Problems in the Definition and Applicability of Jian Ai

Mohism has many ideological conflicts with Confucianism. Jian ai (impartial love) is one of these ideas pitted against the Confucian definition of love. This paper will explain the ideology of jian ai, how it’s different from Confucian graded caring, discuss the potential conflicts that emerged in a case of its practice and how to mitigate these conflicts. 

Mozi believes jian ai is crucial to creating harmony in a society and a higher virtue than partial love. If people love partially, people will prioritize the interests of their own people (e.g. oneself, one’s fellow countrymen, etc.) over those of others and thus “hate and steal” from others and even wage wars for their own interests. Thus, Mozi concludes: “it is those who are partial in their dealings with others who are the real cause of all the great harms in the world” (82 Ivanhoe). In contrast, when jian ai is practiced on a large scale, citizens reciprocate each other’s help and avoid waging conflicts regardless of their relationships and countries of origin. Mozi asks a rhetorical question to demonstrate this point: If people regard other families/cities/states as their own, “who then would incite…” their own groups “to attack that of another” (82 Ivanhoe)? Also, Jian ai has great practical benefits. It encourages people to “promote and procure what is beneficial to the world” and “look out for others” because “anyone who cares for others will receive care from them…” (83, 88 Ivanhoe). Consequently, the practice of jian ai can bring peace and prosperity to the world.

Generally speaking, the attitudinal component of jian ai prescribes maintaining a caring attitude towards everyone, and the action component of jian ai requires one to “do for others as one would do for oneself” (82 Ivanhoe). In practice, the impartial person will “feed,” “nurture,” and “clothe” one’s friends when they are in need (84 Ivanhoe). There are two major scholarly approaches to more detailed interpretations of these two components of jian ai. The radical impartialist interpretation suggests the attitudinal component of jian ai requires one to have equal concern for everyone, while the action component of jian ai requires one to treat everyone equally well. Mozi’s on filial piety supports this view: “If people regarded other people’s families in the same way that they regard their own, who then would incite their own family to attack that of another?” (68 Ivanhoe). One should give everyone equal moral weight. The impartialist interpretation best fits the attitudinal component of jian ai. It is idealistic and thus more fitting as a mentality rather than an absolutist behavioral principle. For the action component, if one interprets the “as” in the first quote of this paragraph as “same as” rather than “similar to but different in degree,” it seems that Mozi expects one to treat everyone impartially.

On the other hand, the inclusivist interpretation of jian ai states that one may have different levels of attitudinal concern towards everyone and not necessarily treat everyone equally well, if one interprets the “as” as “similar to but different in degree.” This perspective describes the action component of jian ai the best. It prescribes less demanding expectations for how people should behave realistically and takes account of Mozi’s emphasis on assisting the weak and the vulnerable. Mozi reveals this view when he voices the extreme importance of filial piety in a society, as he has expressed that the lack of filial piety has inflicted “great harm” on society (68 Ivanhoe). The fact that Mozi believes the lack of partial treatment for one’s own parents actually hurts society directly contradicts the radical impartialist interpretation of jian ai. Also, Mozi is primarily concerned with the weak and vulnerable when he speaks of the benefits of jian ai (83 Ivanhoe). Mozi’s support of filial piety and helping the weak are strong evidence that the action component of jian ai permits preferential treatment and is better explained by the inclusivist interpretation of jian ai than the radical impartialist interpretation. Regardless, when one practices inclusivist jian ai, one still needs to help others and reciprocate the help they received from others to the best of one’s ability.

Although the inclusivist interpretation is credible, Mozi seems to prioritize impartial concern that ultimately guides one’s jian ai actions over inclusive concern. This is because he wants people to follow the way of Heaven, which is the supreme power of nature. He voices that: “I hold to the will of Heaven as a wheelwright holds to his compass and a carpenter his square” (94 Ivanhoe). Thus, he believes one should uphold and follow Heaven’s attitudinal and action patterns. Heaven treats everything impartially and all-inclusively: “[T]hroughout the world, wherever there is right there is life, and wherever there is an absence of right there is death (91 Ivanhoe). Because the way of Heaven punishes and rewards all things equally, Mozi, in this case, implies that he wants people to adopt this impartial attitude and strive to behave according to Heaven’s way too.

Jian ai has incurred harsh criticism from Mencius, a Confucian philosopher who takes the radical impartialist interpretation of jian ai as the Mohist official stance. He criticizes the jian ai concept for misleading people to “have no father,” meaning that jian ai ignores filial piety (142 Ivanhoe). He counterposes Confucian graded caring as a superior approach to jian ai because graded caring takes account of filial piety and the differences in human relations, an essential factor that decides how people interact. When one adopts Confucian graded caring, one cares for people differently based on one’s relationships with them (e.g. have different degrees of concern for and give preferential treatment to the needs of one’s parents over those of strangers), but they should still be “broadly caring of people at large” (1.6 the Analects). However, Mencius has arguably misinterpreted jian ai by only focusing on its attitudinal aspect and ignoring its action component. The inclusivist interpretation of jian ai states jian ai necessitates a concern (attitudinal component) for all but not an obsession with doing the same for all (action component). Also, Mozi does believe jian ai benefits filial piety: “Clearly one must first care for and benefit the parents of others in order to expect that they, in turn, will respond by caring for and benefitting one’s own parents,” then one can produce “unlimited good results” (87 Ivanhoe). Mozi clearly supports the view that certain forms of preferential treatment can be beneficial to society at large. Furthermore, as this paper has mentioned earlier, an inclusivist version of jian ai allows people to prioritize their parents’ needs, although one should still help others’ parents. The inclusivist action component of jian ai and Confucian graded caring are alike because they both allow preferential treatment and different degrees of concern and assistance in action.

