The beginnings of the philosophy of natural human and its influence on the logical beginnings of the social sciences and the humanities
Yuan Haidan & Yuan Xihao
Northern Arizona University 1900 S Knoles Dr. Flagstaff, AZ 86011, USA
August 30, 2021
Abstract: The book The Third Nature of Homo Sapiens establishes a tentative philosophical framework for a "philosophy of natural anthropology" within the paradigm of the natural sciences. This attempt needs to be criticized, researched, falsified, tested, developed and innovated by the academic community. In addition, the field of social sciences and the humanities, where the ultimate philosophical questions about human beings (i.e., who are we? Where do we come from? Where are we ultimately going?) ), all disciplines in the social sciences and the humanities are looking forward to philosophical answers with truthfulness, so that they can rewrite the underlying logic or the logical starting point of these disciplines, thus laying the philosophical foundation for these disciplines to have real truthful attributes. This paper puts forward some suggestions and ideas on this issue for aesthetics, political science, international relations, international politics, economics, history, philosophy of religion and Chinese philosophy.
Keywords: philosophy of natural humanity; social sciences; humanities; logical beginnings
Permanent world peace is an urgent need of all humankind in the present era of the global village, and its realization presupposes that all humankind can agree on a number of major issues, which requires, first and foremost, that humankind possesses a philosophical system that has global attributes, i.e., the attributes of truth, without which the constant clash of civilizations will always remain unresolved and difficult to resolve.
In terms of the transnational, cross-cultural, and global attributes of truth, only science has this attribute of truth in the current system of human knowledge. At the other end of the spectrum from truth is the category of preference (e.g., cooking, customs). For the current system of human knowledge, many prominent philosophers, such as Russell and Mortimer Adler, have argued that both philosophy and religion lie between the truth and preference ends of the spectrum. 【1】、【2】It is recognized that there is no philosophical system with global properties comparable to science.
The Third Nature of Homo Sapiens - A Philosophical Framework within the Paradigm of Natural Science (hereinafter referred to as The Third Nature of Homo Sapiens) is an attempt to establish such a philosophical system. The book proves that it is possible to finally establish a systematic and scientific philosophical system about human beings under the paradigm of natural science, which we can call "philosophy of natural human beings" according to Shrike's "Philosophy of Nature"【3】 . In this way, the philosophy of natural science and the philosophy of natural humanity can be united under the paradigm of natural science, and they belong to the same natural philosophy, and it can be said that natural philosophy is natural science. The establishment of such a system of natural human philosophy can become a philosophical system with the attribute of truth.【4】
The Third Nature of Homo Sapiens is a tentative germ of the philosophy of natural human beings. The possibilities of the resulting interest in the fields of philosophy, social sciences and humanities are as follows:
I. Research, falsification, testing and innovation of the main elements of the philosophy of natural human beings as presented in the book The Third Nature of Homo Sapiens
1、 The three cornerstones of the philosophy of natural human beings are the human transgression and its two main signs, the third nature of Homo sapiens, and the cultural cloud;
1.1、 The first cornerstone: transgression, in which Homo sapiens partially transgressed the two main mechanisms of organisms being regulated by ecosystems and controlled by genetic mechanisms, is called transgression.
