PHI 101 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Laozi, Taoism, Common Source
19 Feb 2017
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Lecture 5
Daoism
• Not a method that follows steps
• Goes through the reality
• Learn how to be like the butcher
o Lao Tzu: Yin and Yang
▪ Dark and light
o Chuang Tzu
▪ Common source
▪ Ultimately one
▪ When you understand that you can return to your true being and have
perfect freedom
Arguments for this relativism
• In an absolute sense that things are relative
1. A person’s opinion change
a. Argument for relativism: there is no true opinion
2. Opposites quickly pass into one another; pleasure into pain, action into laziness
a. Pleasure isn’t really real
3. What is great and good in one circumstance can be petty or evil in another
a. There is no absolute morality, but only opportunist expedience
b. Everybody knows circumstances depends on what’s right
c. It’s not absolutely right, only in the circumstance
4. Appeal to linguistic relativism
a. All judgements of truth and error are relative to functions of language
b. People speak different languages and come from people’s culture and built in to
the culture and have a certain sense of what’s right and wrong
Immersion in Language
• Things we ordinarily distinguish are designated by words
o Words are not absolutely true
• Language is a practical device
o Communication can be successful or not successful
o Have to understand the language and the culture
• Since we are immersed in our language we don’t know how to get outside of it
Don’t impose your views on others but also don’t impose them on yourself
• He focuses on human freedom
o Be the real you
o Daoism is about finding freedom in a world of traps
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Don"t impose your views on others but also don"t impose them on yourself: he focuses on human freedom, be the real you, daoism is about finding freedom in a world of traps. Three in the morning : no change in the reality of the words, they were getting 7 acorns, allow them to get angry and have joy, let them be, but don"t do that yourself. The way allows for a variety of perspectives: life allows for the multitude of different species (like the way, let things be the way they are. Freedom as non-dependence: freedom, stoic (greek) non-dependence, the sage is perfectly free, it doesn"t depend on anything, do not be enslaved to the world, it doesn"t matter if you get honors or are rich. Being true to yourself = not having a self: here is truth to oneself, indifferent to himself, take a step back, don"t distinguish between different persons.