Despite their similarities, jian ai’s attitudinal component differentiates jian ai from Confucian graded caring. The attitudinal component of jian ai as an ideal behavioral approach is radical impartialist and assumes a perfect reality where everyone can see and treat each other equally. Mozi would prefer the ideal jian ai to be realized in our world. However, actual reality is imperfect because humans are finite and resources are limited, so practicing the ideal jian ai is often suboptimal. Mozi thus theorized the action component to teach people how to exercise jian ai based on their individual circumstances and proposes this dynamic position explicitly: although one may treat people differently, one should not “care neither more nor less” about them and forget the jian ai ideal (attitudinal component) (171 Fraser). Confucian graded caring, on the contrary, does not hold that one should care for everyone equally because different relationships give one different sets of duties.

Another time Mencius attacked jian ai because he thinks it is against human nature. He criticizes Yizi, a Mohist, for burying Yizi’s parents lavishly, considering that Mozi adamantly champions frugality and has specified how to bury anyone—simply with some wood and clothing and mourning. Mencius concludes that “…he [Yizi] served his parents by means of what he demeans” (Norden 133). Mencius believes Yi Zi fails to follow the Mohist style of burial because humans have a natural tendency to treat people differently based on their relationships and feelings towards them.

This Confucian disagreement with jian ai is based on its theory of “inner sprouts.” “Inner sprouts” are a set of innate moral intuitions and judgments about and emotional responses to moral situations that guide human behavior. “Inner sprouts” may grow in complexity or wither as humans participate longer in social interactions and become more sophisticated moral knowledge. Because one’s intuitive responses vary depending on different stimuli from different situations, one should care for people differently. Without “sprouts,” these responses cannot emerge. Humans have an instinct to reciprocate help they received from others because they feel gratitude. After prompted by an emotion, one takes account of one’s moral instincts and exercise judgment to decide one’s resulting responses to the moral situation. In the case of filial piety, the emotion will be one’s gratitude towards one’s family members who have nurtured one’s personal development. The final resulting responses are the duties one defines and thus believes one has towards these family members after one judges based on one’s moral instincts. Because emotional attachments and responses are essential and foundational to how one defines one’s duty and what motivates one to carry out this duty, they serve as a greater part of the basis of the Mencian criticism towards jian ai.

Larissa MacFarquhar has investigated a real-life example that points out the potential conflicts that may arise from practicing radical impartialist caring to strangers by deprioritizing taking care of one’s own interests to the fullest extent. The case is about the family of Sue and Hector who had two biological children and adopted at least 20 children because they were convinced that nobody else would adopt these children. Some of these children are dead, went to jail and went through divorces or teenage pregnancies. Sue and Hector “were always exhausted and always broke, and they seldom had any time alone” (234 MacFarquhar).

This case illustrates the tension between striving to fulfill one’s ideals at the cost of almost all of one’s own interests and compromising one’s ideals to prioritize taking care of one’s own personal wellbeing. I believe there is a best way to resolve these conflicts. It seems Sue and Hector believe one of their life’s greatest missions was to take care of as many disadvantaged children as possible. It is noble that they are doing what they can to realize this ideal. However, the world is not conducive to the practice of this ideal yet, so one cannot care for others in a manner completely based on this ideal; otherwise, the results can be suboptimal. 

Therefore, they must adjust their actions to participate in the process of making their ideal more realizable. To construct an environment where radical impartialist caring thrives takes generations and involves implementing measures that may not look like perfect radical impartialist caring. If they want to continue this construction after they die, they need to start an institution that lasts longer than their lives and raise their children to become successful adults who will also take care of the disadvantaged. This step requires taking care of their own family’s well-being first. They cannot be “always exhausted and broke” to lay out the best foundation for these efforts because they are practicing radical impartial caring the way they did. Mohists will approve of this approach because they judge the moral justifiability of one’s actions not only based on jian ai, but also the produced harm and benefits: “The business of a benevolent person is to promote what is beneficial to the world and eliminate what is harmful” (82 Ivanhoe). Motivated by the attitudinal component of jian ai and equal concern, Sue and Hector would be practicing the action component of jian ai in a way that ultimately promotes better consequential benefits for the disadvantaged and reduces people’s suffering in the long term. 

Citations

Ivanhoe, Philip J., and Van Norden Bryan William. Readings in Classical Chinese Philosophy. Hackett Publ., 2007.

Eno, Robert. The Analects of Confucius. Online, 2015.

Fraser, Chris. Philosophy of the Mòzi: the First Consequentialists. Columbia University Press, 2016.   

Macfarquhar, Larissa. Strangers Drowning. Penguin Books, 2016.

You can also read:

5 Daily Practice For Building Self-Esteem

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *