## 1. Background and General Considerations



It is generally recognized today that Chinese philosophy in its
classical period was much more preoccupied with articulating and
supporting philosophical positions through sustained rational
discourse than was previously assumed. Part of the reason for this
oversight in decades past was due to the loss or neglect of ancient
texts critical to the understanding of early Chinese ideas on language
and logic, particularly the writings of the later Mohists, who
developed a sophisticated school of philosophical and scientific
thought in the third century BCE, but whose writings were rediscovered
by philologists only in the late Qing dynasty (1644-1912). In
addition to meticulously developing scientific theories about
geometry, mechanics, optics, and economics, the later Mohists also
articulated detailed philosophical theories in areas we now recognize
as logic, epistemology, metaphysics, and the philosophy of language.
Their writings on language and logic are particularly noteworthy,
since the later Mohists appeared to treat these disciplines as
embodying a subject matter worthy of independent study, and they
devoted more attention to issues about language and logic than any
other school of thought of the same period. One finds in later Mohist
writings, for instance, the only detailed exposition of *bian*
(disputation), the style of argumentation or debate likely practiced
in all major schools of thought in ancient China (Fraser 2013). The
later Mohists aspired to become more proficient practitioners of
*bian* by taking it more conscionably as an object of study,
and carefully articulating, in the context of a general theory, the
terms, rules, and methods for its practice.



A second reason for this oversight is in the fact that those writings
of classical Chinese philosophers that did largely survive the
vicissitudes of history--particularly the major works of Daoists
like Zhuangzi and Laozi, but also those writings attributable to
Confucius and his philosophical descendants--tend to embody what
appear to be unfavorable appraisals of, or at least alternatives to,
philosophical methods that rely heavily on suppositions about the
power of discursive rationality at establishing true ethical,
metaphysical, or scientific principles. Such methods take for granted
the aptitude of the human intellect to logically deduce true,
informative statements about particular objects, events, or states of
affairs from general propositions, or establish correct
generalizations by induction from particular instances, a practice
less self-consciously avowed in most philosophical traditions in China
that were (unlike Mohism) stimulated by centuries of well-established
sociocultural practices. Arguably, much of the interest we see in the
study of logic in early Western philosophy was stimulated by the
supposition of a dichotomy between appearance and reality, which
prompted philosophers to wonder whether judgments or theories about
what appears to us do or do not correspond to the structure or content
of a mind-independent, objective reality. The obvious case is Plato,
whose analysis of Forms was inspired by the methods of Euclidean
geometry with the intention that it be carried out in a realm of
abstraction largely unimpeded by the diffuse and problematic content
of sense experience. Aristotle lamented the fact that Plato's
methods suffered from limited applicability to the varieties of
experiential phenomena, believing instead that the content of
perception does not pose any special problems for the reliability of
judgment, but he retained a fundamental interest in the theory of
representation and hoped that his system of logic would provide proper
normative standards for drawing inferences among the categories we use
to identify things.



Most Chinese philosophers who lived after the unification of China in
221 BCE, which was largely dominated by Confucianism after a brief
period of suppression initiated by the First Emperor Qin Shi Huang, do
not appear to have had any special distrust of the content of the
senses, or were not responding to those who did, and so were not
compelled to view the veracity of representation as a problem of
significance. Consequently, scholars have variously characterized
Chinese philosophical thought in ways that contrast it with Western
preoccupations with discursive rationality. It is common, for example,
to view early Chinese philosophers as largely preoccupied with
problems centering on the proper governance of society and how
citizens ought to conduct themselves within it. As much as in any
other major philosophical tradition, the early Chinese philosophers
were concerned with questions about what kind of life is worth living
and what things, circumstances, or actions are to be regarded as
ultimately valuable. Their philosophical investigations led them to
conceptualize ideals of right conduct, appropriate behavior, and
social propriety (Hall and Ames 1987). But the methods they employed
to establish these ideals tended to emphasize reasoning by example
from the actions or conduct of key moral exemplars rather than
deducing particular judgments of practical action from general
principles. For this reason they were more preoccupied with
identifying proper normative standards by which to judge the
similarity or resemblance of a thing or action with that of a chosen
standard. Arguably, this encouraged a conception of logic based mostly
on methods of inductive, analogical reasoning, given their special
concern with the problem of resemblance, and this view is borne out to
a large extent in the Mohists' more self-conscious appraisals of
their own methodology and in the modes of reasoning they use to
illustrate it (Yuan 2012; Fraser 2013).



Moreover, the Mohists' term for reasoning or disputation,
*bian*, appears in most other major philosophical texts of the
Classical (or pre-Han) era, suggesting broad similarities in use. The
term is generally understood to mean "distinguishing" or
"drawing distinctions", although in its more specific uses
we find it variously understood as a process of conceptualizing
similarities and differences, discriminating objects in acts of
perception, appealing to normative linguistic standards for naming
objects, and using the normative criteria of correct naming as a
proper guide to action (Fraser 2013). At the heart of these uses there
appears to be a basic preoccupation with the philosophical importance
of identifying the similarities and differences of things and events,
a process largely determined by cognitive skills associated with
pattern recognition. Unlike Aristotle, however, whose methods of
classifying things depended on assumptions about metaphysically real
essences (independent of human agency), the early Chinese philosophers
put the burden of correct discrimination at least partly on what they
deemed to be appropriate normative standards, based on the efficacy
with which they were thought to guide action. That is to say, which
similarities and differences they thought were relevant depended on
whether they were thought to guide action in a way that is consistent
with general moral principles about right conduct. A central purpose
of the ethical investigations of the Mohists, for example, was to
identify general standards of judgment that would reliably and
impartially guide action in a way that produces beneficial
consequences, and they appealed to *bian* as the principal
human faculty for determining how these standards would play out in
specific cases. Practical reasoning was conceived as an ability to
respond appropriately on the basis of inferences drawn by analogy from
various preconceived exemplars or models of moral action. According to
Book 4 of the *Mozi*:



> 
> 
> Those in the world who perform tasks cannot do without models
> (*fa*) and standards. There is no one who can accomplish their
> task without models and standards. Even officers serving as generals
> or ministers, they all have models; even the hundred artisans
> performing their tasks, they too all have models.
> 
> 
> 



On the other hand, the Mohists do not seem to have found any reason to
doubt the assumption that this appeal to normative standards of
discrimination (standards relevant to the efficacy of moral action) is
still grounded in the identification of real similarities and
differences among objects, patterns of experience or perception that
could in principle be identified by any competent individual with
dependable cognitive, perceptual, and linguistic capacities.



This way of summarizing the Mohist philosophical enterprise does leave
unanswered important questions about the ultimate justification of
ethical claims. Early Chinese thought does not provide an explicit
distinction between fact and value, so it is a matter of controversy
to determine which has epistemic priority in Mohist thought--the
normative standards by which the correct uses of language guide
behavior, or the evaluations of reason that are determined by our
ability to ascertain real similarities and differences in perception
and thought. This problem is perhaps less controversial in the
interpretation of Confucian philosophy because the priority of
normative standards in the Confucian program of ordering names is
attested by clear examples. It is evident, for instance, in section
1B/8 of the *Mencius*, which acknowledges the admissibility of
killing a wicked ruler in spite of the prohibition of regicide, on the
premise that this ruler is not *really* a king (or does not
warrant the name "king"). The Confucian view is that
anyone who *is* a king *ought* to act like one;
otherwise the name is unwarranted. Hence, correct naming is also a
prescription for conduct.



One can appreciate, in this regard, why the Confucians insisted that
the correct use of names is a matter for authority to decide, because
only an appropriate authority can justify how one ought to act. This
authority was assumed to be found in the forms of ritual propriety
(*li*) that were the common ingredients of established
traditions, or in the judgments or discretions of "virtuous
gentlemen" or other exemplars of moral conduct, and in this
regard was considered to be - if not universal - then at least
constant, dependable and unifying. But the Mohists were skeptical, not
hesitating to point out that tradition was not a strong enough
criterion for proper action. They knew, for instance, that social
practices vary and conflict dramatically across time and place; how
can they all be "righteous"? Something independent of
these practices had to decide to serve as an objective criterion of
moral conduct. It is noteworthy that the Mohists themselves did appeal
to an authority of sorts, in the abstract, quasi-godlike entity they
referred to as Heaven (*tian*), which they deemed to be the
most perfect moral agency. They referred to this agency as
 "Heaven's intention"
 (*tian zhi*), believing that it could serve as the basis of an
authority independent of the variable and opposing opinions and social
practices of people. But in later Mohist writings, particularly the
*Mohist Canons*, we find no mention of this agency, possibly
because the Mohists found that their conception of it was not
substantive enough to discriminate things at the level of
philosophical precision that they sought to address. Whatever the
case, they essentially divorced the justification of action from any
authoritative individual or entity that would otherwise serve to
establish it, and this raised new philosophical concerns about how the
norms of conduct and language use were to be decided. Central to
Mohist ethical thought are the principles of utility (an action is
right depending on whether its consequences are useful) and universal
love (the usefulness of an action is determined by the impartial
beneficence it contributes to public welfare). So, according to the
Mohists, the moral description of an action depends partly (indeed,
largely) on whether it contributes to these ends, or whether these
ends may be judged appropriately analogous to the consequences of the
actions of a moral exemplar. But the judgment of similarity here may
itself depend on preexisting normative standards of correct use
independently of considerations of utility. Safe to say that since the
Mohist Canons do not explicitly address the issue of convention in
language, or its role in the justification of principles of naming,
the Mohists were probably undecided on this point. Not until the
philosophy of Xunzi do we find a clear consideration of this issue,
but Xunzi avoids the hard questions it exposes by deferring to the
more fastidious judgments of an intellectual elite.



