Talk:Eastern world/Archive 1

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Archive 1

Four Noble Truths

Regarding 'Buddhism': The Four Noble Truths would be better stated as: There is suffering, There are causes of suffering, There is a cessation of suffering, There is a path that leads to the cessation of suffering. Furthermore, it should be noted that Nirvana (Nibbana in Pali) is only defined in the Pali suttas by the characteristics it doesn't have (eg. it is free of suffering) but does not say anything about 'oneness with the universe' which is suggested toward the end. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.72.131.230 (talk) 01:20, 28 November 2003 (UTC)

Dualities

From the article:

The central conceptual structure shared with Classical Western philosophy (and lacking in East Asian thought prior to the Buddhist "invasion") includes counterparts of the dichotomies between reason v emotion, appearance v reality, one v many, and permanence v change. Indian and Western thought, with their robust mind-body conceptual dualism, share consequent tendencies to subjective idealism or dualism. Formally, they share the rudiments of Western "folk psychology" --a sentential psychology and semantics (e.g. belief and (propositional) knowledge, subject-predicate grammar (and subject-object metaphysics) truth and falsity, and inference. These concepts underwrote the emergence (or perhaps spread) of logic in Greece and India (In contrast to pre-Buddhist China). Other noticeable similarities include structural features of related concepts of time, space, objecthood and causation -- all concepts hard to isolate within ancient Chinese conceptual space.

Buddhism and especially Taoism seems to reject these dualities as fundamentally illusory, whereas classical Western philosophy embraces them. Comments on this, please? Kwertii 13:12, 2 May 2004 (UTC)

I dunno, it's sort of complex. I mean, on the one hand in Buddhism the idea of reincarnation only makes sense in as much as the mind and the body exist as a Cartesian dualism, so that the soul moves from one body to the next, even if according to anatman that soul has no essential properties over time. Further, in Buddhism the teaching isn't that the world is illusory as it is in Hinduism and other philosophies. Suffering is real, it just isn't necessary once you follow the eightfold path to enlightenment. On the other hand, Mahayana and especially Zen Buddhism tend to reject all labels and conceptions as arbitrary attachments to be discarded, so the belief that the world or the soul being "real" would seen as a stumbling block on the road to enlightenment... So, it's a sort of complicated mix of things, where the nuances emphasized by different sects can vary. --Carl 15:30, 2 May 2004 (UTC)

Also, we have A related argument is linguistic, based on the classification of Sanskrit as one of the earliest Indo-European languages. Shared concepts include the supernatural, the immortal soul (ancestor of mind-body dualism). I'd think that various African and Native American philosophies also have concepts such as the supernatural and the immortal soul, no? Kwertii 17:31, 4 May 2004 (UTC)

Shortened Taoism

I took this text on Taoism and tried to shorten it, because I think this level of detail belongs to [[Taoism] main article:

Taoism's central books are the Tao Te Ching and the Chuang Tzu (Zhuangzi). Tradition had it that the Tao Te Ching of Lao Tzu (Laozi) dates to approximately 600 BCE. Recent archeological finds have reinforced the scholarly argument that it was still being shaped around or after the time of Chuang Tzu (Zhuangzi). The core concepts themselves may be much more ancient, incorporating elements of mysticism dating back to prehistoric times.
The traditional story: The Tao Te Ching was written by Lao Zi (Wade-Giles, Lao tse), a minor Chinese court official (and, according to Taoist legend, teacher to Confucius) who became tired of the petty intrigues of court life, and set off to leave China by the "Western Pass". He was stopped by a "keeper of the pass" who, noting that valuable wisdom should not be taken away, required Laozi to put his tao into words -- whereupon Laozi quickly jotted down the 5000 characters that make up the Tao Te Ching (which actually contains about twice that).
His Taoism (interpreted by some as a version of quietism) involved a slogan often translated (obscurely) as "action through inaction", wu wei. The "wu" is not problematic -- it's just "lack" or "absence." But "wei" has a cluster of meanings, including "for the sake of", "doing", and "regarding or deeming as." (A cognate wei means "to call or designate", and another works like the linking verb "is.") We can speculate that the whole idea suggests no actions generated by concepts. The closest familiar Western idea would be something like non-deliberative or sub-conscious action. This produces the familiar gloss in interpretations that one should effect changes subtly and without disrupting the natural flow of the universe, rather than by attempting to force change according to some conceptual norms (a for the sake of).
A related core structural feature is the argumentative reliance on the dualism of concepts (names). All terms are discussed as paired with their opposites and rather than a model where names refer to objects, the text hints that the complementary concepts (names) map onto distinctions that we can draw in reality. (Mastery of language consists in correctly being able to distinguish using the names). Laozi links this learned capacity to learned (hence unnatural) desires which, in turn, lead to wei--action informed by names, learned patterns of discrimination, and associated desires.
The most famous example of this dualism is one only briefly hinted at in the text but which becomes dominant in the Han (220 BC-3rd centry AD) is the yin-yang dualism that dominated the cosmology of the traditional China. These symbolize the divisions of light and dark, male and female,hot and cool, dominant and submissive, upper and lower, stiff and yielding, hard and soft, active and passive etc. Where Confucianism "favors" the "good" yang, Daoism sees them as interdependent. One half is no better than the other, and indeed, neither can exist without the other, since each contains a small amount of the other. Ultimately, both are the same thing -- the great ultimate which a tao "carves" into two to guide action in some WAY. (The concrete -- pun intended -- translation of dao is "road".)
Some time after the publication of the Tao Te Ching and another work by Zhuang zi (Wade-Giles, Chuang tse), Taoism developed its religious aspect, especially among the Chinese peasantry. Lao Zi and other famous personas were elevated to deity status among followers, and complex religious rituals involving alchemy, magic spells and symbology began to be practiced.

