Li Yousheng (March 2015)
Abstract: In his blog post, Zhang Yuanshan discusses why the Chinese are the most intelligent people in the world, and points out the various drawbacks behind this success after comparing it with the West. Zhang argues that since the Qin and Han dynasties, the Chinese have misdirected their intelligence, becoming clever but not wise. Under the rule of Chinese-style Eastern mysticism, life has become a process of solving riddles and then achieving profound enlightenment by exiting those riddles. None of China’s enlightened figures have revealed objective truths or contributed beneficial ideas to improve national happiness, thus turning China into a barbaric jungle uncivilized by civilization. I completely agree with Mr. Zhang’s views and am impressed by the clarity and articulation he expresses. Here, I use my years of study of the two-tiered society theory and related phenomena I have observed while living abroad to corroborate Mr. Zhang’s article, greatly expanding the various aspects of the issues he raises and making them clearer and more complete. The East and West are respectively based on a natural, primordial society and a man-made, secondary society. If we remain at the level of the emotional aesthetics of the primordial society and disregard the rationality of the secondary society, then there is no mystery or riddle-solving involved. The Chinese people’s introverted nature does not preclude the ugliness and cruelty of secondary societies. The biblical statement that God regretted creating man allows them to deal with the imperfections of secondary societies rationally.
I recently had the opportunity to read the article “Why is the Chinese People’s Intelligence the Highest in the World” by writer and scholar Zhang Yuanshan, and I was deeply moved. I will not go into detail here, and I do not completely agree with Zhang’s views. [1] The questions raised by Zhang’s article precisely confirm my theory of a two-tiered society. [2,3] China has historically lacked the construction of a man-made two-tiered social hierarchy for individual activities. Furthermore, since the Confucian and Taoist schools, as the mainstream cultures, both take the original society as their ideal, the activities of intellectuals living in the two-tiered society are neither safe nor supported by corresponding material and spiritual factors. This has led to what Zhang Yuanshan described as the Chinese being clever but not wise, self-preserving, and thoroughly escaping the world. One direct result is the super-stability of the social structure and the periodic turmoil in history. Over thousands of years, this has also led to the cunning of ordinary people and the thick-skinned and black-hearted nature of a few political figures, which is what Zhang Yuanshan calls a barbaric jungle that is not a civilized society.
I. On the Intelligence of the Chinese People
Zhang Yuanshan didn’t provide a clear definition of “cleverness,” and whether this is part of what he meant by the Chinese “guessing a gourd in confusion” remains unknown. During my studies and work abroad in the 1980s, I read British accounts of early Chinese people: superstitious and cunning. If religious belief is a firm conviction in a god or deity, then superstition is a temporary belief based on conjecture, an inevitable consequence of guessing under authoritarian rule. From today’s scientific perspective, the God of religious belief is purely a fictitious, artificial construct, while Chinese superstition is based on the experience of guessing a gourd in confusion—a “better safe than sorry” mentality. And cunning, as Zhang calls it, is a kind of petty cleverness.
The difference between humans and animals lies in the fact that humans are better able to suppress impulses generated in the brain; that is, humans have a stronger capacity for self-control than animals. There are no food shops in the animal kingdom; if there were, they would be completely devoured by customers on opening day, because animals cannot resist the urge to eat when they see food. This capacity for self-control manifests in the diligence of Chinese and Jewish people—their ability to suppress the urge to stop and rest while working.
I went to Cambridge University in England in the winter of 1979 to pursue my doctoral degree, where I worked for four years. My department had about a dozen people. During those four years, the two most diligent workers were myself and a Jewish man; we published far more papers than anyone else. Throughout the year, only the two of us worked overtime in the evenings or on weekends. This Jewish man often complained to me, “What can those white British people do? They just drink coffee and smoke all day long, and they still get paid even if they don’t publish anything for years.”
There is anti-Semitic sentiment among Western whites. When my husband and I worked overtime, we often received complaints from British whites, but when the reports reached our superiors, they only mentioned the Jewish person, saying he forgot to turn off the lights, etc. My landlady in Cambridge once told me, “People in a city have lived like this since ancient times. One day a few Jews came, and nobody paid any attention to them. Over the years, factories and shops became their property one after another, and eventually, even the banks were theirs.” A large proportion of Nobel Prize winners are Jewish, and many of the world’s economic elites are also Jewish, but very few are Chinese.