It should be noted that those who rejected the Mohists' views
often concentrated their objections on the logical presuppositions of
the Mohists' methodology of disputation by pointing out
counterexamples to the kinds of analogical inferences that the Mohists
were inclined to take for granted. A.C. Graham, for instance, who did
more than any other Western philosopher at reconstructing and
analyzing Mohist philosophical doctrines about language and logic in
the early decades following their rediscovery by Chinese philologists,
nevertheless described the opposing Daoist philosophies (particularly
as espoused in the *Zhuangzi*) as "anti-rational",
representative of an "assault on reason", a
"rejection", and even "mockery", of logic
(Graham 1989). Yet some argue that a great many of the Daoist
objections one finds in the *Zhuangzi* are motivated more by a
general skepticism about the possibility of identifying invariable
standards of discrimination in language than about ineradicable
defects in the very human capacity for reason. One can be a skeptic,
for instance, about the role of necessity in reference without having
anything disparaging to say about our ability to evaluate the
consistency of a theory on logical grounds or reject it by the method
of *reductio ad absurdum*. A number of scholars have even
claimed that Daoism, in particular, is not the anti-rational
philosophy it has been taken to be, but in some ways an attempt at
carrying the methods of reason to their ultimate limits, much as
Wittgenstein in his *Tractatus* attempts to tease out the
boundary of the sayable through sustained rational reflection.
Zhuangzi, for all his skepticism about the utility of natural language
as a medium for the representation of truth and inclinations towards
mysticism, might nonetheless have still venerated reason,
independently of language, as the principal mode of thought through
which one is able to discern right conduct in accordance with the Dao
(or Way). This view is controversial, but scholars have not been
averse to it (cf. the general view of Wing-tsit Chan: "He is
mystical, but at the same time he follows reason as the leading
light", 1963: 177), and there seems to be an increasing interest
in its viability (e.g., Alt 1991). Evidence for it is considered in
 section 4
 below.



It is clear that even if Daoism and other schools of thought
positioned *vis-a-vis* Mohism in ancient China were in
some sense "anti-rational" in orientation, their views
were not developed in isolation but were in fact a consequence of
prolonged social contact and interaction with Mohist philosophers, and
so could not have developed without being amply informed by their
opponents' methods and views. This fact alone demands caution
when making general statements about the logical and linguistic views
of early Chinese philosophers working outside the Mohist tradition.
One can easily discern an increasing sophistication in methods of
disputation in traditions that did not exhibit a great interest in
thematizing language and logic independently of other philosophical
pursuits, and this should not surprise us given the tumultuous period
in which these traditions developed and the contentious struggles of
their adherents for varying positions of social status and privilege.
Mengzi, for example, seeking to defend key ideas in Confucian thought,
goes beyond his forebears in advancing views on the goodness of human
nature by appealing to more sharply formulated premises about innate
dispositions for feeling and moral judgment against those asserting
that human nature is inherently neutral (2A6, and see Shun 1997 for an
extensive analysis of argumentation in the *Mencius* text). By
the time Xunzi enters the fray near the end of the Warring States
period we find rebuttals to Mencian thought that dig deep into what it
is to have a disposition, how dispositions inform the possibilities of
human behavior, and how we ought to act in response to them (e.g.,
*Xunzi*, Book 23). Far from simply explaining his views, Xunzi
marshals highly intelligible theories of semantics and reference in
their defense, and he explicates these theories with punctilious
definitions that are marked improvements over earlier formulations.
According to Cua 1985, methods of disputation reach their highest
point in the writings of Xunzi, who in no small way benefited from the
standards of rigor that had emerged out of the ongoing disputes of his
predecessors.



These developments notwithstanding, it is still important to recognize
that the demise of Mohism following the Warring States period appears
to have squelched philosophical interest in the study of language and
logic mostly until modern times, when it was revived in 1894 the
writings of Sun Yirang (Graham 2003 [1978]: 70-2). Matters are
complicated by the fact that logic as a unique object of study or
discipline disentangled from other philosophical pursuits was
historically awakened in Chinese philosophical thought only after the
introduction of Western philosophical notions and methods in the
16th and 17th centuries. The Jesuit scholar
Matteo Ricci, who first arrived in China in 1583, brought more than
Western science and literature; he introduced Euclid's
*Elements* to the Chinese and arranged a translation of it with
the assistance of the Chinese scholar Xu Guangqi. For these reasons,
considerable caution has to be exercised in any attempt to reconstruct
the philosophical views of classical Chinese philosophers about
language and logic, to avoid anachronistically imposing notions that
were not part of their original philosophical programs (Garrett 1993).
Debates surrounding these issues are very much alive today, with
contemporary scholars of Chinese philosophy tending to fall on one or
the other side of the general dispute about whether it is appropriate
to utilize concepts, terms, distinctions, modes of expression, or
methods of analysis that may have been of foreign origin to interpret
the works of classical Chinese philosophers (see the entry
 comparative philosophy: Chinese and Western
 for further discussion).



It is indisputable that early Chinese philosophers of all major
schools of thought were, at various points in their philosophical
development, preoccupied to lesser and greater degrees with issues
central to the philosophical studies of language and logic. However,
whether they pursued these issues in ways that were similar to, or
very different from, Western or other foreign orientations is a matter
on which no general consensus has been reached. Common notions in the
philosophical study of language include, for example, meaning, truth,
reference, assertion, speech act, and propositional structure, notions
that may or may not translate successfully into the vocabulary
employed by early Chinese philosophers, given radical linguistic and
cultural differences.



Likewise, logic, construed as the study of inference, may have to be
conceived differently from traditional Western accounts, given early
Chinese philosophers' rather unique approach to reasoning about
language as a normative guide to ethical judgment and action (for
example, as based on the doctrine of the ordering of names). It is not
at all clear that early Chinese philosophers had a conception of logic
that involved the typical notions of truth, validity, entailment,
consistency, and so forth. Normally, an inference is conceived as a
rule-bound transition of some kind from one sentence-like
structure--a proposition, statement, or sentence--to
another, and is considered valid if it preserves truth. However, there
is some dispute about whether early Chinese philosophers were
preoccupied with truth as a semantic concept, and even whether they
considered sentences to be units of linguistic significance. On the
other hand, contemporary developments of logic have opened up new
vistas in the study of ancient ideas. Our primary concern in logic
need not be the preservation of truth, and different conceptions have
been developed in which various conditions of satisfiability are
employed, with "validity" appropriately redefined. Caveats
such as these admonish us to be open to alternative accounts of logic
when interpreting the views of early Chinese philosophers, and to
exercise caution when representing these views in contemporary
nomenclature.



Needless to say, any solution to this debate will have to remain open
not only to research in the history of Chinese philosophy but also to
advances in the general studies of language, logic, cognition and
human nature. Given the universality of language and logic as human
capacities or objects of use, can we assume that philosophers
interested in these topics will invariably identify, uncover, or
utilize analogous concepts, presuppositions, or methods, regardless of
time, place, culture, or historical context, or that with conceptual
advances in their understanding of these topics, their views will
invariably converge? Answers to these questions will inform the
methodologies involved in contemporary research on classical Chinese
thought, by compelling us to interpret the writings of early Chinese
philosophers from perspectives motivated by assumptions about either
shared or divergent presuppositions, as the case may be.


## 2. Confucius and the Ordering of Names



The Mohists are generally credited with the first systematic study of
language in ancient China, but the inspiration for putting language at
the center of philosophical thought certainly comes from Confucius
(551?-479? BCE). Against prevailing skepticism and apathy,
Confucius insisted that the correct use of language is essential to
the order and harmony of society, and that the conditions by which
language is correctly used devolve upon determining how names
(*ming*) designate objects, events, and actions. However, the
correct use of names is not simply a matter of attaching labels to a
preexisting domain of things independent of human affairs. That is, it
is commonly recognized that Confucius viewed language as having not
simply a descriptive function, but a fundamentally performative one as
well. Attributing names to objects is not a matter of describing the
world, but of influencing it in a way that causes certain modes of
interaction and existence to be realized. One can do this poorly,
contributing to the degradation of social relationships and
one's relationship with nature, or skillfully, in a way that
contributes to social harmony and prosperity. The skillful use of
language depends on the extent to which one's use of it reflects
a conscientious awareness of the meanings and values that are
essential to acting effectively. This goes hand-in-hand with the
realization that acting on behalf of these meanings and values is
itself constitutive of the very relational efficacy one seeks to
establish.



In understanding this performative aspect of language one can
appreciate why Confucius held that the ordering of society must begin
with the ordering of names. A famous exchange in the *Analects*
explains:




"Were the Lord of Wey to turn the administration of his state
over to you, what would be your first priority?" asked Zilu.



"Without question it would be to insure that names are used
properly (*zheng ming*)", replied the Master.



"Would you be as impractical as that?" responded Zilu.
"What is it for names to be used properly anyway?"



"How you can be so dense!" replied Confucius. "An
exemplary person (*junzi*) defers on matters he does not
understand. When names are not used properly, language will not be
used effectively; when language is not used effectively, matters will
not be taken care of; when matters are not taken care of, the
observance of ritual propriety (*li*) and the playing of music
(*yue*) will not flourish; when the observance of ritual
propriety and the playing of music do not flourish, the application of
laws and punishment will not be on the mark; when the application of
laws and punishments is not on the mark, the people will not know what
to do with themselves. Thus, when the exemplary person puts a name to
something, it can certainly be spoken, and when spoken it can
certainly be acted upon. There is nothing careless in the attitude of
the exemplary person toward what is said". (*Analects*
13.3; tr. Ames and Rosemont 1998)




Scholars have often translated Confucius' expression *cheng
ming* as "rectification of names", but this
translation has been widely supplanted with "ordering of
names" to more explicitly reflect the continuously dynamic and
creative aspects of language use. Hall and Ames favor this latter
translation, objecting to the former's suggestion that the
correct use of names is a matter of conforming to preexisting
conventions of proper use, "rectifying" one's
behavior in light of these conventions. The moral dilemmas we face are
context-dependent and continuously undergoing transformation, so
effective moral action must be motivated by an awareness of these
contexts and assume different courses where appropriate. Accordingly,
while the Confucian ideal of moral conduct involves an unflagging
respect for cultural institutions and the rituals embodied in them, it
also requires "selectivity and creative synthesis", and
the recognition that "inherited wisdom and institutions must be
constantly revamped to accommodate the shifting circumstances of an
always unique world" (Hall and Ames 1987: 271-2).



Although this doctrine brought language to the forefront of
philosophical inquiry, systematic *debate* on its function and
proper use did not begin until the Mohists gained prominence as
Confucianism's chief adversary. Departing from Confucian
orthodoxy, the Mohists endeavored to justify their ethical views
independently of established customs on the basis of general
principles, the articulation of which demanded a comprehensive theory
of naming and reference.


