Week 14 · Chapter

Chapter 14 — Philosophy Beyond Europe

Introduction to Philosophy Free sample edition

The module's primary reading · ~45–55 minutes · Objective 8 (describe central ideas of Confucian, Daoist, Buddhist, and ubuntu philosophy, and compare them with the European tradition without ranking), with Objective 4 (compare positions on the mind-body problem, personal identity, and free will, and evaluate them with the thought experiments that test them) and Objective 6 (explain and apply the major ethical theories — utilitarianism, Kantian deontology, virtue ethics, and social contract theory — and the challenges of relativism and egoism, to moral cases) carried forward · Read it first this week; the lecture, the slide deck, the tutorial, the quiz, and the Philosophy Workshop all build on it.

In plain language

This week you meet four traditions of philosophy from beyond Europe: Confucian, Daoist, Buddhist, and ubuntu philosophy. Each one asks questions this course has already asked, about how to be good, how to act, what a self is, and how to live with other people, and each gives its own argued answers. You will learn a handful of key ideas, such as ren (humaneness, goodness toward others) and wu wei (effortless, non-forcing action), and test each one against its strongest objection. Then you will compare the traditions with each other and with European views. Comparing is not ranking: no tradition here is treated as better, worse, stranger, or less philosophical than any other.

Why you already care about this

A family sits around a kitchen table. Their grandmother can no longer live alone, and they have to decide together what happens next. One cousin asks, "What would make everyone happiest?" A parent asks, "What do we owe her?" The youngest grandchild asks, "What kind of family do we want to be?"

You have heard those three questions before in this course. The first sounds like utilitarianism. The second sounds like Kant's duty. The third sounds like Aristotle's virtue ethics. But people have thought hard about questions like these in many places, for a very long time, and not only in Europe. A Confucian philosopher would ask what the grandmother's children and grandchildren owe her as family, and how to show it. An ubuntu philosopher would point out that each person at that table became who they are through other people, the grandmother among them.

This chapter introduces four traditions in their own terms. Each is named with care: Confucian and Daoist philosophy are 2 traditions of Chinese philosophy, Buddhist philosophy grows from the Buddha's teaching, and ubuntu is a Southern African idea of personhood. Dataset I, the course's world philosophies set, gives you 12 concepts to work with, 3 from each tradition.

By the end of this chapter you will be able to:

define ren, li, xiao, and the junzi, and state the conformity objection to Confucian ethics with its reply;
define the dao, wu wei, and ziran, and explain why wu wei is not doing nothing;
state the Four Noble Truths in order and explain why dukkha is more than pain;
put the chariot argument in standard form and key it for validity only;
explain the Zulu maxim umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu, and say why its English gloss is not the maxim's own words;
sort Dataset I's 12 concepts by tradition;
compare each tradition with a European view on one shared question, saying where they part, without ranking any of them.

Carry this sentence with you: compare to understand; never rank to dismiss.

Where we are

Already covered: Week 2, Arguments and Thought Experiments, gave you standard form, validity, and modus ponens. Week 7, Personal Identity and Free Will, introduced the Buddhist teaching of no-self and the chariot of the Questions of King Milinda, beside the ship of Theseus and Locke's memory theory. Week 12, Ethics III: Kant, Virtue, and the Trolley Problem, gave you Kant's duty and Aristotle's virtue ethics. Week 13, Political Philosophy: The State, Justice, and Liberty, gave you social contract theory.
This week: Confucian ethics (ren, li, xiao, and the junzi); Daoism (the dao, wu wei, and ziran); the Buddha's Four Noble Truths; the chariot, the Week 14 case on the course's roster; ubuntu and relational personhood; and a comparison of all four traditions with European views, without ranking.
How they connect: every tradition this week answers a question an earlier week asked. That is what makes the comparison possible, and it is why this week comes after the European theories.
Where we're going next: Week 15, Existentialism, the Meaning of Life, and the Course Synthesis, asks whether a life can be meaningful and closes the course with a position of your own.

Two tools from earlier weeks do the heavy lifting. From Week 2, you need standard form: premises numbered P1 and P2, the conclusion last, marked C and introduced by "So". You need valid (the conclusion cannot be false if the premises are true) and one form, modus ponens: if P then Q; P; so Q. From Week 7, you need the teaching of no-self, which this chapter recalls in Week 7's exact words rather than changing them.

