On the School of Names in Ancient China

The present study on ancient Chinese philosophy invites us to meet a challenging task in philosophical understanding. The so-called “School of Names” (Mingjia 名家) is a label for a diverse group of thinkers in the Warring States period (479–221 B.C.) that has sometimes been accused of dabbling in flippant linguistic and conceptual puzzles, paradoxes, or sophistries. Bernard Solomon analyzes the works of its two main representatives, namely Huizi 惠子 (Master Hui, or Hui Shi 惠施, 380–305 B.C.?) and Gongsun Long 公孫龍 (b. 380 B.C.?).

The Chapter One deals with the ten “paradoxes” of Huizi as recorded in the Zhuangzi 莊子. Chapters Two to Six are devoted to five texts attributed to Gongsun Long that have been called cryptic or even a mixture of banality and nonsense. Among them is also found the “White-Horse Dialogue” with its famous dictum “A white horse is not a horse.” The aim of Solomon’s investigation is the discovery of the rules of “language games” in the School of Names and of the key to solve their linguistic and conceptual puzzles and paradoxes. His analysis shows in all the texts he interprets an “evidence of an interest in language qua language” (p. 12), which is unique for Chinese thought in the classical era.

Bernard S. Solomon holds a Ph.D. in Far Eastern Languages of Harvard University (1952) and was a long-time Professor of Chinese in the Department of Classical and Oriental Languages at Queens College, City University of New York (CUNY).

“On the School of Names in Ancient China is a collection of essays composed between 1967 and 1985. […] Its belated publication almost thirty years after the completion of the last manuscript in no respect diminishes this book’s invaluable contribution to our understanding of what its author calls the ancient Chinese ‘School of Names’.”

Rafael Suter in Asiatische Studien

CONTENTS

Chapter One: The Assumptions of Huizi
     I. Translation and Introduction
     II. Discussion
     III. Assumptions
     IV. Interpretation
Chapter Two: On Understanding Change
     I. Gongsun Longzi IV: “Tongbian lun” 通變論 – Translation
     II. Discussion and Interpretation
Chapter Three: On Names and Reality
     I. Gongsun Longzi VI: “Mingshi lun” 名實論 – Translation
     II. Discussion and Interpretation
Chapter Four: The White-Horse Dialogue
     I. Gongsun Longzi II: “Baima lun” 白馬論 – Translation
     II. Discussion and Interpretation
Chapter Five: On the Hard and the White
     I. Gongsun Longzi V: “Jianbai lun” 堅白論 – Translation
     II. Discussion and Interpretation
Chapter Six: On Concepts and Their Instances
     I. Gongsun Longzi III: “Zhiwu lun” 指物論 – Translation
     II. Discussion and Interpretation
References
Editor’s Epilogue