1.2、 The second cornerstone: the third nature of Homo sapiens, which refers to the existence of a third nature of Homo sapiens in addition to the two main natures of survival and reproduction that all living things have. That is to say, Homo sapiens will always have the possibility of longing for anything, including its own survival and reproduction activities, and will never be satisfied; it is always curious and inquisitive, thirsting for all wisdom, and full of motivation to innovate; it is more controlled by secondary rewards, and even regards some extremely abstract concepts, such as ideology, as rewards; it interprets and makes assumptions based solely on perception, establishes order, creates rules, improvises, and interprets the "meanings" of behaviors; it has the ability to imitate, learn, and transmit behavior. "meaning" of behavior; imitates, learns, and teaches; is aesthetically and artistically inclined; covets virtual reality, can reason about invisible forces, builds concepts about the unknowable, and can adapt to different environments by separating the real from the virtual; fantasizes about the future and uses montages to show new scenes; multiple brain systems can communicating with each other; having changeable values; conscious reflection and even the ability to question and adjust automated internal homeostasis, setting socio-cultural internal homeostasis higher than the ideal range needed for survival, etc;
1.3、 The third cornerstone: the culture cloud, all the cultures that have ever existed in all of humanity are called culture clouds;
While the first two cornerstones are scientifically falsifiable, the third cornerstone, the cultural cloud, is a self-evident fact;
2、 The philosophical framework of the third nature; starting from the three major natures and three cornerstones of Homo sapiens, it is judged that Homo sapiens evolve synergistically with culture and thus transgress the boundaries under the drive of the third nature; the three major natures of Homo sapiens, i.e., the survival nature, the reproduction nature, and the third nature, are manifested as the biological nature of Homo sapiens; Homo sapiens transgressing the boundaries manifests itself as a superimposition of the biological and the cultural nature, and every individual Homo sapiens manifests itself as a concrete superimposition state under the effect of the superimposition nature, which is a dynamic state; superimposed human and cultural interactions produce the phenomenon of cultural clouds; the mechanism of cultural cloud formation is the mechanism of blindness; superimposed human and cultural cloud interactions become the driving force of history and form history; the main driving force behind the two cornerstones of human transgressions and cultural clouds is Homo sapiens' third nature;
3、 The conclusion of the inquiry and exploration of epistemology, free will, definition of good and evil, meta-ethics, truth, aesthetics, freedom and equality, the law of human existence after transgression, and the transcendental nature of the meaning of human existence within the framework of the philosophy of the third nature;
4、 The line of research, methodology and logical structure of The Third Nature of Homo Sapiens;
5、 Research, testing (confirmation or falsification) and innovation in relation to each of the above, separately or in combination, in ecology, genetics, brain science, biology, anthropology, archaeology, genetics, history, logic, philosophy, etc.
This phase should be finalized within a year or even half a year. The outcome of this phase could be the publication of a number of thematic collections of papers and monographs, with the participating scholars also producing their own papers and monographs. On the basis of the conclusions of these papers and monographs, all or part of items II to X will be revised and implemented.
II. Critique, study, innovation and development of the philosophical framework of the Third Nature of Homo Sapiens and its system
The organization of experts and scholars in the process of critiquing and studying the philosophical framework of the Third Nature of Homo sapiens has been continuously building, innovating and improving the "Natural Anthroposophical System". This process of continuous achievement lasts for years or even decades. The process for the following items is largely similar.
III. Ethics
1、 Due to the lack of a scientific logical starting point, Western philosophy has not established a scientifically sound ethical system or even a recognized definition of good and evil. Therefore, based on the critique, research and innovation of the philosophical framework of the Third Nature of Homo Sapiens, the definition of good and evil, and meta-ethics, the research and development of the definition of good and evil and meta-ethics will be carried out in a comprehensive manner, so as to carry out the comprehensive construction of a system of ethics for human beings;
2、 On this basis, research, development and comprehensive construction of ethics in various fields are being carried out: political ethics, legal ethics, eco-ethics or environmental ethics, economic ethics, social ethics, scientific ethics, cultural ethics, medical ethics, military ethics, media ethics, journalism ethics, business ethics, and so on.
IV. Esthetics
According to the philosophical framework of The Third Nature of Homo sapiens, the basic aesthetic needs arising from the first and second natures and the needs of the third nature are the roots of the needs of the major stages of aesthetics, and the third nature is the driving force of the major stages of aesthetics. Examining the course of the four major stages of aesthetics, it can be found that the more aesthetic activities conform to the three major natures of Homo sapiens, the stronger and more enduring vitality they will have. Many areas of aesthetics belong to the realm of preference, but the foundation of aesthetics and the roots of its emergence belong to the realm of truth (i.e., science). The fundamentals of aesthetics need to be remodeled.