1. Learn goodness in relationships: Confucian ethics

Think about how you learned to say thank you. Nobody handed you a theory of gratitude. A parent or a grandparent nudged you at the door of a friend's house, again and again, until saying it came from you. Over time, the words started to mean something: you were grateful, and the words gave your gratitude a shape.

Confucian ethics builds on that kind of everyday learning. Its source is the Analects.

The Analects — the sayings of Confucius compiled by his followers, the source of Confucian ethics, which center on ren, li, xiao, and the junzi.

The Analects center on 4 ideas. Here are their course definitions.

Ren — in Confucian ethics, humaneness: goodness toward others, the quality that fitting conduct is meant to express.
Li — in Confucian ethics, ritual propriety: fitting conduct, such as how a person greets, thanks, mourns, and cares for others, which gives humaneness a shape.
Xiao — in Confucian ethics, filial piety: the care and respect a child owes parents and elders.
Junzi — in Confucian ethics, the exemplary person, whose conduct is both humane and fitting.

Dataset I keys 3 of these to the Confucian tradition: ren, li, and junzi. Xiao is the fourth Confucian idea the course teaches, so the course teaches 4 Confucian ideas and Dataset I keys 3 of them.

Now state the view the way its best defenders would. You do not learn goodness alone and then apply it to other people. You learn it inside relationships: as a child, a parent, a sibling, a friend, a neighbor. Ren is goodness toward others. Li is the fitting conduct that gives that goodness a shape: how you greet, mourn, thank, and care. The junzi is the exemplary person whose conduct is both humane and fitting. Its strongest appeal is that it explains why so much of morality happens in ordinary roles and daily conduct, not only in rare dilemmas.

Worked example — xiao at the kitchen table. Go back to the family deciding about the grandmother.

The question utilitarianism asks: what would make everyone happiest?
The question xiao adds: what do we owe the person who raised us, and how do we show it fittingly?
What xiao asks of the choice: that it honor her, and that the family make it with her, not about her.
What xiao leaves open: the choice might be care at home, or a care home visited often. Xiao is a standard for how the family makes and shows its decision, not a single fixed outcome.

In one plain sentence: read with xiao, the family's decision is about what children and grandchildren owe an elder and how to show it, not only about the total happiness.

Every position deserves its strongest objection, so here it is.

Conformity objection — the objection to Confucian ethics that, if goodness is ritual propriety, morality shrinks into following whatever customs a society happens to have, so a bad custom would count as right.

You met a relative of this worry in Week 10, when normative cultural relativism made right whatever a culture believes. Here is the reply from the Confucian side. Li is glossed as fitting conduct, and fitting is not the same as customary. Conduct is fitting when it expresses ren, goodness toward others, so a custom that harms people fails the very standard li answers to. The junzi is the person who can tell the difference.

Misconception check — Confucian thought is philosophy, not religion in place of argument. Students often think Confucian ethics is a religion rather than philosophy, a set of customs to be accepted rather than a view to be argued. It is tempting because li includes rituals, such as mourning, and rituals can sound religious. The cure is the conformity objection itself. Confucian ethics makes claims about how to live, faces an objection, and answers it with a reason: fitting conduct must express humaneness. That is what philosophy does. It sits beside Week 12's virtue ethics as another argued account of good character.

Pause and think, choosing one: (a) name one piece of fitting conduct you learned from someone older, and say what goodness toward others it expresses; or (b) name a custom you think fails the test of fitting conduct, and say which part of ren it leaves out.

2. Act without forcing: the Daoist way

Picture a potter at a spinning wheel with a lump of wet clay. A beginner grips hard and pushes. The clay wobbles off center, and the walls collapse. An experienced potter keeps steady hands and follows the spin, and the walls rise as if on their own.

Daoist philosophy starts from scenes like that one: a great deal goes wrong when we force things against the way they go. Its source is the Daodejing.

The Daodejing — the Daoist text traditionally attributed to Laozi, which teaches the dao and wu wei.