## 3. Mohist Views on Logic and Language



The Later Mohist writings in which logic and language are provided the
most extensive treatment are the entire four chapters of Book 10 and
the first two chapters of Book 11 of the *Mo Zi* (chapters
40-5, collectively referred to as the Mohist *Canons*).
The chapters of Book 10 are known by the titles *Jing Shang*
(*Canons I*), *Jing Xia* (*Canons II*), *Jing
Shuo Shang* (*Expositions of the Canons I*), and *Jing
Shuo Xia* (*Expositions of the Canons II*). In Book 11, we
have the *Da Qu* (*Greater Selection*) and the *Xiao
Qu* (*Lesser Selection*). The text of the *Canons*
leaves a great deal unsaid; there are missing segments and obvious
textual errors, and interpretations of a number of critical passages
have exhibited widespread disagreement. For convenience, this entry
follows the widely recognized numbering system presented in Graham
2003 [1978], which pairs each *Canon* with its corresponding
*Exposition* and identifies the passages from each pair by
numbers prefixed with the letters A and B. (For instance, passage B40
of the *Canons* is from *Canons II*.) Graham's
work also reconstructs the *Da Qu* and the *Xiao Qu*
into a single corpus entitled *Names and Objects* (*NO*)
(Graham 2003 [1978]), although there is controversy in his
reconstruction of the *Da Qu* as a single body of writing,
given the fragmentary state of many of its key sections.


### 3.1 Basic Logical Notions



A great deal of scholarship on Mohist logic in the past 50 years has
been devoted to explicating Mohist texts with the purpose of
identifying basic similarities with Western logical notions or
principles (e.g., Zong 2000), or arguing that among the Mohists'
basic aims was a program for developing a formal theoretical apparatus
comparable to, say, Aristotle's categorical logic or the
elementary propositional logic of the Stoics (e.g, Zhang and Liu
2007). Alternatively, it has been claimed that embodied in the
Mohists' account of disputation (*bian*) was in fact a
theory of logical analysis motivated by a desire to deduce particular,
informative statements about the world from general propositions
(Harbsmeier 1998). According to Harbsmeier, "The aim of logical
analysis was to establish a correct description of the
world".



In spite of textual errors and incompleteness, there is no dearth of
material in Mohist texts that is highly suggestive of these
similarities. In developing their views on disputation from its
logical roots, the Mohists appear to have made conscientious and
regular use of logical operators that are commonly found in
today's propositional calculi, including conjunction
(*yu*), disjunction (*ruo*), a variety of articles and
verbs for negation (e.g., *wu*, *fei*, *bu*), and
implication (variously indicated with *ze*, *ran hou*,
and other devices). They gave special attention to quantificational
notions, taking "no" or "none" (*mo*)
as a primitive (or undefined) notion and in A43 defining
"all" (*jin*) in terms of it: "All is none
not being so" or, in modern notation, \(\forall x\varphi\
=\_{\mathit{df}}\ \mathrm{N}x\mathord{\sim}\varphi\). Furthermore, in
their *Greater Selection* (*Da Qu*), they use
"all" to define "some": "Some is not
all" (*NO*5), quite possibly with the definition
\(\exists x\varphi\ =\_{\mathit{df}}\ \mathord{\sim}\forall
x\mathord{\sim}\varphi \) in mind (although textual incompleteness
warrants caution on this point; Robins 2010 translates it as
"Some is not exhaustive"). They employed special terms for
modality, using *bi* (necessity), for example, as an adverbial
relation between two things, where one can be said to be the necessary
complement of another (e.g., elder brother and younger brother). And
some scholars have suggested that the Mohists took steps toward
formalizing their logical views by conscientiously employing variables
and other devices that are capable of functioning in the same
grammatical role, such as indefinite and demonstrative pronouns (e.g.,
Liu and Zhang 2010). These views are plausible, but support for them
is hampered by the fact that the texts do not present them in an
organized fashion, but mention them variously in passing as other
views more central to their theoretical program are developed.


### 3.2 Principles of Reason and Inference



Beyond these superficial similarities with the basic logical notions
of contemporary formal-theoretical systems, there is a great deal of
material in the Mohist *Canons* that is indisputably concerned
with articulating logical principles, but whose interpretation is
still highly debatable. Scholars have extrapolated from Mohists texts
versions of principles common to Western systems of symbolic logic,
such as basic rules of inference (*modus ponens*, *modus
tollens, hypothetical syllogism*), necessary and sufficient
conditions, the laws of non-contradiction and excluded middle, and
*reductio ad absurdum*. Intriguingly, we also find what appears
to be a formulation of the liar paradox, first attributed in the West
to Eubulides in the 4th century BCE: "To claim that
all saying contradicts itself is self-contradictory. Explained by:
what he says himself" (B71). It is hard to believe that the
Mohists had anything in mind here but a precise notion of logical
inconsistency.



Observations such as these might encourage the view that the later
Mohists were uncovering basic principles of reasoning that we all
share, regardless of culture or history. For instance, using their
stock examples of "ox" and "non-ox" for
contrary terms, the Mohists assert of any general kind that



> 
> 
> [o]ne calling it "ox" and the other "non-ox"
> is "contending over claims which are the converse of each
> other",
> 
> 
> 



and that



> 
> 
> [s]uch being the case, they do not both fit the fact. (A74)
> 
> 
> 



If these statements are really about converse *claims*, as
Graham's translation contends (e.g., "This is an
ox", and "This is a non-ox"), then the Mohists
appear be to asserting something quite like a version of the principle
of non-contradiction formulated in Aristotle's
*Metaphysics*, in which it is stated of any two contradictory
propositions that they cannot both be true simultaneously (IV 6
1011b13-20, Kirwan 1993). Moreover, B35 appears to recognize
that they cannot both be false ("To say that there is no winner
in disputation necessarily does not fit the fact"), suggesting a
version of the principle of excluded middle.



Still, it is hasty to assume any resemblance here amounts to an
equivalence. Aristotle's principles are grounded in a theory of
predication that is anything but neutral with respect to the basic
structure of a proposition. A categorical proposition has a
subject-predicate structure that partly determines whether or not it
is true, and this structure contributes to the explanation of the
assertoric force of this proposition when asserted. There is no clear
evidence that the Mohists were making a point here about truth, if
truth is conceived as a semantic property of propositions that have a
subject-predicate structure. Indeed, some scholars have rejected the
idea that a subject-predicate structure is a necessary condition of
sentences of even contemporary Chinese, let alone is classical forbear
(e.g., Han 2009). Tiles and Yuan (2004) argue that the
subject-predicate structure of Aristotle's categorical
propositions only makes sense against the backdrop of a classificatory
system in which things are categorized in terms of genera and species,
something absent in early Chinese philosophers' emphasis on
context-dependent relationships among things in varying fields of
focus. That is, to assert "This is an ox" is not to
identify a substance in terms of a species of things to which it
belongs, but to make an association between one thing and other things
with the same name according to a presupposed criterion or standard,
which varies depending on the context in which the association is
made. More fundamentally, A.C. Graham claims that the proposition was
a philosophical discovery only of the later Mohists, with their
earlier counterparts primarily interested in teasing out the
philosophical implications of individual terms and their combinations
in expressions (2003 [1978]). But in his view this discovery did not
lead to an analysis of subject-predicate structure. Chad Hansen (1983)
even rejects the view that early Chinese philosophers were concerned
with articulating theories of truth, suggesting instead that their
primary focus was on the pragmatic, behavior-guiding functions of
language, and how these functions contribute to normative views about
proper ethical discourse and conduct.



These important questions aside, it is clear that the Mohists had a
primary interest in determining the conditions under which two or more
objects may be regarded as the same (*tong*) or different
(*yi*). Correlatively, they looked for conditions in which an
object is admissibly characterized as of a certain kind. This prompted
the Mohists to recognize names of different types, three in
particular: unrestricted (*da*), classifying (*lei*),
and private (*si*). In A78 the Mohists assert that
"naming something 'horse' is classifying it",
and that "for 'what is like the object' we
necessarily use this name", indicating that the name
'horse' applies to a class of objects that are in some
sense relevantly similar. By contrast, "naming someone
'Zang'" (or, say, the proper name
'Jack') "is 'private'", a
"name which stays confined to this object". Names that are
"private" refer to single individuals and no others. These
two kinds of names are distinguished from the universal
'thing', of which the Mohists assert, "any object
necessarily (*bi*) requires this name".



With this, the Mohist art of disputation concentrates on pairs of
complementary names (e.g., "ox" and "non-ox")
to determine which is admissibly applied to an object. Together, the
two names in each pair partition all that exists into two mutually
exclusive categories. Any given object is in one or the other category
of each pair, but not both. Accordingly, the names of each pair cannot
both "fit" the object, nor can it be the case that neither
fits. It is in these terms that the Mohists recognized what we would
identify as the principles of non-contradiction and excluded middle.
Their primary interest is with naming and reference, and only
consequentially are they drawn into reflections on meaning. In an act
of reference, one's utterance of "This is an ox"
might be explained as the expression of a proposition in a speech act
with assertoric force. But this explanation depends on a general
theory about the relation between reference and meaning, something the
Mohists did not explicitly investigate. Their increasing interest in
how names combine into meaningful wholes may have put them on the
verge of developing such a theory, but their focus remained mostly at
the level of particular acts of naming and uses of words. This makes
it an open question whether or to what extent the logical principles
underwriting their specific views on reference, and their general
theory of language, are adequately characterized in Aristotelian terms
or in some other way.



Inference is commonly understood as a syntactic operation on the form
of a sentence or assertion that preserves the semantic property of
truth. Aristotle's logic, in which validity is determined by an
argument's categorical form independently of the truth of its
premises and the semantics of its terms, is an example. Like most
other early Chinese philosophers, the Mohists do not appear to have
conceived of valid inference in this way. Even as they gave increasing
attention to matters of logical or grammatical form, they remained
skeptical that different categories of form can be regarded as an
invariable guide to meaning. In particular, they were consistently
wary of assuming that the meaning of a sentence or complex is
determined by the meanings of its constituent parts and their modes of
combination. For this reason they maintained that valid inference is
partly a semantic affair, hinging on our consideration of the
idiosyncrasies of meanings in combination. So rather than developing a
theory of inference strictly on the basis of appeals to logical or
linguistic form, they instead sought to develop a viable
classification of what they took to be valid inference patterns based
on analogies in the semantics of terms in combination (see
 section 3.4
 below).