The construction of major North American railroads using Chinese laborers left a deep impression on white North Americans. Hiring people of other ethnicities not only resulted in slower construction progress and equipment theft, but also frequent strikes and disturbances. In North America, both Jews and Chinese were generally wealthier than the average North American, with average income and wealth exceeding the North American population average. I’ve heard people comment, “Jews earn their money, Chinese save theirs.” Saving money is about suppressing the impulse to spend; while the Chinese may not be less driven to earn money than Jews, they lack the Jewish perspective and behavioral norms. Large multinational corporations like Walmart are rarely owned by Chinese; Chinese tend to run family businesses, and they lack the ability to handle interpersonal conflicts, making them more prone to division rather than cooperation to form large multinational corporations.
A Canadian scholar’s research report stated, “Compared to Asians, whites, and blacks, Asians are the most intelligent (wise), whites are in the middle, and blacks are the least intelligent.” After his report was published, he was attacked, accused of being a racist. I believe the intelligence he referred to was the ability to exercise self-control for long-term goals.
This capacity for self-restraint for long-term goals also has a degree to it, especially for a nation; more is not necessarily better. Self-restraint also has side effects, which in Chinese history resulted in a lack of secondary social spaces for individual activity, including corresponding laws and behavioral rules. At the end of the Ming Dynasty, China saw the emergence of a capitalist economy based on wage labor, almost simultaneously with the development of capitalist economies in Europe. Both developed independently, as a natural consequence of their local economic development, rather than as a result of mutual influence and learning. Their subsequent development, however, was vastly different.
Capitalism first emerged as a prominent social force in the Netherlands, employing a large workforce and controlling banking and finance. This new social life quickly spread throughout Europe, and its influence extended into government, becoming the third major power, alongside the existing aristocracy and religious clergy. The subsequent religious revolution forced religious forces to withdraw from government, followed by the French Revolution which significantly diminished the power of the aristocracy. Thus, the rise of a few merchants and factory owners led to the capitalist transformation of society as a whole, turning the former aristocratic government into a capitalist people’s government. This process was accompanied by a rapid expansion of government functions and institutions. That is to say, the space for individual activity at the secondary social level, or what some scholars call civil society, is not empty, but rather composed of countless people with different professional specialties. The legal system, for example, requires the training of numerous judges and lawyers, and the establishment of numerous courts to cope with the increasing interactions and financial exchanges among people. Since ancient Greece, the West has been an open society, primarily open internally, acknowledging and accommodating the behavior of its people and the creativity of their social constructions, even with a transformative change like capitalism.
Historically, Chinese governments and societies lacked this openness, adopting an indifferent indifference towards the capitalist economy that emerged at the end of the Ming Dynasty. This indifference, primarily towards new lifestyles and values, prevented their spread and growth. The capitalist economy that emerged in China at the end of the Ming Dynasty could not, like in Europe, integrate into the government to represent their demands, let alone achieve government capitalistization. Furthermore, the capitalist economy itself lacked the capacity to form a large-scale, self-governing, spontaneously generated government. In other words, China’s indifference towards new lifestyles and values was comprehensive, encompassing not only the government but also society and its citizens. Even if one or two intellectual elites, faced with the prevailing capitalist economy and foresight of a new capitalist society, were forced to remain silent and protect themselves, ultimately leading to the profound realization described by Zhang Yuanshan. Zhang Yuanshan wrote:
In China, most things are not explicitly stated in the law and can only be understood by divine intervention. The so-called “understanding by divine intervention” means that “heaven knows,” and normal people cannot truly understand them.
The capitalist transformation of modern European countries and societies required explicit laws, the right to know for ordinary people, and the knowledge of both Heaven and ordinary people. This situation in Europe, where knowledge and understanding extended from Heaven to ordinary people, was a result of the European religious revolutions and the French Revolution. Chinese history lacks similar revolutions; China’s modern transformations were largely influenced by Western influences, a result of the Chinese people’s ability to learn.
