## 1. Zhuangzi's Life and Times


Zhuangzi flourished through the latter half of the 4th century BC
roughly contemporary with Mencius, and the movement known as the
School of Names (Ming Jia  *ming-jia* name
school). Zhuangzi shows familiarity with Classical Chinese
theories of pragmatic-semantics and makes his own theoretical
contributions to it. The traditionally recognized figures in this
school included Gongsun Long and Hui Shi--Zhuangzi's close friend
and most frequent direct philosophical discussant. With the recovery
of the Later Mohist dialectical work detailing their theory of
language, we find compelling evidence that the linguistic turn in
Classical thinking was a widespread feature of this mature phase of
the Classical period. The later Confucian thinker, Xunzi, follows
Zhuangzi in reacting to and incorporating this linguistic turn in his
thinking. 


 Most of what we infer about Zhuangzi's life, we draw from evidence
within the *Zhuangzi*, although the Han biographers did speculate about
his place of origin (the state of Meng) his personal name (Zhou), and
the official posts he held (minor in Qiyuan in his home state) and
period he lived (during Prince Wei reign over Chu--which ended
about 327 BC). Scholars have found it hard to confirm any details of
his life from outside this text and from his being discussed by later
thinkers. The text itself contains scattered stories about Zhuangzi,
but given its frequent use of fantasy, even these we must season with
the salt of textual skepticism. We attribute a large chunk of the
extant text of the *Zhuangzi* to "students of Zhuangzi" but
we have little hint of who his students were or if he even had
students in any formal sense. 


## 2. Evolving Text Theory


A scholar working around 600 years later after the fall of the Han,
Guo Xiang (d. 312), edited and reduced what he saw as a haphazardly
accumulated cluster of apocryphal and possibly authentic texts. He
concluded that many were added after the time Zhuangzi lived. Guo
reports compressing that prior collection of writings from fifty-two
chapters to thirty-three. This is the extant text on which our
knowledge is based. Guo divided the chapters he had chosen into three
sections: the "Inner Chapters" (1-7), the "Outer
Chapters" (8-22) and the "Miscellaneous Chapters"
(23-33). He attributed only the first section to the period dating
from Zhuangzi's lifetime--hence possibly originating from
Zhuangzi himself. The second grouping may have included writings of a
"School of Zhuangzi." Modern scholarship assigns various
sources of other influences found in both the second
"outer" and final "miscellaneous"
chapters. Graham drawing on work of the Chinese theorist, Kuan Feng
and followed with some variation by Liu Xiaogan and Harold Roth,
divides these influences into roughly four variously named groups:



* Zhuangzi's students or the School of Zhuangzi credited with
 those later writings committed most closely to the views expressed
 in the "inner chapters."
* Authors with egoist views associated with Yang Zhu (4th century
 BC). The *Mencius* presented Yang's thought
 as a version of an ethical egoism that rejected conventional
 altruistic social *dao*s.
* The third group Graham dubbed the
 'primitivists'. Primitivists share Yang Zhu's antipathy
 to social, historical or conventional
 *dao*s--typically those supporting social norms
 extending beyond agricultural village life--in favor of more
 natural ways. This group shares attitudes with the text of the
 *Laozi* (*Daode Jing*) mixed with Yangist
 themes.
* The final group, dominated the "miscellaneous"
 sections, Graham called them syncretists (eclectics) who seemingly
 attempted comprehensiveness by combining all points of view into a
 single complete *dao*.


However widely assumed, Zhuangzi's authorship of any of the
"inner" chapters remains a speculative hypothesis. Guo's
original assessment that Zhuangzi did not author any of the remaining
sections remains conventional scholarly wisdom, but religious Daoists treat the
entire book as a Canon--The *Nanhua Zhen-Jing*. 


 Combining all these elements into a single volume reflects a
familiar Classical pattern of embellishing the teachings of a master,
adapting the additions to the namesake's writing style and expanding on his
themes and insights in distinctive ways. The four schools contributing to the extant
text shared an emphasis on natural -usually as opposed to
social-cultural, *dao*s. Yangism or egoism largely rejected
social or moral *dao*s on the apparent assumption that natural
guiding *dao*s essentially recommend self-preserving
behavior. Its paradigm is the anti-social hermit. Motivation by
self-interest was normatively prior to any conventional *dao*. They
preserved their natural purity from social corruption by rejecting society's
mores. 


 Primitivism similarly rejected social and conventionally moral
daos (mores), but has its own conception of a natural,
pre-social, typically intuitive, way of life that supports rustic,
agricultural, village life. It supports populist and anarchist
political tendencies. 



Syncretism does not reject social *dao*s per se, but does
reject any particular *dao* as biased and narrow in contrast to a more,
"rounded," idealized, or comprehensive *dao*. This is often
expressed in an ideal observer form (the sage, perfect human, or Tian 
*tian*nature:sky's
*dao*). These views tend toward epistemic
supernaturalism--claims to superlative cognitive or religious access
to some transcendently correct *dao*. Both tend to deny that their
correct *daos* can be expressed and transmitted in language or
words. 


The discussions in the "Inner Chapters," particularly
in the 2nd chapter, by contrast, treat language as also natural and
social-conventional *dao*s as themselves natural *dao*s. It
undermines the otherwise presupposed contrast of natural
vs. conventional *dao*s. Humans are naturally social animals and
execute natural causal processes when their walking, speaking,
writing, and other practices leave marks in nature, (like a trail or a
text) which become physically accessible to later *walkers* as
history (stored in memory, legend, writings, or footprints etc.). 



The pivotal 2nd chapter draws relativist and skeptical conclusions
from its normative naturalism. It rejects the religious traditionalism
of Confucianism and the Gaia-hypothesis implicit in the Mohist attempt
at utilitarian naturalism. Nature provides us with many ways to go,
but does not favor or *command* our making any choices among
them. *Shi-fei*
Shi Fei  (This way not that) judgments
are made by living creatures in nature, not by
 Tian 
*tian*nature:sky itself. We can find guiding
structures, *dao*s, in nature but not a favored or
dictated *dao* of nature. 



Like the later syncretist chapters, the "Inner Chapter"
Zhuangists accept that social *dao*s are continuous with
natural ones, but they do not endorse any imagined or alleged,
comprehensive judgments from everywhere, from all natural points of
view. The cosmic judgement from nowhere is a non-judgment. Zhuangists
are not committed to Laozi's conception of an exclusive choice of
natural (Tian 
*tian*sky:nature) over social
 (Ren  *ren*human)
daos. They are skeptical of any claim of special access to
contextless guiding knowledge by alleged or self-styled sages,
"ideal observers" or perfect exemplars of epistemic
virtues. They accept language but also accept our natural capacity
and inclination to toy with it, alter it, and mould it to our use in
various situations of practical choice. 



Zhuangzi's exemplars are butchers, musicians, cicada catchers,
wheelmakers--exemplars of mundane and focused action
guidance. Each is an exemplar of one of the many ways of life
(*dao*s) who execute their particular specialties in a
highly cultivated, precise, smooth, and seemingly easily executed
way. The imagined eclectic synthesis of all the various ways of life
into some total-comprehensive *dao* is no more than
de-facto restatement of their co-existence in a single natural world
as optional ways of life. The cosmos makes no judgment that they
should exist--though it combines them into a cosmic
*dao* that is the history of everything. That the cosmos
has this outcome does not mean it makes a human-like choice which
humans could or should execute. We are ill advised to strive for skill
in *everything*. 



The eclectics were probably the last community working with the text,
adding to it and carrying it into later periods. The Laozi had become
enmeshed with a ruler cult worship of The Yellow Emperor. Laozi became
the far more influential figure during the entire Confucian orthodoxy
of the Han (206-220 BC).


## 3. Competing Interpretive Narratives


The wide range of views of Zhuangzi stem from the style of the text
and the ways it has figured in China's intellectual history as well as
the ways it was caught up in the modern interaction between China and
the modern, scientific West. 


 Zhuangzi's style is the philosophical parable, typically a
brief discussion or exchange between two points of view. There is
slight plurality of humans among the discussants joined by natural and
imaginary creatures. Its fictional characters are usually cleverly
named, some are Confucian icons (Confucius or his alleged teacher, Lao
Dan). Some discussants are animals (real and fictional fish, birds,
snakes), a talking skull, the wind, musicians, debaters, tigers,
trainers, butchers, butterflies, burglars and the myriad "pipes
of nature." Expressive brevity and subtlety of detail enhances
the impact of the often complex and elusive point of the
parables--they seldom explicitly formulate the moral or point
explicitly. Most commonly, the author(s) end discussions in a doubting
tone, a double rhetorical question or some pithy enigmatic parting
shot. They may make their point by having the two parties walking away
shaking their heads, agreeing only to disagree; both appreciating that
they barely understand one another, and yet feeling that something has
been learned from the exchange. 


 Translation into Western languages invites biases that are hard to
avoid. The main effect is loss of the conceptual cohesion of the
original, but the parables still engage our Western philosophical
curiosity. We get the exhilaration of immersion in an independent
philosophical tradition of comparable antiquity and richness. Readers
in and out of China invariably suspect that the
*Zhuangzi*'s appealing style is infused with
philosophical genius, even as they disagree about its philosophical
upshot. Indeed, much of the *Zhuangzi*'s philosophical appeal
may stem from its seemingly deliberate open-ended texture, the
interpretive malleability of its dialogues which invites, even perhaps
requires, us to join the author(s) in their philosophical
reflection. 


 This appeal stems only partly from the quality and sophistication
of his episodes; each illuminated a patch of philosophical territory
ending with a question for further pondering--rather like
Nietzsche or the Later Wittgenstein. Each exchange presents or
illustrates shards of insight with open-textured conclusions--all
laced with Zhuangzi's obvious joy in exploring
paradox--particularly linguistic ones of the sort that appeal to
analytic Western thinkers. Each is an expression of some natural, but
perhaps inaccessible, alternative way of life. The frequent enigmatic
conclusions "the answer is X" leaves interpreters arguing
centuries later, Fermat-like, how X can be an answer--or what X
is (e.g., "free and easy wandering," "walking two
paths," "goblet words," "clarity," and
so forth). Each seems easily to fit into a range of puzzles familiar
to thinkers in both traditions. One suspects that we find the correct
interpretation by finding our way, like Wittgenstein's fly, out
of some philosophical bottle. The correct philosophy coincides with
the correct interpretation of Zhuangzi.


The traditional religious Zhuangzi narratives placed him as the
disciple of Laozi, whom they regard as a quasi-divine founder of a
mystical religion worshipping a mysterious entity translators tended
to render as a definite descriptive term, but capitalized it as if it
were a singular name, "The Dao." Compatible
philosophical treatments were versions of metaphysical monism,
epistemic intuitionism (often explicitly anti-rationalist), political
anarchism and a vague normative absolutism--follow The
Dao. The bulk of popular and religious treatments still follow
this interpretive line, treating Laozi as the earliest layer of
"Daoist mystical thought" or "Lao-Zhuang"
thought and situating Zhuangzi as his "follower."


