The Confusion Of Ontology—a Study Of Xiong Shili's Philosophical Thoughts

The fundamental point of Shili Xiong's philosophy is that he establishes The Moral Subject and The Metaphysics of Morals by illustrating the relationship of the world and Ben Xin(??).Ontology is the core of Shili Xiong's philosophy. He considers that the noumenon is not only cosmic substance but also Ben Xin, and they will be combined by a dialectic relection of beings and becoming and the law of opposite but complementary. Since the cosmic substance is complexity, it has the ability of diversification. Meanwhile, Ben Xin and objects are the results of the diversification. We have the conclusion that Ben Xin and objects are not the noumenon directly. However, Ben Xin predominates the objects and has the function of noumenon. According to this reason, we can say that Ben Xin is noumenon.Cosmic substance is Da Quan(??)and can create all the things in the cosmos. So, we can say it is Ren and comfort, energetic and quiet. It does nothing, however, it does everything. The virtue of cosmic substance is creation, and Ben Xin is the expanded state of cosmic substance. With an opinion that the world has only one noumenon, Shili Xiong thinks the relation of Li(?)and Qi (?)is like the relation of Ti(?)and Yong(?),and they are not separated. So we can see, Shili Xiong's ontology has two noumenons: one is the absolute cosmic substance, and the other is Ben Xin. Meanwhile, Shili Xiong attempts to combine them by the creation of cosmos. However, it is not convincing in the background of contemporary philosophy.We attempt to discuss Shili Xiong's basic opinions on knowledge and proving the being of noumenon in Liang Lun(??).On one side, inheriting the basic teachings of The old Mere-Consciousness Theory(???)and its consciousness of problem, he tries to explain the possibility of the being of cosmos. This is called Su Di(??).On the other side, Shili Xiong takes the noumenon as the root of phenomenon, and he believes that the basic mission of philosophy is to prove the being of noumenon. And this is called Zhen Di(??)In the theory of knowledge, Shili Xiong sets out the basic condition of cognition, elaborates the beginning mechanism of cognition, and tries to discuss the basic categories of knowledge. However, because of knowing little about the development of modern western philosophy, Shili Xiong gets many problems. He explains noumenon by two ways: one is to explain noumenon is not the things he enumerates, and the other is to directly feel that the noumenon is Ben Xin(??).The former is a method of logic, and the latter is Kong Fu theory(???).So we can say that the ultimate goal of Liang Lun is to clarify the noumenon, and in this sense, we will say that Liang Lun is a part of ontology.The theory of inwardness inherits the scholars' subjects of Song and Ming dynasties, and it also inherits the thoughts of Mencius, Jiuyuan Lu and Yangming Wang. This theory unfolds itself with a central discussion of Benxin, Xing(?),Li, Ming(?),Ren(?),etc. Shili Xiong's theory of inwardness highlights the functions of moral subject and moral noumenon. It represents a philosophy of energetic life and perpetual becoming, and it also represents the moral consciousness of self-discipline. However, since he does not confirm the noumenal function of humanistic history and social life, he can not prove the existence of the principles of moral noumenon, which find the moral noumenon theory from common value consciousness. An integral moral noumenon should be the unity of function and principle. We should get the moral noumenon theory from the unknown awareness, from which comes humanistic history and social life. The moral noumenon theory has a preexistent meaning in moral practice. In addition, Shili Xiong's theory has an inevitable contradiction about evil, because he persists that the world has only one noumenon called cosmic substance.Shili Xiong's metaphysic has two sides:through the first side, we can see he explains the becoming of cosmos on the basis of confirming only one cosmic substance, and by using evolutionism theory, he explains how Ben Xin is also the hart of cosmos. These tell us that human should live an energetic and positive life. On the other side, he tells us that Ben Xin is the cosmos noumenon, the being and the value of cosmos noumenon need the existence of Ben Xin. The former is called Cosmologic Metaphysics, and the later is The Metaphysics of Morals. Now we can see, that Shili Xiong's metaphysics of morals has an inevitable contradiction, because of his cosmogonical point of view, and the contradiction is inherited by Zongsan Mou—his pupil. In the conclusion of this dissertation, I will point out this dilemma and discuss how the metaphysics of moral is possible in the background of modern philosophy.