V. A Systematic Critique of Modern Western Philosophy
1、 The discursive path of modern Western philosophy has been wrong, says the famous philosopher and physicist Shrike: From the earliest days of Western thought until the time of Newton, and even until the time of Kant, no distinction was ever made between natural philosophy and natural science. But since that time the discursive method (belonging to natural philosophy) seems to have separated itself from the experimental procedure (belonging to natural science). As a result, it was only in the middle of the nineteenth century that it began to become clear that the discursive method turned out to be a fraud, and that it led down a dead end.
2、 As scientific research has shown, the human brain has evolved to adapt to survival and reproduction, and philosophical paths of personal discernment can easily go in the wrong direction. All the models of the human brain or human society that Western philosophy has consciously or unconsciously relied on in its path of discernment are wrong. Studying philosophy in a discursive way according to the wrong model results in the present situation of "as many philosophers as there are philosophies", and thus it can only be placed, together with religion, in a position between neither truth nor preference in the human knowledge system. That is why Whitehead criticized that Western philosophy for more than two thousand years has been nothing more than a footnote to Plato's philosophy;
3、 Plato and Aristotle are the seminal milestones of Western philosophy, including the natural sciences; since the Enlightenment, the various disciplines of nature have successively departed from their original trajectories and embarked on the path of natural science. Through centuries of development, natural sciences, including formal sciences, have today become the only reliable human knowledge system with the attribute of truth; whereas modern Western philosophy, despite centuries of discursive thinking, is still in the pre-paradigm period, which not only has not made much substantial progress, but has instead caused mankind to almost fall into the abyss of the world, as Juvenal Herrari has pointed out that the three major humanist conflicts are directly related to the Second World War and the Cold War .;
4、 In order to clear the way for all mankind to finally reach a consensus, it seems inevitable to carry out a comprehensive critique of modern Western philosophy. The so-called two mountains that modern Western philosophy cannot bypass are Kant and Hegel: in short, Kant's dualism is unacceptable to the Western philosophical community itself; and Hegel's vast and extremely complex philosophical system would probably collapse if only the illusory so-called "absolute spirit of the universe" were taken out of the equation. The first fatal mistake of the two is the lack of correct underlying logic. This is true of Kantian and Hegelian philosophy, not to mention others. A comprehensive critique, screening and inheritance of Western philosophy under the paradigm of the natural sciences is in order.
VI. Political Science, International Relations, International Politics, etc.
The philosophical framework of The Third Nature of Homo Sapiens points out that in the case of Western political science, international relations, international politics and so on, in terms of one of their philosophical sources and underlying logical starting points, namely, the social contract theory, the main representatives of the contract theory, namely, Hobbes, Rousseau and Locke, have relied on their respective imagined models of human beings and societies, which are different from each other and also very different, and all of them are wrong. Therefore, the underlying logical starting point and philosophical source of Western political science, international relations, international politics and other related disciplines need to be reconstructed within the "natural human philosophical system".
John Rawls' A Theory of Justice, which proposes a primitive equal status hypothesis, the Curtain of Ignorance, is an improvement over the Hobbesians' primitive model of human society mentioned above. However, when there is already enough evidence and scientific conclusions from the disciplines of paleontology, anthropology, psychology, evolutionary biology and neurobiology on how human beings have come from the anatomical homo sapiens 200,000 years ago to the present day, if the hypothetical "curtain of ignorance" is still used as a logical starting point in the fields of justice, fairness, politics, economy, law, ethics, and so on, it will not be possible for us to understand how human beings have come to the present day, ethics, etc., then it may be really ignorant.
VII. The underlying logic of economic principles
Economics is the study of all kinds of economic activities and all kinds of corresponding economic relations in human society at all stages of development, as well as the laws governing their operation and development. The core idea of economics is material scarcity and effective utilization of resources. If the underlying logic of human philosophy comes to a scientific conclusion, the underlying logic of the principles of economics will naturally need to change accordingly.
Currently, mainstream microeconomics considers that as the main participants in economic activities, individual human beings pursue utility maximization and enterprises pursue profit maximization. These two pursuits may be basically consistent with certain realities, but they are fundamentally problematic.
