The liberating power of harmony and order : on the notions of liberty and mathematical logic in Zhang Shenfu’s philosophical thought

Vrhovski, Jan (author)

This paper discusses the thought of Zhang Shenfu, one of the central figures behind the propagation of modern science and dialectical materialism in Republican China (1911 – 1949). In particular, it focuses on the notions of liberty, mathematical logic and humaneness (ren 仁) in his writings in the period between the year of the May Fourth events (1919) and the late 1930s. The main aim of the analysis is to cast some light on the common conceptual and methodological features which underlay these interpretations, in order to reveal the essentially Chinese cultural “perception” or traditional worldview that served Zhang as the prism through which he viewed and understood the nature of and the relationships between all these “novel” concepts from the West. Consequently, an important aim of this paper will be to highlight a specific fragment of the intellectual mechanism that conditioned the so-called Chinese intellectual modernisation of the Republican period.

• Language: English
• Keywords: Chinese philosophy, mathematical logic, humanism, liberty, Zhang Shenfu
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: FF - Faculty of Arts
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Publication date: 01.01.2022
• Year: 2022
• Number of pages: Str. 184-214
• Numbering: Vol. 31, no. 1
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-137063
• UDC: 1(510)
• ISSN on article: 2585-8793
• DOI: 10.31577/aassav.2022.31.1.09
• COBISS.SI-ID: 109912067
• Publication date in RUL: 31.05.2022

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Asian and African Studies
• Shortened title: Asian Afr. Stud.
• Publisher: Institute of Oriental Studies of the Slovak Academy of Sciences in Bratislava
• ISSN: 2585-8793
• COBISS.SI-ID: 40930051

Licences

• License: CC BY 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Description: This is the standard Creative Commons license that gives others maximum freedom to do what they want with the work as long as they credit the author.
• Licensing start date: 31.05.2022

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: kitajska filozofija, matematična logika, humanizem, svoboda, Zhang Shenfu

Projects

• Funder: ARRS - Slovenian Research Agency
• Project number: N6-0161
• Name: Humanizem v medkulturni perspektivi: Evropa in Kitajska