The words "traditionally attributed" matter. The course says the Daodejing is traditionally attributed to Laozi, not that Laozi is known to have written every line. Here are the tradition's 3 concepts in Dataset I.

Dao — in Daoist philosophy, the way of things, which acting well means moving with rather than against.
Wu wei — in Daoist philosophy, effortless, non-forcing action: real action that does not fight the way things go, which is different from doing nothing.
Ziran — in Daoist philosophy, naturalness: the quality of a thing that is so of itself, not pushed into shape from outside.

State the view at its strongest. A great deal of trouble comes from forcing things against the way they go. The dao is the way of things, and acting well means moving with it rather than against it. Wu wei is that kind of action: effortless and non-forcing. Ziran is the naturalness of a thing that is so of itself, not pushed into shape from outside. Its strongest appeal is that it explains why the most skilled action often looks easy.

Worked example — wu wei at the potter's wheel. Take the potter one step at a time.

What the potter does: centers the clay, raises the walls, and shapes the rim. That is a great deal of action, built on years of skill.
What the potter avoids: the hard push that fights the spin and throws the clay off center.
What the result shows: the work succeeds because the action does not fight the clay.

In one plain sentence: wu wei is the potter's kind of action, effortless and non-forcing, not inaction.

Now the objection.

Passivity objection — the objection to Daoism that, if the best action is non-forcing, the view seems to counsel doing nothing even when something needs to be stopped or changed.

Reply, from the Daoist side: wu wei is effortless, non-forcing action, and action is still action. The potter changes the clay completely; what the potter avoids is the forcing that makes the work fail.

You can now set two traditions side by side. Confucian li gives good conduct a cultivated form, learned in practice and shared with others. Daoist ziran prizes what is so of itself, without that kind of shaping. Where they part, in one plain sentence: li holds that good conduct is shaped by fitting forms, while ziran holds that good conduct flows best when nothing is forced into shape.

Misconception check — wu wei is not doing nothing. Students often think wu wei means sitting back and letting things happen. It is tempting because the words are sometimes rendered as "non-action". The cure is the potter. The potter acts the whole time; wu wei names the kind of action, effortless and non-forcing, not its absence. And like Confucian thought, Daoism is philosophy with arguments, not a mood: it makes a claim about why forcing fails, faces the passivity objection, and replies.

3. Diagnose suffering: the Four Noble Truths

Picture a person refreshing a phone again and again, waiting for one reply. When the reply comes, the relief is brief. Soon the waiting starts again, for the next message. Nothing here hurts the way a burn hurts, and yet the cycle is unsatisfying.

Buddhist philosophy gives that experience a careful analysis. Its starting point is the Buddha's Four Noble Truths.

The Four Noble Truths — the Buddha's four teachings about suffering: that there is suffering (dukkha), that it has its origin in craving, that it can cease, and that a path, the Noble Eightfold Path, leads to its cessation.

There are 4 truths, and the course numbers them in order.

Truth 1 concerns suffering (dukkha).
Truth 2 concerns its origin, in craving.
Truth 3 concerns its cessation.
Truth 4 concerns the path that leads to its cessation, the Noble Eightfold Path.

Three of the terms need their own definitions.

Dukkha — in Buddhist philosophy, suffering or unsatisfactoriness: both pain and the unsatisfying quality of good things that change and cannot be held onto.
Craving — in the Four Noble Truths, the desire that the second truth names as the origin of suffering.
The Noble Eightfold Path — in Buddhist philosophy, the path to the cessation of suffering, which the fourth of the Four Noble Truths names.

Dataset I keys dukkha, anatta (no permanent self), and the Noble Eightfold Path to the Buddhist tradition.

State the view at its strongest. The truths move from a problem, to its cause, to the claim that it can end, to a way to end it. Suffering is real; it has an origin, in craving; because it has an origin, it can cease; and there is a path that leads to its cessation. Its strongest appeal is that it treats suffering as something to understand and address, not only to endure.

Worked example — dukkha at the phone. Read the phone scene through the first two truths.

Truth 1, what the person feels: the brief relief and the restart of the waiting. Nothing here is physical pain, yet the cycle is unsatisfying. That is the second sense of dukkha, unsatisfactoriness.
Truth 2, where it comes from: the craving for the next reply is what the second truth names as its origin.
Truth 3, what follows: if the cycle has an origin, the cycle can cease when its origin does.