I will try to mix this in the main article. gbog 15:49, 1 Jun 2004 (UTC)

This line "—concepts of good and bad energy, the connectedness of mind and body and nature, etc." is a complete misrepresentation of Daoism and Daoist Chinese Folk religions, and I Simply removed it. The lack of the concepts of good and bad is a main feature of Daoism. Those paragraphs are an adequately correct rough summary but the inconsistent transliteration is very confusing. Trust me, it's a lot easier for you, readers, and scholars (and not to much actually correct) to just stick with pinyin. I understand why this much detail wouldn't fit this page. Given the context of this page and that this is a list of religions, not philosophies, the label Daoism often includes the yi jing, other classics, and various religious movements throughout Chinese history. This would be a better description (for consideration):
Daoism — Chinese folk religions rooted in ancient mystic and quietist texts.

WHAT?

Why was this moved from Eastern philosophy, and how can we fix this as soon as possible? -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 04:24, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

To clarify, in case it's not transparent, culture is a much, much broader topic than philosophy or even "systems of thought" or other glosses. Culture is stuff like music and food. And while an article on Eastern culture is something that's not a horrible idea to have, it should be something other than the Eastern phliosophy article, which should be returned immediately to Eastern philosophy. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 04:28, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Well, lets not be hasty - if youre saying that the term should refer to philosophy instead of culture, then we have a conflict. But if you might agree that there needs to be both, then I can simply parse the material relevant to philosophy to Eastern philosophy, keeping the Eastern culture article as a more general cover - containing within it Philosophy, society, art, etc... OK? -Stevertigo 04:47, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Yes, that should be fine. -- कुक्कुरोवाच|Talk‽ 04:50, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Please do not copy-and-paste move articles. Since nearly all of the text was transferred back to Eastern Philosophy, I felt we had to preserve history. I deleted Kukkurovaca, reverted Stevertigo's changes, and did a proper move. I reistated the edits of both of you, and the edit summaries attribute the changes to you. (See history for both pages). [[User:Sverdrup|❝Sverdrup❞]] 13:43, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

About the article Eastern philosophy: maoism?

Please forgive my poor english. To me, this article could be improved a lot as a whole. Unfortunatey, my knowledge of english won't allow me to do much, but there's still something that i find quite stunning: even if we accept the field of eastern philosophies has having some kind of discrete character (and I do not, eccept maybe the buddhist lineage in some asian countries) I still wonder why the maoist philosophy is listed in the article. Reading the introduction and the list of traditions, I see that the article deals with philosophies and teachings which have their roots in Asia. This could be considered logic from a certain perspective but, in the same perspective, I don't find any reason to put Maoism in the list. Not only Maoism has its well known roots in the west but it bring into question almost every aspect of cultural continuity in China (which is quite what you would expect from a socialist point of view, and that's ok). So, at first its inclusion in the list would seem laughable, while actually is simply nonsense, IMO. Now, I see that someone would consider my opinion NPOV. But to me, NPOV doesn't mean simply putting some statement everywhere merely adding that it could be false or not. It rather means the respect of the context and structure of an article (and the respect of any user's aim to gather serious informations about something). I would consider a severe infraction of a NPOV to list, say, Ufology in the Science category rather than in Western world, for that manner. That's all. Thank you. Bai Shengzhi 19:48, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

There is no reference to Maoist philosophy and never has been. The only context in which Communism is referred to is the Cold War meaning of Eastern bloc, which refers mainly to east Europe, but was sometimes extended to include Asian conuntries. This is perfectly legitimate explanation of a usage, and is in no way comarable to Pseudoscience.Paul B 10:11, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Title/gist?