This prioritizing of semantics over formal logic had the effect of
encouraging a rather different conception of argumentation based
mainly on patterns of analogical reasoning, which the Mohists referred
to as *bian*. Fraser 2013 argues that *bian* is
understood in classical Chinese texts with an assortment of meanings
of different levels of generality. Broadly speaking, it refers to
processes of reasoning and disputation, basic operations of cognition,
and the means by which we acquire knowledge. But in its more specific
use it involves correlating things based on their similarities and
differences, and drawing conclusions from the distinctions thus
established. Given that objects are found to resemble one another in
different ways, we correlate them consistently only in virtue of a
model or standard (*fa*), which the Mohists define in A70 of
the *Canons* as "that in being like which something is
so". By ascertaining the resemblance relation between other
objects and the standard, we apply the name consistently and identify
a class. Thus, to answer the question of whether or not we should
predicate of something *x* the name *G*, the Mohists
would typically identify a model *m* (a particular object) for
*G*, and then inquire whether *x* resembles the model.
If it does, then they would assert "*x* is
*G*" as a consequence.



The Mohist conception of valid inference may depart from many Western
accounts in another way as well. Given their prevailing tendency to
regard the action guiding significance of language as its principal
function, the Mohists were likely compelled to think of the semantic
property that is preserved in valid inference not simply in
descriptive terms, but in normative ones as well. It is for this
reason that scholars of early Chinese philosophy often prefer to
translate the Chinese evaluative term *ke* as
"admissibility", as opposed to "truth", since
the Mohist conception of the correct use of a sentence was closely
tied to presuppositions about proper social conduct. In this way,
valid inference was construed as having complex justificatory import.
For instance, in claiming that an action *x* is humane
(*ren*) by its resemblance with the conduct of a sage, one is
also providing justification for it as such, because one is asserting
in the act of naming that it resembles the model for humane action,
and resembling this model is the very condition that justifies calling
it such. (Recall again that naming something is classifying it, such
that for anything else that is like it one is obligated to use the
same name.) Moreover, asserting that *x* is humane justifies
the claim that it *ought to be recognized* as such, because the
model which it resembles (in being a *model*) is the very
justification for how the name ought to be used. Its resemblance
carries with it the normative requirement that language users
recognize it as such, for that is what would be expected of a language
whose principal function is to guide behavior and encourage proper
social conduct. Arguably, the English terms "admissible"
and "inadmissible" come closer to capturing this notion
than the more neutral terms "truth" and
"falsehood".


### 3.3 Methods of Application and Problems



Given this appeal to resemblance for valid inference, we can perhaps
see why the Mohists' semantical investigations took priority
over the analysis of logical form. Determining whether *x* is
*G* depends on whether it resembles the model *m*, but
objects can resemble one another in different ways, and imperfectly.
To use one of the Mohists' own examples, a man may resemble the
chosen standard of a "black man" because he has black
hair, but we would not for that reason call him a black man. He would
have to resemble the standard "in the appropriate way"
(*yi*), as determined by a criterion (*yin*)
(A95-7). Similarly, a square piece of wood resembles a
carpenter's T-square (taken as a model) in virtue of its
squareness, not its being wood (B65). A horse is big not because its
eyes are big, but because its body is, whereas it is blind because of
its eyes, not its body (*Xiao Qu* [*NO*18]). The Mohists
generally identify these criteria by appeal to discriminations
directly evident in perception or based on ideas parasitic on acts of
perception (such as the mental image of a square). But *bian*
is more than just a term for the discriminatory acts of perception; it
is about the business of naming objects in virtue of appropriate
discriminations, and the application of a name cannot be regarded as
correct without an appeal to its semantic content. This is less
evident with simple terms like "horse" or
"square", whose practical applications are plain enough to
preclude any conscious reflection on meanings. But it was surely at
the forefront of the Mohists' minds in their consideration of
terms with abstract content and complex expressions, like
"beneficence", "utility", and "universal
love".



For instance, a consequence of the Mohists' doctrine of
universal love is that "loving people" (*ai ren*)
requires loving all people without exception, a criterion that is
quantificationally different from that of "riding horses"
(*cheng ma*), which requires only that a person ride at least
one horse (*Xiao Qu* [*NO*17]). These expressions are
similar grammatically, but the Mohists analyzed their quantificational
content differently, something not given merely in the analysis of
perception. So the Mohists' research program was one of
coordinating similarities and differences given in perception with
divisions determined in the analyses of the semantics of terms. The
result is the determination of criteria that fix the relations between
objects and their chosen models (cf. A97). To be sure, questions
abound in attempting to suitably refine these criteria to apply them
consistently (the perceptual content of the world may be infinitely
complex), but this is precisely what gave the Mohists'
philosophical research program its impetus. (For a fascinating essay
on issues arising out of attempts at modeling in modern nomenclature
Mohist conceptions of reasoning about *yi*, see Liu, Seligman,
and van Benthem 2011.) For the Mohists, such practical concerns with
the relations between names and objects superseded investigations into
logical form.



On the other hand, while the analysis of logical form might not have
been the Mohists' primary theoretical concern, we should not
take this to imply that their philosophical pursuits did not involve
ample deductive reasoning. Lucas 2020 provides several examples of
argumentative passages from Mohist texts that appear "almost ready
made" for formalization and which are easily regimented in a way that
demonstrates either their deductive validity or inductive soundness.
Indeed, the Mohists seem to have presupposed as a *paradigm* of
good reasoning a form of inference that is purely deductive. Note that
the Mohists assert "*x* is *G*" as a
consequence of *x*'s resemblance with the model
*m* for *G*, but this only follows logically with the
addition of a further general principle, something like
"Anything *x* that resembles the model *m* for
*G* is *G*". This principle might not have been
rendered explicit in their logical investigations, but their assertion
that *x* is *G* does not follow without its
presupposition or something logically equivalent to it, and they did
make a distinguished place for quantifiers among their basic logical
notions. So assuming that the model for *G* is *m*, the
Mohists appear to have taken the following (or something equivalent to
it) as a paradigmatic form of reasoning formally justifying the
application of names to objects:




Anything resembling the model *m* for *G* is
*G*.



Something *x* resembles *m*.



Therefore, something *x* is *G*.




This argument is deductively valid, and it seems highly improbable
that the Mohists were not employing something like it in their
assertions about the correct methodology for resolving disputes by
*bian*. So, it would be highly misleading to say that the
Mohists were simply not doing logic of the kind with which we are
familiar today. That they were not formalizing a theory of logical
form does not imply that they were not engaged in rigorously defending
their views on the basis of principles that involve or presuppose
valid deductive reasoning and other basic methods of logic. To be
sure, that the Mohists did not articulate this pattern of reason
explicitly could support the claim that their use of it was little
more than a trivial exercise of our unconscious aptitude for deductive
reason, and hence unwarranted as a distinctive feature of their
philosophy. Even if this is true, however, its consistency with the
text makes it not unlikely that they were on the verge of discovering
it, for they did endeavor to provide analyses of linguistic form,
which point in the direction of formalization, and with the apparent
intention of testing theories about various patterns of inference (see
 section 3.4
 below).



Going with this idea, it has been suggested that the Mohists did
realize a distinction between predicates and singular terms in their
classification of names: recall that in A78 *lei* refers to
names that classify (they may be true or admissible of many things,
like predicates), whereas *si* refers to names that are fixed
to individual objects (like singular terms). When we add the Mohists'
third category, unrestricted (*da*), we have a set of names
that Lucas (2020) identifies as corresponding to the three basic
syntactic categories that are common to the notations of formal logic:
individual variables (whose values may be unrestricted), predicates
(whose values are determined extensionally by classes), and individual
constants (or singular terms, whose values are fixed to individual
objects). This gives us some liberty, at least, for thinking of simple
Mohist statements in terms of the basic form of predication
"\(F(a)\)", and even for allowing for the use of
quantifiers and variables, \(\forall x(\textit{F}x)\)and \(\exists
x(\textit{F}x)\).



It was noted above that for the Mohists our capacity to correlate
objects in various ways is exercised when we name particular objects
and then apply these names to all objects that are analogous to them.
We correlate objects consistently in virtue of a model *fa*
("that in being like which something is so") (A70), and we
identify a class from this model by ascertaining the resemblance
relation between it and other objects. Indeed, according to Graham, by
identifying an object as a "horse" based on its
resemblance with the standard for horses, we are in effect treating
the name *ma* ("horse")



> 
> 
> as an abbreviation of "something which is like the
> object", the object being the particular for which the name is
> ordained. (2003 [1978]: 325)
> 
> 
> 



Hence, on this interpretation, when the Mohists say *you ma*
("There is a horse"), or \(\exists x(\textit{Horse}(x))\),
they are, in effect, making an assertion that the particular object to
which they are referring is such that it correctly resembles the model
for horses. (The term *you* would have been taken to imply
existence.) That is to say,



(P1)
There is an object *x* such that *x* resembles the
model *m* for horses.


We can extend this idea to assertions of Classical Chinese of the form
'*F G ye*', which we gloss here as "All
*F* are *G*", or "*F* are
*G*" (with *F* functioning as a generic
quantifier). For example, taking the expression *bai ma*
("white horse") to represent "any *x* that
resembles the model \(m\_1\) for white horse" and *ma*
("horse") for "any *x* that resembles the
model \(m\_2\) for horse", the basic form of the assertion
"White horses are horses" would be:



(P2)
Any *x* that resembles the model \(m\_1\) for white horse
resembles the model \(m\_2\) for horse.