In one plain sentence: the phone scene shows dukkha as unsatisfactoriness with its origin in craving, which is why the truths say suffering can cease.

Now the objection.

Pessimism objection — the objection to Buddhist philosophy that, by saying life involves suffering, it seems gloomy and blind to the real joys of life.

Reply, from the Buddhist side: dukkha is glossed as suffering or unsatisfactoriness, so the claim is not that nothing is ever good, but that even good things change and cannot be held onto. And the third truth says that suffering can cease, which is the opposite of despair. Here is an honesty note: whether the truths are true is an open question, and the course renders no verdict on it, as it renders none on any religious belief. You study the argument.

Misconception check — dukkha does not mean only pain. Students often read the first truth as "life is pain" and stop there. It is tempting because "suffering" is the most common English rendering, and the word makes most people think of injury or grief. The cure is the phone. There is no pain at all, yet the cycle is unsatisfying, and that unsatisfactoriness is dukkha too. A precise reading changes the argument: the pessimism objection loses much of its force once dukkha includes the unsatisfying quality of good things that do not last.

4. Take the chariot apart: no-self, again

Picture an old cart in a museum. A guide points out the wheels, the axle, the frame, and the pole. Then a child asks, "But where is the cart?" Everyone laughs, because the cart is right there, in the parts put together.

That child has found the Week 14 case on the course's roster: the chariot, from the Questions of King Milinda. The roster's question is: is a person anything over and above their parts? It tests Buddhist no-self, compared with Week 7.

First, recall Week 7's terms exactly, without changing them. No-self (anatta) holds that there is no permanent self beyond a changing collection of 5 parts: body, feelings, perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness. The chariot compares a person to a chariot that is nothing over and above its parts: wheels, axle, frame, and pole, put together. The teaching denies a permanent self; it does not deny that persons exist.

Worked example — the chariot argument in standard form. This is the course's own reconstruction, and P1 is added.

P1 (added) If a person is nothing over and above a changing collection of parts, then there is no permanent self.
P2 A person is nothing over and above a changing collection of parts, as a chariot is nothing over and above its parts.
C So there is no permanent self.

Judge the form. Let P stand for "a person is nothing over and above a changing collection of parts" and Q for "there is no permanent self". The argument runs if P then Q; P; so Q. That is modus ponens, so the argument is valid. Its soundness is not keyed. Whether P2 is true is the open question the case tests.

In one plain sentence: the chariot argument is valid by modus ponens, so everything rides on whether a person, like a chariot, is nothing over and above their parts.

Now press the argument where it is most open, at P2.

Unity objection — the objection to the chariot comparison that a person's experiences come together in one point of view, which a chariot lacks, so comparing a person to a chariot leaves out what makes a person a person.

Reply, from the Buddhist side: consciousness is one of the 5 parts of the changing collection, so the sense of one point of view is itself part of the collection, moment by moment; it does not need a permanent self behind it.

Set the case beside Week 7. The ship of Theseus asked whether a thing whose parts are all replaced is still the same thing. Locke's memory theory answered for persons: the same person, as far as memory reaches. The chariot asks a different question, whether a person is anything over and above their parts at all, and no-self answers no: there is no permanent self beyond the changing collection.

Misconception check — no-self does not deny that persons exist. Students often hear "no self" as "no one", as if the teaching said you are not real. It is tempting because the English phrase sounds like a denial of people. The cure is the museum cart. The wheels exist, the axle exists, and the parts put together make a real cart that carries real loads. In the same way, the changing collection is real; what the teaching denies is a further, permanent self over and above it.

5. Become a person through others: ubuntu

A new nurse joins a hospital ward. On the first day the nurse holds a license, so in one sense the job title is already theirs. But over the next months something else happens. A senior colleague shows how to calm a frightened patient. The patients teach what they need. The night shift covers when the nurse is sick, and the nurse covers for them in turn. A year later, the colleagues say this person has become a nurse in the full sense.

Ubuntu philosophy says something like that about being a person at all.

