“Bodyheartminding” (Xin 心): Reconceiving the Inner Self and the Outer World in the Language of Holographic Focus and Field

doi:10.3868/s030-004-015-0013-1

Front. Philos. China

2015, Vol. 10

Issue (2) : 167-180 https://doi.org/10.3868/s030-004-015-0013-1

research-article

“Bodyheartminding” (Xin 心): Reconceiving the Inner Self and the Outer World in the Language of Holographic Focus and Field

Roger T. Ames(

)

Department of Philosophy, University of Hawai’i, Honolulu, HI 96822, USA

Download: PDF(289 KB)
Export: BibTeX | EndNote | Reference Manager | ProCite | RefWorks

Abstract

In this essay, inspired by the somatic turn in philosophy initiated by Richard Shusterman, I want to invoke the language of classical Confucian philosophy to think through the best efforts of William James and John Dewey to escape the mind-body and nature-nurture dualisms—that is, to offer an alternative vocabulary that might lend further clarity to the revolutionary insights of James and Dewey by appealing to the processual categories of Chinese cosmology. What I will try to do first is to refocus the pragmatist’s explanation of the relationship between mind and body through the lens of a process Confucian cosmology. And then, to make the case for James and Dewey, I will return to the radical, imagistic language they invoke to try and make the argument that this processual, holistic understanding of “vital bodyminding” is in fact what they were trying to say all along.

Keywords Richard Shusterman John Dewey William James dualism “bodyheatminding ” cosmology Chinese medicine holography focus-field internal relations aspectual language pragmatism somaesthetics

Issue Date: 19 June 2015

Cite this article:

Roger T. Ames. “Bodyheartminding” (Xin 心): Reconceiving the Inner Self and the Outer World in the Language of Holographic Focus and Field[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2015, 10(2): 167-180.

URL:

https://academic.hep.com.cn/fpc/EN/10.3868/s030-004-015-0013-1
https://academic.hep.com.cn/fpc/EN/Y2015/V10/I2/167

[1]	John Robert Williams. A Couple Nagging Interpretive Difficulties in Zhuangzi Studies vis-à-vis William James on the Ethics and Psychology of Belief[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2019, 14(4): 593-611.
[2]	SUN Ning. Embodied Perception and the Schemed World: Merleau-Ponty and John Dewey[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2019, 14(3): 423-434.
[3]	JIANG Niling, ZHOU Jing. Ontological Epistemology: William James and the Chinese Traditional Philosophy of Experience[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2019, 14(2): 342-356.
[4]	Timothy O’Connor. Consciousness, Free Will, and the Sciences of the Mind[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2018, 13(3): 394-401.
[5]	SUN Ning. Natural Realism or Transactionalism: On the Relationships between Putnam and Two Pragmatists, James and Dewey[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2017, 12(2): 295-305.
[6]	Alan Fox. A Process Interpretation of Daoist Thought[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2017, 12(1): 26-37.
[7]	Megan Altman. Heidegger on the Struggle for Belongingness and Being at Home[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2016, 11(3): 444-462.
[8]	Richard Shusterman. Somaesthetics and Chinese Philosophy: Between Unity and Pragmatist Pluralism[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2015, 10(2): 201-211.
[9]	Russell Pryba. Ars Erotica and Ars Gastronomica in Shusterman’s Somaesthetics[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2015, 10(2): 192-200.
[10]	Eva Kit Wah Man. A Cross-Cultural Reflection on Shusterman’s Suggestion of the “Transactional” Body[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2015, 10(2): 181-191.
[11]	Sun Ning. On Generalization: Pragmatists’ Contributions to Constructivism[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2014, 9(3): 417-430.
[12]	Thomas M. Robinson. Aristotle, the Intellect, and Cognition[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2014, 9(2): 229-240.
[13]	Nicholas S. Brasovan. Conjunctions and/or Disjunctions: Radical Empiricism in the History of Philosophy[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2014, 9(1): 130-148.
[14]	YUAN Li. The Philosophical Underpinnings of Western HRM Theory[J]. Front Phil Chin, 2012, 7(2): 317-346.
[15]	ZHAO Yanyan. The Knowledge Argument against Physicalism: Its Proponents and Its Opponents[J]. Front Phil Chin, 2012, 7(2): 304-316.

Viewed

Full text

Abstract

Cited

Shared

Discussed