Week 3 Discussion 2: Logic, Ethics and Attitudes to Knowledge in Asian Civilization

It's me back again. The topic that we discussed on last Wednesday was, Logic, Ethics and Attitudes to Knowledge in Asian Civilization. It was quite fun to discuss. We will be discussing about a lot of logic. Well, in some sense, people nowadays have lots of logics till they have non of those. As an example, there are so many people neglected their children for money and for work. So they gave up time to spend with their kids. Children learns from their parents and they will also do it later when they grow up. They will think that it is logical to do so. But it is not.

Interesting fact isn't it? Just something about logic nowadays. The topic that we discussed on Wednesday, again, was Logic, Ethics and Attitudes to Knowledge in Asian Civilization. The group discussion was led by Wong Kah Yee, aka Jaise. Well, I knew her since my foundation years and we knew how each other works. So, it was lucky for me. She is a really good presenter, just that she need to polish her English. Just saying. No offence, Jaise.

So what Jaise talked about was that there are 3 readings this week. The 3 readings were all focusing on the 3 main influence or what we call ethnics in Malaysia, the Indian, the Chinese, and lastly the Islamic. It was all really long and confusing but thanks to Jaise who make all these things so much easier to understand.

So when we talk about 'logic', what comes to your mind? For me, it is something about common sense. Everyone have common sense. So, giving an example: A is C, B is C. So A is B. We can conclude it this way right? So yes. this is logic. In the 3 readings, they talk a lot about all these. In the first reading that we discussed, it was about Indian Philosophy. They have different type of argument when it comes to what centuries the civilization are. When there is a different period, there will be a different teaching. And in the conclusion, they have this Principles, where we can segregate people based on the way of their thinking. We have the Principle of Non Contradiction, the Principle of Excluded Middle and the Principle of Double Negation.

All these things are about what people thinks and how people thinks. And lastly on Indian Philosophy, we have Orthodox and Heterodox. It is different way of how people thinks. Orthodox people believes in the Trimurti and the Heterodox people are the other people that does not believe in the Trimurti. We know that India is a really big country and it can go as big as China. They have schools for all these people who teaches different logics, All these teachings somehow relates back to the historical background of what a country had gone through. Like for example, the Orthodox people learns logic through the books that were left by the ancestors about the trimurti. So, for what I think, it is all back to the roots.

In the second reading, we discussed on the Islamic Philosophy. For them, where I mean them is the Muslim people, their law is their logic and reasoning. Whatever they do, they must not disobey the law of their own. So when they think of logic, they are quite controversial about their thinking. There are different people stating different things like for instance, Abu Bishr Matta thinks that logic is not the superficial detail of a particular language and does not need to examine those ordinary lexical meanings when Abu Said al-Sirafi said that the logics that the Greek uses is only for their structure of the civilization and they do not do for others. This is like two different people saying two different things where one logic said that it should embrace other culture with different logic but the other says the opposite.

And when we talk about logic, Aristotelians thinks that logic is an Instrument and Platonists thinks that logic is as part of every civilization and philosophy and it is being related to some aspect of being. It goes very similar on what Abu Bishr and Abu Said says. But when I think of it, it just depends on how you want to put it in words. It's like how people think on one thing. It is the same as how people's common sense works. Different people have different logic and different way of thinking. There is also al-Ghazali and Avicenna's way of thinking. That is too much to talk about so I will just skip it. It's just basically what and how they define logic and philosophy.

Lastly on this, we have the famous debate of Essence vs Existence. This is a really famous debate. There is Avicenna's theory and Averroes's theory. They both have different way of saying this. Just a thoughts, it is essence that precedes existence. Things need to have an idea before that they were created. So this is what we meant by essence precedes existence. Just a thought. If you have different thoughts, please do not hesitate to comment below.

I know, I know. This is being very very longwinded. So I will cut things short. Last reading is on Chinese Philosophy. Chinese had been through so many dynasty and all those dynasty have their Own logic that was brought down to the next dynasty. And in the starting of everything we have the concept of Ying and yang. Ying is the negative and Yang is positive. Their logic is that when there is positive things, there will be negative things going together. It is very normal for them. Everything was created for a reason. Lastly we talk about the five phases which consist of Wood, Fire, Water, Metal and Wind. It is really famous is all of Chinese philosophy. It is by saying that which is suitable with witch and which is not suitable for which. Before marriage, we will be asking people of Feng Shui about this. They will tell us based on our Chinese Date of Birth.

So after we talk of all these, There are questions like is there really a god that exist? It depend on how people things actually. Some might think that there is and to those non believers, there are none. For me, As I am a Buddhist, while not a really deeply believing one, I do trust that there are god existing in this world. I also believe that there is not. In Buddhist's believe, we only think that there are Buddha and He is not a Creator. He is the first one who knew the life and death cycle while meditating for a week under the tree.

So another question that was asked by my classmate Jaise is that Civilization comes first or Logic and reasoning comes first? I would say that logic and reasoning surely comes first. While there is first thinking and only they will have a civilization.

Ending this chapter, It was really confusing for me as why people think so many things to confuse themselves. Hahahahahaha.. But it was really interesting to know that the logics behind the civilization. Every civilization starts from a believe and those believes soon to be manifested to the logic that we think now.

So long for now. I will be presenting and leading my class session next Wednesday. So if you want to know what I will be doing, just email me. I will tell you.

Cheerios,
YiXin