This seems to captures the Mohists' view for basic nominal
assertions, but there are problems with it, however. Resemblance is
normally construed as a relation that is both reflexive and symmetric.
Notice that the model \(m\_1\) for white horse resembles itself, if
\(\forall x(\textit{Resembles}(x,x))\) is assumed. In virtue of P2,
the model \(m\_1\) resembles the model \(m\_2\). Since the color white
is irrelevant to the criterion required for the resemblance to
\(m\_2\), it must be in virtue of its shape that \(m\_1\) resembles
\(m\_2\). (Shape is a common example the Mohists use to distinguish
horses when color is irrelevant.) But then, given symmetry,



\[ \forall x\forall y(\textit{Resembles}(x,y) \leftrightarrow \textit{Resembles}(y,x)), \]


\(m\_2\) resembles \(m\_1\), by the same criterion. This would warrant
the conclusion that any model \(m\_i\) that satisfies the requisite
criterion of shape for "horse" would warrant the name
"white horse", regardless of its color. Hence, a model
that is brown would warrant the name "white horse".



These are undesirable consequences of this view, but they do follow on
standard analyses of resemblance. Did the Mohists really intend it
this way? More careful exegesis suggests probably not, but scholarship
on Mohist thought has tended to gloss over semantic subtleties in
failing to recognize that in Classical Chinese the term for
resemblance (*tong*) is highly polysemous, with different
meanings that the Mohists endeavored to distinguish (Fung 2020b). In
A86-7 of the *Canons* the Mohists articulate four
distinct senses of sameness or resemblance (*tong*), along with
difference (*yi*), corresponding roughly to the notions of
being identical, being the units of a whole or class, constituting the
same object, and being of the same kind:



Sameness: Identical, as units, as together, as of a kind.



Note the inclusion of identity; the Mohists use *tong*
variously much in the way the copula "is" functions in
English. What is obvious from the explanations they provide of these
terms is that, however much their stock illustrations appeal to acts
of perception, the Mohists are using their technical term
*tong* much more broadly than mere perceptual likeness. They
include identity, as noted, as when two names refer to the same thing
or have the same extension (*gou* "dog" and
*quan* "canine" were typical examples). Moreover,
not only may two horses appear alike perceptually (being of the same
shape or having four legs), but a hand may be "the same
as" Mozi (being a part of Mozi) or the same as another part of
Mozi, the hardness and whiteness of a stone may be the same in partly
constituting the same object ("as together"), and Mozi may
be "the same as" a human (in that he is "of the
kind" human). These examples make it evident, moreover, that
*tong* was intended to cover both mereological and member-set
relations (cf. Fraser 2007). Such relations are obviously not always
symmetrical, and while there is no direct evidence that the Mohists
were perplexed by the specific problem posed above, it is evident that
their own definitions provided them with various means of
response.



For purposes here, one way to do this is to adopt the generic notion
of an admissible substitute, taking care to provide criteria of
admissibility that is inclusive enough to capture the points in the
analysis above. For instance, any white horse can stand as an
admissible substitute for the model for "horse", but it is
not true that any horse can serve as an admissible substitute for
"white horse".



(P3)
Any *x* that is an admissible substitute for the model
\(m\_1\) for *F* is an admissible substitute for the model
\(m\_2\) for *G*.


Why do some things count as admissible substitution instances but not
others? More specifically, what is it in virtue of a thing that makes
it "resemble" something else? The Mohists do give many
illustrations of relevant criteria, making it evident that there are
different kinds; shape, color, and function are common examples. As
noted above, we judge the squareness of a piece of wood by the
similarity of its shape with a carpenter's T-square, and say
that a horse is white because of its color, not its shape. We also
judge that a horse is blind because its eyes are impaired in their
function.



Indeed, given that the Mohists did not claim to provide an exhaustive
list of these criteria, and that the text refers to them mainly by way
of example (T-squares, blind horses), the door is open to the view
that virtually anything can stand as a criterion of resemblance and
may even be regarded as "appropriate" depending on the
context of reference.



Mou (2016) argues that the Mohists identified these criteria through
features of salience in variable fields of cognitive focus: an aspect
of a thing can stand as a criterion of resemblance provided only that
we, as language users, single it out either through an act of
perception or through a mental act in which one's attention is
concentrated inward (such as on a mental image). Furthermore, this
aspect may be used appropriately in that the judgments we make may be
true or false depending on whether it is singled out in such an
attentive act. For example, the judgment "A white horse is not a
horse" may be deemed false if the salient aspect of our mental
focus is on the "horse-ness" feature of each entity
indicated (white horse and horse). But it may also be deemed true if
the salient aspect is "whiteness", since whiteness is a
feature that may be true of some horses but not others.



Mou's account situates this view in the context of an account of
reference that requires two joint determinants in every referential
act: (1) an undifferentiated semantic-whole that is referred to
independently of any particular aspect or feature, and (2) a
particular aspect or feature that is rendered salient by our faculties
of attention. Mou argues that this dual-reference account provided the
Mohists with the flexibility to determine the truth or falsehood of
judgements variously by situating each determination in a context that
arises out of the many - perhaps infinite - ways in which
we can identify things. At the same time, this account was also
intended to provide an objective ground for the determination of the
truth of our judgments by requiring that reference (and correlatively
our knowledge of the identities of objects) be determined in each act
by a mind-independent whole from which any particular aspect is
identified.



Whether or not the Mohists held anything like this dual-reference
account, it is clear that which criteria the Mohists found relevant
depended on what they found "appropriate" in comparisons
of things, and the identification of these criteria was no doubt both
a central part of the Mohists' research program and a source of
ongoing controversy in debates with their opponents. But given the
subtlety with which the Mohists analyzed their key terms, they seem to
have been increasingly sensitive to the worry that no exhaustive list
is possible.



Moreover, they were aware that simple terms might have complex or
polysemous meanings, and that the problems of analysis are compounded
as terms are combined into larger expressions. As a result, it became
increasingly evident that complex expressions of the same grammatical
form can have different conditions of satisfaction. An example from
the *Lesser Selection* (*Xiao Qu*) noted above comes
from their analysis of the expressions "loving people"
(*ai ren*) and "riding horses" (*cheng
ma*):



> 
> 
> Loving people requires loving all people without exception, only then
> is this called loving people. Not loving people does not require
> loving no people at all; it is (rather) not loving all people without
> exception, and by this it is called not loving people. Riding horses
> does not require riding all horses without exception; it is (rather)
> riding some horses, and by this it is called riding horses. But not
> riding horses does require riding no horses at all; only by this is it
> called not riding horses. These are cases in which something applies
> without exception in one case but not in the other. (*Xiao Qu*;
> tr. Graham 2003 [1978])
> 
> 
> 



The Mohists are pointing out here that the predicate "loves
people" is satisfied only by those who happen to love all
people, whereas the predicate "rides horses" is satisfied
by anyone who happens to ride at least one horse. By the same token,
the predicate "does not love people" is satisfied by
anyone who fails to love at least one person, whereas the predicate
"does not ride horses" requires that one ride no horses at
all. To take another example, the Mohists observe that the name for
"both" (*ju*) works differently in combination with
different names; we say "They both fight" (*ju
dou*), but not "They both are two" (*ju er*).
Again, while the name *fu* means "husband" on its
own, its combination with *yong* yields the sense "brave
man" (*yong fu*) without any reference to a husband,
indicating that complex meanings are not necessarily mere products of
their constituent parts (B3). Revelations such as these prompted what
is aptly characterized as a linguistic turn in Mohist philosophy, as
the Mohists concentrated their attention on language itself and the
implications its grammatical forms have on the analysis of
meaning.


### 3.4 The Mohist Linguistic Turn



The Mohist program was beset with two basic kinds of problems. First,
in the domain of reference, the Mohists encountered difficulties in
their method of "extending kinds". This was the problem of
identifying appropriate salience conditions in perception and thought
to serve as criteria for naming the similar similarly and the
different differently. Second, in the domain of meaning, they faced
unexpected questions in their evaluations of the meanings of names in
complex expressions, suggesting problems in extending their theory of
reference from simple terms to complex expressions on the assumption
that the latter are to be treated compositionally. One can see how the
Mohists' preference for reasoning by analogy, and the problems
beleaguering their quest for certainty, would have encouraged them to
adopt the same orientation with respect to the study of language
itself, its grammatical forms and their implications for meaning. They
turned their attention to the study of language in hopes that more
sophisticated analyses of meaning would help resolve some of the
problems afflicting their account of reference. But one would also
expect the Mohists to remain apprehensive here about making general
statements, just as they found was necessary in their analysis of
reference, and this is exactly what we find in the later writings of
the *Canons*, particularly in the *Lesser Selection*
(*Xiao Qu*), the compilation most noteworthy for its novel
insights in the study of language.



On the surface, the Mohist program for language is to put together an
inventory of parallel linguistic constructions with the expectation
that the logic implicated in their meanings will at least partly track
their grammatical form. But the Mohists' recognition that
judgments about resemblance involve uncertainty convinced them that
any method of disputation based on analogies in grammatical form is
not inherently reliable. They explain:



> 
> 
> Things have respects in which they are similar, yet it doesn't
> follow that they are completely similar. Parallels between expressions
> are correct only up to a point. When things are "so",
> there is that by which they are "so". Their being
> "so" is the same, but that by which they are
> "so" isn't necessarily the same. When people accept
> things, there is that by which they accept them. Their accepting them
> is the same, but that by which they accept them isn't
> necessarily the same. Hence, expressions in analogies, parallelizing,
> "pulling", and "pushing" become different as
> they proceed, become dangerous as they change direction, fail when
> taken too far, and separate from their root as they flow, and so one
> cannot be careless and cannot invariably use them. Thus statements
> have many methods, separate kinds of different reasons, and so one
> cannot look at only one side. (*Lesser Selection* [*Xiao
> Qu*])
> 
> 
> 



The Mohists are crisscrossing here between reference and meaning,
between the problems they observe in their analogical theory of naming
and those they now identify in their theory of linguistic parallels.
Presumably, the Mohist expression "being so"
(*ran*) is a reference to "being of a certain
kind", and "that which makes it so" refers to the
conditions under which a thing is admissibly considered to be of that
kind. Recall the Mohist observation that objects may resemble one
another but not be of the same kind, because they do not resemble one
another "in the appropriate way". Here the Mohists appear
to be making the correlative point that two objects may be of the same
kind ("their being 'so' is the same"), while
the conditions that warrant their being treated as of the same kind
are not necessarily the same. In the domain of meaning, the Mohists
are making the same point: expressions in language may have the same
grammatical form, but the conditions by which they are admissibly
applied might be different.