Individual human beings: According to the Third Nature of Homo sapiens, the needs of human beings for survival and reproduction are based on material resources, and their actual needs are limited; the Third Nature is based on virtual needs, and has the attributes of insatiability and greed, such as in the pursuit of knowledge, religion or morality. For various reasons, some human individuals may pursue unlimited material resources and maximize their utility, which is merely alienated behavior rather than human nature. If economic theories do not recognize human nature and respond to it appropriately, extreme cases will result in the unreasonable depletion of the earth's resources on the one hand, and the unlimited needs of human beings remain far from being satisfied on the other hand, thus leaving both sides of the equation unfulfilled, and human beings will face the abyss. The reality is that the gap between the rich and the poor is getting wider and wider, which is one of the biggest potential factors for social unrest. Sadly, since the dawn of capitalism, this trend has become more and more pronounced, to the extent that the actual consumption of mankind today already requires 1.5 Earths.
According to the three major natures of human beings in The Third Nature of Homo Sapiens and the ethical requirements of meta-ethics for homo sapiens, the basic theory of economics should be rewritten to guide human economic activities according to the real needs of the three major natures of homo sapiens, so that human beings can avoid falling into the trap of resource depletion, avoiding that the enhancement of material life is contrary to happiness, and avoiding that human beings run all the way on the road of putting the cart before the horse. In this way, we can ensure that "the eternal pursuit of economics is to maximize happiness, not wealth" will not become a beautiful empty phrase.
Superpowers such as corporations: There is no doubt that the participation of corporations in economic activities should and must be in the self-interest of human beings and in line with the "eternal quest of economics". However, the "pursuit of profit maximization" by superpowers such as corporations is in direct contradiction to the "eternal pursuit of economics", because superpowers such as corporations and their behaviors do not have the natural attributes of conforming to the interests of human beings and conforming to the "eternal pursuit of economics". The reason is that corporations and their behaviors do not have the natural attributes of being in line with human interests and the eternal pursuit of economics. Moreover, the pursuit of profit maximization by enterprises is contradictory to the eternal pursuit of economics. Therefore, economic theory should study how superpowers such as corporations can comply with the ethical requirements of the meta-ethics of the Third Nature of Homo sapiens for superpowers in their economic activities, that is, how to make the behavior of corporations consistent with the "eternal pursuit of economics".
VIII. History
According to the definition, historiography is an organic combination of five parts: history, science, philosophy, human nature and its time and space. At least three of the five parts are intersected with the "philosophy of nature and humanity", and historiography and the philosophy of nature and humanity are not only closely related, but are also intertwined with each other. When the discursive philosophy is eclipsed, the philosophy, science and human nature in the natural philosophy of mankind will naturally make their appearance in history.
Shi Zhan, a Chinese history scholar, pointed out that history is the science of failure and that history is the history of constant failure. The famous historian Toynbee pointed out that of the 26 civilizations we have identified, 16 have died and 9 of the remaining 10 have gone into decline. Some historians have also pointed out that there are no rules in human history.
The philosophical conclusions of the natural anthropology of The Third Nature of Homo sapiens: that the mechanism for the formation of cultural clouds is blind; that superimposed human and cultural cloud interactions become the driving force of history and shape it; that history is blind and contingent and can hardly stand up to the long-term scrutiny of the biosphere and of historical trial-and-error mechanisms; and that this is the philosophical explanation of the historians' view of history as described above.
The new system of historiography will certainly form a ripple in the combination of historiography and the philosophical system of natural mankind.
IX. Philosophy of religion
The Third Nature of Homo Sapiens states that "Eve was tempted by the serpent in the Garden of Eden to eat the forbidden fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, and since then people have been plagued by their conscience", and this well-known story is a metaphor for the fact that the difference between before and after eating the forbidden fruit seems to be the difference between before and after the transgression of the boundaries of human beings. All the major religions have a very deep understanding of some parts of the third nature of Homo sapiens, and in fact religions have mainly applied some parts of the third nature to cope with the third nature of human beings.
