The Philosophical Thought of Wang Chong by Alexus McLeod

Author:Alexus McLeod
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
ISBN: 9783319952918
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

Even though the pieces of testimony discussed here are not explicitly linked, in terms of a defeater for one of them entailing (or constituting) defeat for the other, Wang nonetheless rejects both, on grounds of the untrustworthiness of more general aspects of testimony.97

Despite my disagreement with key elements of their view of Wang’s epistemological and methodological views, Klein and Klein are right that Wang is “demanding” in his view on investigating testimony, holding that we have a duty to critically examine testimony. Indeed, I think this is built into Wang’s method of questioning and challenging (nanwen 問難) as discussed in Wenkong . He offers a statement in defense of his method in this chapter, directed in particular at Confucius , but offering a general explanation of why he thinks the method should be applied.98 If we do not rigorously apply the dual method of questioning and challenging statements (including but not limited to testimony), we will inevitably accept untruths along with whatever truths (if any) we may gain from these statements. If it is inevitable that even sages such as Confucius on occasion got things wrong (for a variety of reasons), then certainly there must be even more that is empty and false in the statements of those who are not sages.

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