Shouldn't this article be a better parallel to Western culture (e.g. maps, examples, similar structure)? Also, why is it titled 'world' instead of 'culture'? - IstvanWolf 23:23, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

It's called what its called, because it parallels the Western world page, not the Western culture page. However, the concept is less clearly defined than the Western one, as the article states. That does not mean that more can't or shouldn't be added.Paul B 10:04, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
The parallel article to Western culture is curently under the title Culture of Asia. You get directed to if you click on "culture" in the Eastern Culture template. Paul B 18:31, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

"Eastern world" as "Asia"

Hi.

In the beginning of this article it says the "Eastern world" is "namely Asia". But "Asia" includes more than just the Far East, it also parts of the Middle East as well (except for those in Africa, of course), however most people don't seem to call this part of the "Eastern" world, but usually the "Arab" or "Muslim" world. Should this be mentioned in the intro? 70.101.144.160 00:15, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

Definately muslim culture should be considered Eastern culture. Because all muslim practices in middle east have there parallels in the east rather than the west. I support your idea. Muslim culture is the strongest eastern culture in the world at the moment. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.58.115.33 (talk) 10:13, 10 April 2007 (UTC)‎

Actually "East v. West" dichotomies applied firstly to the Middle East and then later to other areas. The Middle East is, in a sense, the original "Eastern World" in Western eyes. 69.141.156.49 (talk) 21:42, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

"Achievements of the Eastern culture"

I think this section is rather misplaced because it is out of the scope of this article. Further all sub-sections are whole articles so there should be links to the proper wikipedia pages instead.. right now, we're trying kind of trying to fit an elephant into a fridge! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.162.142.147 (talk) 18:57, 15 April 2007 (UTC)‎

Rewrite

I think it would be helpful to understand what the "East" is if we could make it look more like the article on Western culture. Primarily I'm thinking of the "Foundation" section. It could start: "Eastern culture has developed many themes and traditions. Some important ones are:

  • Buddhism
  • Confuscious
  • etc"

This would help to show how the lables "East" and "West" describe the different approaches people have to life because of their different backgrounds. I think the technological "break-throughs" that are listed now (April 2007) are irrelevant. These articles (Eastern culture/Western Culture) are not about what the people have done but the how their different histories have produced different ways of thinking. Schaeen 02:29, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

A few quick points

A few quick points; the Chinese elite historically suppressed superstition and despised the Buddhists. Confucianism is a meritocratic system. Position depends upon education and ability. As time passed, that education became largely drawn from old classics. The Chinese language predates Buddhism. Ancestor veneration is a basic human instinct and much like superstition is found everywhere throughout the world. Heaven's knight 06:46, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Proposed renaming and split

I'd like to suggest that this article is rather confused and should be split up. The definition of "East" has had different meanings over time and today has more than one meaning. The differences in meaning are not subtle. The article is trying blur these meanings which doesn't make sense. I'd like to propose the following articles to make this more logical.

  • Eastern World - Make this a disambig page linking to those below.
  • Eastern World (Traditional) - Covers Eastern Europe, Turkey, and the Middle East. The name is a little awkward. If somebody wants to suggest a better name, feel free.
  • Middle East - Same as it is now.
  • Eastern Europe - Same as it is now.
  • Far East - Merge in any unique elements from this page there.

