Linda Lin commented on my post For God’s sake…, I quoted it below:
hey, sorry about my rather long tirade/explanation of ID then! That is a really intriguing question though, how ID supporters might view China’s policies on science, considering the cultural differences and just how different their beliefs are.
A little off topic, and likely politically incorrect (my apologies if i offend anyone), but this kinda reminds me of having lunch at the student cafeteria at uni, during the beginning of a semester when clubs and student societies would be aggressively trying to recruit members. Among them would be the Campus Crusade for Christ club, totally harmless if not over friendly. Their members would also randomly poll the student body, and if you replied that you were Christian they’d try to convince you to go to bible study with them. One time I kinda wanted to be left alone, so I told them I was atheist and my parents were from Communist China (stretching it, but partly true, my parents are Beijing-er’s). They were actually completely captivated by my reply, and i think their next question was “what do you think would happen to your family if they died in a car accident tomorrow? and how would you feel about this?” :S
I told a friend about it later, she said that usually if she told them that she was buddhist, which she is, they’d leave her be. So from then on, I lied and said i was buddhist and it actually worked, the Campus Crusaders for Christ would just smile and wave as they walked past.
Sorry about the lengthiness again and if the subject touches politically sensitive areas.
There is no politics here. What’s there is cultural differences. Western cultural oriented from a nomadic way. People were isolated from each other and left alone in a vast area of wild nature. If one encountered living problems or challenges there were no other people to call for help. So he/she tended to rely on God. Westerners also tends more to know the Nature and less the human relationship, or they only emphasize the importance of independent individual. And if there are conflicts among individuals it is up to God or law, both of which not human, to define and judge. Weak inter-personal relationship also allows more fights or war.
China, in contrast, has a culture of ‘river valley", i.e. the Yellow River. People located in one area constantly and lived on agriculture. This required solutions to many complex problems such as how to distribute lands and harvest among people and avoid conflicts of interest. And due to people always reside in fixed areas they also needed defense and diplomacy. All these requirements call for a strict, graded, and centralized governmental system, as well as a rich ethics about relationship among people, instead of that between human and nature/God; they weren’t curious about the Nature very much. What matters most for Chinese is relationship of people, e.g. family, ‘danwei’ (the organization you work for), and the whole country. All Chinese philosophies are about how people’s relationship should form. Chinese believe their athlete’s gold medals belong not only to themselves but to the whole nation, for instance. You live never for yourself, but for you family, for your organization, and for your society. And it is up to people, not God or law or any thing not human, to judge and reconcile conflicts. That’s why laws aren’t respected so much as ‘guanxi’ (relationship) in China.
So even supposing other’s parent’s death is rather impolite in Chinese view, as in Linda Lin’s case. Because we view death a tragedy as we lost a family member. We don’t believe in heaven.
A high respect to family also results in a high respect to the elder rather than the stronger, the know-early rather than the know-more, the authority rather than the genius. We often compare Confucius with Greek philosophers for masturbation, but the fact is no one was able to bypassed the status of Confucius in later history of China, whereas in western history this is by no means the case: Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Galileo, Newton, and Einstein. There is always a huge ethical burden for any Chinese people to disagree with former establishment. We pay a great deal of attention to preserving the feeling and harmony of the whole group we belong to and have an equally sensitive feeling about other members’ activities (whereas in western society they emphasize individuals’ freedom). Because what you act is not individual but must affect the whole group even the whole nation, the Chinese people always act overly carefully, with too many, too complex and too far-reached consideration of consequences beforehand. As a result, we have less or less important innovations than the westerners. And our governmental cost is high; everything is up to people, everything must be considered in a complex, people-involving way; everything is connected; everything is not only itself but part of something known or unknown.
These also form an introvert characteristic of Chinese people, whose aim of becoming stronger is for defense rather than conquest. Because of what we believe in, we think of aggressiveness highly dangerous. So Chinese people are even not always willing to let others know their merits or excellence. Humility always protects you in a complex network of people, whereas maverick is always envied and attacked. We highly repsect a wisdom that one should stay dull/plain, called 守拙. We always add the word ‘humble’ between ‘in my’ and ‘opinion’, the more frequently the more significant the opinion actually is. And we call our daughters and sons stupid and parents awkward, when we have to talk about them with other (these are prefixes), while we must add good prefixes when calling others’ relatives. There is a competition to unbalance the status between every two Chinese contacts (while the westerners believe all men are created equal). That’s why China always seems to disrespect human’s (individual’s) rights, but easily enraged by any interference of its sovereignty. And finding the true nature of a Chinese person, or knowing a Chinese person, is perhaps the most difficult thing in the world. As I have said, they are trained actors/actresses. They are always characters of a whole opera. They are not themselves, but what they belongs to, what they work for and what they orient from.
I personally totally dislike these Chinese characteristics and seem to have form a western mind to some extent. But I know I can’t isolate myself from my family at last, and therefore still can’t isolate myself from everyone, being trapped in Chinese ethics again.
I prefer Lao Zi to Kong Zi (Confucious), and prefer Zhuang Zi to Meng Zi. Somewhere between the Confucian and Daoist models is the lifestyle I can follow. I suppose it comes of being American, I am drawn to the wild Daoists. I couldn’t follow their way though, it is not consistent with being a scientist and trying to do something useful for society — so perhaps my view of the world is closer to Kong Zi after all. But quietly, I hear the call of the cave on the mountainside…
In fact Confucious is not the only part that resemble a typical Chinese mind, which is actually a mixture of Confucious, Daoism, and Zen. In a very simplified view, Zen solves the problem of after-death, Daoism solveds the problem of the Nature, and Confucious solves the problem of individual and society. Ancient Chinese intellects pursued according to Confusious and tried their best to be valuable for the society, while when their couldn’t get their jobs they rely on Daoism to reconcile themselves and secluded into the nature.
Andrew – a very interesting take on your own ambivalence as an expatriate. (I’m one, too.) You gain a different kind of hybrid wisdom from leaving the ease of your own upbringing, to which you’ve adapted over the years of your childhood. I attended a lecture by a friend on guanxi, and she echoed much of what you said, as to trying to interpret a “typical” Chinese mindset to a “typical” European who wants to do business with said Chinese partners.
However, just a caution about generalizing with respect to humility. While individual self-aggrandizement gets more attention, there is still a strong current in certain Western subcultures that women, in particular but not exclusively, should be humble and serve their communities over their personal accomplishments, that aggressiveness is dangerous and such people are “uppity” and should be “put back in their place”. That seems a little like what you phrased as “unbalancing the status”.
I see. Then it is unemployment I hear calling. Perhaps I had best pursue the Confucian ideal, if for naught else, then for the education of my children (Universities are expensive! Keep working!)
Perhaps they will write “than for the education” rather than writing after their father’s style.
Just as glad you’ve not resigned yourself yet to a Zen perspective, Jon…
Thank you for a very interesting and thought-provoking post!
Oh Cool. I hadn’t heard about the “river valley” culture before, and this explains so much about my familiy actually, that i didn’t quite understand. Thanks for putting it up!