Hallo, this is Dr. Bin Song in the course of “Foundations of Morality” at Washington College.

Another thinking fallacy, which is closely related to the one of “demanding perfection” and can cause a slew of negative emotions and self-defeating habits of behavior, is damnation. As explained in last unit, people who demand perfection ascribe their standards of ideal human living to objective realities, and once they fail to witness or achieve these standards in reality, they tend to judge human life as not worth living.

One conceivable result from the thought that human life is not worth living is that you start to damn it. This damnation can be taken in multiple forms:

You may start to damn yourself to say words, such as “I will be a complete failure,” “I should not be borne by my parents,” or even harboring the intention of suicide, just because you don’t have those achievements or approval which you think your worth of life as a human individual is necessarily tied to.

You may also start to damn other people, and smear them using vulgar languages just because they fail in certain aspects of their life to realize your standards of good human living. This can be furthermore taken in multiple forms. For instance, you believe people should be honest; but once some people lie and behave in a dishonest way to you, you will think they are essentially and irreversibly a liar, and then, start to condemn them as worth going to hell. Another instance is that when you are greatly irritated by your disagreement with someone during a debate, you start to yell to them, and use damning languages all over the map to turn the debate into a name-calling shouting abuse.

With one step further, you may also start to damn the entire world. Think about the dividing politics, the natural disasters, the humanitarian crises, the ongoing pandemic and the apocalyptic global warming. I believe many people would feel overwhelmed at a certain point of their life, and they may start to condemn the entire world and doubt whether it is worth living here at all.

Quite evidently, once you think of either your self, the persons of others’, or the world as a whole as lacking an intrinsic worth, you will be greatly disturbed by strong self-defeating emotions, and sometimes, these emotions can be very dangerous. Apart for the formidable intention of suicide we mentioned above as an instance, once other people are looked at as damnable pieces of object, we can start to think over how the holocaust, genocides, and racism happen and recur in human history and society. Therefore, in order to live a healthy, good human life, we must eliminate this thinking fallacy of damnation, and start to build genuine respect to every human and non-human being that lives and exists in this world.

Despite standards using which people judge either themselves, others or the world as damnable may be different, there are two essential characteristics shared by all the aforementioned forms of damnation:

• Firstly, the thinking fallacy of damnation ascribes what happens badly (in whatever sense the badness is understood) in parts to the whole, so as to have a global negative judgment towards a person or the world just because of their partial imperfections.
• Secondly, which is closely related to the first, the thinking fallacy of damnation fails to appreciate the life of an individual human being or the entire world as constituting an endless process of changing, becoming and daily renewal. Instead, this fallacy reifies its targets of thought, and treats them as stiff, rigid and disposable “objects.” Since being objects rather than respectable beings, what are damned by the thinking fallacy could be either manipulated for selfish purposes or gave up and jettisoned to the extent of (self-) elimination.

In contrast with these two essential features of the thinking fallacy of damnation, if we start to think of people as respectable human beings who keep changing and growing, and if we stop using global, damning languages to address any one who fails to deliver certain of our expectations at a certain moment of their life, we will become more realistic, accepting and kind in our relationships with them. We will therefore become dedicated to patient communication, and rectifying humans’ wrong-doings in a concrete, piecemeal and perfectible way. In a reflective perspective, the attitude towards ourselves will also become much more accepting, motivating, and confident.

As indicated by the assigned reading, the author raised many philosophies and religions to help to nurture this virtue of “respect” to rectify the fallacy of damnation. These wisdoms all pertain to the recognition of the incomparable and constant worth of human life, and its authentic relationship with the world. In the following, I will use my expertise in Confucianism to address the same issue. Surely, for the sake of practicing the virtue of respect, I will also encourage you, my students, to find the philosophy or religion which is the best fit for you.

So, where does the worth of human life consist?

To answer this question, Mencius (372-289 B.C), the second most important philosopher in classical Confucianism, imagined a thought experiment. He said, any ordinary human being who saw a baby about to fall into a well will spontaneously have a feeling of fright and alarm, so as to have the initial thought to save the baby from the impending danger. In this thought experiment, it is completely out of question where the baby is raised, who its parents are, of what color the baby looks, what accomplishment the baby will have in its future life, etc. In other words, In Mencius’s view, all these objective attributes of the baby which we can describe from outside have no relevance to the stimulation of the universal feeling of compassion and love hardwired into the good part of human nature. As long as it is a baby to be approaching some danger, we will recognize immediately the value of its life, and try to save it from distress.

Along the same lineage of thought, Wang Yangming (1472-1529) thought humans’ universal compassion can reach even further to all beings in the universe. So, we have a feeling of alarm and fright not only to a baby about to fall into a well. If an animal gets slaughtered, a plant gets uprooted, or even some tiles and stones are blown away from their original places, we human beings can also be aroused with some inner feeling of concern and alarm, since according to Wang Yangming, the good part of human nature makes us all feel united with everything in the universe.

So, as indicated by these Confucian philosophers’ thought, Confucianism measures the intrinsic worth of human life from the perspective of the philosophy of life. It understands the entire universe as an all-encompassing, constantly creating and renewing cosmic field. Within this field, all human lives matter since they are the manifestations of this continually renewing cosmic force. Therefore, no matter what achievements we can have during our life, and how many people approve of our works, as long as we keep changing, growing, and renewing ourselves just as the normal function of life entails, our life is intrinsically valuable. Quite evidently, this Confucian philosophy of life is also very appropriate for the growing mindset that I explained before to counteract the fallacy of demanding perfection.

