Move along. Nothing to see here. La la la

Every now and then some people in the US get excited and worried about Chinese gains in science, technology, engineering and STEM education – that China is beating the US in the critical tech race to the future. The comforting reaction is always on the order of, “Yes, but. We have freedom of thought and speech and eventually the authoritarian regime will self-destruct. And we will always lead in DEI technology.” 

Now comes The Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), a credible independent think-tank. One of its recent projects has been to investigate the state of research in 44 critical technologies around the world.

Results are in their Critical Technology Tracker report https://www.aspi.org.au/report/critical-technology-tracker.

From an Al Jazeera news report on the ASPI study –

China leads the world in 37 out of 44 critical technologies, with Western democracies falling behind in the race for scientific and research breakthroughs, a report by an Australian think tank has found.

China is in a position to become the world’s top technology superpower, with its dominance already spanning defence, space, robotics, energy, the environment, biotechnology, artificial intelligence (AI), advanced materials and key quantum technology, according to the report by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI).

The key areas dominated by China include drones, machine learning, electric batteries, nuclear energy, photovoltaics, quantum sensors and critical minerals extraction, according to the Critical Technology Tracker released on Thursday.

China’s dominance in some fields is so entrenched that all of the world’s top 10 leading research institutions for certain technologies are located in the country, according to ASPI.

In comparison, the United States leads in just seven critical technologies, including space launch systems and quantum computing, according to ASPI, which receives funding from the Australian, United Kingdom and US governments, as well as private sector sources including the defence and tech industries.

The UK and India are among the top five countries in 29 of the 44 technologies, with South Korea and Germany making the top five in 20 and 17 technologies, respectively, the report said.

 You can read the ASPI report yourself. Link above.

Figures below are the ASPI assessment on the 44 technologies.

 One can quibble with their assessment of dominance and future monopoly risk. But the overall assessment is pretty clear.  Apologies on the poor quality of the images.

 I have no particular expertise in commenting on any of these assessments. But no snarky comments needed. 

The Great American Cultural Revolution

Further to  Xi, DJT, GOP, CCP

About two years ago, I wrote a series of posts pointing out similarities between Mr. Xi and Donald Trump and their respective political parties.  Now comes the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution – with American characteristics. 

We have a leader who promotes violence but keep his hands sufficiently clean by not leading, like Mao. We have a political party with fortunes tied to the words of this mercurial leader.  Dissension has risen within GOP, as it did in CCP, but the political leaders who are rebels will be slapped down. The entire party is in thrall to a crazed minority, who determine policy for years.  From a trumpian perspective, Mao’s famous quote is right on target – “there is great disorder under the Heavens and the situation is excellent.”

It would be too delicious if it weren’t so scary. I can’t help but paraphrase the wiki entry on the Chinese Cultural Revolution. Go ahead and read that first. Won’t take but a minute. The parallels are eerie.  Below, I changed a few words from the wiki.

The Cultural Revolution, formally the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a sociopathic movement in the US from 2016. Launched by Donald Trump, leader of the Republican Party of the United States (GOP), its stated goal was to preserve racism and evangelical Christianity by purging remnants of truth-seeking and progressive traditional elements from American society, and to re-impose Donald Trump Thought (known outside China as moronism) as the dominant ideology in the GOP.

Beginning in 2016, Trump called on young people to bombard the headquarters and proclaimed that to rebel is justified. He insisted that GOP revisionists be removed through violent class struggle, to which America’s  youth, as well as some urban workers, responded by forming boogaloo and “Proud Bois” groups around the country.  In late 2020, Trump inserted political loyalists in the Defense Department, possibly as a prelude to use of the military in quelling or fomenting civilian unrest. He indicated his readiness for battle by clearing peaceful protests from Lafayette Park and posing for an iconic picture, not swimming in the Yangtze but in front of a church, holding a bible upside down.  Rebels were told to not be afraid and take charge of the movement themselves, independent of GOP loyalists.   On January 6, Trump wrote his own ‘big character poster’ – a series of tweets and a speech –‘ rallying people to target the “command center (i.e., Congress) of counterrevolution. From Trump’s speech – And I would love to have if those tens of thousands of people would be allowed the military, the Secret Service and we want to thank you and the police and law enforcement great you’re doing a great job, but I would love it if they could be allowed to come up with us. Is that possible? 