Ubuntu — a Southern African idea of personhood: humanness shown toward others, often glossed with the Zulu maxim umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu.
Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu — the Zulu maxim often used to gloss ubuntu, commonly rendered in English as "a person is a person through other persons"; in Xhosa it is umntu ngumntu ngabantu.
Relational personhood — in ubuntu philosophy, becoming a person through relationships and community, so that a person grows into who they are through other people.

Dataset I keys all 3 of these to the ubuntu tradition, which it labels Southern African.

One more term protects you from a classic error.

Gloss — a short English rendering of a term or saying in another language, such as "a person is a person through other persons" for a Zulu maxim; the English words belong to the gloss, not to the original.

The maxim's words are Zulu. "A person is a person through other persons" is a common English gloss of it, and the course never says the English words are the maxim's own. This is the same care you took in Week 1 with Jowett's translation of Plato: the English is someone's rendering, not the original.

State the view at its strongest. You are not a finished person first who then decides whether to bother with others. You become a person through relationships and community: through the people who raised you, taught you, worked beside you, and were cared for by you. Ubuntu is humanness shown toward others. Its strongest appeal is that it explains why cruelty and neglect feel like failures of humanity, not only rule-breaking.

Worked example — relational personhood on the ward. Take the nurse's year one relationship at a time.

The senior colleague: teaches how to calm a frightened patient.
The patients: teach what care they need.
The night shift: covers for the nurse, and the nurse covers in turn.
What does not change: the nurse is still one person with their own choices. Those relationships are how that person grew.

In one plain sentence: on ubuntu, the nurse became a nurse, and a person, through other persons, without ceasing to be one individual.

Now the objection.

Override objection — the objection to ubuntu that, if a person is a person through other persons, the community seems to have the final say over each person's choices, so an individual who disagrees counts for less.

Reply, from the ubuntu side: the maxim speaks about a person, so the individual is the one who becomes a person; and ubuntu is humanness shown toward others, so a community that crushed its members would fail ubuntu itself. Relationships form the individual; they do not erase the individual.

Misconception check — ubuntu does not erase the individual. Students often read ubuntu as a collectivism, the view that only the group matters and the individual disappears into it. It is tempting because the maxim puts "other persons" at the center. The cure is to read the maxim's subject: it is about how a person becomes a person. The nurse on the ward is formed by colleagues and patients, yet remains one individual with their own choices, and a ward that bullied a nurse into silence would show a lack of ubuntu, not an example of it.

Pause and think, choosing one: (a) name two people through whom you became who you are, and say what each one gave you; or (b) describe a group you belong to that sometimes pushes its members too hard, and say whether ubuntu would side with the group or with the member.

6. Compare without ranking: four traditions and Europe

Picture a long table with name cards for 12 guests. Each card carries one concept from Dataset I, and your job is to seat each guest with the tradition it comes from. Then the four tables talk with the European guests you met earlier in the course.

Worked example — sorting Dataset I. Seat the 12 concepts.

Confucian: ren, li, junzi.
Daoist: dao, wu wei, ziran.
Buddhist: dukkha, anatta, the Noble Eightfold Path.
Ubuntu (Southern African): ubuntu, umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu, relational personhood.

That is 4 traditions × 3 concepts = 12 concepts. Week 7 introduced 1 of them (anatta), so 12 − 1 = 11 are new this week. Xiao is not on any card, because it is taught this week but is not one of Dataset I's 12 concepts.

Now let the tables talk. The table below sets each tradition beside a European view the course has met, on 4 shared questions.

Four shared questions, each answered by one European view and one tradition from beyond Europe, with where the two part
Shared question	A European view the course has met	A tradition beyond Europe	Where they part
What is a self?	Locke's memory theory ties a person to memory	Buddhist no-self finds no permanent self at all; ubuntu finds a person made through other persons	Over whether there is a self for memory to link
What makes a person good?	Aristotle's virtue ethics points to virtues built by habituation	The Confucian junzi is good through ren and li, learned in relationships	Over how much good character is learned in family roles and fitting conduct
How should one act?	Kant asks you to act from duty, whatever you happen to want	Daoist wu wei asks for effortless, non-forcing action	Over whether the best action takes effort against what you want or flows without forcing
How do people live together?	Social contract theory, from Thomas Hobbes's Leviathan (1651), starts from individuals who agree on rules	Ubuntu starts from persons who are already formed by one another	Over whether the individual comes before the community or through it

Read each row the same way: two answers, each stated at its strongest, and one plain sentence about where they part. In each pair, both sides are philosophy with arguments, and the course keys no winner.