 The story of the religious view of Zhuangzi starts a century after
Zhuangzi lived (4th century BC). Philosophical schools were
closed, books burned and thought repressed during the superstitious
Qin dynasty (221-206 BC) which followed the classical
period. This initiated China's philosophical "Dark
Age." The more orthodox Confucian Han Dynasty (206
BC to 220) followed. Over two decades (109-91
BC) the Han emperor's hereditary Grand
Historians, Sima Tan and Sima Qian (a father and son team), wrote an
official history from the mythical Yellow Emperor (c. 3rd Millennium
BC) to the Han. It is in this account that the
classification of thinkers into three concept schools, Daoist,
Legalist, and School of Names first occurs. Graham speculates that the
assumption of an affiliation of Zhuangzi to Laozi may have originated
from the Outer Chapters. There Zhuangzi's students used the mythical
teacher of Confucius, Lao Dan or Laozi, to ridicule Confucius in a
cycle of dialogues. 


A cult of Huang-Lao, worshipping the Yellow emperor and Laozi as
divinities, had grown up in the Qin. The father and son historians
were students of Huang-Lao masters. At the fall of the Han the
narrative of Zhuangzi as a follower/elaborator of a semi-divine Laozi
was well entrenched. The post-Han resurgence, known as Neo-Daoism,
began with the editing of the received edition of, first, the
*Laozi* (Wang Bi 226-249) then the *Zhuangzi* (Guo Xiang
d. 312 see above). Neo-Daoist discussion practices and ideas were
influential in bringing Buddhist and Chinese thought into interaction
and Daoism became enmeshed with Buddhism in the popular view
(especially with Chinese Chan Buddhism). A Daoist
"religion", borrowing models of religious institutions
from Buddhism (monasteries, monks and nuns) influenced discourse about
Daoism throughout the period of Buddhist domination of the Chinese
intellectual world (achieved gradually during the Six Dynasties period
220-589 and extending through the Tang 618-907). Neo-Confucians from
the medieval period on treated Buddhism and Daoism as essentially
similar religions.



Modern text theory concerning the *Zhuangzi* grows from two recent
discoveries.


1. The reconstruction of the Later Mohist dialectical works and
2. Archeological reconstructions of the text of the *Daode Jing*.


The following section discusses their twin impact on our view of
Zhuangzi. 


 Developments at the end of the 19th and early 20th century in
China led Chinese intellectuals to adopt the European concept of
philosophy (Zhe Xue ) with its implicit distinction from
religion. This distinction was seen as pivoting on logic--the
theory of proof or argument. They started to segregate their own
writings which seemed most like argument, inference and logic from
those sustained mainly by credulity and tradition. They began to sort
out the philosophical aspects of their traditional thought from its
more religious and superstitious elements. Sun Yirang's
(1848-1908) 1897 reconstruction of the Mohist Canon provided
convincing evidence that analytically inspired and rigorous thinking
had grown up in Classical China. This example encouraged 19th century
intellectuals like Yan Fu (1854-1921) and Liang Qichao (1873-1929).
They started to emphasize the ancient schools that more clearly
related to the logical paradigms of Western philosophy and Mohist
analytics. Hu Shih (1891-1962) continued this tradition of
reconceiving and re-centering Chinese thought away from the Confucian
scholasticism that had dominated since the decline of Buddhism. 



The early 20th century logic-inspired reformation recently began to
influence the interpretation of the *Zhuangzi* and the
*Xunzi* in the west, largely inspired by Angus Graham who had
observed that both ancient texts demonstrated a mastery of the
technical vocabulary of Mohist linguistic theory.


Modern philosophical
appreciation of the *Zhuangzi*, probably stems from Graham's 1969
"[Zhuangzi]'s Essay on Seeing Things as Equal"
(Graham 1969, predating his work on Mohism). Wryly replying to Wang
Fuzhi's speculation that Shen Dao, not Zhuangzi had authored the
beloved chapter, Graham averred that whoever wrote that
philosophically rich text is the person we would want to think of as
Zhuangzi. Graham proposed looking at the text's seemingly conflicting
thoughts as analogous to the "inner dialogue" of a
reflective thinker who formulates a view, considers then rejects
it. Graham also noted the writer's deep involvement and apparent
fluency in the technical language and obscure issues arising in
Classical Chinese theories of language which he then only beginning to
study. 


 Graham's outlook conflicted overtly with a traditional
Chinese narrative of a disciple Zhuangzi following a semi-divine Laozi
in worship of The Mystical Dao. Zhuangzi, Graham quipped, didn't
know he was a Daoist. Graham later argued that the internal evidence
suggested Zhuangzi had never seen the text of the Laozi (The
*Dao De Jing*) and probably thought of Lao Dan as a
Confucian. Most interpretive disputes are, to a greater or lesser
degree, a result of the tension between Graham's textual
arguments and the traditional Historian's picture of Zhuangzi as a
religious mystical Daoist follower of the semi-divine Laozi, similarly
worshipping "The Dao." 


 Graham's textual arguments were indirectly supported by
archeological discoveries of different Laozi texts. The discoveries in
the early 1970s and 1990s together implied a relatively late date
for the emergence of the Laozi text--probably some years after
Zhuangzi had lived and perhaps overlapping the composition of a series
of dialogues between Laozi and Confucius in the "Outer
Chapters" section. Graham speculated that Zhuangzi's
students, who were writing the cycle of Laozi-Confucius dialogues, may
have rhetorically chosen to use the legendary Lao Dan (mythical
teacher of Confucius) to give him authority to lecture and ridicule
the revered master. 



When we abandon the traditional identification of Zhuangzi as a Laozi
follower, it opens the door for speculation about his relation to the
relativist, linguistic theorist, Hui Shi, traditionally treated as
belonging to the School of Names. Christoph Harbesmeier speculated he may have
been either Zhuangzi's teacher, mentor or fellow student. If he was a
teacher, he came to accept his student as an equal or even
superior. Zhuangzi portrays him as playing a role in Zhuangzi's
philosophical skill development as an intimate philosophical interlocutor and
eventually as a foil for sharpening his analysis. Among those texts
that concentrate on Ming 
*ming*names, Hui Shi's ten theses mark
him as a relativist response to Mohist realism on the relation of
names and "stuff"--focusing especially on comparative and
indexical terms. 



We can read Zhuangzi's relativism, accordingly as an alternative,
arguably more reflectively subtle, indexical relativism about
 Shi Fei 
**shi-fei**this-not that
judgments regarding choices of paths (*dao*s) of correct
use of names/words/concepts as guideposts to our
 Xing  *xing*walking:behavior. This
can both explain Zhuangzi's relativist direction of analysis and his
recognition of sound Mohist/realist responses to Hui Shi's version of
that relativist direction of thought. This article develops and
expands on Graham's philosophical interpretation and emphasizes this
relation to Hui Shi rather than to Laozi. 


Between the traditional, piously mystical Daoist religious
interpretation and that view's nearest philosophical neighbors, lies
the bulk of the interpretive historical and religious
literature. Given the philosophically oriented venue of this article,
what follows should not be treated as ecumenical.



## 4. A Modern Philosophical Interpretation


### 4.1 The Background Dispute about Social Normative Daos



Confucian *dao*s were broadly humanist. The earliest
version (Confucius 551-479 BC) traced normativity to
earlier human invention. Metaphorical trails are left by past human
walkings, i.e. social practices. Language was an example of such an
invented social practice which intertwined with routine activities
(rituals) to yield the *correct*, sage-king inspired way of
life--the social Dao  *dao*path. A
later version (Mencius 372-239 BC) focused on natural
human psychology. The correct path is that to which our natural moral
psychology inclines us. Humans have a
 Xin  *xin*heart-mind that is
naturally *shan*good-at normative choice and
practice.


Mencius may have been reacting to Mohism. Mozi (470-391
BC) had earlier initiated a shift in focus to more
natural and objective, less culturally relative way of grounding
normative judgment. His claim that Tian 
*tian*nature:sky exhibited a tendency to a
course leading to human utility or well-being. So humans should use
that natural norm, the Bian 
*bian*distinction between
Li Hai  *li-hai* benefit-harm
in constructing our social *dao*, including the norms of
language.


Correctly using terms is using them to mark the path of cooperative
behaviors that lead to general human benefit--a social
Dao  *dao*path utilitarianism, rather than a law or rule version. Nature *intends* us to follow its natural
structures in ways that lead to universal human
 Li  *li*benefit. Ethical
questions thus have a single correct answer in an ideally engineered
and shared normative linguistic practice. Mohist utilitarian
metaethics pointed to natural realism.


Daoist primitivism (symbolized by the mythical Laozi and the
anonymous text known as the *Daode Jing*) was, as noted
above, a further trend toward a broader ethical naturalism with
anti-language absolutist implications. We should forget or ignore all
social norms and practices, including linguistic ones. Utility
(perhaps egoistic utility) does motivate our behavior as naturally as
water follows the paths created by natural contours of earth. Language
should not interfere in any way with this natural guiding interaction
between us and the course(es) of nature.


### 4.2 The Conceptual Foci of Chinese Daoist Normative Theorizing



Understanding the *Zhuangzi* is made more difficult by the huge
differences not only in the philosophical context, but in the
pervasive metaphors that structure and focus discussions of norms of
behavior in the Chinese vs Indo-European classical traditions. His
positions invite comparisons with modern metaethical naturalism but he
does not focus them with concepts linked to grammatical sentences such
as "laws" or "rules" (sentences in
*all* form) or "facts" (sentence-sized chunks of
reality) or "properties (realities corresponding to sentence
predicates)." Zhuangzi used the traditional Dao 
*dao*path metaphor together with the
technical terminology developed in Mohism  of
*shi-fei*this-not that,
*bian*distinction and
*ke*permissible. 



The metaphor shaping most Chinese discussions of pragmatic knowing,
choice and behavior was *dao*--a path or trail.
Questions we would phrase in terms of moral propositions, laws, or
principles are questions about finding, choosing and following
*dao*s, paths or ways. *Dao*s can be
social or natural structures that guide us in answering practical
questions: what to do or how to do it. As the focus of warring Chinese
conceptions of guidance, *dao* guidance has three
phases. We must find or notice them, choose one from among those we
notice, and then follow or interpret the selected *dao* in
 Xing 
*xing*walking:behavior. We
 Bian 
*bian*distinguish, discover and recognize them; choose or approve (*shi*this:right)
them or reject (*fei*not-that:wrong ) them, and
treat them as *ke*permissible  or not. Our
capacity to engage in these three processes governing natural guiding
structures, *dao*s, is an internal
*dao*--our
 De 
*de*virtuosity.  Our
 De 
*de*virtuosity at interacting with the web of
*dao*s reads and interprets the path-marks thus generating our
 Xing 
*xing*walking:behavior. 



The *dao* metaphor corresponds closely with the Western
translation metaphor of 'a way' which, while ubiquitous in
philosophical discourse, is rarely a central focus of philosophical
analysis of normativity. 
The salient differences between the two
traditions accounts of behavior are that the Chinese does not focus on
sentential items (actions, events, beliefs) particularly as conclusions of belief plus desire mental arguments. Instead, it focuses on the interplay of
natural processes grounded in the temporally shifting distributions of Qi 
*qi*physical stuff that yields path-like guidance structures for living things.



Confucians and Mohists had their own theories of the both the right
*dao*s and the right
 De 
*de*virtuosity  to use together in
guiding behavior. Confucian *dao*s tended to be those
enshrined in past practice and their version of
 De 
*de*virtuosity  tended toward the
intuitive, typically appealing to Ren 
*ren*humanity. 



Mohists advocated guiding reform of conventional social *dao*s
using a natural normative Bian 
*bian*distinction of
 Li Hai  *li-hai*benefit-harm. For
Mohists,
 Li Hai  *li-hai*benefit-harm
was a Tian 
*tian*natural way of finding, choosing,
reforming and interpreting social *dao*s. In contrast to
Confucians, Mohists sought to elaborate their natural ways of
selecting *dao*-like social practices as operational,
objective, measurement-like processes accessible to ordinary people
and not subject to training and indoctrination.



Chinese linguistic analysis folded naturally into similar
language--it concerns ways of using words--*dao*s
(norms) of linguistic behavior focused on word use. The more
philosophically inclined schools began to see such norms of the use of
words as underlying the explicit disagreements among schools about
which norms or *dao*s to follow and how to follow
them. 



The discussion of norms of use are typically couched in behavioral formulations such
as Qu  *qu*choose, Ju  *ju* pick-out Ke  *ke*assertible:admissible
Bian 
*bian*distinction
Zhi  *zhi*point and
*he*combine. The core psychological attitude
is
 Wei  *wei*deem:do
which may be expressed as a tendency (in speech, both inner and
expressed) to express a
 Shi Fei  *shi-fei*this-not
that judgment
regarding the use of a word. A phonetically and semantically related tendency is 
 Wei  *wei*calling it
by the term. Behaviorally, it amounts to dealing with it under that word-concept. Conversely we
can *shi* or *fei* the use of a name of some
contextual object--*wei*call it or
*wei*deem it properly associated with that
Ming 
*ming*name. 



To Wei  *wei*deem:do can be either to
express the category assignment in one's behavior--either
speech-behavior or behaving toward the object as people would be
expected to, given that they assigned the object to that category. The behavior for the category would be found in the social or natural *dao*path
they follow. A Wei 
*wei*deem:do state is less a mental picture
of a fact (a belief) than a disposition to treat or identify some
object as deserving the term in question. Instead of the western
reality vs. appearance dialectic, Chinese discussion revolves around
the contrast of natural
 (Tian  *tian*nature:sky)
*dao*s and human
 (Ren  *ren*human) or
socially constructed, *dao*s. The human
*dao*s are constructed with the help of
 Ming  *ming*names
strung together into Yan 
*yan*language.


Mozi, as we noted above,
appealed to what he regarded as a natural utility standard to judge
the acceptability of *yan*language use and
Confucius relied more on past usage ranging back to the mythical sage
kings. Problems of justifying approvals and disapprovals of word usage
led such later Confucians as Mencius, to rely more on cultivating an
intuition. Since the account of cultivation typically presupposed
practice in conformity with the social practice requiring
justification, the threat of circularity pushed traditionalists
eventually to teach about and appeal to an allegedly innate or
pre-social human psychology.


By contrast, the craft-inspired
Mohists went on to emphasize the use of measurement tools and
operations as the standards guiding term use. They argued that such
operational standards would be more accessible to ordinary people who
could rely only on their "eyes and ears." The Confucians,
by contrast, were forced to flip between appealing to some cultivated
authority and attributing an innate moral inclination to the existing
conventional language *dao* to such ordinary people.



Shi Fei 
*Shi-fei*this-not that judgments can
concern choice of a *dao* or the interpretive
performances of a chosen *dao*. Chinese writers
similarly focused on
 Ke  *ke*assertible:permissible
which may be said of a *dao*, or of a permissible
walking of some *dao*--including those of language
use. Disagreement could be at the level of *dao*s, or at
the interpretive level--endorsing or rejecting a 
 Wei 
*wei*deem:do. The endorsing-rejecting
 Shi Fei 
*shi-fei*this-not that and 
 Ke  *ke*permissible
behaviors themselves involve either choosing or interpreting
*dao*s. Each time we make any of these judgments we
contribute to further constructing our socially shared
*dao* with its implied practices of
 Ming  *ming*names
use.



### 4.3 Zhuangzi's Distinctive Approach


Zhuangzi conforms to the general pre-Han model, using a path
metaphor to discuss normativity in general. This fuels the traditional
view of him as a Daoist. Most of his discussion, moreover, further
conforms to the practice of focusing on social
*dao*s--undermining treatment as religious disciple
of Laozi's insistence we follow only
 Tian  *tian*natural
*dao*s. What links him to a naturalist theme is his
reluctance to draw the usual contrast between natural and social
*dao*s. (Is it nature? Is it man?). Human social
*dao*s **are** natural behaviors of natural
animals. This grounds Zhuangzi's pattern of talking about and with
other equally natural creatures. 



Humans are as natural as monkeys, birds, and fish. "How can
*dao*s be hidden such that there are authentic and
artificial?" he asks rhetorically? (Harvard Yenching
*Zhuangzi Yinde* hereafter HY 4/2/24-5) All the different
social traditions expand the number and kinds of naturally existing
*dao*s. Other animals' walking patterns also
construct natural *dao*s which, similarly, become
available for human finding, choosing and walking. 



Zhuangzi's discussion, particularly in the philosophically
most sophisticated second chapter, is mainly about the plurality and
relativity of second-level *dao*s, our naturally
endowed, internal *dao*sways of finding,
choosing and following one of many natural ways of life in the maze or
network presented by nature. This stance makes the complexity of the
natural network only the first level of variety and
possibility. Recursion of *dao*s explodes the
complexity. A tripartite recursion follows because there are many
*dao*s of finding, of choosing, and of translating the
first level plethora. The many layered complexity of
*dao*s of *dao*s yields the human sphere
of life. "Fish interact
in water; humans interact in *dao*s"
(*Ibid*., HY 18/6/72) 



He naturalizes *dao*s less by attending to natural physical
guiding structures (e.g. *dao*s of water) than to the
variety of human *dao*s presented by analogy to the
variety of creatures with different *dao*s. Alternately,
he encourages us not to assume we have found all the available ways to
behave or he reflects on the variety of sources of
*dao*s of choice or of different capacities to catch on
and follow within us--our different natural organs and the range
of different ways we may train or habituate them. This complexity of
*dao* structures fuels, in turn, both his skepticism of
absolutes, of authority, of ideal observers, of social dogmas and his
qualified advice to leave the finding, choice and interpretation to a
working out from the variety of perspectives that make up the behaving
units in the particular circumstance. *Dao* choices are
best made from the perspective of walkers.(*Ibid*., HY
4/2/33)



The other distinctive feature of Zhuangzi's approach lies in the
sophistication of his handling the issues of language in explicating
this natural complexity of *dao*s. Graham interpreted a
famous Zhuangzi trope (the pipes of
 Tian  *tian*nature:sky) as
Zhuangzi's way of positioning language as *tian*
(natural) sound. 




> The pipes of earth, these are the hollows everywhere;
>  the pipes of men, these are rows of tubes. Tell me about the pipes
>  of Heaven.' Who is it that blows the ten thousand disputing
>  voices, who when of themselves they stop their talk has sealed them,
>  and puffs out of them the opinions that they choose for
>  themselves?' HY 3/2/4-9 



Graham elaborates:



> 
> These are apparently the holes in the heart through which thought
> courses and the mouths which utter it, so that the breath blown by
> heaven through the inner formations of different men issues in
> contradictory utterances. (Graham 1969:149)



Zhuangzi's Daoism, thus, starts by removing
*tian*constant nature from its role as ultimate
normative authority--the role it played in virtually all the
rival accounts of which *dao* we should follow. All
*dao*s that are practically available at the point of
choice for walking (actually existing *dao*s) are
similarly *tian*. *Tian* (nature) generates
*dao*s as it generates the
 Wu  *wu*thing-kinds 
(humans and other animals) that find and follow them. Neither it nor
the cosmos can play the role of an authority, far less of an
anthropomorphic authority commanding or dictating our choice among the
network of naturally existing
*dao*s. *Dao*s are chosen from those found
in nature, but none represents nature's choice for us--none
of the *dao*s in nature is **the** *dao*
**of** nature. 



Dialectically, Zhuangzi's replacement for
*tian*'s role as source of normative guidance would be the entire complex network of *dao* structures that permeate the natural world. He situates us at indexed points in this
network seeking paths forward from *here and now*, choosing
from among the plethora of those accessible which, if any, to follow. 



The philosophical advantage of Zhuangzi's way of discussing
*dao*s, thus, does not leave him suggesting that what is
natural is moral (analogous to implying "ought" from
"is"). Nature gives us a complex network of iterative
guiding structures among which we are about to *swim*. In our
waking hours, we continue constructing systems of contending,
resolving and agreeing on
 Shi Fei 
*shi-fei*this-not that
judgments--the rejected ones buried in rubble of ongoing
construction of normative language marking behavioral paths. (HY
3/2/11-13)


We recognize greater and lesser models of both--the more
reflective and engaging vs. a lazier, more wordy type. As we
*walk* through a day, we encounter attitudinal
states--joy, sorrow, surprise, ennui etc. We don't know
what role these play but they seem central to our choosing
activity--indeed to our having a perspective, an
'I'. (HY 3/2/11-14)



When we describe that entire structure, e.g. as resembling a natural
network of links (*dao*s) between temporally and
spatially indexed points we can see how it might generate talk of a
single cosmic dao. All guidance is at a point in the network and
available to and for some emergent object--physical, living,
animal or human. The inner processes of seeking, choosing, and
following *dao*s from node to node are themselves part
of the natural network. We are not sure what the normative point of
our natural reactions in walking through the nature's maze. Each step
or utterance adds a Shi Fei 
*shi-fei*this-not that to the edifice of
guiding discourse marking paths for ourselves and for
others. It's as if there is some natural authority guiding the
construction process, though we can't see marks of its authority. We can reliably walk paths or *dao*s but can't see the shape of the authority. We light on paths and react with heart-mind
responses. That's it. (*Ibid*., HY 4/2/14-16)



Human *dao*s of finding, choosing and following are
capacities normally attributed to the
 Xin  *xin*heart-mind.  Zhuangzi
recognizes its involvement in the construction process, but is
skeptical of making it a kind of natural authority. It is, after all,
only one of the natural organs involved--our daily reactions
include being directed by our stomachs, our eyes, etc. Why, Zhuangzi
wonders, should we think they need a single authority? (HY
4/2/14-16)



Even, then, if we take the
 Xin  *xin*heart-mind as an authority,
it's not clear how it can help us deal with the role of
judgments of greater and lesser wisdom and different ways of using
 Shi Fei 
*shi-fei*this-not that. Aren't all the hearts
involved in the evolving construction equally natural--the sages
and the fools? (HY 4/2/21-22)  



Any output from our Xin  *xin*heart-mind
 into this
construction of a *dao* to follow from here is itself a
product of our having walked one of a range of possible *dao*s to this point. (HY
4/2/20)



> "To get a Shi Fei 
> *shi-fei*this-not
>  that from the
>  Xin  *xin*heart-mind  without
>  it's having been constructed there is like going to
>  *Yue* today and arriving yesterday, like getting something
>  from nothing." Even the wisest of mythical sages (Yao)
>  can't know how to do that! (*Ibid*., HY
>  4/2/22-23)



There are many natural ways of finding and choosing ways. Humans
naturally exhibit variety in how they find or choose a course of
behavior. This recursive complex of *dao*s of choosing
is part of nature. No single one need be considered *the*
*dao* *of* nature to the exclusion of
others. They may be capacities of individuals or of social groups,
embodied in their social practices. The gestalt set of past
commitments and acquired inclinations to choose and interpret paths is
another component of our situation or location in a complex web of
*dao*s. The given *dao*s of choice are
what Zhuangzi treats as Cheng 
*cheng*constructed/mature within our body as
we traverse the nodes of the network of *dao*s. Our
heart-minds reach an indexed point with a given momentum vector--a
speed on an existing trajectory--this is our a point of view or
perspective, complete with prior commitments to
*dao*sways of appreciating and selecting
among available paths.



These second-level *dao*s can also be chosen and walked
correctly or incorrectly. Choosing an epistemic *dao*, in turn, depends
on other a practically available *dao*s for guiding that
meta-choice... and so on. Zhuangzi does not view it as a rational or
logical construction, but a complicated, multi-layered natural one. He
speaks of "eight De 
*de*virtuosities" involved in
constructing *dao*s and guiding expressions, starting
with the indexical locatives, left and right, then human relations,
then mores, divisions (categories?), distinctions (disputes),
competition and then strife. (HY 5/2/55-6)     



A similar recursion concerns *dao*s of finding and
interpreting *dao*s. This network of recursive natural
guidance structures constitutes the complex network of natural *dao*. We
rely on meta-*dao*s, practically available links in this
network, in choosing and in interpreting practically available
ground-level *dao*s. Humans navigate in a
 sea of *dao*s. 



Then who or what does the choosing? Zhuangzi's theory here is
similarly detached and natural. He focuses less on the consciousness
or subjectivity of some mental substance or cognitive self or agent,
but on a grammatical locus of judgment, a
 Wo  *wo*I:me
 within the linguistic *dao* structure--the
grammatical indexical marks a choosing point in the conceptual and
space-time structure. Like Hume's self, without the naturally
occurring grab-bag of attitudes, it would not be there to play its
choosing role. The Wo  *wo*I:me is
situated in a frame of reference with its own complicated Cheng 
*cheng*commitment trajectory in the iterative
*dao*s of choice. The *wo*I:me
that knows-how is situated in existing commitments embedded in an
indexed here-now in the network of ways it will assign to
*shi-fei*this-not that. Each
*shi-fei*this-not that it "shoots out"
further commits it to a path. (The narrator had introduced the above
"pipes of heaven" metaphor
to describe a gestalt he describes as having "said farewell to
my *wo*I:me.")



> "Its eruptions are like a repeating
> crossbow" expresses how it manages
>  Shi Fei 
> *shi-fei*this-not that
> judgments. "Its resting on them like an oath or treaty"
> expresses how it clings to past winners, "its death is like
> autumn and winter" expresses  how it daily declines, a
> weakening brought about by this (the weight of accumulated
> commitments?) and it cannot start the process over. "Its
> rejections are like tightening bonds" puts into language these
> aging channels. As the *xin*heart-mind nears
> death, nothing can restore its dynamism. (HY 3/2/11-13) 
> 
> 
> 
> Joy, anger, sadness, pleasure, worrying, sighing, resisting, clinging,
> being drawn to, eschewing, launching, and committing, like music from
> empty holes, dampness generating mushrooms, these day and night
> replace each other before us and yet none can know from what they
> emerge. Let it be! Let it be! They come from where they
> emerge--without these, there would be no Wo 
> *wo*I:me and without a
> *wo*I:me there would be no choosing. (HY
> 3/2/13-14)
> 
> 



For Zhuangzi, the issue is not mind or consciousness, but the
behavioral inclinations and the normative authority of these
roving indexical perspectives scattered within the natural
*dao* network. Their choices of which
*dao*s to walk furthers the construction (
 Cheng  *cheng*fixing)
of our perspective for the next choice.



> It seems as if there is a natural authority, but we
>  cannot find its authoritative source. There is sufficient reliability
>  that this is walkable, but we don't see it's
>  [authorizing?] shape--it has natural reality but no visible
>  shape. (HY4/2/15-16)


The first level paths have a shape, but the *dao*s of
correct choice and performance are inside the performer and not plainly visible.



The trend from social construction humanism toward naturalism had been
gradual. Mozi's argument for basing such constructions on a natural
distinction of benefit and harm was an early step. Graham had
separately theorized that Mencius developed both his response to Mozi
and his account of the role of
 Ren  *ren*humanity
as arguments that Confucian ritual behavior had evolved from
*tian*natural intuitive response patterns in
the
 Xin  *xin*heart-mind. This
implicitly endorsed Mozi's reliance on a
*tian*natural ground for the social
construction of morality. 


### 4.4 Doubting Intuitionism


Graham's Zhuangzi then addressed this Mencian response in a
passage that extends the Hume-like skepticism about any identifiable
"inner self". That should be what guides the naturally occurring emotive
reactions that are necessary for a *wo*I:me
that chooses. It seems, he says, there must be one, but we find no
evidence of it. We approve of behaviors and place our trust in its
reactions but find no sign of what is authorizing or making them. 




> Hundreds of parts, nine
> openings and six viscera included and completed
>  (Cheng  *cheng*fixed)
> in place in us, with which should I feel most akin? Should I be
> pleased with them all? Is there a *wo*I:me
> among them?  Among them, should we deem some as rulers and as
> servants? Are the rulers and servants incapable of governing each
> other? Are they not capable of taking turns as ruler and servants? Is
> there a genuine ruler among them?  It's as if trying and
> failing to grasp its real character has no bearing on whether it is
> genuine. (*Ibid*., HY 4/2/16-18)



Mozi had worried that it would be circular to appeal to intuitions about the word use in a social *dao* to authorize that very practice, for example Confucian ritual. Being a product
of ritual training. acquired intuitions could not be a sufficiently
neutral way of justifying our choosing *ritual* as our social
guide. Nor could one trained practitioner have authority over another
in resolving interpretive disputes about how to execute the ritual,
e.g., about how to apply the terms found in ritual texts to concrete real-time
behaviors. He insisted we need a neutral, non-cultural or natural
basis for such meta-choices of social practices of choosing and interpreting practices. 



The narrative history of Classical thought found near the end of the
*Zhuangzi* (*Ibid*., HY 90/33/1) takes off from this
dispute between Confucians and Mohists. It welcomes Mozi's
implicit search for neutrality, universality, and greater
objectivity. However, the school viewed the familiar debate between a
utilitarian and traditional morality as interminable because
Mozi's *dao*guide, like
Confucius's, starts from different standards, different Cheng 
*cheng*constructed commitments to linguistic
practices. Each relies on their past practice of judging how to use
the key moral Ming  *ming*names.
Confucians would reject Mozi's standards because they led to what
Confucians view as the wrong conclusions (e.g., *implied*
Confucians should abandon Yi  *yi* moral
rituals such as burial). The Mohists reject burial rituals because
they use Yi  *yi* morality of the social
mores reformed according to their standard of general utility. The
pivotal statement of Zhuangzi's position is expressed as a riff
on the relativity or dependence of Shi Fei 
*shi-fei*this-not that judgments about
language use on natural circumstances, naturally existing past
practice, commitments and attitudinal gestalt shifts. 



> Where can
> Dao  *dao*guides hide such that there are
> genuine and artificial? Where can
> Yan  *yan*language  hide such that
> there is Shi  Fei  *shi-fei*this-not
> that. Where can *dao*s hide such that they do not
> exist? How can a Yan  *yan*language exist
> and not be Ke  *ke*assertible?
> *Dao*s hide behind small achievements and language hides
> behind rhetorical flourishes and elaboration. So you have the
> "this is right-that is wrong" of the Confucians and
> Mohists. Of what one says "this is right" the other says
> "that is wrong" and of what they say "that is
> wrong" says "this is right." If you want to
> "wrong" what the other "rights" and
> "right" what the other 'wrong's, nothing
> matches Ming  *ming*discerning. (*Ibid*.,
> HY4/2/24-7)



Though balanced in judging this impasse, the *Zhuangzi*'s
interesting target is the Mohist aspiration to objectivity. Many
stories in the text target the notion that *utility* is a
naturally constant value--particularly the *human* utility
that Mozi champions. Among this series of parables, the most famous,
the useless tree, illustrates the relativity of usefulness to Hui
Shi. (*Ibid*.,  HY 3/1/46-7)



Not only are we implicitly appealing to a *dao* in
choosing to adopt a benefit/harm standard, we are also going to appeal
to interpretive *dao* to judge whether we have followed
it correctly or not. Mozi had treated moral disputes as disagreements
about how to Bian  *bian*distinguish in
applying terms like Yi  *yi*morality and
Shan  *shan*good-at. He had also objected
to Confucian reliance on acquired intuition since it made access to
such judgments esoteric. He argued that standards governing such
evaluative word use should be made by Fa 
*fa*measurement standards that are accessible
to the "eyes and ears" of ordinary people. His utility
standard, Zhuangzi is suggesting, is still relative to the
*way* of translating it to behavior. 



Others in the ethical debate, notably Yang Zhu and related
Primitivists, also appealed to *tian* (natural constancy)
as a normative arbiter. The growing awareness that norms of behavior
are intertwined with norms of language use, produced another feature
of this strand of thought bringing the natural world into our
guidance. Primitivists came to advocate silence--letting the natural
paths of the world take over completely. 


 For most of history, the *Laozi* has exemplified this rejection of language. It
treated all social Dao 
*dao*spaths as implicit rejections of the
natural Dao  *dao*path. Graham has argued
that echoes of this line of thinking lay in the background of
Mencius's thought. That concern led him to attempt to substitute
natural moral psychology (a natural moral disposition in human
Xin  *xin*heart-mind) for positive social
mores. 



A paradigm of this anti-language, silence trend (cited in the
*Zhuangzi*'s internal history just before discussing the
*Laozi* group ) was Shen Dao. Shen Dao postulated a
"Great *Dao*" (essentially the actual course
of cosmic history from past to future) which "even a clod of
earth" will follow. We all will follow Great
*Dao*. We can (and should) therefore abandon knowledge
of how to make linguistic distinctions (Shi Fei 
*shi-fei*this-not that judgments) to
follow Great *Dao*. Shen Dao, based on his version of
logical determinism (i.e., There being an actual complete history of
space-time entails your behavior tomorrow is included) draws an
anti-normative, quietist and stoic conclusion.



Later Mohist writings contain several acute critiques of such a
trending pro-silence posture. Deeming all Yan 
*yan*language as not-Ke 
*ke*assertible is not Ke 
*ke*assertible. The explanation, later Mohists
noted, lies in the asserter's own use of
 Yan  *yan*language. Rejecting
(*fei*-ing) all *shi-fei* judgments is
*fei* (wrong, to be rejected). Similarly self-defeating is
"teaching not to teach." 



Zhuangzi's "pipes of nature" metaphor signals his
departure from these defective *Laozi*-like or Primitivist
anti-language positions. Language is natural and arguments for silence
are self-condemning. So the point of Zhuangzi's own reflections on the
absence of natural normative endorsement of our
*shi-fei*this-not that  decisions
should not guide us to stop making them. Making them is what
*we* naturally do when we find *our*
*dao*s *in* nature. It is natural for us to make
a judgment, but not nature making it. Normativity arises from within
nature, but nature only makes all its normative, behavior-guiding
paths for us naturally *available*.


### 4.5 Relativism: It depends on ...


The *Zhuangzi* emphasizes the plurality of natural stances
or points of view from which one may see paths of possible behavior as
"natural." For one of the paths to be available for
*me* will be dependent on where I am and my *given*trajectory in the network. All the appeals to
*tiannature* as an authority are right in
insisting their *dao*s are natural, but mistaken in
using that as a reason to deny a similar status to the
*dao*s of rival normative thinkers. *Tian*
cannot serve as an arbiter of which rival norm is correct since it
equally "puffs" all of them out. This allows each to claim
their choices are of *tian*natural
*dao*s but does not allow them the corollary that their
rival's choices violate *tian*. They, like us,
conform with *tian*'s constancies in being committed
to their *dao*s. 



Any
*shi-fei*this:right judgment concerning
a *dao* may be either a Yin 
*yin*dependent *shi,* based on
prior or enacted commitments, gestalts orientations, and inner
processes or it may be an arbitrary posited (Wei 
*wei*do:deem) *shi*. Dependency
arises from past (*cheng*fixed) commitments
to the *dao* structures through which we worked our way
to our *here-now*. We always encounter such choices as we are
already engaged in walking along some *dao*. Those past
*dao* commitments bring us to a normative stance from
which successive judgments of *shi-fei* and
Ke  *ke*permissible vs. not
*ke* arise. Zhuangzi's pivotal illustration pairs
Shi  shithis with Bi 
*bi*that as near and far indexicals. His use of
another indexical here signals his view that Shi 
*shi*this:right used normatively as opposite
to Fei  *fei*not-that:wrong is relative to
a commitment index.



Local justifications for having
*shi-fei*this-not that or
*ke*assertible are delivered in accordance our
*cheng*fixed commitment momentum along the
*dao*s that guided us to this point. This relativity of
normative dependence underpins Zhuangzi's mildly ironic,
skepticism of special or extraordinary normative statuses we give to,
e.g., sages. The skepticism must apply even to the quietist posture that
*shi-fei*this-not that judgments are
"bad" or unnatural. We should doubt any transcendent or
allegedly perfect, totalistic epistemic access to nature's
inexpressible normative know-how. There are no naturally ideal
observers.




> 
> Will the eventual result be there is both Shi 
> *shi*this:right and Bi 
> bithat?  Will the eventual result be there is
> neither shi nor bi? We can call the situation of neither
> *shi* nor *fei* finding its opposite the
> "pivot of Dao  *dao*guides."
> The pivot sets the start of the center of a sphere from which there
> are inexhaustible responses--inexhaustible *shi*
> and inexhaustible *fei*.  Hence the saying
> "nothing matches Ming 
> *ming*discernment." (*Ibid*., HY
> 4/2/30-31)



This cautious skepticism undergirds Zhuangzi's departure from
the primitivists'. He neither thinks we should conclude that we
must not issue *shi-fei* judgments nor that we must
reject or deny our natural, situational inclinations to
*shi-fei*. We should, however, adopt an attitude of
epistemic modesty in making our perspective based choices and
recommending our interpretations to others. That modesty arises from
*ming*discerning that their perspectives,
like ours, arise from within a immensely complex and complicated
natural *dao* structure. Epistemic modesty also
undergirds Zhuangzi's openness and willingness to interact with
others. If nature has a point of view, it is that one in which all
*actual dao*s of *shi-fei*-ing in
nature are available as natural guiding structures. Hence nature makes
no choice that implies a more absolute, or superior normative status
on either perspective. Nature makes them possible candidate guiding
*dao*s for us to choose and walk. 



A question implicitly and repeatedly left to the reader is what
Zhuangzi means by Ming 
*ming*discerning. Does it amount to taking
the view *of* nature but of *nowhere* in particular or
is it a naturally occurring, perspective on perspectives, a
recognition of the plurality of natural perspectives? He usually
recommends to our attention insights gained from realizing that our
choice is one among a wide range of naturally available
*dao*s. He provokes us to realize that we may make
progress and improve our guiding perspective by simulating the guiding
perspectives of others. Some tales, by contrast, warn us not to expect
the *dao*s of others to mesh with our capacities and
character--as with the boy from Shouling who goes to learn the
 Handan way of walking, which "cripples"
his original ability. Still a third outcome of the interaction, as
with violent gangsters, reminds us simply to keep our distance. 



However, in the standard cases, we learn from simulating others'
perspectives, choices and interpretations of the natural
*dao*-structures either from projecting or
communicating--sharing methods and techniques we did not grasp
before (new ways to use gourds or hand-salve or find ways to
accommodate and interact while "walking two ways"). New
accumulated insights about natural structures may improve our range of
options, from our own point of view. Learning can also help us see how
to walk in the natural paths together without getting in the other's
*way*.



In understanding other's trajectories along their
*dao*s, we *may* judge them as correct or
incorrect. First, we do this from our own present perspective. We
neither judge all to be right nor all to be wrong--nor even that all
are equal. Certainly, not all are equally worthy of *our*
choice. We need not judge that all are good choices for those
following them--only that the grounds of their choice may be
different from ours. They might still be dogmatic, careless, or
unwarranted even given the situational grounds of their
choice. Nothing about the *naturalness* of such choices arising
makes them right. All this is compatible with recognizing others as
natural creatures guided by natural inner processes along natural
guiding *dao*s.


 We neither seek to follow all at once or each equally--as Hui
Shi seems to suggest. Nor do we resolve to follow none--as Shen
Dao suggests. We do judge that we might gain from being aware of and
engaging in open exchanges--as in Zhuangzi's dialogues. We are more
inclined to follow a path, and given our similarities, think we might
pursue it with benefit when we know some natural being like us found
and followed it. And Zhuangzi clearly does ridicule the social
moralists (Confucians and Mohists) as well as Hui Shi for the
narrowness of their range of choices--their failure to appreciate
the richness and complexity of alternative ways of life. 



Our tendency to appreciate and share others' values, to mirror their
behavior cooperatively, together with our awareness of the wide
variety of perspectives, many of which we judge to be worthless,
mistaken, or dangerous, makes it hard to treat any projected
transcendental, comprehensive viewpoint as the single answer.
Zhuangzi's "pivot of
*dao*s," his "view from nowhere,"
is not a final *shi-fei* judgment. It is the point
prior to any *shi-fei* and from which all
diverge. Each commitment propels us down a different path at a
*cheng*fixed momentum. We rely on
*cheng*fixed commitments to prior
*shi-fei* in all
*shi-**fei* judgment. All
*shi-**fei* are indexed within the
network. The judgment from no-where-when is no-judgment. 



We learn from openness and exchange because we acquire commitments
from simulating others' path following behavior. That we progress in
such exchanges is something we ourselves judge, not the cosmos. No
judgment comes from some point outside of or everywhere in the network
of *dao*s. We are naturally influenced by others'
evaluations, their judgments of our choices and their behavioral
virtuosity--especially when the others are our parents, perceived
superiors and respected models. These, again, are the Yin 
*yin*dependencies on which present judgments
depend.



This gives Zhuangzi's indexical relativism a different contour
from Hui Shi's. The latter structures his analysis mainly on
comparatives. This leads him to a version of normative 'error
theory' -the conclusion that we should abandon normative
semantic distinctions as all wrong. Since the Bian 
*bian*distinctions on which they are based
are relative, they are unreal. Ergo, there are no real distinctions
and the world is actually one. Any distinction making judgment, any
*shi-fei*this-not that, unnaturally
divides what is naturally one. Hui Shih's Tenth Thesis is:



> Flood concern on all the 10,000 thing-kinds; The cosmos is
> one Ti  *ti*unit. (HY
> 93/33/74)


Graham, relying on his hypothesis that Zhuangzi frequently
considers positions which he later rejects, had already targeted the
stereotype view of Zhuangzi as agreeing with Hui Shi's
monism. Graham's translation reveals the reductio that puts
monism in a "considered and rejected" category. It amounts
to the self-rebutting anti-language stance targeted by the Later
Mohists--the error Zhuangzi's naturalism of all
perspectives (the "pipes of
heaven") was intended to avoid.



>  "[H]eaven and earth were born together with me
> and the myriad things and I are one."
> 
> 
> 
> Now that we are one, can I still say anything? Now that I have called
> us one, did I succeed in not saying something? One and the saying make
> two, two and one make three. Proceeding from here even an expert
> calculator cannot get to the end of it, much less a plain
> man. (HY5/2/52-54)
> 
> 


### 4.6 Zhuangzi on Language


Zhuangzi's relativism expresses choice, commitment, and
interpretive performance on analogy to natural processes involved in
following a path. Commitment is setting off along a path. We have
momentum and a trajectory. The shape of the path combines with these
and *commits* us to walk on or continue in a way that depends
on the discernible shape of the path. Walking a path involves staying
*mostly* within its physical boundaries. 


This account allows us
to capture the flavor of Zhuangzi's discussion which does not employ
the familiar Western sentence-based metaphors of laws, rules,
principles with norms of *obedience*, *belief* or
propositional desire. Using the Western idiom, along with the
associated practical syllogism of belief-desire explanation would give
Zhuangzi the basis for a distinction between a cause and a
reason--a distinction he seems not to draw in his talk of
Yin  *yin*dependence. There is a kind of
inference from *dao*s of choice, interpretation etc. of
a path and an internal feedback *dao* (our De 
*de* virtuosity at)
"reading" external paths to guide behavior. 


Zhuangzi
would not make that point in terms of deduction from a normative
premise or principle. The internal and external paths themselves have
a causal and normative relation to our walking behavior. A more
sentential focus would similarly mean describing the outcome as an
action rather than an extended *course of*  walking/following
behavior. A sentence would state the action or the intent--rather like
the conclusion of a practical syllogism rather than, as as fits in
this metaphorical space, as performing a role in a play or or part in
a symphony.



Zhuangzi's use of the path metaphor did extend to the
understanding of language but, again, not with a focus on sententials. Rather
than constructing *dao*s in sentential form, Zhuangzi
construes language in *dao* form. The focus of ancient
Chinese theory was on names on the analogy of path markers: "go
past the tree, turn right and then down to the water." Names
take on importance as sign-posts along physical structures. Confucian
social versions emphasized the names of social roles and statuses more
than of natural kinds. Primitivist opposition to social
*dao*s led them into the sweeping anti-naming postures
that Later Mohists showed to be self-condemning. 



Graham's interpretation of Zhuangzi's
 pipes of nature gave him a way to evade
this anti-language abyss. Human language is a natural sound. Hui
Shi's using relativist premises about names to derive an
absolutist monism which threatened to collapse to the primitivist
anti-distinction, anti-naming quietism. Making everything one is
equivalent to denying Bian 
*bian*distinctions thereby denying any real
basis for the *shi-fei*this way-not that
statuses implicit in all
Ming  *ming*names  and
yanwords:language.


Zhuangzi's naturalism is
anti-dogmatic, it neither denies nor asserts any particular set of
distinctions as authentic. Distinctions arise from indexed here-now
points in the actual network of *dao*
perspectives--by travelers on a trajectory along one of the
*dao*s choosing
Shi Fei  *shi-fei* this-not that
from among multiple possible courses of behavior afforded by the
cosmos. The cosmos does not select which way to make the choice. 



Zhuangzi's analogy of language and wind, however, had its own
problems. Graham had noted that Zhuangzi returns to the metaphor
nearer the middle of the dialogue, noting that here Zhuangzi seems to
be taking back some of its implications. Having disposed of
Mencius's appeal to intuition and Hui Shi's attempt to
make everything normatively equal, he here addresses a more
challenging position. The Later Mohists advocated a version of
pragmatic-semantic realism. The Later Mohists had also argued that
when a Bian  *bian*distinction was
formulated as a *shi-fei*, e.g., one of the
disputants calls it "ox" and the other
"not-ox", one of them must Sheng 
*sheng*win i.e., Dang 
*dang*hit on it. 



The Later Mohists' version of common-sense realism incorporated social
conventions. Conventions set out what
Wu  *wu*natural-kind each term
"selects out" or
*bian*distinguishes from the rest. We then
extend that distinction to pick out new objects based on their
objective similarity or difference (those accessible to "eyes
and ears" of ordinary people). This is the basis of a social
standard of correct word use enshrined in past practice.


Hui Shi,
however, had undermined that simple version of realism with his observation that
between any two Wu  *wu*natural-kinds we
can find *some* similarity and *some* difference. The
world, in effect, gives us many ways of establishing conventional
distinctions and assigning names. The Later Mohists had failed to find
an adequate account of what similarities would and would not lead to
what they called Kuang Ju  *kuangju*wild
picking out . Zhuangzi's analogy of language to the noises
made by wind had seemed to echo Hui Shi's normlessness about
language. In this later passage, however, he revisits the wind
analogy, and retreats, accepting the Mohist insight that language is
more than a "natural sound."



> 
> 
>  Language is not blowing; those who use
> language, have language. (Graham translates: "Saying is
> not blowing breath, saying says something.) That which it languages is
> decidedly not yet fixed. Is the eventual result that they have (there
> is) language? Or there has never been language? Deeming it as
> different from bird calls: does that mark a distinction?  Or is
> there no distinction?" (HY4/2/23-4) (This passage is followed by
> the passage cited in the "Intuition" sub-section
>  above)
> 
> 


This frustrating vagueness and signature indecision in the text
leaves interpreters to philosophize about what Zhuangzi's
implicit answer (Ming  mingdiscern:clear) might
be. However, the analogy with bird calls is a fortuitous suggestion.
We arrange, adapt and modulate the elements of our language to fit our
environment, abilities, and opportunities (e.g., mating). Would
Zhuangzi have guessed the same about birds?


The claim following that
concurs that the "aboutness" of a language exists but
aboutness is not fixed. This can be explicated with the
 above discussion of the indexicals Shi 
*shi*this:right and Bi 
*bi*that. Zhuangzi carries the diectic
character over to his treatment of the ubiquitous
*shi-fei*this-not that that undergird
the norms guiding how to use names (words). We endorse and recommend
(*shi* this:right) our guiding terms,
language and linked behavior. We may base that on our correctly
following prior commitments to *dao*s of word
use--relying on a Confucian traditional standard, the past and
existing practices of our linguistic community.


 In one passage, Zhuangzi allows this appeal to past or existing
common practice but does not endorse it as right--merely as
useful. Conventions are useful because they facilitate
communication. He he adds a tone of "that is all" hinting
we need not regard them as plausible candidates for being absolutely
right--a single transcendent standard of use. 



> Only those who "break through" know how to
> communicate with it as a "one." Because of this, we
> don't use that strategy and instead locate things in the
> conventional realm. The
> conventional is useful; the useful, communicable, and the communicable
> achievable. If you hit on the achievable, you are almost there and
> dependent *shi*s end. (*Ibid*., HY 4/2/36-37)
>  


Zhuangzi describes our past *shis* of this kind as
"like an oath or treaty." (*Ibid*., HY 3/2/11) They
have "enactment force" committing us to a
*dao* governing their later use. We may conform to
(correctly follow) and further construct our transmitted linguistic
*dao* in expressing or performing (Wei 
*wei*deeming) other things as
*shi-fei*. Our trajectory along our paths
incorporates these accumulated commitments to prior practices of
language use. As our *dao*s now bring us to new
situations, how do we know to project the correct indexed choice from
the prior history of differently-indexed behavior? That actual language behavior commits us to a linguistic *dao*-type, but it's not clear what the commitment entails at this choice point. The
Mohists and Confucians are both claiming, from their different
directional perspectives, to be following similar commitments to existing
*dao*s of practice.



Mozi's recommending naturally or empirically available
*dao*s for reforming shared linguistic practice was
itself, Mozi thought, following existing natural practice. He even
noticed that our ongoing linguistic practice rejects treating
something's merely being a shared past practice as automatically making
it right. Our existing evaluation practices remind us that shared and
unquestioned past practices can be wrong. 



Mozi appealed to what he would also have regarded as a purely natural
practice. Practical efficiency (*li*benefit) is a standard accessible to all ordinary people's
"eyes and ears." Each time we apply some natural, empirically guided interpretation in practice, we participate in
shaping evolving normative practices (both linguistic and behavioral
practices). Each such decision commits us *and others* to a
*dao* of interpreting our social *dao*. We
understand our commitment to that *dao* as a commitment
to practice and transmit it correctly--where the standard of
'correct' is itself either enshrined in a past practice or
in natural utility. This is the basis for Zhuangzi's claim that
social *dao*s, including linguistic
*dao*s, are natural *dao*s--and there
are many of them. Further, as the *Laozi* would later famously
observe, *dao*s can be interpretively guided. They are
changeable *dao*s.  


 Humans, in finding ways to walk and walking them, initiate the
construction of social paths, naturally and perhaps unintentionally,
by leaving prints in the natural world. Zhuangzi links the path
metaphor to a society's linguistic practice thus:



>  That which we treat as Ke  *ke*assertible
> is Ke  *ke*assertible;
> that which we treat as not assertible is not
> assertible. *Dao*s are made by walking them; thing-kinds
> are made Ran  *ran*so so by
> being called 'so'. (*Ibid*., HY 4/2/33)
> 


This sense of the immense complexity and the fluid nature of
normative commitments to a *dao*path underlie
Zhuangzi's skeptical
themes. Ming  *Ming*clear:discerning seems
linked to the gestalt in which we accept ourselves as embedded, along
with others similarly situated, in nature's endlessly complex
evolution of guiding structures. How do we know either that our past
practice was correct or that we are correctly following them in this
new situation, here and now, based solely on our eyes and ears?


### 4.7 Skepticism


Zhuangzi's stance toward Mohist formal realism (if we
disagree on a *shi-fei*, one party must Sheng 
*sheng*win) becomes clearer now. The Mohists
did not specify any objective mechanism of "winning"
beyond some vague suggestion of tipping a balance. However Zhuangzi's
point in response appears to track the *warning function* of a
norm of truth (even when justified by our best available judging
standards, we may still be wrong). Zhuangzi takes
*sheng*winning as a vague primitive in
arguing that we cannot finally settle skeptical doubts by appeal to
winning disputes. The main mechanism Zhuangzi discusses is appeal to a
judge or authority. We appreciate that all judges will also use terms
like *shi-fei*this-not that indexed by
their acquired commitment momentum. Their judgments, like ours,
express their momentum along a *dao* of using
*these* words *here, now* and projecting the usage to
*that, there, then*. 



>  Given that you and
> I have been brought to Bian 
> *bian*dispute and you win me over and I
> don't win you over, in such a case is your distinction
> substantively Shi  *Shi*this:right? Mine
> substantively Fei  *fei*? If I win you over and
> you don't win me over; is mine substantively right? And yours?;
> substantively wrong? Are they partly right and partly wrong? Or
> jointly right and jointly wrong? You and I cannot know between
> ourselves, so another human inherently inherits our obscurity and
> doubt. To whom can we go to correct us? Employing someone who agrees
> with you, given that they are like you, how can they correct the
> situation? Employing someone who agrees with me, given that they are
> like me, how can they correct it? Employ someone different from both
> me and you to correct it, given that they are different from us both,
> how can they correct it? Employ someone who is like both of us to
> correct it, given that they are like us both, how can they correct it?
> So you and I and others cannot know, and in these condition on what
> other can we rely? The changing sounds' mutual dependence is like their
> conjoint autonomy. Harmonize them with glances at nature and make them
> dependent on eventual consensus and with that exhaust the
> years. (*Ibid*., HY 7/2/84-92) 



It is not clear if the conclusion is supposed to be a solution to the
skeptical problem posed or merely a way to cope constructively with
complexity and uncertainty. The passage rules out any appeal to a
special authority of any other point of view--while giving equal
authority in the construction to all. Even where we all share some
"conventional wisdom" it does not have special
authority--say over other creatures. This, was implicit in Mozi's rejection of socially agreed
*dao*s. Zhuangzi's notorious toying with the perspectives of
animals expanded it (for naturalists).
.


 
> Gap-tooth asked
> Kingsley, "Do you know that which all natural kinds agree in
> *shi*endorse-ing?"   
> He answers
> "How would I know that?"   
> "Then, do you know of
> what you don't know?"   
> "And how could I know
> that?"   
> "So, does no natural kind know
> anything?"   
> "And how would I know that? Nonetheless,
> let me try to put it in language. How would I know that what I call
> 'knowing' is not not-knowing? And what I call
> 'not-knowing', is knowing."
> 
> 
> 
> And let me try a question on you. If people sleep in the damp, they
> get pains and paralysis; would eels? If in a tree, they tremble in
> fear; would monkeys? Of the three, does any know the correct place to
> live? ... From where I see it, the origins of goodness and
> morality, painting things as 'this/right' or
> 'not-that/wrong' are, as boundaries, both confused and
> complicated; how could I know how to distinguish them?
> (*Ibid*., HY 6/2/64-70)
> 
> 
> 



This passage reinforces the conclusion that norms of correct word use
is Zhuangzi's core skeptical target. So we may indeed know how
to act, according to some norms of using 'know how' and
not if judged by some other *dao* of correct usage of
the knowing/ignorant distinction. Linguistic skepticism easily
metastasizes to virtually any commitment. According to which
*dao* of projecting past practice should we
judge *this* linguistic behavior as conforming to our commitment or
not. Normative skepticism, in a use-theory is hard to
contain--especially when the model of all judgments is as some indexed
Shi  Fei  *shi-fei*this-not that
assignment. It sweeps in metaphysics, epistemics, and semantics.



A consequence is that Zhuangzi's skepticism is broad but weak. Broad
because it infects so many judgments, but weak not merely in the usual
sense of denying absolute certainty, but in failing to imply that we
should stop or refuse to make the judgment. It does not rest on any
theory of the probability of an error, but that the concept of an
error is subject to the same concerns as the original judgment. It
neither undermines nor give us reason to withdraw our
judgments. Appreciating that others reach their views as naturally as
we do only removes our status to claim that our judgment is
authentically and uniquely correct. 


Temporally, Zhuangzi's
skepticism is buttressed by reminding us of our own past experiences
of learning, of acquiring new gestalts, of realizing that what we had
considered *the* way, was subject to reconsideration and
improvement. The skepticism does not target any specific failure in my
epistemic process. It does not advise me to abandon my present
course. It reminds me only to remain open to the further possibility
of learning more--about what? About the world? We can do that by
learning more about other natural ways of processing and how they work
in the world--other *dao*s. 