We see that now the rebel groups, as in China, are splitting into factions –  Feeling Betrayed, Far-Right Extremists Have a New Message for Trump: ‘Get Out of Our Way’

We await the American version of the Little Red Book.  Maybe it will come in the form of hundreds of twitter posts, and mass rallies at state capitols in support of Trumpism and its offshoot moronism.  Intellectuals, teachers, dissident party members and rightists (know in America as Democrats) will be targeted, just like in the old days.

The American version of the Cultural Revolution – as in China – severely damaged the economy, cost hundreds of thousands of lives in the virus pandemic.  Rebels damaged cultural sites (more damage expected this coming week). 

We await an announcement by the GOP, coming in about a decade, echoing the CCP – the Cultural Revolution was “responsible for the most severe setback and the heaviest losses suffered by the Party, the country, and the people since the founding of the Republic.”

In the meantime, we should expect the 2021 version of big character posters like this –

https://chineseposters.net/themes/criticize-lin-biao-confucius

Down with Michael Pence! Down with Lindsey Graham! Hold high the great red banner of Donald Trump Thought – Great Meeting to thoroughly criticize the reactionary capitalist line of Pence and Graham!

Rebels – the proles – have nothing to lose but their chains … and in the American case, their democracy.  If only Mao had lost that 1968 election, we wouldn’t have such a useful model for trumpians and their ilk ….

A Quick Voting Guide

We get plenty of advice about how to be a good or strong leader – ask others for input, don’t take all the credit, don’t micromanage … but these are modes of practice.  When we look around, there is surprisingly little advice on the sort of moral qualities a leader should possess.  Here is a quick review.

Plato advises that rulers be a breed apart – possess no wealth, no property, claim no children, to prevent bias and corruption.  Aristotle call for the politician and lawgiver to be wholly occupied with the city-state.  Both require a sort of asceticism, along with wisdom, practical experience, and isolation from corruption.  Philosopher-kings would be good. 

Look in the other usual places for advice.  The business literature is devoid of advice on moral qualities of leaders. The Bible has some advice, though sparse.  In 1 Timothy, a leader is advised to be of pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith; temperate, self-controlled, respectable, able to teach, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome and not a lover of money.   That is some sound advice, although it seems sort of hidden away in the letters.

Closer to home, and to our times, we look to Mill, Madison, and the American founders for advice on the character of a leader, and find … little.  Without doubt, Washington, Madison, Jefferson, Franklin, et.al. were exemplary leaders, but there seems an assumption that men of intelligence, good will, and perspicacity will naturally lead.  We do have Federalist Paper No. 68  from Alexander Hamilton. This is with regard to what became the Electoral College –

The process of election affords a moral certainty, that the office of President will never fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications. Talents for low intrigue, and the little arts of popularity, may alone suffice to elevate a man to the first honors in a single State; but it will require other talents, and a different kind of merit, to establish him in the esteem and confidence of the whole Union, or of so considerable a portion of it as would be necessary to make him a successful candidate for the distinguished office of President of the United States. It will not be too strong to say, that there will be a constant probability of seeing the station filled by characters pre-eminent for ability and virtue.   Little did they know.  But all claim virtue as a common thread.

Some direct advice

Plato, Leo Strauss, Machiavelli and Nietzsche told us that leaders must project power, and Mao told us that power grows out of the barrel of a gun.  All supported use of the noble lie, the lie in service of protection of the state.  I have no doubt that leaders make decisions in complex environments with no pure solution.  We hope that the lies be told not too often, and at least be noble, and that leaders agonize over their choice.  Cheap lies are just so … unvirtuous. 

In ancient China, rulers did not obtain their posts by election or merit. Confucius still had a great deal of advice on how to be a just and fair leader.  He tells us that the most important way for the people to become virtuous is by example, and in that regard, political leaders should be moral leaders. Analects 13:13 – if the ruler makes himself correct, what difficulty will the ruler have to govern people? If the ruler cannot make himself correct, how can the ruler make others correct?

The example is the legendary emperor Shun, whose virtue and wisdom was so great that he could rule by simply facing south and saying nothing, and his administrators would know the right thing to do, and do it.   Analects 12:22 – if we promote the upright people as the examples for the crooked people, the crooked people will become upright.