Comments? --Mcorazao 04:29, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

The article is not "trying" to blur the meanings - on the contrary the principal part of it it is trying to draw attention to the the fact that there are multiple meanings which are often blurred. It emphasises the problems with different definitions. That is the point of the article. I think the problem, as noted above, is the irrelevant "achievements" section, which undoes the intent of the earlier part. It was added because there was an "achievements of Western culture" section in the Western culture article, and someone thought it was unfair not to have a parallel "achievements of Eastern culture". But this is not really the right place for it. I tried to delete it but it was readded. Paul B 10:33, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

My point is that this article is about multiple distinct topics. Ideally each article should be about one coherent topic (which sometimes is a subtopic of a larger topic). In this case I don't really see a coherent topic. "Not Western" does not seem to me to be a topic. In the Middle Ages, "Not Western" referred to the Byzantine Empire and countries within its influence (or else in close contact with it such as the Muslim Caliphates). But today "Not Western" can be interpreted in a variety of different ways each with their own distinct meaning. The only common thread in these distinct meanings is "Not Western" which does not seem to me to justify more than a disamig page. Moreover, it is potentially offensive to those distinct cultures to "lump" them all together. --Mcorazao 15:07, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't think playing the "potentially offensive" card is helpful. The page is about the multiple meanings of a single concept. It has never been equated with "not Western" - which would include Africa and America (before it was "westernised"). Paul B 15:45, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Note sure how to take the first sentence so I'll pass on that. The problem here is "multiple meanings" and "single concept". If there is a "single concept" here then that is fine. But the article does not clearly articulate a "single concept" that is being described. Logically a "single concept" should have a "single meaning" (if the "term" has other less frequently used meanings then those can be redirected to other pages at the top of the page). As I say, you haven't made a case that there is a single coherent topic being discussed here. The fact that these various topics are often described using the same terms does not make them one topic. --Mcorazao 16:17, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I think there are two issues here. The single concept is the idea that the there is a coherent "eastern world". It does not have to be true (it's pretty much unfalsifiable, as is the concept of the "western world"), but it is an important concept. It is worthwile exploring it. Now you may say that it is not clearly distinct from "the Orient" which has a different page, but which has tended to become embroiled in debate about the American usage of the word "Oriental(s)", which is not dealt with here. We also have inconsistencies - the 'eastern world' and 'eastern culture' both come here, but there are separate articles on the Western world and Western culture, because these terms have greater political/ideological resonance. Paul B 16:28, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

OK, that is a valid point. The "idea" of the Eastern World (presumably from the so-called "Western" perspective) is a coherent topic. However, the article neither makes clear that this is really what it is about nor does it stick to this topic (i.e. to talk about the Foundations and Achievements of the Eastern World implies more than just the "idea" in someone's head). So I still say that the article needs to be split although perhaps in a different way from what I suggested (personally I like my organization better but I'll yield since you were here first and you have a valid point). --Mcorazao 17:02, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

As I said, I think the first part of the article does make this point - by listing overlapping but also inconsistent definitions and trying to analyse the rwasons for that. The second part then messes it all up! Paul B 11:16, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Eurocentric!

The so called "Eastern cultures" are very heterogeneous. The only thing they have in common is that they are not Western i.e European. This terminology was invited by Europeans, where Western meant European and Eastern "the rest". Therefore, the Arabic and the Japanese cultures became part of the "Eastern World". There is no such a thing! Actually I think Western and Islamic culture has much more in common than Japanese and Arabic culture have. Aaker (talk) 12:16, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely true, but also not relevant. The fact is that this type of terminology is used, both by Easterners and Westerners, and so it needs explanation.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 09:31, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

And most Europeans have a lot in common with other peoples in Asia, hence 'Indo-Europeans' existing in Asian (India, Iran etc) and Europe (most Europeans). Also, I must point out that Christianity is as much an eastern non-European philosophy as Islam and Judaeism, religions that are related to Christianity (all three from the Abrahamic sub-branch of Semitic mythology). The actual European religions are now considered heathenism and sometimes, by christians, 'Devilry'! 86.154.189.194 (talk) 12:37, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I completely agree with Aaker. Grouping all of Asia as part of the Eastern world is very Eurocentric. Even the term "Asia" itself is Eurocentric. Middle Easterners and Far Easterners has very little in common in culture, language and genetics. I think the term "Eastern World" should only apply to the cultures of East Asia, South Asia and Southeast Asia. Jcdizon (talk) 13:34, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Philippines not in the Sinosphere

On the Eastern Culture Series box on the top right of the page, it lists the Philippines as part of the Sinosphere. The Philippines is not a Sinosphere country. It should be removed from the grouping. Singapore should also be moved from the Indosphere grouping and moved to the Sinosphere grouping.--Wambeter (talk) 11:21, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Eastern vs western world

Reintegrate article section, see here 91.182.185.192 (talk) 07:37, 19 May 2012 (UTC)

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