Chapter 17 Section 10 Mohism's Epistemology and Views of Time and Space

The exploration of the natural world in which human beings live and multiply is an important aspect of the academic contention and academic prosperity of the pre-Qin philosophers.In this regard, Mohism is unique, establishing its own view of nature and cosmology, trying to summarize from the height of rational understanding, and put forward many insights with scientific value.Here we only introduce the Mohist epistemology and the concept of time and space reflected in the "Mo Jing". Mohists first opposed Lao Tzu's idea of ​​"existence is born of non-existence", and clearly stated that everything in the world began with "existence".This "being" exists objectively and is independent of human consciousness.The nature of an object exists attached to the object of the object, and without the object, the nature of the object ceases to exist.For example, "hard white" is the nature of stone, and it cannot exist without stone.Moreover, firmness and whiteness exist at the same time and cannot be separated. Stones will not only be firm but not white, nor will they be white but not firm.When one touches a stone, one perceives its firmness, but whiteness does not exist; when one looks at a stone, one perceives its whiteness, but firmness does not exist either.People's perception of whiteness is the reflection of the nature of stone.Thus, the Mohists established the theory of reflection in epistemology, that is, human cognition is the reflection of objective things.

So, how do people know objective things?The Mohists believe that the reason why people are human is that they have the ability to understand and can acquire knowledge.Human vitality lies in the unity of body and knowledge, and it is human instinct to seek knowledge.In the view of Mohists, a simple form without knowledge is a lifeless thing, nothing more than a walking corpse.The Mohists summed up three basic ways of cognition, namely hearing knowledge, speaking knowledge and intimate knowledge.Hearing and knowing are divided into hearsay and personal knowledge, but no matter whether it is hearsay or personal knowledge, it should not be simply accepted, but must be digested and integrated to make it your own knowledge.Saying knowledge includes the meaning of inference and investigation, and refers to knowledge obtained by inference.Familiar knowledge refers to the knowledge obtained from the five sense organs.And familiarity can't just stop at the superficial perception, but also requires the synthesis, sorting, analysis and inference of the acquired knowledge in order to obtain true knowledge.It can be seen that the Mohists' understanding of the source of human knowledge is quite comprehensive and profound.

In terms of time and space, the Mohists also have a unique understanding.The Mohists believe that time includes all time from ancient to modern, morning and evening, and space includes all spaces in east, west, north, south, and they are all continuous and infinite.And this continuous and infinite space-time is composed of time element "beginning" and space element "end" which are too small to be divided.Thus, space-time is not only continuous, but also composed of the smallest units that cannot be divided. Infinity contains finiteness, and continuity contains discontinuity.The Mohist view of time and space is extremely profound and brilliant, and is basically consistent with the modern scientific view of time and space.