Leaders should teach virtue.  In order to do so, leaders must of course teach by example and be virtuous themselves. 

Confucian scholar Dong Zhongshu articulated the character of a ruler in Luxuriant Gems of the Spring and Autumn Annals (Chunqiu Fanlu), essays from the Han dynasty –

Establishing the Primal Spirit

Section 1 – He who rules the people is the basis of the state.  Issuing edicts and initiating undertakings, he is the pivot of all living things.  The pivot of all living things, he is the source of honor and dishonor….(H)e who acts as the people’s ruler is attentive toward the fundamental, careful of the beginning, respectful of the small, and cautious of the subtle.  His will resembles the stillness of dead ember …. He calms his vital essence and nourishes his numen (spirit).  He is quiet and nonactive …. He contemplates what lies in the future and observes what has passed.  He deliberates with his numerous worthies to seek out the opinions of the majority of the people. He knows their hearts and understands their sentiments…. He separates their factions and clans and observes the men they esteem….

 

(Section 2) He who rules the people is the foundation of the state.  Now in administering the state, nothing is more important for transforming the people than reverence for the foundation.  If the foundation is revered, the ruler will transform the people as if a spirit.  If the foundation is not revered, the ruler will lack the means to unite the people…. This is called “throwing away the state.”  Is there a greater disaster than this? … Therefore, when the ruler relies on virtue to administer the state, it is sweeter than honey or sugar and firmer than glue or lacquer. That is why sages and worthies exert themselves to revere the foundation and do not dare to depart from it.

 

What advice for us, now?

Plato told us that the smartest, the best and brightest, should rule.  They should disdain material rewards.  Aristotle told us that leaders should be wholly concerned with the affairs of state.  In the Bible, we have Timothy – pure of heart, self-controlled, not a lover of money.  Confucius told us that leaders should lead by example, and teach virtue. Dong Zhongshu clarified further. Hamilton in Federalist No. 68 told us that the electoral college would ensure that men of preeminent ability and virtue would rule. 

All would agree that loving wisdom is necessary for good rule.  All would agree that rulers should be exemplars of virtue.  All would agree that rulers should be temperate and sincere.

Why, in the name of Plato, Aristotle, Confucius, Paul’s letter to Timothy, Alexander Hamilton … why in the name of God would anyone be thinking of voting for our current dear leader?  Why would someone want to throw away the state?  The inquiring minds of the sages, all of them, want to know. 

I m Perfect – Picture at an Exhibition

Until at least 2016, there was a fascination with western looking models in China, just as there has been with Asian looking models in the US. Women’s clothing stores are a major venue for other-looking models in ads and store windows. This upscale women’s clothing store at our local mall in Hangzhou featured a beaming, perhaps ecstatic sophisticated western woman, with long curled hair – the store’s image of perfection.

The photo is from 2016, and from the angle, one can miss the apostrophe. But this is 2020. Given the efforts in China now to eliminate western influences, perhaps the store would be required to eliminate the apostrophe in any case.

What do you think of western civilization?

The question to Gandhi is now being asked again, this time by educated, sophisticated Chinese of each other.

This was the topic of a four-hour phone call a few nights ago between Chinese PhDs, both with extensive American experience and important midlevel career positions. 

In a word, their conclusion was the same as Gandhi’s – it would be a good idea. 

Their argument below is depressing, as if you need any more of that. I am paraphrasing in spots and retelling in what follows.  My own Chinese language skills couldn’t have kept up. 

For my colleagues and for many educated Chinese, the US and the west have been the model of civilization – educated, smart, democratic, highest technology and culture, in a word, modern. Human rights were honored, even if not always observed in the breach. This, coming from Chinese who know that historically, Zhongguo was always considered the center of the universe. 

A little background

That the west was the center of modernity was an idea nurtured over a long span of time, probably going back to the era of treaty ports in the mid-nineteenth century.  Out of the humiliation of the 19th century came the May 4th movement, which sought to replace millennia of deference to authority and superstition with “Dr. Science and Mr. Democracy.” 

Ancient Chinese culture was … well, ancient and feudal.  Chen Duxiu, founder of the Chinese Communist Party, saw modernism and personal independence as the conditions necessary for growth.  This was in 1916.