The passage quoted above makes a passing reference to four techniques
of disputation commonly recognized by the Mohists and their
interlocutors. The four techniques are listed explicitly in the
*Lesser Selection* with explanations:




Analogy (*pi*): "Bringing up other things and using them
to clarify it"



Parallelizing (*mou*): "Comparing expressions and jointly
proceeding"



Pulling (*yuan*): "Saying, 'You are so. How is it
that I alone cannot be so?'"



Pushing (*tui*): "On the grounds that what they
don't accept is the same as what they do accept, propose
it".




There is a great deal of controversy surrounding how these techniques
are to be understood and what their relationship is. It has been
argued that they comprise the steps of a single, complex inference
procedure in which a claim is established. However, this view is
difficult to justify because it requires supporting the claim that
each step is somehow necessary, serving as an essential premise for
the next. An easier and more commonly accepted view is that each
technique may operate independently to establish a point. Yang (2020)
argues that each serves to make an inference in its own right: the
first two are used to infer in each case that a proposition is true,
while the second two are used to infer in each case that a proposition
is false. By contrast, Robins (2010) argues that each is an instance
of the general method of reasoning by analogy that was common
throughout most of early Chinese thought. The Mohists are clarifying
four different ways in which this general method might be
instantiated. The first two cover the domains of reference and
meaning, as distinguished above. Analogy (*pi*) indicates the
method of extending kinds, employing models of comparison in
perception or thought by acts of reference to identify or explain what
something is. Parallelizing (*mou*) is the Mohist extension of
this idea into the world of linguistic forms. "Pushing"
and "pulling" hint at the pragmatic circumstances in
disputation in which one attempts to establish a claim on the basis of
its analogy with claims the other side has already accepted.



Here we concentrate on the technique of parallelizing, arguably the
Mohists' most original contribution to early Chinese thought on
disputation and logic. (For further discussion, see Yang 2020, Robins
2010 and 2012, and the entry
 Mohist Canons.)
 As their explanation suggests ("comparing expressions and
jointly proceeding", *bi ci er ju xing*), the Mohists
treat parallelizing as a technique in which linguistic models of a
certain grammatical form are utilized to make a comparative point
about some other linguistic construction that is in doubt. For
instance, the following statements have similar grammatical form:




White horses are horses; riding white horses is riding horses.



Black horses are horses; riding black horses is riding horses.



Jack is a person; loving Jack is loving a person.



Jill is a person; loving Jill is loving a person.




Each is a model that instantiates a common linguistic form. The
Mohists do not give a symbolic representation of this form, but we can
assume its recognition as a general kind in virtue of the parallelism
in structure that the models collectively exhibit. Technically, each
statement is a conjunction of two simpler statements (with no obvious
conditional relationship indicated, which is sometimes assumed). So
the general form seems to be:



(Form A)
(*A* is *B*) & (*VA* is
*VB*),


where *V* is a verb combined with the noun phrases *A*
and *B* to yield, in effect, two distinct nominalized
infinitives. We call this "Form A" to represent a general
kind, a kind of linguistic form commonly recognized in its instances.
On the other hand, they are aware that instances of this form may fail
as well. For example:




Robbers are people, [but] being without robbers is not being without
people.



Robbers are people, [but] desiring to be without robbers is not
desiring to be without people.




The Mohists put these latter examples in a different class, which we
may identify as:



(Form B)
(*A* is *B*) & (*VA* is not
*VB*)


The Mohist technique of parallelizing seeks to establish some other
claim that might be doubted on the basis of its analogy with the
proposed models. Consider the following statement constructed from the
nominals "boat" and "wood", and the verb
"enter":



A boat is wood, [but] entering a boat is not entering wood.



The Mohists treat this statement as admissible, thus classifying it
under the general kind associated with
 Form B.
 This is "comparing expressions and jointly proceeding",
but the Mohists' increasing sensitivity to semantic nuances led
them to admonish caution about drawing inferences merely on the basis
of form. Some inferences "proceed", others don't,
regardless of obvious parallelisms. As a result, they appropriated
individual cases in one way or another depending on how the semantics
of their terms played out in combination. On the other hand, this
careful attention to individual cases led them to a discovery of
intensional contexts, arguably the most original contribution of the
Mohists' studies of language.


### 3.5 Investigations of Intensionality



The later Mohists may well have been the first in the world to attempt
to furnish a systematic philosophical treatment of intensionality. An
abundance of evidence suggests that they were aware of both the
pervasiveness of intensional phenomena in natural language and the way
in which these phenomena tend to frustrate the view that natural
language meaning is essentially compositional in structure (Willman
2010). They were probably also aware not only of the distinction
between intensions and extensions, but also of the way in which this
distinction may be essential to the determination of the truth or
admissibility of sentences involving intensional contexts. Moreover,
they do not seem to have made any attempt to explain away these
contexts in terms of basic semantic principles, by denying that they
exist, or by asserting that they can be reduced to, or explained in
terms of, other more philosophically admissible modes of expression.
On the contrary, they not only embraced intensionality as a
fundamental feature of language, but also attempted to exploit it for
the purpose of advancing their philosophical views, particularly their
views on ethics.



To be sure, the Mohists did not attempt to develop any rigorous
notation for handling differences of logical form. But as noted in
examples above, they were wary of assuming that sentences or
expressions with the same grammatical form have analogous semantical
representations. It is quite possibly from observations like these
that the later Mohists were led to compare the satisfaction conditions
of expressions obtained from the intersubstitution of co-referential
terms and co-extensive predicates. They did so by utilizing what we
would now identify as tests for intensionality. Many of these tests
involved typical epistemic verbs, like "know",
"think of", and "love". For instance, in B40
of the *Canons* the Mohists claim that:



To assert the identity of knowing dogs and knowing canines is a
mistake; to not do so is not a mistake.



This translation is but one of many that have variously interpreted
the original text, and some scholars have claimed that the original is
in need of textual emendation due to copyist errors in centuries past
(e.g., He 1971 and Chen 1983; see also Zong 2000). However, it does
make sense when we recognize that the Mohists spent a great deal of
effort thinking about how the meanings of simple names vary in
combination with others. According to A.C. Graham, the names
*gou* (dog) and *quan* (canine) were the Mohists'
stock examples of terms that refer to the same thing, but which have
slightly different senses, probably due to their individual
etymologies. Contemporary philosophers of language might consider that
the Mohists were on the verge of developing an ontology of mental
states with these examples, thinking of the opacity of the context
"knowing" as a consequence of potential failures of
knowledge. Jack might know what a dog is, but he might not know what a
canine is, regardless of the co-extension of "dog" and
"canine". But the Mohists were not likely thinking of
language in any way as a window to the mind. There is no indication
anywhere in Mohist literature suggesting that they were interested in
developing a classification of mental states. Indeed, the Mohists
weighed the consequences of comparing linguistic expressions involving
not only those intensional verbs we usually associate with mental
states, such as "know", "think of",
"believe", "love" and the like, but also
apparently intensional contexts introduced by verbs having nothing
obviously to do with the mind, and they provide no indications that
they thought about distinguishing them.



In the *Xiao Qu*, for example, the Mohists give an intensional
analysis of linguistic contexts involving the expressions
"riding" (*cheng*), "entering"
(*ru*), "abounding in" (*duo*), "being
without" (*wu*), "serve" (*shi*), and
even "killing" (*sha*). Their interest seems to
have been primarily semantical, with the issue of compositionality at
the forefront of their inquiries. They were concerned with whether or
not ideographs in combination produced meaningful wholes that are
properly analyzed as the sums of their constituent parts. Those not
analyzable in this way were likely deemed idiomatic. Consider again
the curious use of the phrase "entering wood" (*ru
mu*) in the following line from *NO*15:



A boat is wood, but entering a boat is not entering wood.



The verb "entering" (*ru*) would not normally be
considered to indicate an intensional context. Zhang and Liu (2007)
analyze the complex expression *ru mu* (entering wood) as
"going to die", a meaning obviously surpassing the
connotation of *ru chuan* (entering a boat), in this case
signifying only the simple action of going into a boat. On the other
hand, each of these expressions is identical in grammatical form, a
fact again leading the Mohists to the conclusion that grammatical form
can be deceptive and that any expression may be either an analyzable
compound or an undifferentiable semantic whole.



It might be noted that the terms "boat" and
"wood" are not co-extensive, and hence cannot be
interchanged to test whether or not the context in which they occur is
intensional. Yet while it is true that the Mohists recognized names of
different scope (*lei* categorizes names that classify many
things while *si* categorizes those that refer to just one),
they were clearly not confined to conceiving expressions of the form
"*X* is *Y*" as assertions of predication.
As noted above, their concept of "sameness"
(*tong*) was inclusive enough to accommodate a reading that in
no way presupposes a failure of extension. For instance, a boat is
wood in the sense that it is made up of wood, where "wood"
is conceived not as a general kind, but as the very stuff of which the
boat in question is made. This is likely what the Mohists had in mind
with this example because the point they are making clearly turns on a
comparison of the meanings of linguistic *complexes*
("entering a boat" and "entering wood") and
how the meanings of words change in virtue of the contexts in which
they occur.



Moreover, intensionality is marked by tests other than the
intersubstitution of co-referential terms, co-extensive predicates, or
logically equivalent sentences. A context may be deemed intensional if
it contains a phrase with a quantifier that allows for an
"unspecific" reading (see the entry on
 intensional transitive verbs).
 For example, it may be true that Oedipus is seeking a member of his
family, but not true that he is seeking Jocasta, in spite of the fact
that Jocasta is a member of his family. For, there might be no family
member *in particular* whom Oedipus is seeking. Something like
this seems to be the point the Mohists are making with the following
example:



Her younger brother is a handsome man, but loving her younger brother
is not loving a handsome man.



The sparsity of grammatical marks for quantification in Classical
Chinese does not require us to read the expression *mei ren*
("a handsome man") in terms of the existentially
quantified phrase "some *x* such that *x* is male
and handsome". But this only makes the Mohists' point more
glaring. If "loving a handsome man" (*ai mei ren*)
may be taken to involve romantic attraction, and not just the kind of
filial love that exists between family members, then we can see why
the Mohists would consider this a failure of inference.