The roster has a count too. It has 15 thought experiments, 1 per instructional week. The chariot is the 14th, so 15 − 14 = 1 is left, Sisyphus and his rock, for Week 15.

Misconception check — comparing is not ranking. Students often think that putting two views side by side means deciding which one is better, or that a tradition from beyond Europe is a colorful extra beside "real" philosophy. Both are tempting because comparison tables look like scorecards. The cure is the last column. It says where two views part, not which one wins, and every row holds two argued positions. A limitation to keep in mind: four traditions are not the whole of philosophy beyond Europe, and no one tradition speaks for a whole region's thought.

In one plain sentence: Confucian, Daoist, Buddhist, and ubuntu philosophy each give their own argued answers to questions the course has already asked, about goodness, action, suffering, the self, and living together, so the comparison shows where each tradition parts from the others and from European views without ranking any of them.

Key terms

The Analects — The sayings of Confucius compiled by his followers, the source of Confucian ethics, which center on ren, li, xiao, and the junzi. (first used: 1. Learn goodness in relationships: Confucian ethics)
Ren — In Confucian ethics, humaneness: goodness toward others, the quality that fitting conduct is meant to express. (first used: 1. Learn goodness in relationships: Confucian ethics)
Li — In Confucian ethics, ritual propriety: fitting conduct, such as how a person greets, thanks, mourns, and cares for others, which gives humaneness a shape. (first used: 1. Learn goodness in relationships: Confucian ethics)
Xiao — In Confucian ethics, filial piety: the care and respect a child owes parents and elders. (first used: 1. Learn goodness in relationships: Confucian ethics)
Junzi — In Confucian ethics, the exemplary person, whose conduct is both humane and fitting. (first used: 1. Learn goodness in relationships: Confucian ethics)
Conformity objection — The objection to Confucian ethics that, if goodness is ritual propriety, morality shrinks into following whatever customs a society happens to have, so a bad custom would count as right. (first used: 1. Learn goodness in relationships: Confucian ethics)
The Daodejing — The Daoist text traditionally attributed to Laozi, which teaches the dao and wu wei. (first used: 2. Act without forcing: the Daoist way)
Dao — In Daoist philosophy, the way of things, which acting well means moving with rather than against. (first used: 2. Act without forcing: the Daoist way)
Wu wei — In Daoist philosophy, effortless, non-forcing action: real action that does not fight the way things go, which is different from doing nothing. (first used: 2. Act without forcing: the Daoist way)
Ziran — In Daoist philosophy, naturalness: the quality of a thing that is so of itself, not pushed into shape from outside. (first used: 2. Act without forcing: the Daoist way)
Passivity objection — The objection to Daoism that, if the best action is non-forcing, the view seems to counsel doing nothing even when something needs to be stopped or changed. (first used: 2. Act without forcing: the Daoist way)
The Four Noble Truths — The Buddha's four teachings about suffering: that there is suffering (dukkha), that it has its origin in craving, that it can cease, and that a path, the Noble Eightfold Path, leads to its cessation. (first used: 3. Diagnose suffering: the Four Noble Truths)
Dukkha — In Buddhist philosophy, suffering or unsatisfactoriness: both pain and the unsatisfying quality of good things that change and cannot be held onto. (first used: 3. Diagnose suffering: the Four Noble Truths)
Craving — In the Four Noble Truths, the desire that the second truth names as the origin of suffering. (first used: 3. Diagnose suffering: the Four Noble Truths)
The Noble Eightfold Path — In Buddhist philosophy, the path to the cessation of suffering, which the fourth of the Four Noble Truths names. (first used: 3. Diagnose suffering: the Four Noble Truths)
Pessimism objection — The objection to Buddhist philosophy that, by saying life involves suffering, it seems gloomy and blind to the real joys of life. (first used: 3. Diagnose suffering: the Four Noble Truths)
Unity objection — The objection to the chariot comparison that a person's experiences come together in one point of view, which a chariot lacks, so comparing a person to a chariot leaves out what makes a person a person. (first used: 4. Take the chariot apart: no-self, again)
Ubuntu — A Southern African idea of personhood: humanness shown toward others, often glossed with the Zulu maxim umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu. (first used: 5. Become a person through others: ubuntu)
Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu — The Zulu maxim often used to gloss ubuntu, commonly rendered in English as "a person is a person through other persons"; in Xhosa it is umntu ngumntu ngabantu. (first used: 5. Become a person through others: ubuntu)
Relational personhood — In ubuntu philosophy, becoming a person through relationships and community, so that a person grows into who they are through other people. (first used: 5. Become a person through others: ubuntu)
Gloss — A short English rendering of a term or saying in another language, such as "a person is a person through other persons" for a Zulu maxim; the English words belong to the gloss, not to the original. (first used: 5. Become a person through others: ubuntu)
Override objection — The objection to ubuntu that, if a person is a person through other persons, the community seems to have the final say over each person's choices, so an individual who disagrees counts for less. (first used: 5. Become a person through others: ubuntu)