 It counts as
skepticism because it reminds us that we normally err on the side of
overestimating than underestimating our epistemic security. We think
we know and do not more often than we think we don't know and we
do. And that is because we underestimate the range of possible
alternative *dao*s. Hence the pragmatic upshot of his
skepticism is to remind us to engage with more other points of
view.



Zhuangzi's skepticism is weak because it acknowledges that we
may apply different concepts of 'knowing' in different
situations. Implicitly, it does not deny that we could meet
*some* particular standard of knowing, but that we could know
for every situation which standard is the right one. What standard is
the right one to use for acknowledging or denying someone knows well
enough to satisfy, for example, the correct *dao* of
assertion? 



This feature of Zhuangzi's skepticism lies at the heart of the famous
debate between Zhuangzi and Hui Shi about the fish-pleasure in which
Zhuangzi *defends* a claim to know against Hui Shi's
challenge. Zhuangzi makes an assertion and Hui Shi initiates the
skeptical challenge. His challenge implies that there is a favored or
correct standard of knowing that turns out to be impossibly
strict. All knowledge must come from inside. It's impossibly strict
because it doesn't allow Hui Shi to issue the challenge in this
conversation. 



 

 
> Zhuangzi and
> Hui Shi wandered over the Hao River bridge. Zhuangzi said,
> "those mini-fish coming from there and cruising around, relaxed
> and unhurried, are fish at leisure." Hui Shi said "You are
> not a fish; from whence do you know the leisure of fish?" Zhuangzi
> retorted, "You are not me, from what perspective do you know my
> not knowing fish at leisure?" Hui Shi responds, "I'm
> not you, of course I don't know about you; You are not a fish
> and that's enough to count as you're not knowing
> fish's leisure." Zhuangzi concludes, "Let's
> return to where we started. When you said 'from what perspective
> do you know fish at leisure', you clearly knew my knowing it as you
> asked me. I knew it here above the Hao." (*Ibid*., HY
>  45/17/87-91)
>  


Graham drew our attention to the role of perspective in this
passage, noting that Hui Shi's challenge to Zhuangzi's assertion
does not use the normal question form, (He 
hehow do you know?) but a locative question word
(An  anwhence?). This brings the debate into
alignment with Zhuangzi's concern about the various perspectives
from which to deploy a *dao* of word use. Here, as
 above, the word is Zhi 
*zhi*know. The norm of asserting, as in
English, involves answering the challenge "how do you
know?" What normative conditions allow me, here and now,
correctly to use the term *zhi*know--hence
to make the assertion about these fish below me? Hui Shi both knew
Zhuangzi was relying on a *dao* of using
'know' "from zhuangzi's here" **and**
Hui Shi knew Zhuangzi's situation from his own relevantly
similar "here-now" and relying on **the same** Dao 
*dao*norm of claiming to know from a distinct
perspective. Hui Shi cannot consistently insist that a speaker can
only use Zhi  *zhi*know when he
occupies the perspective of the thing known.


### 4.8 Perspectives on Perspectives


Notice, the argument about the fish implies we have a perspective
on the perspectives of others. So skepticism grounded in dependence or
relativity of perspective need not be predominantly
negative. Zhuangzi, here, uses it to justify a way of claiming to
knowing. In many other parables, he addresses the kind of knowing that
comes with a gestalt shift, especially when we see our own and
others' points of view as similar--see ourselves as others
see us. This is the more comprehensive perspective Zhuangzi urges on
us. We experience such gestalt shifts especially when we come
appreciate we had been wrong before and now view things
differently. We are confident from our own "now" that we
have made epistemic progress--our new awareness seems
"relatively" improved to us now. We reach a state where we
judge our former perspective to be inferior to our present one. It
includes insight into our relative situations. Evidently, this
awareness of one's own perspective as one of many, equally
natural points of view motivates us to wonder if we have made the
final correction. This enhanced awareness of ourselves as one of many
perspectives is an intelligible candidate reading of Zhuangzi's
Ming  *ming*clarity. It is harder to
construct a coherent narrative for mystical and/or dogmatic
readings--those that jump from an improved perspective to a
perfect one.


 This kind of gestalt shift leads us to reflect on how narrow our
past perspective had been. It features prominently in the "Autumn
Floods" Chapter 17. The Earl of the Yellow River, having thought
himself as the ultimate, discovers the North Sea and announces his
former error and newfound awareness of his lesser significance in
"the greater path." The North Sea Overlord tells him that
he too sees himself as situated in a modest status in a still greater
scheme and rejects the River Earl's attempts to identify the
North Sea's as ultimate. He casts doubt on there being a final,
ultimately small or large.



>  The lord of He river said, "So can I consider
> cosmos 'large' and the tip of a hair as
> 'small'?" North Sea Ruo replied, "No! Thing
> kinds have unlimited measurement (ways of measuring); Time has no end;
> distinctions have no constancy, beginning and ending no inherent
> cause. Because of this great knowing is viewed within a range of
> distant and close. ...We calculate that what humans know is never
> as great as what they do not know, their temporal extent of life is
> not as great as not as much as the time before life, and from the very
> small to try to take in the scope of the very large, is an invitation
> to confusion and disorder and not that from which we can
> gain. (*Ibid*., HY 42/17/14-20) 



Can we describe Zhuangzi's *ming* as "having
a sense of our limited perspective?" Credulous, dogmatic and
imperious absolutists do not appreciate themselves as being in one of
a variety of natural perspectives. Broad open-mindedness and mild
skepticism come together in the *ming*clarity
Zhuangzi encourages in us. It has a dual nature--an epistemically
modest perspective on ourselves that arises from improving our
epistemic status and encourages us to continue. It helps us appreciate
that we are still as naturally situated and others with whom we may
disagree and still grow. Further improvement can come from further
exchange of perspectives. 



The naive Confucian-Mohist advocates of imposing a single social
*dao* thus disrupt the natural process by which social
*dao*s evolve in real time as we seek a harmony guided
by "glances at nature." Seeing things from another's
perspective both alerts us to how we could be wrong and makes us feel
that we now understand things better than with our former, narrower
perspective. Yet, the *Zhuangzi* repeatedly reminds us not to
abandon epistemic modesty when we make epistemic progress. That we now
see things from a perspective in common with another does not make us
both right. Yet, the more comprehensive our perspective, the
"clearer" the new gestalt should seem. 


 The search for this kind of perspective on ourselves and others
seems to motivate Zhuangzi's willingness to engage and interact
with others, seeking to understand their perspective as having a
natural status and role for them as ours does for us. This is partly
illustrated by common sense examples of our judging from our own
current perspective that theirs "adds something" enriching
our own perspective by our own lights. Sometimes it's dangerous
to try to mix others' perspectives with your own. 



> And have you alone not
> heard tell of those from Shou-ling who studied walking with those in
> Handan? They never mastered the country's skill and lost their
> original way of walking, and stumbled and crawled
> back. (*Ibid*., HY45/17/79-80) 


 Aside from its frequent usefulness from our point of view, the
main benefit from the self-recognition as a natural creature embedded
as are others at a perspective-point within a natural network
structure is to encourage being open-minded. Part of the value is the
humbling of our epistemic pride, mildly disrupting our judgment
equilibrium. Without such an occasional perspective on ourselves, we
too easily fall into exaggerating our epistemic exceptionalism. The
reminder that we are intermingled with others in a web of natural
perspectives gives us an appropriate, realistic correction. A
Zhuangzi story illustrates such a moment.



> 
> Zhuangzi was wandering in Diaoling fields when he glimpsed a
>  weird magpie-like-thing flying in from the south. It had a wingspan of
>  over seven-feet and passed so close his forehead, he could feel
>  it. Then it gathered its wings and settled in a chestnut
>  grove. Zhuangzi thought "what bird is that?  Massive
>  wings of such power and eyes so large it couldn't see
>  me." He hiked up his robe and hurriedly tiptoed closer holding his
>  cross-bow at the ready. Then he spotted a cicada settling in the
>  shaded shelter without a worry for itself, but a preying mantis
>  opened its pincers about to grab it, also focused on its gain and
>  ignoring its own bodily danger. The strange magpie burst out and
>  harvested them both--similarly unaware of the natural dangers he
>  faced.
> 
> 
> 
> But Zhuangzi was suddenly seized with this thought, "We natural
> kinds are all interconnected! We two different species are mutually
> seeing things in our own ways." He dismantled his crossbow and
> fled, himself now himself pursued by the game warden shouting out his
> crimes. (*Ibid*., HY 54/20/61-5)
> 
> 
> 


Overall, Zhuangzi clearly recommends open-minded flexibility as
when he scolds Hui Shi for being tied to conventional thinking about
how to use giant gourds. He illustrates it again with his story about
different uses of a salve that prevents chapping. He models such
openness in his conversations with cripples (righteously shunned by
Confucians), freaks, thieves, strange creatures, the wind, a shadow
and a skull. He imagines many other conversations illustrating the
differences of perspectives, capacities and needs. 



While we cannot help making our own judgments and commitments, he
seems to see tolerance and accommodation as values that follow from
appreciating other natural perspectives:



>  A monkey keeper says (to the monkeys) "I'll
> give you three [rations] in the morning and four in the
> evening." The monkeys seemed angry. "Ok, I'll give
> you four in the morning and three in the evening." The monkeys
> were happy. So with no substantive loss, he could change their anger
> to happiness. This is an example of a *shi* judgment
> being dependent on circumstances. So the sage uses
> *shi-fei*this-not that judgments to
> harmonize and rests in the natural balance. And we can call this
> walking as pairs. (*Ibid*., HY 5/2/38-40) 


 We are, as it happens, capable of understanding the perspectives
of others well enough to accommodate and cooperate with them, to
borrow insights and to reach agreements. However, the
*Zhuangzi* seems skeptical that we can extrapolate from this
ordinary capacity to broaden our perspective to having some absolute
or comprehensive insight--as it were from *all* points of
view. Nor, as we saw above, can we assume that because the two
disputants come to a resolution or agreement, it constitutes knowing
from a cosmically or absolutely higher perspective. Hui Shi's
relativism, recall, does point to such an infinite expansion ending in
a single universal point of view. Here, however, we are reminded that
while we experience a gestalt broadening of perspective as revealing
something real and significant (like waking from a dream), we cannot
extrapolate from that to the claim to be able to know the final result
of such gestalt leaps to broader perspectives.



Even though North Sea Lord denies there is any final or ultimately
broad perspective from which we can make
*shi-fei*this-not that judgments, the
parable suggests a progressive path toward broader perspectives with
those further along having the epistemic status to guide those with
less comprehensive perspectives. However, arguments in Chapter 2
suggest that progress must always be judged from a moving frame of
reference along a *dao* that is already
*cheng*fixed in our
*xin*heart-mind that *shoots-out* the
*shi-fei*.


Our location and trajectory makes us
receptive to some and not other avenues of learning. The boy was
unable to master the Handan way of walking
because of the way he had already learned to walk. The monkey keeper
could accommodate the monkeys, but still disagreed with them about the
importance of the breakfast-dinner choice. That someone understands
and agrees with both of us does not make his judgment correct. The
final skepticism concerns whether these paths of progress of
perspectives must or will converge on a single outcome. 



