Chapter 31 Values ​​and compassion

Values ​​and compassion The progress of material science in the modern West over the past two to three hundred years is well known to all.However, the backwardness and out-of-touch of the humanities have revealed their disadvantages.For example, giving a child or a madman a sharp knife is already dangerous, but later giving him a pistol, and now giving him an atomic bomb will eventually lead to catastrophe.This is not unknown to Western intellectuals, but their humanities have never been able to catch up, and there are reasons for this.Before the innovation of modern science, Jesus Christ was the biggest backbone of Western culture.The most important conflict between religion and science lies in their methods.Science must face the facts and seek knowledge in the face of the facts. As long as there are new discoveries in the facts, our intelligence should immediately follow and seek adjustments. This is the minimum condition for scientific cultivation.But the religious spirit is just the opposite. They have pre-arranged a God outside of human beings, and all human social activities must be attributed to God and returned to God.Although people and events change, religious beliefs and theories can remain the same.It is precisely because of the utter contradiction between the two spirits that the humanities of the Westerners have encountered a huge obstacle invisibly, preventing them from achieving a free development.

The rapid development of the material sciences is making religion stand aside, and the humanities of Westerners will remain hopeless.Why?Because they often want to use the laws of material science to replace religion to guide humanities. If so, human society itself will still have no status and weight.In the past, it was to obey religion, to obey God other than human beings.Now it is taking orders from matter, and it still has to take orders from another God other than human beings.In fact, this is contrary to the spirit of science.Because the scientific spirit is seeking knowledge in the facts themselves, but Westerners often want to transfer the achievements of the material sciences to the humanities, so how is it possible?

In the era of Newton, Westerners almost all wanted to explain human society with the principles and principles of mathematics, physics and machinery to establish the humanities.In the Darwin era, biology began to gain attention, so Westerners wanted to apply some theories and laws of biological evolution to human society to establish humanities.Compared with Newton's era, it seems to have progressed.Because biology is a science of life after all, it is closer to humanities.The theory of life of the mechanical view is ultimately not as realistic as the theory of life of the evolutionary view.But the root cause still exists.They always want to transfer the laws and theories outside the study of human society and apply them to human society.Whether it is material or life, it is separated from the field of humanities by one or two layers of walls.How can it work?

The humanities should have their own life and field.The humanist scientist should cultivate its own garden to plant its own seeds.But in the west, that field has always been barren.What was first invaded by religion, is now stolen by natural science.Religion talks about God, God, and natural science talks about things.Even if we cannot abandon God and things, even if God and things are related to human society, they are not human society itself after all.Transplanting the seeds of natural science in the garden of humanities, only the flowers of natural science and the fruits of natural science, has nothing to do with humanities itself.Although life sciences are closer to human beings than material sciences, all knowledge of human beings cannot be covered by biological sciences.The modern West got rid of the shackles of religion, but fell into the trap of natural science.When they escape from the trap of natural science, they still want to enter the cage of religion without knowing it.This is one of the biggest reasons why modern western humanities cannot have ideal development.

Let me give you an example: Psychology is the first subject of science in the field of modern Western humanities.But modern Western psychology cannot be said to be a human science.It was just ceded and sold from the garden of the humanities.First ceded to physical science, later betrayed to biological science.Westerners first talked about psychology, but only about physics, such as how the eyes can see, and how the ears can hear.What I talked about later was only about biology, such as experiments on conditioning reactions and so on.We are not saying that physics, biology and psychology are irrelevant, but human psychology should have its own field and life outside of physics and biology.After hearing this theory, the Western scientific community will definitely not agree with it.It doesn't matter.It's a pity that there are those in the West who agree with this theory, but most of them are religious scholars, not humanistic scientists.The humanities in the West are still barren, and they have not yet recognized their own field.Haven't planted their own seeds yet.

As mentioned above, if we want to have true knowledge about a certain class of things, we must seek it from the class of things themselves.This is the most common and fundamental law of all sciences.Darwin's biology cannot rely on Newton's physics and astronomy.If we want to establish a new humanities, naturally we should not rely on Newton and Darwin, let alone God or God.In terms of biology since Darwin, life evolves along a route, so life has classes and grades.Some of the psychology of rats, rabbits, dogs, etc. are the same as human psychology, but there are only some.Comparing humans with rats, rabbits, and dogs, the difference in rank should not be ignored.That is to say, in terms of anthropology, the early civil society, the low-level and superficial nation, compared with the high-culture society, there is also a very obvious class hierarchy, which cannot be ignored.That is to say, within the same cultural society, the level of difference between individuals should not be ignored.That is to say, as far as young children are concerned, they have not yet been cultivated by society, but there are already differences among them. Some are geniuses and some are imbecile. This is well known, so studying the humanities is by no means compared to studying the material sciences.Material science can treat everyone equally without distinction.Water is water, stone is stone.Not so with the humanities.The humanities differ not only from the physical sciences, but also from biology.Biology differs from class to class and very little from class to class.The humanities are not the same. Although people are of the same kind, the differences between them are too great to have a value.Obliterating value and obliterating class ranks to study the humanities, and trying to transplant the spirit of equal treatment in the natural sciences to the field of the humanities, this is another reason why the modern humanities cannot develop ideally.

Thirdly, human beings study material science and life science, and the research objects are not human beings themselves.Not so with the humanities.The object of research is himself.At least he himself belongs closely to this object.Therefore, material scientists and even life scientists can be purely rational, without emotion, and they should also be purely rational, without the slightest emotion.But if you study the humanities, how can you be purely rational?How can you not get involved with your own emotions?Not only is it impossible, but it also shouldn't be.A humanist scientist should not be like a natural scientist, who is only interested in the object of his research without the slightest emotion, and should be as indifferent and serious as a natural scientist.What is more valuable than humanistic scientists is that they should not only be intellectually calm and ordinary, but also emotionally sincere and excited.This is not to say to be moody and selfish.It is only necessary to have a very broad and sincere benevolence towards the object of study.Newton invented universal gravitation, so there is no need to be kind to everything.When Darwin created the theory of biological evolution, he didn't have to be kind to all living things.But if a Newton or Darwin is born in the humanities in the future, and he also creates earth-shattering new laws for the humanities, then he must first have a deep and pure benevolence for human beings.If he is extremely indifferent to human beings, extremely calm, and only uses a purely rational mind, he will never penetrate deeply into the hearts of human beings, and create new paths and guide new guidelines for human society.That would never be an ideal and outstanding humanist scientist.

The above two points, one is values, and the other is benevolence, which are the two essential elements for the establishment of humanities.But if you tell these words to modern Western scholars who are deeply immersed in natural science, they will not accept it.It doesn't matter, but it's a pity that it must be a religious man who accepts this theory for Westerners.In this way, the humanities will be brought back to the control of God, and the humanities will still not be established as ideal. It is necessary to seek a kind of mental habit, which is full of values ​​and benevolence, without being stained with religion, and can seek truth from facts to explore the knowledge of life from human beings, without being negative and pessimistic, like Indian Buddhism. Only talk about what is born in this world, and that is only Chinese Confucianism.Modern people know that Confucianism is not a religion, but at the same time say it is not science.In fact, Confucianism is not only natural science, material science and life science, but it cannot be said that it is not a kind of humanities.At least Confucianism is very close to the humanities we ideally want to establish, and it already has several mental habits necessary for the establishment of humanities.Many theories of Confucianism will be accepted by the emerging humanities in the future.Now that we are intent on learning natural science from the West, we should also try to build the humanities based on what we have, so that we also have a gift in return for the West.