The Rise of Modern Chinese Thought

Author: Wang Hui
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-08-01
Features: Wang Hui's works discuss the fundamental principles that form the modern world, such as how the "individual" became the moral or "life philosophy" foundation of the modern world, how "science" dismantled and replaced the traditional "worldview," and how modern language and expressions evolved alongside the formation and transformation of the modern world, particularly modern nation-states. Wang Hui aims to contribute to the fundamental principles of modern knowledge, and in fact, he has made his contributions precisely in this area. Wang Hui studies and questions the fundamental principles of the knowledge that describes and governs the modern world. On one hand, he revises the classical or classic applications of these principles by incorporating changes in contemporary world knowledge. On the other hand, he enriches and transforms the Western applications of these principles by integrating China's modern experience and intellectual history. Due to this achievement, the era when Chinese academia lacked "a voice" in the "fundamental principles" of modern knowledge and when modern Chinese knowledge lacked "originality" will be gone forever. We can look forward to entering an era of ideological and academic self-awareness. This book is divided into two volumes, each consisting of two parts. The first volume of the first part is titled Reason and Things, and the second volume is Principles and Anti-Principles. The first volume of the second part is titled Empire and the State, and the second volume is Science and the Community. The entire book spans 1.5 million words, starting from the Song and Ming dynasties' rites studies, analyzing the relationship between Chinese intellectual circles and social changes, and particularly examining the "scientism" concept formed from the late Qing Dynasty to the May Fourth Movement. It points out the close and complex relationship between this concept and the modern transformation of Chinese thought.