Title: Naming and Propositional Attitudes in Ancient Chinese Philosophy
Speaker: Yiu-ming Fung
Abstract:
This paper includes three parts:
(1) Textual Analysis and Methodology;
(2) Naming and Social Ontology in Confucian Tradition;
(3) Propositional Attitudes in Classical Chinese.
In the first part, I will explain why philological method without the complementarity with syntax, including historical syntax and logical syntax, is unable to disclose the deep structure of expressions in ancient texts. I will also mention an example committing fallacy as a case study.
In the second part, I will discuss the old question of naming in Confucian tradition together with the problem of the rectification of names. I will treat this theme as the view of social ontology. Some points of John Searle’s theory will also be revised in this paper.
In the last part, I will argue against the popular view held by Chad Hansen, Roger Ames and others that there are no concept of a sentence and sentential beliefs in ancient China. I will provide some functional equivalents of the that-clause structure in classical Chinese which also appear in old English and classical Latin.