The “riddle-solving” dilemma that Zhang Yuanshan described after the Qin and Han dynasties lacked the openness of Western societies, where people created their own social life, and also lacked a shared understanding between the upper and lower classes. This open society of European religious revolutions and the French Revolution differs from the Chinese revolution described by Zhang Yuanshan as a game of guessing riddles. For example, the peasant revolution led by Mao Zedong was driven by the equal distribution of land, but a few years after seizing power, the land was taken back, renamed: cooperatives, people’s communes. Zhang Yuanshan further stated:
In recent years, with China opening its doors to the world and its people venturing out, the incredibly intelligent Chinese have come to see foreigners as simple-minded, which has only increased their pride in Chinese intelligence. The truth is, foreigners seem simple-minded because their affairs are governed by reasonable and transparent regulations.
Another explanation, which may be closer to the truth, is that Western secondary societies have a long and mature history, which was also forced out by thousands of years of escalating wars. Human resources and intelligence are distributed and distributed more rationally in society. With intelligent people taking care of the greater society, ordinary people do not need that kind of petty cleverness.
II. Regarding Confucius’s statement “At fifteen, I set my heart on learning”
Zhang Yuanshan said: Confucius is considered the father of Chinese culture after the Qin and Han dynasties, and also the main enigma setter of Chinese culture after the Qin and Han dynasties; the opening passage of Confucius’s “At fifteen, I set my heart on learning” describes the six stages of the Chinese people gradually becoming wiser and gradually giving up. When Confucius was old, he talked about his own mental journey, saying: “At fifteen, I set my heart on learning; at thirty, I stood firm; at forty, I had no more doubts; at fifty, I knew the mandate of Heaven; at sixty, my ear was attuned to the truth; at seventy, I could follow my heart’s desire without transgressing the rules.”
I have no objection to Zhang Yuanshan’s viewpoint and argument. However, according to the two-tier society theory, Chinese civilization began as a primitive society, a superpower, and entered a secondary society during the Warring States period after Confucius’ death. Confucianism was based on this primitive society, emulating the reigns of Yao and Shun, and following the example of Wen and Wu. Confucius dedicated his life to preventing China from entering a centralized system characteristic of a secondary society. The political model after the Qin and Han dynasties was unrelated to Confucius, but Qin Shi Huang initiated centralized rule. Emperor Wu of Han and Dong Zhongshu cloaked centralized rule in Confucianism, deceiving the people to gain political legitimacy, merely using Confucius and Mencius to whitewash themselves.
The order of the original society is based on emotional aesthetics, while the order of the secondary society is based on rationality. When people leave the original society and face the choice of different secondary societies, they are easily confused and at a loss by the vast world of the secondary society. The so-called modern world dominated by Western civilization is the result of the great upheaval, differentiation and reorganization of modern Europe, and is a highly rational social order. The traditional social order left by China’s centralized system for thousands of years is not highly rational. Modern society officials at all levels are a group of people with management expertise. Under the influence of Confucianism and Taoism, ancient Chinese officials have always been inseparable from the mentality of the original society and lack the vision and mindset to build a secondary society on the scale of the West. The traditional social model in Chinese history is as follows [4]:
The distorted quasi-primitive society of the imperial family (Huang-Lao Legalism)
│
The bureaucratic and reserve intellectual group constitutes a secondary social unit (Confucianism).