The combination of the philosophy of religion and the philosophical system of natural mankind will certainly produce a new philosophy of religion. The new philosophy of religion will certainly guide the healthy development of religion.
Over the course of more than 2,000 years, each major religion has continued to diverge from its original source into numerous religious sects. Some religious sects of the same origin are not even compatible with each other, not to mention the problems and even wars between some religions.
There is a certain striking similarity between the development of Western philosophy and that of religion; in the course of more than two thousand years of development, Western philosophy has continued to produce new schools of thought, and has long since developed into a situation in which there are as many philosophers as there are philosophies. It is no wonder then that the famous contemporary philosopher Mortimer Adler argues that between the two extreme realms of truth and preference, philosophical views and religious beliefs occupy a middle ground.
The opposite is true of the development of the natural sciences. It is well known that by observation of nature and logical reasoning, natural science can lead to the laws of nature. If the observed phenomena are different from the predictions of the laws, it is either because there is a mistake in the observation or because the law that has been considered correct up to this point is wrong; supernatural factors are not taken into account; natural science is rational, fallible, universal, and regular; and scientific cognition converges naturally in the end. Convergence into the philosophy of natural humanity is the inevitable way out of the philosophy of religion.
X. Chinese philosophy
It is well known that the Chinese civilization, which is based on Confucianism and Taoism, is the only human civilization that has survived intact for more than 2,000 years, and that it has a cultural kernel of unity under the heaven, equality among all peoples, advocacy of peace and aversion to war. The famous historian Arnold Toynbee thus believed that the hope of the world lies in China and the fate of mankind lies in the Chinese civilization. Toynbee said, "I would like to be born in China. I would like to be born in China because I think that China will play a very important role in the future of all mankind. If I were Chinese, I think I could do some kind of valuable work myself.
The treasure trove of Chinese civilization is extremely rich in philosophical ideas that are consistent with the philosophy of natural human beings, i.e., with global attributes. Undoubtedly, this requires scientific excavation, identification, organization and development under the paradigm of natural science. For example:
1、 Mencius said of the four ends: compassion, the end of benevolence; shame, the end of righteousness; resignation, the end of propriety; and right and wrong, the end of wisdom. "Compassion, shame, resignation, and right and wrong have a high degree of overlap with our millions of years of evolutionary morality. Once this point is further investigated and confirmed by evolutionary psychology, it can show to what extent the Confucian moral system is derived from human evolutionary morality, and which of them has a rigorous biological genetic basis. Once confirmed, it will be a great contribution to the "natural human philosophical system";
2、 Zhuang Zi's doctrine and his life's behavior seem to be more or less consistent with the definition of good and evil and the meta-ethical definition of the biosphere - Homo sapiens species - Homo sapiens individual and Homo sapiens community animality - Homo sapiens third nature - Homo sapiens super-power - the intelligence circle of the "third nature of Homo sapiens". Zhuangzi's life proves that people can only survive and reproduce in the nature of the third nature can be played to an extreme that is difficult to be surpassed by future generations, leaving the world with great literature, philosophy of life, and a life that is not burdened by materialism and is free from the world;
3、 "Kinship, as one of the core principles of ritual governance, permeates all aspects of social norms throughout society. It is the nature of the simple natural human emotions, with blood relations as the bond, with straight and hidden respectively, deeply reflecting the ancient traditional social management, clan ethics and political system centered on the family and clan as the core of a variety of issues, while also refracting the value orientation of our ancient times that have always revered the system of etiquette, cherished the kinship, the family harmony, and the unity of the relatives. It is the starting point of Confucian kinship ethics" (according to Baidu Encyclopedia). In fact, this starting point of Confucian kinship ethics is almost the ancient version of modern genetics research on genetic relationships between relatives!