The US remained the modernist pole star for the next hundred years.  The term for the United States, meiguo, means beautiful country. But by 2010, many Chinese believed in the American dream and an American miracle more than did many educated, sophisticated Americans.  Chinese were not ignorant of American deficiencies – racism, poor schools and health care for poor people, a developing oligarchy, gun nuts and chaotic politics – but democratic values seemed able to pull victory from the claws of every looming defeat, and all that was necessary was a little money to get world class schools, education, health care, and a peaceful life. John Dewey had been a popular figure in China, and above all, America was seen as pragmatic.

That was then, this is now

That was the image, and it is no more, my colleagues said in the wechat call.  America has been the standard, but they also considered western Europe, and found it wanting as well. America – and the west – seem in thrall to an ideology, not one my interlocutors could identify, but it was definitely not pragmatic.

This democracy thing – perhaps more precisely, individualism – has met its match.  The covid-19 virus is only the latest and most clearly defining symptom.  Democracies, they said, seem unable to do basic things that improve the lives of most people.  A hundred thousand dead is an acceptable level of loss?  Policies that pit states against one another to obtain PPE? The interlocutors on the phone call couldn’t get to evolving deficiencies in laws, regulations and institutions that were the subject of Why Nations Fail (Acemoglu and Robinson).  Nor had they read How Democracies Die (Levitsky and Ziblatt).  The sense was the American promise was now – well, if not a lie, at least more marketing than substance.

I have many Chinese government friends and associates, some of whom have made moves to purchase real estate in the US for retirement or for their kids to go to school here, or just in case.  Those days seem over, and not only because of the egomania of the leaders Xi and Trump.  The America that was promised is now an uncertain risk.  Who knows what part might fail next?  Metaphorically, the American car used to be new and shiny and had the latest gadgets.  It was safe, everything worked, and the warranty was sound. Now the American car is a used car, and if you look under the hood, it gets pretty scary.  The warranty is barely worth the Constitution it is printed on. 

This jaded view of the US and the west is not new.  Chinese university students in America have been coming home to China for a decade, unimpressed by the lure of freedom of speech and democracy that comes at the cost of guns and mayhem and ridiculous health care expense.  Now world news and opinion is flush with incredulity and alarm about the US. 

There is little sense of individual responsibility and little concern for the other, said my colleagues.  Freedom to die is apparently the mantra for those now rushing to bars without masks or distancing.  Chinese would say, good luck to them.  And, they say, the Cortland County New York wallet card should be made mandatory in Wisconsin, Georgia, Florida – anywhere the stupid people congregate. 

The comparisons with China are easy and superficial, and my colleagues were speaking only in personal, offhand remarks. Their feelings about the Chinese government in January and February were very negative. Now, looking at the rest of the world, they have a different idea. China bungled badly in the first six weeks or so of the virus time, but with testing and lockdown, distancing and quarantine and tracing, it basically beat the virus in two months.

There was no expressway driving allowed.  If people were infected, they were isolated away from their families.  Temperatures were taken going in and out of residential complexes.  People’s level of cooperation was very high.  It didn’t matter if you were young or old, rich or poor, lives were treated as more important than the economy.  Now that cases have shown up again in Wuhan, the plan is to test all 11,000,000 residents in the next couple of weeks.  We can discount real implementation of that plan as fanciful, but nevertheless, the government will test and isolate and trace, and that will work.  Individuals bear no cost for treatment of Covid-19, from testing to ventilator. There is no point in staying away from the hospital if you are sick because you can’t afford it.  All things considered, including that the virus started there, they said, China had about the best possible response.

One can quibble.  This was their considered evaluation. 

In the US – well, you know the news stories.  The rate of new daily cases has still not fallen in two months, to May 23. And that was with two-months notice before shutdowns began. On the phone call, my Chinese friends were appalled at the ignorance and sheer stupidity.  The Michigan legislature shut down rather than confront gun wielding freedom-to-die fighters who deny medical expertise. If I don’t wear a mask, and I infect you, so what?  Leaders tell old people to die for the sake of the economy, and everyone should drink bleach. Neither Dr. Science nor Mr. Democracy are in evidence. Who are these people?  Left unsaid, I think, was the question of whether these can be real humans at all, but there certainly was a sense of the inmates running the asylum. Over the next few months, will we really accept 2000 deaths a week as the cost of doing business?  Is this what human rights comes to?