│
Village families (citizens) Quasi-primitive society (Taoism)
The three levels in the upper social model are separated, each with its own philosophy of life. The hundreds of millions of illiterate peasants in the vast countryside live in the family affection of the quasi-primitive society and do not care about how the government above them operates. Therefore, the riddles and enlightenment and thorough mistakes that Zhang Yuanshan talks about refer to the bureaucrats and reserve literati group in the upper social model diagram, that is, the so-called literati class. The scholar-bureaucratic system in Chinese history has left a deep impression on the Western historical community, and this bureaucrat and reserve literati group and the corresponding imperial examination system reached a mature stage in the Song Dynasty. Famous bureaucrats in the Song Dynasty, such as Su Dongpo and Wang Anshi, were also famous scholars and poets. I have discussed how poetry, books, music and painting became a way to comfort the lonely and desolate bureaucratic life and the heart of the literati. [1]
In short, the bureaucrats and reserve intellectuals of traditional Chinese society combined the qualities of today’s writers, scholars, and social administrators. They viewed society and life through the unique lens of the literati, including the great leader Mao Zedong, whose poetic temperament was evident in events like the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution. I remember in the early days of the Cultural Revolution, a couplet hung high in front of the student buildings at the university: “The seas are churning, clouds and waters are furious; the five continents are shaking, winds and thunder are raging.” Young students would gather and sing Mao Zedong’s poems: “This tiny globe, a few flies bump against the wall, a few cries of anguish, a few sobs. Ants along the locust tree boast of a great nation; how easy is it for a mayfly to defend a tree? We must sweep away all harmful insects, none will be able to defeat us.”
Rather than saying that those young students gained some enlightenment through solving riddles with Mao Zedong’s poems, it’s more accurate to say that these poems captivated their emotions, forming a collective mentality, a world of emotional aesthetics. Under the influence of this emotion and mentality, they destroyed the Four Olds, shattering an old world. But how to build a new world from ruins? They immediately realized that this couldn’t be accomplished by an emotional aesthetic mentality. Moreover, they discovered that the new world of a secondary society had countless possibilities, making it difficult for them to reach a consensus. Even the great leader Chairman Mao himself later hesitated and wavered.
Having said all that, let’s return to Zhang Yuanshan himself and his views. Zhang is a professional writer and a scholar renowned for his research on Zhuangzi and Daoist philosophy. Although he is not an administrator, this article focuses on society and human life, taking a national and familial perspective, similar to the bureaucrats and future intellectuals in the previous social model, rather than the individualistic stance of Western society. Furthermore, Zhang’s long-term research on Zhuangzi and Daoism advocates viewing the world and life from the leisurely, amateur perspective of early society.
A long-overlooked fact: Confucius was a philosopher who lived and worked in primitive society, a philosopher of primitive society in his purest form. [2] Confucius said of himself: “At fifteen I set my heart on learning, at thirty I stood firm, at forty I had no more doubts, at fifty I knew the mandate of Heaven, at sixty my ear was attuned to the truth, at seventy I could follow my heart’s desire without transgressing the rules.” This passage of Confucius not only describes the six stages of Chinese people gradually becoming smarter and gradually giving up, as Zhang said, but also describes his life’s journey from the perspective of the emotional aesthetics of primitive society, and in the language of primitive society. This is a journey of the mind that abandons all considerations of worldly interests in secondary society, a journey of the mind that only has the meaning of emotional aesthetics. It is precisely because of this that Zhang Yuanshan can use this passage of Confucius to summarize the journey of intellectuals over the past few thousand years from the Qin and Han dynasties to today, that is, the six stages of Chinese people gradually becoming smarter and gradually giving up, as Zhang said.
III. Also on Sudden Enlightenment and Profound Understanding
The term “sudden enlightenment” is frequently used in Zen Buddhism. After Buddhism entered China, it was influenced by Taoist thought, giving rise to Zen Buddhism. Zen Buddhism does not emphasize ascetic practice or scripture study, but rather sudden enlightenment. When I was young and had just started working, a senior colleague told us the following story:
A group of monks were traveling on a river in a boat. The trees and rocks on the riverbank seemed to recede into the distance. Several young monks began to argue: some said the trees and rocks were moving, while others said the boat was moving. The old monk, upon hearing this, rebuked them, saying, “The trees and rocks are not moving, nor is the boat; it is your minds that are moving.” This story serves as a powerful reminder of the Buddhist teaching that all phenomena are illusory.
The movement of trees and rocks is a phenomenon observed by people on a boat; the movement of the boat is an objective fact discovered by Western science; the movement of the heart is an aesthetic experience felt by people in a moment. In Buddhism, this aesthetic experience of a moment after forgetting the external world is also an illusion that should be discarded.