4、 Confucianism "unity of heaven and man", with heaven, earth and man as the "three talents" of the holistic view of nature; Laozhuang to the Tao, heaven, earth and man as the "four greats", the Tao is not only the essence of the universe, but also the rule of all things, and also the criterion of life, nature-based, nature is honored. Can we understand that the main axis of the core idea of Chinese civilization is to emphasize conformity with the laws of nature, respect for human nature, and harmony with the biosphere; the other pre-Qin schools of thought also have some reasonable ideas, such as the Legalists emphasize that "there is no distinction between affinity and affinity, no distinction between the noble and the lowly, and a break in the law," which is also unique among the schools of thought;
5、 For more than two thousand years, the ideals of the Chinese culture, based on the concept of the world as a commonwealth, benevolence and love for others, and harmony among all nations, have been deeply rooted in the hearts of the Chinese people. How to make the Chinese culture's concept of the world penetrate into the hearts of all mankind will surely be a great contribution of Chinese culture to the natural philosophical system of mankind.
Due to the blind mechanism of the cultural cloud, all civilizations and histories of mankind are blind and accidental, and can hardly stand the long-term test of the biosphere and the trial-and-error mechanism of history; however, it also shows that the establishment of a natural human philosophical system requires not only the scientific correctness of the logical system, but also the enrichment of the valuable experience and bitter lessons that all mankind has gained from the trial-and-error mechanism of history. Once the Chinese civilization with Confucianism and Taoism as its main axis is studied, identified, interpreted, standardized and developed in the natural human philosophical system, it will become a rich source of the "natural human philosophical system". This will be the concrete path to realize Toynbee's idea that the hope of the world lies in China and the destination of mankind lies in Chinese civilization.
To sum up, with the relevant academic units or publishing institutions as the center of the organization of the selection of planning, based on the selection of planning to organize the implementation of the relevant scholars, its broad prospects, its social and economic benefits of the high, its cultural penetration, integration, guidance and cultural tension of the great, can be said to be unprecedented.
As the philosophy of man becomes a science under the paradigm of natural science, scientists and philosophers from all over the world will be able to philosophize together under this paradigm and easily agree on the major issues of philosophy【5】 , and the "natural system of philosophy of mankind" will finally be established. Then the Newtonian era of philosophy or the Darwinian era of philosophy will begin.
In this way, the philosophy of mankind and the natural sciences together can be called "natural philosophy", or "natural philosophy of mankind" and "philosophy of natural sciences" respectively. This is not only a perfect fit with the natural philosophy that originated in Ancient Greece, but also fulfills Zhang Zai's famous saying: "To establish the heart for heaven and earth, to establish the life of the people, to succeed the great learning of the past sages, and to open up the peace for all times"!
Therefore, whoever seizes this opportunity will lead the world. The day philosophy leads the world is the day it leads the world comprehensively. The centers of the world's scientific and technological revolutions have all shifted with the leadership of philosophy. In the last 300 years of modern times, it happened first in England, then in Germany, then in the United States, without exception.
Notes:
【1】 Mortimer Adler. The underpinnings of philosophy: six philosophical themes in the eternal pursuit of mankind[M]. Translated by Luan Jianhong,Beijing:CITIC Publishing House, 2019,58-59.
【2】 Russell. History of Western Philosophy [M]. Translated by He Guangwu, Joseph Li and Ma Yuande, Beijing: Commercial Press, 2005, 5-6.
【3】 Moritz Shrike. Natural Philosophy [M]. Translated by Chen Weihang, Beijing: Commercial Press, 1997, 5-6.
【4】 Yuan Xihao and Yuan Haidan. The third nature of Homo sapiens-A philosophical framework in the paradigm of natural science[M]. Second edition, Akron, OH: 48Hr Books, 2020, 17.237-238.283-286.
【5】 Yuan Haidan and Yuan Xihao. A Philosophical System with Global Attributes to Cope with the Global Crisis [M]. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3919886
China Academic Journals-Education and Social Sciences, Issue 3, 2021 (A national excellent journal under the supervision of the Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China and organized by Tsinghua University. Domestic uniform issue number: CN11-9108/C)
Copyright case: 1-10824460351
Preprint release: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3919961
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