My colleagues used Marx for reference.  The first stage of capitalism was certainly ugly.  Marx said that every pore on the skin of the workingman was filled with blood or dirt.  But wealth bought respectability and human rights talk, and this worked pretty well until the real control and desires of the capitalist class were exposed in 2020. The political leaders and a lot of citizens are in thrall to the economic oligarchs. 

A story about a woman named Peggy Popham from North Carolina summarizes the views of my colleagues that a good portion of Americans are just … well, nuts – The coronavirus pandemic created the perfect environment for apocalyptic Christianity to fuse with antigovernment libertarianism, New Age rejection of mainstream science and medicine, and internet-fueled gullibility toward baroque conspiracy theories about secret cabals ruling the world through viruses.  About twenty percent of Americans have said they would not take a vaccine when available.

The rejection of science and rationality, they said, means the US can no longer be considered modern. Other Chinese agree. In a recent article, Wu Haiyun, editor at Sixth Tone, echoed the feelings expressed on the phone call, but she was referring to Chinese now in their late thirties and early forties – Trust in Science Saved China. Practicing It Will Keep It Safe

This Chinese view is not itself isolated

Edward Luce at Financial Times writes about the world’s view of America now, and it is not pretty –  William Burns, most senior US diplomat and now head of the Carnegie Endowment – America is first in the world in deaths, first in the world in infections and we stand out as an emblem of global incompetence. The damage to America’s influence and reputation will be very hard to undo.

The Guardian suggests that the world looks on in horror at the US response.

And Fintan O’Toole writes in the Irish Times – Over more than two centuries, the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the US until now: pity.

Another colleague of mine whose tax clients are mostly foreign nationals remarked that part of what he had done for forty years was enable people to live, work, or make a living in the US.  Now, he says, he is dealing with the converse – people wanting to move assets or themselves out.

What is to be done?

Now, if you have choices about where to live in the world, where to go? If you have kids, what is a safe and humane place with expectations of solid education in which to bring them up?  Where will a kid be more easily cultivated as a right-valued person?  The virus seems the last straw.

For my colleagues, this democracy thing has come to mean not that citizens are empowered to obtain information and make educated choices, but that “my ignorance is just as good as your expertise” and more to the point, “every man for himself.”  No democratic founder in Athens, the Colonies, or political philosophy in any era would support that view.

This is what the American image has come to.  Evaporation of American soft power cannot be far behind. The vaunted American Dream has become a version of Is that all there is? Robert Frost considered whether the world would end in fire or in ice.  Neither, it turns out.  The world as we know it ends in willful ignorance and stupidity.  The scientist, the doctor, the researcher, the humane and rational end up looking like navigators on Plato’s Ship of Fools. “Fake news,” is what my Chinese colleagues said about this alarming American discrediting of science – but they meant that people could not distinguish science from lunacy.  Good luck to those Americans, is what they said at the end. 

The humane leader – some Confucian thoughts on becoming human

With all the electrons displaced in analysis of our dear leader and his minions, I’ve seen nothing that presents a Confucian view. Confucianism, partly a guide to humane leadership, should have some advice for us right now.

Out of modesty and concern for the other, no learned Confucian would seek to point out how unfit, unwise, unprepared, and dangerous is our dear leader.  I am certainly no Confucian scholar, so I can proceed.  Confucianism, it seems to me, is a tool with which to expose some of our cultural stultification.  Briefly, let’s see what we can learn – advice for leaders, advice on choosing leaders, and advice for all of us, all the time.  The hyperlinks contain pertinent text.

Responsibilities of leaders

The Confucian concept of ren, which we usually translate as benevolence or humaneness, is characteristic of the ideal leader.  A leader must be concerned with the general welfare of his people, and unconcerned with money, status, or power. A ruler who is more concerned with his own welfare than that of the people may be replaced, as Mencius told us.

The legendary Chinese emperor Shun is extolled because of his magnificence – his benevolence was so great, trust in him was so great, that all he had to do was sit facing south, and his ministers would cause the empire to run effectively and efficiently and peacefully.  The great man inspires those around him to be great. 