Zhang Yuanshan interprets enlightenment as a Western-style scientific fact. The modern academic view is that there are no purely objective truths or facts; all truths and facts are subjective human constructs, though these constructs are only related to various phenomena in the objective world to some extent. Comparing China and the West, the perspective of Chinese intellectuals throughout history has been closer to psychological experience and perception, while the perspective of Western intellectuals has been closer to uncovering the objective facts behind phenomena. Compared to the vast material world of the West, China’s emphasis on aesthetic construction in achieving profound enlightenment appears impoverished. Let us read Mr. Zhang’s arguments:
“Sudden enlightenment” means understanding everything, while “complete enlightenment” means no longer hoping to understand everything. Therefore, “complete enlightenment” is not the same as “sudden enlightenment”.
Unfortunately, the cleverness of the Chinese people is contrary to the direction of wisdom; the more clever they are, the further they stray from wisdom. Therefore, when China’s truly enlightened thinkers gave up and retreated, they also abandoned all efforts that could have changed the “puzzle-solving” dynamic. Thus, since the Qin and Han dynasties, no truly enlightened Chinese person has revealed objective truth or contributed beneficial ideas to improve national happiness.
Each Chinese person possesses varying levels of intelligence and areas of expertise, and the areas they find difficult to manage and are forced to abandon also differ. The sum total of all the intelligent people’s retreat and abandonment prevented Chinese society after the Qin and Han dynasties from becoming a civilized society or a civilized community, but rather a barbaric jungle where cleverness backfired.
In my opinion, the strongest support for Mr. Zhang’s statement that “no enlightened Chinese person has ever revealed objective truth or contributed beneficial ideas to improve national happiness” is Mr. Chen Lin’s account of the ten major acts of destruction in Chinese history:
Large-scale wars and famines after the Qin and Han dynasties often led to a sudden drop in population. According to Chen Ping, such a devastating event with more than half the population dying occurred at least ten times in China over two thousand years, while it only happened once in Europe. The population of the Western Han Dynasty was 60 million, but by the beginning of the Three Kingdoms period, only 2 percent remained. [5] Historical records show that the population was halved during the reigns of Emperor Wu of Han and Empress Wu Zetian. During the reign of Emperor Wu of Han, Dong Zhongshu promoted Confucianism and established it as the official ideology of the Chinese government for the next two thousand years. It is said that Emperor Wu of Han left a self-criticism edict before his death to persuade his descendants to change course, otherwise they would repeat the mistakes of Qin Shi Huang. The fact that less than half of the people died during the reign of Qin Shi Huang may be related to the fact that he was in power for a shorter period than Emperor Wu of Han. In any case, the two can be compared in terms of their ambition leading to a nationwide disaster, but the results are completely different: one led to the collapse of the dynasty, while the other opened up a political ideology and ruling system that lasted for two thousand years in China. This is related to Emperor Wu of Han’s modification of the Confucian and Mencian doctrines by Xunzi, Dong Zhongshu and others to adapt to the centralized social order of a two-tiered society.
The unconventional, rebellious, and detached approach of Confucius and Mencius, who would simply walk away if their views differed from the people’s, vanished. As a minister to Emperor Wu of Han, Sima Qian was sentenced to death for merely offering his views on the Li Ling issue, fulfilling his duty as a subject. Fortunately, prioritizing the completion of his father’s unfinished work, he endured castration to survive, allowing us to read the great work, *Records of the Grand Historian*. It was precisely this practice of forcibly imposing personal will through cruel punishments that led to the policy of executing eight hundred laborers, including Chen Sheng and Wu Guang, for being late due to rain. It was also this practice of depriving the people of their right to speak that prevented a nation from rising up in rebellion to overthrow the dynasty, even when faced with the tragedy of more than half its population dying. Zhang Yuanshan’s article also touches on contemporary politics; the official figure is that 30 million people starved to death in China in the 1960s, yet no Chen Sheng or Wu Guang rose up in rebellion. Any uprising has a relatively long period of preparation and mobilization; ideological despotism blocks this possibility.