Similar points are made with regard to the remaining non-epistemic
intensional transitive verbs. For example:



The father of *huo* is a human; and yet it does not follow from
this that when *huo* serves his father, he is serving a
human.



Evidence that the transitive verb *shi* (serve) is intensional
comes from the expression "serving a human", which was
understood in terms of the behavior of a service worker, somebody who
acts as a servant. Quite obviously this has nothing to do with states
of mind (such as those involving failures of knowledge).



On the other hand, we feel rightly confused when the Mohists say:



Robbers are people ... but killing robbers is not killing
people.



The term "killing" is ordinarily thought of as an
extensional verb. It is a matter of some controversy, but the Mohists
apparently felt that the combination of the ideographs *sha*
(killing) and *dao ren* (robbers) formed an idiom that was
recognized as a distinct, unanalyzable unit of common speech, carrying
with it connotations of justified execution. This was not discerned in
the semantics of "killing people", which probably more
simply indicated an act of murder. Indeed, the Mohists explicitly
prohibited the latter in connection with their espoused doctrine of
universal love (cf. *NO*17 from Graham's translation
(2003 [1978])). Not unlike many Western philosophers, the Mohists seem
to have felt that careful attention to semantical nuances can have an
important bearing on moral issues.



That is to say, part of the Mohists' interest in the analysis of
language stems from a firm conviction that the semantical distinctions
uncovered by careful analysis can help put to rest certain questions
about the legitimacy of their basic moral beliefs. The Mohists
insisted that proper conduct involves "loving all people without
exception" (which implies opposing acts of murder), but they
were also not opposed to the "justified execution" of
those found guilty of serious crime. When questioned on grounds of
inconsistency, they replied by pointing out that the endorsement of
justified execution is not an inhumane act that compromises their
stance on the value of loving all people. This might not have
convinced many of their interlocutors that their doctrine of universal
love is justified, but it would have put to rest the charge that they
were being illogical, and in any case consistency would surely have
been conceived as a mark of superiority over any of the views of their
opponents incapable of withstanding comparable scrutiny.


## 4. Daoist Replies and Critique of Logic



While the kinds of semantic rules underlying the interpretation of our
expressions in language might be heterogeneous, with no guarantee that
assumptions about compositionality will hold, the Mohists nevertheless
did not waver in their belief that the objects of experience exhibit
real similarities and differences, and that the identification of
these similarities and differences is what allows us to
"distinguish the noble and the base" (*ming gui
jian*, to use Xunzi's phrase). Indeed, the central purpose
of language is to guide behavior by clarifying how one should act, and
this is done by distinguishing the noble and the base through the
subtle analysis of similarities and differences. We take the actions
of exemplary individuals as models, identify the criteria that
distinguish them or their actions, and act accordingly in an analogous
way. Sometimes these semantic analyses would reveal odd consequences;
as noted above, "robbers are people, but killing robbers is not
killing people". But the Mohists were not in general averse to
embracing such oddities, given their general conviction that the
philosophical explication of meaning should follow normal conventions
of use. In any case, they never abandoned the belief that an
exhaustive analysis of semantic possibilities should render
transparent real similarities and differences in the world in a way
that provides a consistent, invariable guide for action. If the
analysis of language can provide this, then confusion about how to act
should be dispelled from society and people should be able to live
together in harmony.



This claim that the analysis of language can provide a consistent
guide for action is precisely what the Daoists targeted in their
objections and the main focus of their philosophical skepticism. What
is surprising is that Daoist skeptics like Zhuangzi do not reject the
Mohists' basic view that the world is populated by various kinds
of objects with real similarities and differences. They agree,
moreover, in their basic understanding of how objects undergo
different forms of transformation in time; the Mohists even give us
distinct terms to convey these differences. The difference is that, in
Zhuangzi's view, no matter how much analysis we undertake, or
how finely we discriminate, our language will never secure enough
traction in reality to provide us with a constant guide for action.
Zhuangzi was so unsatisfied with the ongoing debates of his times that
he was compelled to develop what he took to be a transcendent
philosophical worldview not limited by the hope of resolving these
debates through simple explications of semantic distinctions. Life is
larger than what can be grasped by the human capacity for reason, and
there are forms of intuitive knowledge or experience that cannot be
explained by the crude implements of language.



There are stories in the *Zhuangzi* that attest to the
perfected skills of wheelwrights, carpenters, and other artisans who
lament the fact that they cannot express how they manage to perform
their tasks so well. The self-description of wheelwright Pian is a
good example:



> 
> 
> I look at it from the point of view of my own work. When I chisel a
> wheel, if the blows of the mallet are too gentle, the chisel slides
> and won't take hold. But if they're too hard, it bites in
> and won't budge. Not too gentle, not too hard--you can get
> it in your hand and feel it in your mind. You can't put it into
> words, and yet there is a knack to it somehow. I can't teach it
> to my son and he can't learn it from me. So I've gone
> along for seventy years and at my age I am still chiseling wheels.
> When the men of old died they took with them the things that
> couldn't be handed down. So what you are reading there must be
> nothing but the chaff and dregs of the men of old. (tr. Watson 1968:
> 152-3)
> 
> 
> 



The reference to books at the end of this passage is striking.
Zhuangzi claims to have an insight about the subtlety and facility of
understanding that cannot be captured in written form, or even through
oral discourse with appropriate demonstratives. The names of language
discriminate meanings, but inevitably there is slippage in their
coordination with objects.



This is most obviously apparent in Zhuangzi's appeal to the
indexical phenomena of language, which Zhuangzi used as a foil against
the Mohists' claim that the meanings of terms can reliably fix
their designations. He seems to have in mind what we would understand
by the term "indexical" today: a term whose designation is
fixed not only by its meaning but also by facts about the conditions
surrounding its utterance. Such facts are relevant to the
determination of the shifting referents of pronouns ("I",
"you"), demonstratives ("this",
"that"), and spatial and temporal adverbs
("here", "there", "yesterday",
"now", "before"), and Zhuangzi appeals to all
of these in a variety of elliptical and argumentative contexts. His
general view seems to be that different perspectives or standpoints
involved in the utterances of terms have important bearings on how
these terms are used and what they refer to. The so-called impure
indexicals "this" (*bi*) and "that"
(*shi*) (see the entry on
 indexicals),
 commonly used in Classical Chinese for naming objects ("This is
a horse", "That is an ox"), make the perspectivalism
of Zhuangzi's approach clear:



> 
> 
> No thing is not that; no thing is not this. From that, it is not seen;
> from this it is known. Therefore it is said: That comes out of this;
> this goes along with that; which is to say, that and this are born
> simultaneously. (*Zhuangzi* 2/27-29; tr. Graham 1989)
> 
> 
> 



Arguably, Zhuangzi is suggesting that reference is always keyed to a
perspective that somehow rules out others. This would explain the
conclusion that "that and this are born simultaneously":
the perspective one takes in calling an object "this"
implies an alternative perspective in which another calls it
"that". "That" and "this" is a
pair whose terms function in coordination. Zhuangzi is seeking a
philosophical perspective that transcends all arbitrary
dichotomies:



> 
> 
> This too is that, that too is this. There they say "It's
> this, it's not" from one point of view, here we say
> "It's this, it's not" from another point of
> view. Are there really this and that? Or really no this and that?
> Where neither this nor that finds its opposite is called the axis of
> the Way. When once the axis is found at the center of the circle there
> is no limit to responding with either, on the one hand no limit to
> what is this, on the other no limit to what is not. Therefore I say,
> "The best means is illumination". (*Zhuangzi*
> 2/29-31; tr. Graham 1989)
> 
> 
> 



This point is made with demonstratives, which are among the most
fickle of the indexicals of language, seemingly capable of referring
to anything regardless of context. But we can appreciate the
generalization Zhuangzi is hinting at when we consider again how the
Mohists explained acts of reference. Recall that when the Mohists say
"There is a horse" (*you ma*), they appear to be
making a claim to the effect that a certain object *x*
resembles the model *m* for horses. If they state this with the
demonstrative *bi* ("this"), then they are making
the further claim that some object *x* to which they stand in a
certain relation (likely of perceptual acquaintance) resembles the
model *m* for horses. Note also that the Mohists recognize that
objects do not always resemble their standards exactly; sometimes it
is only partial, in which case the object of reference must resemble
it "in the appropriate way", according to a criterion
(*yi*). Presumably, this criterion identifies something salient
in the comparison that remains consistent across linguistic contexts.
Zhuangzi's point would then amount to the claim that no salience
conditions are ever invariable across linguistic contexts. The
uniqueness of each act of reference undermines the possibility of
identifying any contextually invariant rule, since the conditions of
successful reference involve facts not only about the relations of
names and objects but also about the relations of acquaintance one has
with those objects. Indeed, given the great emphasis on indexicality
in the *Zhuangzi*, some scholars have claimed that Zhuangzi
holds the thesis that all language is indexical. This is a view that
cannot be defended here; readers may consult Hansen 1992 for a lengthy
treatment.


## 5. Xunzi's Confucian Appropriation of Mohist Logic



Significantly more so than other major philosophers of the Warring
States Period, the Mohists believed that proper ethical conduct, and
the uses of language essential to its realization, could be determined
by the ability of the common citizen to distinguish, independently of
government authority and by rational means, real similarities and
differences in the nuances of ethical action. Zhuangzi's
skeptical arguments called much of this belief into question, but left
little in its place to placate the demands of effective governance and
orderly rule. The Confucian philosopher Xunzi of the late Warring
States Period sought to reestablish ethics on positive, constructive
foundations, but without succumbing to the frustrating Daoist
rejoinders that put so much of Mohism in doubt.



On the surface, Xunzi's theories of logic and language resemble
those of the Mohists, and he makes great use of the doctrines of the
Mohist *Canons* to develop his own arguments. But underneath we
find Confucian presuppositions that diverge radically from the Mohist
paradigm. Zhuangzi seized on indexicality to make the case that names
cannot be used invariably across linguistic contexts. Reacting to the
problematic task of identifying impeccable salience conditions in
perception or thought to determine how a name is to be used, Xunzi put
Zhuangzi's arguments to use to make the case that the
correctness conditions of language, if there are to be any at all,
must be determined by convention. Since these conventions are
ultimately arbitrary, they cannot be established by the Mohists'
methods of discourse or argumentation. They have to be determined by
authority, the rule of sage-kings who institute the conventions of
language as they deem fit through the promotion of proper social
conduct and the suppression of deviant behavior.