The epistemic modesty implicit in Zhuangzi's skepticism targets
mainly the paternalistic, superior attitude toward other points of
view exemplified by Confucian and Mohist moralistic posture. When we
have an accommodation (you and I come to a common agreement) you and I
may both rate it as progress. However, it does not imply we have moved
to a higher state of overall insight along an absolute scale--or from
any arbitrary third point of view. Exchange of points of view can be
valuable to each (perhaps in different ways) and broadening
perspective in this way can make us wiser--but always as judged
from our already operative Cheng 
*cheng*fixed *dao*s . We can
advise and recommend our normative perspective on others, but their
being able to appreciate and use it depends on their capacities,
options and situation. 



At this point, Zhuangzi starts to draw an analogy of dreaming and
waking up to the shift in gestalt that comes when we leap to a more
comprehensive perspective. At awakening, we immediately appreciate the
unreality of the dream, yet within the dream, we can have a similar
gestalt shift and dream of having dreamed and interpreted that deeper
dream. 



> How do I know that loving life is not a form of ignorance?
> How do I know disliking death is not a weak farewell of the sort when
> we don't know about the return? Miss Li Zhi cries when she is
> betrothed to someone's son, and when she first goes off to the Jin
> state soaks her clothing with her tears; but then she arrives at the
> kings abode, sleeps with the king in his bed, eats fattened
> livestock and then starts to regret her tears. How do I know the dead
> do not regret their former clinging to life, We dream of eating and
> drinking and on awaking cry bitterly, we dream of weeping and wailing
> and awake in a good mood to go off hunting. When we dream, we don't
> know it as a dream, and in our dreams, judge something else as a
> dream. On awakening, we know it was a dream, and there could be
> another greater awakening in which we know a greater dream, and under
> these the conditions the ignorant think they are as enlightened as if
> they had learned it by an investigation. Gentlemen to shepherds
> inherently do this! (*Ibid*., HY 6/2/78-83) 


So, is there an ultimate or final possible such shift in
gestalt--some final state of knowing what to do? Zhuangzi's
relativism is mildly skeptical because he cannot know either that
there is not nor that there is a final or ultimate
"awakening"



The dream theme is memorably carried over to the story of Zhuangzi
dreaming a butterfly and/or vice versa. It seems to suggest that the
gestalt sense of liberation from error may even be reciprocal. Perhaps
our subsequent perspective is one from which most would move to our
former perspective. Adolescent conversion can be to or from a
religion. 



>  Once before, Zhuangzi dreamt of being a butterfly, gaily
> butterflying and himself embodied in this sense of purpose! He knew
> nothing of Zhuangzi. Suddenly awakening, he then is rooted in
> Zhuangzi. He doesn't know if Zhuangzi dreamt being a butterfly
> or a butterfly is dreaming being Zhuangzi--though there must be a
> difference. This is called "things change." (*Ibid*.,
> HY7/2/94) 


 Elaborating the complexity this way makes Zhuangzi's
proposals seem disappointing as solutions. They amount to mildly
suggesting that we allow the exchange of views to go on without the
domination of any dogma and with some vague "glances at natural
constancies" and see what comes out "in the long
run."



Zhuangzi's conception of *dao*s in nature, from a
here-now to a there-then, differs from a Mohist (broadly utilitarian)
naturalism. Utilitarianism is a natural constraint, an allegedly
single naturally correct way for all of us to choose our course. In
effect, Zhuangzi is more of a natural pluralist, with the natural
outcome of morality the product of ongoing individual and social
construction.


*Dao*s are in nature but not choices of
nature for us. So the discussion, competition, and even strife between
*dao*s and their advocates are factors in an ongoing
natural Dao  *dao*guiding process. We and
our circumstances change as we each find, choose and walk different
naturally evolving paths.



This does not entail we should not advocate our own way. Such
exchanges are part of the natural process of construction of Dao 
*dao*spaths and making them available to
others. Such a dialogue of competing *dao*s constitutes
the natural evolutional *dao* of guidance. Realizing
this, we should not flatter ourselves, posing as the Confucian father
shaping his child's character, but as a contributor in this
competition among similarly natural ways. We express perspectives
located in a real world of indexed points from which we choose
behavioral paths.


Some characters in Zhuangzi's dialogues wonder
about exceptional figures who allegedly have abilities that justify
that paternal posture--the capacity to transcend our location in
points of view and to lecture all of us from a privileged
perspective. The *Zhuangzi*'s response typically remind
them that such idealized points of view are neither intelligible to us
nor relevant to what *we* should do. Either these exceptional
observers have their own naturally
*cheng*fixed frames of reference in the
natural world, or they are outside of the natural world in some
unrealistically free realm. If the latter, then their views are both
unintelligible and irrelevant to us. What they would do in our
situation does not constitute helpful advice to us. To advocate
following the advice of these ideal observers is to speak practical
nonsense to non-ideal, actual actors.



Gap Tooth, following Kingsley's skeptical formulation
 above says:



> 
> So you don't know what is beneficial or harmful, does the
> "fully arrived human" necessarily not know them? 
> Kingsley replied, "the fully arrived person becomes pure
> sapience, he could be in a blazing forest and not be able to feel any
> heat, the rivers of our civilization could freeze and he
> couldn't feel any chill, devastating lighting could pulverize
> mountains and the wind raise a tidal wave and he could not experience
> surprise. Someone like that could ride on clouds and air, straddle the
> sun and moon, and wander beyond the four oceans.  Death and life
> are not different for him, much less the inclinations of benefit and
> harm."
> 
> 
> 
> Master Ju Que asked master Zhang Wu, "I've heard from
> my teacher that a sagely man does not find social dealings worth
> engaging, doesn't pursue utility, doesn't avoid harm,
> doesn't take delight in striving, doesn't follow
> *dao*s, in silence says things, and in saying things is
> silent, and roams outside the nitty-gritty of the actual world. Master
> regarded this as romantic fantasy but I deem it the execution of a
> mysterious *dao*. My kind sir what do you say of
> this?"
> 
> 
> 
> Zhang Wu replied, "This is something that, were the yellow
> emperor to hear, it would be like buzzing, and so how could the likes
> of Confucius come to know it? Furthermore, you have jumped to
> conclusions... . I'll give you some absurd talk and you absurdly
> listen." (*Ibid*., HY 6/2/71-7)
> 
> 
> 


 However, in later chapters, Zhuangzi himself seems to recommend to
us examples of such spectacular capacities--the most beautifully
and elaborately expressed of which is the passage celebrating Butcher
Ding.



> Butcher Ding carved an ox for Lord Wen Hui; his point
> of contact, the way he inclined his torso, his foot position, the
> angle of his knee ... gliding, flowing! The knife sang
> "whuaa" with nothing out of tune. It was as if he were
> dancing the Faun Ballet or directing an opera. 
> 
> 
> Lord Wen Hui exclaimed "Ole! Splendidly done! Can talent
> extend even to this?.
> 
> 
> 
> Butcher Ding gestured with his knife, explaining, 
> 
> 
> 
> > 
> > "What your
> > servant pursues is *dao*; which is what skill aims
> > at. When I began to carve oxen, what I saw was nothing but the
> > oxen. After three years, I had ceased seeing them as wholes, and now
> > my sapience mingles so that I don't see with my eyes, Sensory
> > know-how ends and my sapient desires take over my performance. I rely
> > on natural guiding structures, separate out the great chunks and steer
> > through empty gaps depending on the anatomy. I evade places where
> > cords and filaments intertwine, much less the large bones. 
> > 
> > 
> > A good cook gets a new knife every year; he chops! Mediocre cooks
> > change knives monthly; they hack. My knife now has 19 years on it;
> > it's carved several thousand oxen and the edge is as if I had
> > just taken it from the sharpener.
> > 
> > 
> > 
> >  Those joints have gaps, and the knife's edge no thickness, to
> > put something infinitesimally thin in an empty space?! Effortless! It
> > even allows the edge wander in with ample room to play. That is why,
> > with 19 years on it, this knife's edge is grindstone
> > fresh."
> > 
> > 
> 
> 
> (*Ibid*., 7/3/2-8)


 The *Zhuangzi* plays several variations on this theme.
Sometimes the virtuoso performer catches cicadas on a sticky rod,
another crafts chariot wheels, there are musicians, debaters, and
thieves. The theme extends to animals, millipedes with their expertise
in coordinating their limbs while maintaining a smooth flow, snakes
flashing by while slithering on their stomachs, One implicit example
is Zhuangzi's own relation with his relativist rival and buddy,
Hui Shi. Bemoaning his loss while visiting his sidekick's grave,
Zhuangzi spins a tale of a virtuoso ax-thrower who sliced specks off
the nose of his crony, but lost his "knack" when his
co-performer passed away. (*Ibid*., HY 66/24/48-51)


 The tales often highlight the tranquil state that accompanies
behavior that skillfully follows a natural path. The performances look
and feel effortless. The spontaneity of the flow along a natural path
gives performers the sense that their behavior is
"world-guided" rather than internally controlled. These
behaviors become second-nature. We move beyond anything like
sub-vocalizing instructions, deliberating or reflecting--and yet we
are concentrating intently on the behavior. The range of his examples
reminds us that such satisfying states of performance can be
experienced in even the most low caste and mundane of activities,
including butchering, criminal skills, as well as in the finest of
arts, and philosophy. 



Another feature of this theme is the observation that such expertise
in performance always comes with some kind of limitation--not
least that each example is a different person with a different
knack. There is no shortcut *dao* that gives you a knack
at every activity. Cook Ding "comes to a hard place;" the
cicada catcher tries to balance two coins on his stick--if he is
not calm enough, he will have a bad night. The wheelwright could not
teach his son the art; the musician cannot play all the notes and only
reaches true perfection when he dwells in silence. And above all, the
valorization of this kind of specialization in an art pulls in the
opposite direction of Zhuangzi's encouragement to broaden and
enlarge our perspectives and scope of appreciation. 



This theme of the limits of virtuosity is pursued explicitly in the *Zhuangzi*'s
discussion of the necessary connection of
Cheng  *cheng*completion:success and
Kui  *kui* failure:deficiency. The theme of
this weak skeptical relativism plays out smoothly into the classical
Chinese focus on paths as the model of normativity and the objects of
knowledge. Paths are everywhere, but guide natural kinds from particular space-time
locations and can guide a wide range of behavior types, normative
subject matters. Each leads to subsequent choices among
*dao*spaths.


Zhuangzi does not ground his
skepticism in an account of specifically human epistemic
deficiencies. We are one among many natural creatures with different
capacities choosing paths from their indexed point in space and time.
The skeptical theme is the wide range of our different
perspectives. We are limited mainly in the sense that there is no
behavior from the point of view of the whole--there is no omniscient
perspective on the path structure. We may wonder if we have discovered
all the available Dao  *dao*spaths. And
we may always wonder if our judgment about which is best now is about
the best in the long run. All we can substitute for this global
perspective is some local consensus.



> Substantively, in the end, is there success and defect?
> Substantively, in the end, is there neither success nor defect?....If
> we can call these successful, then even I am also successful. If they
> cannot be called successful, then neither I nor any other thing may be
> called successful. For this reason, illumination of slippery doubt is
> that which sages target. For this reason, we do not use it and let
> things rest in the conventional. (*Ibid*., HY
> 5/2/42-47)



The weak skeptical conclusion is most strikingly expressed in the
observation that introduces the chapter with the story of Cook
Ding. 



>  My life is limited and know-how is unlimited. To pursue
> the unlimited with the limited is dangerous. (*Ibid*., HY
> 7/3/1)