Summary

Each tradition this week is philosophy with its own arguments; none is ranked.
Confucian ethics, from the Analects: ren, li, xiao, and the junzi.
Li is fitting conduct, and fitting is not the same as customary.
The Daodejing is traditionally attributed to Laozi; it teaches the dao and wu wei.
Wu wei is effortless, non-forcing action, not doing nothing.
The Four Noble Truths: suffering, its origin in craving, its cessation, and the path.
Dukkha is suffering or unsatisfactoriness, not only pain.
The chariot argument is valid by modus ponens; its soundness is not keyed.
No-self denies a permanent self, not persons.
Ubuntu: a person is a person through other persons, as a common English gloss of a Zulu maxim.
Relationships form the individual; they do not erase the individual.
Dataset I: 4 traditions, 3 concepts each, 12 in all.

Check your understanding

Work these before looking at the answers — they are ungraded, and the answers (with reasoning) are at the bottom of the page.

A soccer captain says, "Real team spirit means doing every pre-game ritual exactly as the seniors did, even the one where rookies carry everyone's bags." Using the conformity objection and the Confucian reply, explain what a Confucian philosopher would say about the bag ritual.
A rock climber says that on her best climbs she stops straining and her body finds each hold. A friend says, "So wu wei means you stop climbing." Explain what the friend gets wrong.
Sort these 6 concepts by tradition: ziran, relational personhood, junzi, dukkha, wu wei, ren. Then say how many traditions they cover and how many concepts each covers.
A classmate writes, "Ubuntu says 'I am because we are,' so the Zulu words mean exactly that." Name two problems with the sentence.

Answers (worked reasoning — read after attempting)

The conformity objection worries that li would make any team custom count as right. The Confucian reply is that li is fitting conduct, and conduct is fitting when it expresses ren, goodness toward others. A pre-game ritual that builds respect could be fitting. Making rookies carry everyone's bags treats them as lesser, so it fails the very standard li answers to. A junzi captain would keep the rituals that express goodness toward teammates and drop this one.
Wu wei is effortless, non-forcing action, not inaction. The climber is still climbing, hold after hold; what she stops is the straining that fights the rock. The friend has read wu wei as doing nothing, the misconception the potter at the wheel cures.
Confucian: junzi and ren. Daoist: ziran and wu wei. Buddhist: dukkha. Ubuntu (Southern African): relational personhood. That covers 4 traditions; Confucian and Daoist have 2 concepts each here, and Buddhist and ubuntu have 1 each, for 2 + 2 + 1 + 1 = 6 concepts.
First, the course's pinned gloss of the maxim is "a person is a person through other persons"; the classmate's line is a different English phrase, so it should not be presented as the course's gloss. Second, any English line is a gloss: the maxim's own words are Zulu, umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu, so no English sentence is "exactly" the Zulu words. That is the translation-versus-original-words distinction again.

Next up in this module: the Readings & Resources page, the lecture tutorial, the practice set, the quiz, the discussion, and the assignment. Next week, existentialism tests a new claim, that existence precedes essence, against the question of whether a life can be meaningful.

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