Xunzi thus reasserted the Confucian tradition of imposing order onto
society through uncompromising but benevolent rule to ensure that the
anarchy of moral discourse that abounds in its absence does not
culminate in the deterioration of civil society. He held these views
not merely because they offered a pragmatic solution to
Zhuangzi's radical skepticism, but also because they were
consistent with his cynical view of human nature. Our nature is
inherently corruptible and bad, incapable of sustaining civil order if
left to itself, and therefore demands correction by the institutions
of society. More generally, and quite against the convictions of his
Daoist counterparts, Xunzi held that morality is an invention to
control man's nature, because nature itself, in its endless
transformations and unpredictable spontaneity, cannot be relied on to
constrain human passion sufficiently to maintain the requisites of
social harmony.



In practice, Xunzi's philosophical method follows much the same
course as the Mohists'. He takes it upon himself to analyze the
"purpose of having names", the "evidence for
assimilating and differentiating", and the "basic
requirements for instituting names" (*Xunzi*, Book 22).
However, for Xunzi, reason must stop short of justifying what actions
may serve as models for ethical conduct. The Mohists held that an
action is admissible if it accords with general considerations of
utility. This makes the justification of the action contingent on the
circumstances surrounding the action's consequences, whether
they lead to the enrichment of society, and whether they contribute to
the realization of the principle of universal love. Determining
whether the action is justified thus prescribes the use of reason
independently of judgments of authority. In Xunzi's view, this
appeal to utility implies a use of reason that his own ethics would
forbid, because the actions of a sage are not to be justified by
anything independently of their intrinsic moral authority. Since the
customs instituted by the sage are essentially stipulated as models of
appropriate conduct, reason plays no role in their identification as
such to the common individual.



Notably, the hypostasization of the notion of a model of ethical
conduct (*fa*) in early Chinese thought is largely a
contribution of the Mohists, who used it liberally in place of the
Confucian appeal to the authority of tradition. But Xunzi found little
use for it except in reference to the very Confucian customs the
Mohists attempted to supplant. Indeed, the reason of the common
individual is out of place here because the ability to correctly
identify these models is a talent requiring years of cultivation and
mastery, which only the intellectual elites of society would be
expected to attain. Proper conduct must be transmitted through
education from these elites, ultimately from those in high office who
have the benefit of a life of education in proper governance.



Such presuppositions have important ramifications in Xunzi's
theories of naming and reference. Acts of naming are decided not by
reason, but by convention, and Xunzi attributes the authority to
establish these conventions to the sage-kings of later antiquity:



> 
> 
> As for the names established by the later kings, for names of
> punishments follow the Shang dynasty, for names of titles the Chou,
> for cultural names the ceremonies... (*Xunzi*, Book
> 22)
> 
> 
> 



Common people are prohibited from questioning the mandates of
linguistic conventions:



> 
> 
> Hence hair-splitting wordings and invention of names on your own
> authority, to disorder correct names and put people in doubt and
> confusion, multiplying argument and litigation between persons, are to
> be pronounced the worst of subversions, to be condemned like the crime
> of falsifying tallies and measures. (*Xunzi*, Book 22)
> 
> 
> 



Xunzi avoids one of his own subversions by restricting his task to
figuring out how the conventions established by authority can serve as
examples for the common citizen, and this requires (much as the
Mohists thought) identifying the conditions by which one extends the
names so designated to other objects or actions that are appropriately
similar to them.



It is in this matter that our common reason plays its critical role,
which Xunzi understands in terms of our capacity to use the evidence
of perception to make appropriate discriminations. For example, one
sees two shapes, one triangular, the other square. Nothing in this
differentiation of patterns forces one to attribute the name
"triangular" to the first and "square" to the
second. A single name could just as well be used for all three and
four sided polygons. However, the senses have the effect of
encouraging a distinct name for each; they are "evidence"
(*yuan*, causes, means) for assimilating and differentiating
objects in language. For instance, one may regard the assertion
"Mountains and abysses are level" as inadmissible (or
false), because it is contradicted by our perception of the non-level
relation of the two geographical objects. This is the case, for Xunzi,
even though it is convention, in the final analysis, that determines
how the terms "mountain" and "abyss" are to be
used. Xunzi's point is not that the analysis of meanings somehow
fixes how the terms of language are to be used, but that when
convention does "fix ahead" (*qi*) the meanings of
these terms, one is to use the senses to determine whether the objects
to which they refer are to be treated as the same or different.



Xunzi's insistence that convention is at the bottom of all acts
of naming gave him the liberty to favor simple, commonsense solutions
to semantic puzzles that aroused such contention among the disputants
of other schools. Recall that the Mohists argued that while robbers
are people, it does not follow that "killing robbers is killing
people". Their aim, apparently, was to reconcile their
utilitarian ethics with their doctrine of universal love. They
regarded "loving all people" as compatible with the
justified execution of criminals on the supposition that the phrase
"killing robbers" (justified execution) was not
"killing people" (murder), and hence not inconsistent with
their ethics of "loving (all) people". Xunzi, whose
Confucian ethics were not challenged by this apparent inconsistency,
remained unpersuaded by the Mohists' odd appeal to the idiom. In
his view, the assertion "Killing robbers is killing
people" is analyzed compositionally in the same way as
"Riding white horses is riding horses", making it likewise
admissible.



In rejecting the Mohists' judgment on this point, Xunzi is not
contesting the Mohists' general theory of inference. He is only
disputing its application in this case. While there is no evidence
that Xunzi held that all complex meaning is strictly compositional, he
was disinclined to take seriously the kinds of exceptions that the
Mohists garnered for their ethical views. His preference seems to have
been for a simpler theory that accommodates terms of whatever levels
of generality are necessary for purposes of communicative clarity. The
complex "killing people" is better analyzed
compositionally if another simple term of appropriate generality
(e.g., "murder") is at hand to avoid the confusion:



> 
> 
> If a single name is enough to communicate, make it single; if not,
> combine. (*Xunzi*, Book 22)
> 
> 
> 



As a rule of thumb, single terms are more general than the complexes
in which they occur:



> 
> 
> If the single is nowhere in conflict with the combined, it is the more
> general; but general though it is, there is no harm in it.
> (*Xunzi*, Book 22)
> 
> 
> 



No harm, that is, in terms of whatever levels of generality are
necessary for communicative clarity (e.g., "bird",
"animal"), up to the broadest level of generality
("thing"). Like the Mohists, Xunzi's theory of
inference is based on the notion that a model must serve as a standard
of resemblance: naming an object is like "measuring an unknown
length by a footrule". He was therefore inclined to draw
inferences in much the same way. The assertion "*x* is an
animal" is a valid inference from the claim "*x*
resembles the model *m* for animal" on the assumption
that anything resembling *m* is an animal.



Similarly, "A white horse is a horse" is a valid
inference, in Xunzi's view, from the claim:



The model \(m\_1\) for "white horse" resembles the model
\(m\_2\) for "horse".



Xunzi's reference to this example in particular in Book 22 of
the *Xunzi* is likely his response to the paradoxical statement
"White horses are not horses", famously asserted by the
sophist Gongsun Long probably as a foil to the Mohists' theories
of naming and reference (Gongsun Long may himself have once been a
Mohist; see the entry
 School of Names
 for further discussion). The inference works, presumably, because
\(m\_2\) serves as a model for "horse" irrespective of its
color. Since color is not a relevant criterion of resemblance,
"horse" functions as a term of greater generality.



In all of this, there is no disagreement with Mohist views. The
disagreement arises in the analysis of particulars, which the Mohists
felt could substantively determine the outcomes of ethical disputes.
Given that convention lies at the bottom of all acts of naming, Xunzi
abandons any supposition that semantics (or even reason, narrowly
construed in the Mohists' sense of disputation) can be the
ground of ethics. On the other hand, Xunzi's deference to
authority leaves one to wonder what principles of reason an educated
elite would use in determining why a given set of conventions in
language are more appropriate than others. It can be assumed that
their choices would not be completely arbitrary, but that they would
be guided by the very faculties of discrimination in perception that
the Mohists argued were at the foundations of our common reason.
Indeed, much in spite of the admirable clarity with which he
articulated his views on the role of language in ethical conduct,
Xunzi leaves the reader with an unresolved tension between what he had
hoped to accomplish in his own philosophical analyses and the mandates
of those higher officials to whose authority he admonishes us to yield
(see the entry
 Xunzi
 for further details).


## 6. Concluding Remarks



Among Chinese philosophical schools of the pre-Han era, it is the
later Mohists who deserve the greatest credit for pioneering and
systematizing the studies of language and logic. In the context of a
general theoretical framework based on precisely formulated
definitions, they developed a workable theory of analogical inference
that was sensitive to the idiosyncratic semantic contributions of
terms in combination. Awareness of the limitations of compositionality
probably led them away from the development of a theory of logical
forms, but it stimulated insights about intensional phenomena in
language that prompted more sophisticated defenses of their ethical
views, and encouraged a broad understanding of how language functions
in communicative discourse that warrants ongoing consideration today.
Xunzi may have reached a new height in the rigor and clarity with
which he presented his logical and linguistic views, but he did not
surpass his Mohist forebears in originality, seeking primarily to
utilize their insights in support of a largely Confucian ethical
agenda. While the Mohists were clearly aware of many of the
limitations of their own methods of reasoning, they nevertheless
retained the hope that a sophisticated analysis of language would
reveal real similarities and differences in experience that would
reliably guide ethical action. It is this general hope that was the
focus of Daoist critics like Zhuangzi, who argued from radically
perspectivalist assumptions that no language, however refined, is
adequate to the task of providing consistent normative standards.
Whether or not this claim is true is still a matter of debate, with
scholars of Chinese philosophy today leaning one way or another on
ancient conceptions of the roles of language and logic in human
thought and action.