If the intrinsic value of human life consists in the sheer fact that each individual’s life is one form of the all-encompassing cosmic life, how should we deal with human relationships, particularly when others are doing something wrong to us?

There is a Confucian version of the so-called golden rule of ethics, and its three aspects address the question fairly well.

• Firstly, the negative golden rule, which is told by Confucius in the Analects 15.24: do not do to others what you do not want done to yourself.
• Secondly, the positive golden rule, which is told by Analects 6:30: establish others what you want to establish yourself; help others to achieve what you want to achieve yourself.
• Thirdly, the corrective golden rule, which is told by Analects 14.34: when someone does something wrong to you, you should neither revenge nor tolerate. Instead, you should treat them with justice, viz., to correct their wrong-doing in a loving, but just and righteous way.

Among these three aspects of the Confucian golden rule, the third one is particularly relevant to address the fallacy of damning other people. When someone does something wrong to us, according to this Confucian rule, we should neither tolerate them, viz., that we continue to be kind to them as if nothing happens; nor revenge them, viz., to seek retaliation through damning them as revengeable pieces of object. No, Confucius approved of neither of these two approaches. Instead, Confucius says that we should treat them with justice. That is to try to correct their wrong-doing deeds, rather than damning their whole personhood, so as to create an opportunity for people to morally grow and improve. That can surely be done through legal terms, but can also be implemented in a much softer way in a daily basis, but the key of the methods is still the same: stop damning people, but correct their wrong-doings to indicate our respect to their perfectible humanity.

Last but not least, what’s the Confucian view towards the world as a whole? It is true that the universe is life-generating; otherwise, there would not be so many wonderful things to happen on this earth on a daily basis. But there are also so many natural disasters and humanitarian crises on the earth. If we only look at the bright side of the life-generating process without regarding the tragical sides of it, are we burying our heads into the sand as an ostrich?

To address this concern, the following conversation between Confucius, Confucius’s student Zi Lu, and two hermits (Changju and Jieni) in the Analects 18.6 will be illuminating. The context of this conversation is that Confucius wandered among varying warring states in his time with his students to find opportunities to implement his political and ethical ideas in order to regain peace and harmony in the world. And I will read the conversation as its entirety:

Changju and Jieni were plowing the filed side by side, when Confucius passed by them and sent Zilu to ask the whereabouts of the place to cross the river.
Changju said, “Who is the man holding the reins over there?”
Zilu said, “It is Kong Qiu (Confucius).”
“Is it the Kong Qiu of Lu.”
“Yes.”
“Then he must know where to cross the river already.”
Zilu then asked Jieni, and Jieni said, “Who are you, sir?”
Zilu said, “I am Zhongyou (Zi Lu’s style name).”
“Are you not the disciple of Kong Qiu of Lu?”
“I am.”
Jieni said, “Turbulent floodwater is surging everywhere under heaven. Who is able to change this? Besides, rather than following a man who avoids some people here and there, would it not be better to follow whose who avoid the world altogether?” With this he went on to cover up the seeds without stopping.
Zi Lu went back and reported it. The Master signed, saying, “One cannot be in the same herd with birds and beasts. If I am not with my fellow humans, with whom shall I associate? If the world had the Way, I would not be involved in changing it.”

In other words, in Confucius’s view, the world is neither set up to go against nor for the interests of human beings. The world is just what it is, and nothing about it needs to be particularly praised or condemned. Instead, the world would look exactly as what human beings make out of it. If we want a better world, we need better ourselves at first. If we want a better society, we need better human individuals at first. Therefore, Confucius teaches: do not give up the world, and the whole purpose of human living is to better the world through bettering ourselves.

So, let’s wrap up the Confucian wisdom to counteract the fallacy of damnation: the worth of human life consists in its livingness and perfectibility, which is independent from achievements and approvals from others. If others do something wrong to us, neither tolerate nor damn it; find ways to correct these wrong-doings while showing respect to their perfectible humanity; eventually, have a realistic human attitude towards the world as a whole, and make it as good as yourself can be.

Quiz:

(1) What are the two features of the fallacy of damnation?

A, to have a global negative judgement because of partial imperfections.
B, to fail to appreciate the processual nature of human living.
C, to rightfully condemn evil deeds rather than the whole person.

(2) According to Confucianism, where does the intrinsic value of human life consist in?

A, human individuals as perfectible and living human beings.
B, human individuals as autonomous rational beings.
C, human individuals as sentient beings to seek pleasure and avoid pains.

(3) what is the golden rule of ethics in Confucius thought?
A, do not do to others what you do not want done to yourself.
B, help others to achieve what you want to achieve yourself.
C, treat someone who did wrong to you with justice.

(4) “An imperfection in the part may be required for a greater perfection in the whole,” and the whole is the best possible world that God can ever create. Whose view is this?

A, Leibniz.
B, Thomas Aquinas
C, Sartre.

(5) Only when the world become an “it,” it can be damned. However, if we see the world as an “Thou,” viz., some being worth of respect just as equally as us, we would not damn it. Whose view is this?

A, Martin Bubber
B, Confucius
C, William James.

(6) What philosophy would like to use to affirm the unconditional worth of human individual?