poem by Feng Yanji of the Southern Tang Dynasty:
"Rain pours wildly, the March dusk is upon us,
The door is shut, dusk falls, no way to hold spring.
With tears in my eyes, the flowers do not speak,
Chaotic red petals fly past the swing."
Here it seems to say that flowers are natural objects, without language. But the line "With tears in my eyes, the flowers do not speak" precisely implies that in the late March, falling flowers are speaking of the scene where red fades and fragrance is gone. "The flowers do not speak" means that the flowers can speak but choose not to. Does the poet "tear at the flowers with tears in my eyes" not mean that the flowers are speaking to the poet? Though the flowers "do not speak," they still answer: "Chaotic red petals fly past the swing." A scattering of disordered fallen petals fly past the swing—this only makes people's sense of sorrow for the passing of time and pity for the fleeting even stronger.
In conclusion, all artworks, all works with aesthetic value, are linguistic in the presence of humans. Then, what are they speaking of? A simple answer is that all art represents the infinite through the finite, speaking of the infinite, or transcending the finite. The difference in aesthetic value, the difference in the value of artworks, the difference in poetic realms, lies in the size of the space being spoken, the size of the space being transcended, and the imaginative space left for people.