Canons: names and things

Introduction

This is the last of the four Canons weeks, covering the entries in Canons II and its Explanation on names, things, sameness, difference and disputation.

First, "hard and white." The School of Names (Gongsun Long) held that in a white stone hardness is felt and whiteness is seen, so they are two things. Canons I says "hard and white do not exclude each other," and Canons II: "they must fill each other." Both fill the same stone throughout and cannot be pulled apart. This is the Mohist resistance to treating words as things. Names pick out things; you may not use names to take things apart.

Then sameness and difference. Canons I distinguishes four kinds of same: identity (one thing, two names), part (belonging to one whole), togetherness (in one place), and kind, with four matching kinds of difference. "Things of different kinds are not compared." This is the foundation of inference by kind in 墨辩.

Finally, disputation. Canons I: "Disputation is contending over 'that.' To win in disputation is to be right." One says this is an ox, the other says it is not; they cannot both be right. Canons II continues: "To claim that in disputation nobody wins is necessarily not right." Whoever says no argument can be won has made an arguable claim, and if it is right, it is wrong. Likewise, "to hold that all speech is false is false." And an entry we prize: "Learning is useful; the reason lies in those who criticize it." Whoever argues that learning is useless is, in arguing, teaching.

Look back at the Lesser Selection: "use names to pick out things, sentences to express meaning, explanations to give reasons." The four Canons weeks close by joining those steps: definition, proposition, reason. The rules of 墨辩 in 墨门 / The Mohist Community come down to these three.

The three tests

"Nobody wins is necessarily not right" and "all speech is false is false" are pure reasoning: a self-contradictory claim is dismissed without the three tests. That shows the tests have a precondition. A claim must first hang together before it is worth grounding, checking and using. The Community's rule for judging 墨辩 therefore has four steps: first, is it self-contradictory; then the first test (tradition and precedent), the second (evidence), the third (consequences). Discuss this week whether the order of the four can be changed.

For families

• Hard and white: feel a stone with eyes shut, then open them. Are hard and white two things? Can they be separated?
• Same and different: sort household objects. Two cups are "same in kind," a cup and its lid "same in whole." Who can find "same in identity," one thing with two names?
• "Disputation is contending over 'that'": next time there is a quarrel at home, have the children say first what exactly is being argued about.

For chapters

• 20 min reading · 20 min 墨辩 · 10 min 三表 review · 10 min 职 reports.
• 墨辩 motion: "All opinions are relative." One side defends it as well as it can; the other answers with "nobody wins is necessarily not right"; then the whole group discusses the limits of such self-refutation arguments.
• 三表 review: close the four Canons weeks. Each Mohist names one entry they will take with them and one habit it has changed.