Peasant uprisings after the Qin and Han dynasties required waiting for the right opportunity, a period of relative relaxation in ideological autocracy that allowed for a longer period of preparation and mobilization. Just as someone who smokes in front of a gas cylinder causes an explosion and then never smokes in front of a gas cylinder again, the unique social situation in which Chen Sheng, Wu Guang, and eight hundred other laborers faced execution due to being late because of rain occurred only once in Chinese history. The Chinese ruling class learned this lesson, a lesson not innate to the young emperor, but rather transmitted to him through court officials, the crown prince’s tutor, and historical textbooks such as those by Sima Qian and Ouyang Xiu.
The knowledge and experience of millions of bureaucratic intellectuals throughout Chinese history were sufficient to ensure that the unique social situation faced by Chen Sheng, Wu Guang, and eight hundred laborers who were late due to rain, facing execution, would never happen again. The same group of bureaucratic intellectuals neither prevented the tragedy of more than half the population dying during the reign of Emperor Wu of Han, nor prevented the recurrence of similar tragedies, resulting in nine more such disasters. This repeated occurrence of such devastating events with more than half the population dying proves Zhang Yuanshan’s point: millions of bureaucratic intellectuals throughout Chinese history have not revealed objective truths for improving national happiness. Confucianism, which studies society and human life, has not seriously researched the social phenomenon of more than half the population dying in Chinese history, nor has it revealed the various causes and evolutionary patterns behind its occurrence. To my knowledge, none of the numerous works left in Chinese history specifically study this historical social phenomenon of more than half the population dying in China. Therefore, Zhang Yuanshan’s use of “savage jungle” to describe Chinese society is not an exaggeration, nor is it just internet slang for venting emotions. Rather, it reflects the rigor of a scholar: a society where the life-altering situation of Chen Sheng, Wu Guang, and eight hundred laborers facing death for being late due to rain occurred only once, but caused the death of more than half of the nation’s population to happen ten times, has no other suitable name but “savage jungle.”
In contrast to Western history and society, Zhang Yuanshan argues that Chinese intellectuals throughout history have not revealed objective truths to improve national happiness. This also includes the so-called Needham Question: why did modern science occur in Europe instead of China, given that China’s science and technology have historically been ahead of the West? Modern science began with natural science, with figures like Newton and Galileo, before Marx and others made significant contributions by using natural science methods to study human society.
Faced with the vast world of life, society, and nature, the Chinese people’s enthusiasm for uncovering the truths behind everyday phenomena is by no means inferior to that of Westerners. Rather, it is China’s centralized social system that discourages such thinking, even suppressing the free thought and independent individualism of intellectuals. The greatest inventions the Chinese are so proud of—gunpowder, printing, papermaking, and the compass—are difficult to pinpoint definitively who invented them. Even the Pythagorean theorem, known as Shang Gao’s theorem, remains largely legendary. These inventors could not enjoy the same renown as Qin Shi Huang and Emperor Wu of Han. This is related to China’s historical emphasis on imperial autocracy and unification rather than individual empowerment. Confucius’s saying “not using what is useful is not being a tool” reflects a primitive society’s independent individual perspective. It emphasizes the primitive society’s view of life from a leisurely, amateurish angle, despising material interests while refusing to become a tool for others. Therefore, Confucius called Zigong a tool. Consequently, Zigong’s achievements as an official in the feudal states surpassed Confucius’s, while Confucius, passionate about politics, never achieved official success.
The so-called individualism of modern Western society is essentially the very kind of mentality that Confucius despised. They pursue self-realization, seemingly transcending the material self and seeking individual uniqueness—the uniqueness of who I am. This individualism itself possesses an external quality, essentially constituting the essence of a man-made secondary society. Not only is this self-realization an inherent phenomenon within the multifaceted world of a secondary society, achieved through the material foundation and social reality of that society, but even if the individuals pursuing this individualism aim to transform or fundamentally oppose the existing world, they are still part of the existing secondary society.
In short, the modern Western individualism of eccentricity is based on Confucius’s opposition to the pursuit of power and tools. Confucius was an individualist and eccentric figure in a primitive society, while Zhuangzi transformed this individualism and eccentricity into a vibrant and magnificent world. Even those who achieved great enlightenment after the Qin and Han dynasties may not have been without their own inner turmoil, and Confucius and Zhuangzi merely served as a form of solace for their inner anguish.
author By Dr. You-Sheng Li
Share