The way for a leader to become great – indeed, the way for any person – is to practice self-discipline, engage in study and learning for self-cultivation, and enlarge other people.  Those concerned with bodily comfort and wealth are not great, the xiaoren, the little people, or, better, petty persons – small not in stature or number, but small in righteousness.

Responsibilities of all of us

In the Great Learning (one of the four Confucian classics) we learn that all people should work to gradually expand the sphere of self-cultivation, from early study and learning from parents, to having an orderly family, then participating in the governance of the state, and finally, bringing peace and enlightenment to the world.  This remains a goal for all of us, even if bringing peace and enlightenment to the world is a bit above our personal pay grade.

Confucius’ ideas about goals for a human life are similar to those of Jesus and Aristotle, whether we call it self-cultivation, union with god, or flourishing – some form of “be the best person you can be in community.” None have making money, insulting people, lying, deceit, cheating, or debasing the sacred texts as virtues. Jesus and Confucius have some universal advice – from Jesus – humility, charity, brotherly love, and love your neighbor as yourself. From Confucius – in  

Analects Yan Yuan 22, benevolence, education, and sincerity – Fan Chi asked about benevolence. The Master said, “It is to love all men.” He asked about knowledge. The Master said, “It is to know all men.”

And in Analects, Yong Ye 30, humility and charity – Now the man of perfect virtue, wishing to be established himself, seeks also to establish others; wishing to be enlarged himself, he seeks also to enlarge others. To be able to judge of others by what is nigh in ourselves – this may be called the art of virtue.

The Beatitudes are clearer, but similar moral instruction –

Blessed are the poor in spirit; Blessed are they who mourn; Blessed are the meek; Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness; Blessed are the merciful; Blessed are the pure of heart; Blessed are the peacemakers.

Not so many of us – particularly our leaders – are skilled at humility, charity, enlarging others, or assisting the poor, those who mourn, and those who seek righteousness.  But for Confucians – as well as Christians – the moral imperative is there. 

Where our leaders are now

Examples of Trump – and GOP – lying, mendacity, cruelty and mopery are available for all to see on a daily basis. Just one –

Fact-checking Trump’s attempt to erase his previous coronavirus response  (CNN, April 1, 2020)

Ok, one more –

Adam Serwer – The Cruelty is the Point  (Atlantic, October 3, 2018)

The Bible is a rich source of morality contrary to Trump’s tweets, words, and actions. Biblical advice on leadership is mostly confined to church leadership, as in 1 Timothy 3:1 and 2 Timothy 2:2.   There is Mark 10:43-45– “But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all   which sounds quite a bit like advice from Mencius and Confucius. Mencius in 7.2. 60 (Jin Xin 2.60) – The people are most important, the nation second, the leader last. And from Analects Yan Yuan 19If the leader strives for goodness, the people will follow him in being good. 

For Confucians as well as Christians, the goal of government is to build a harmonious society, including a climate of virtue. Leaders should be role models.  We don’t seem to have that right now.

How to understand where we are

Confucius tells us that political authority is a trust, conferred by heaven for the welfare of the people.  And the greater the political power, the weightier the moral responsibility.  Collectively, we elected Trump, some of us support GOP mendacity, and those are problems for a different article.  In some sense, we deserve what we have. Even given that, how to understand our leader’s lack of public decency, of morality, of benevolence?

Mencius told us about growing in ren, in humaneness. Those humane virtues are what sets humans apart from animals.  One should be virtuous to be a genuine or non-defective human being. In 2A.6 Gong Sun Chou 1, he  tells us that without the feeling of commiseration, one is not a human; without the feeling of shame and dislike, one is not a human; without feeling of modesty and complaisance, one is not a human; and without the feeling of right and wrong, one is not a human. Mencius in 4B Li Lou 2.47 –

That whereby man differs from the lower animals is but small. The mass of people cast it away, while superior men preserve it. Shun clearly understood the multitude of things, and closely observed the relations of humanity. He walked along the path of benevolence and righteousness; he did not need to pursue benevolence and righteousness.

Humanity, righteousness, propriety, and wisdom constitute the virtues one ought to have in order to be a non-defective human being.  These virtues are not inborn.  They must be cultivated, nurtured, and demonstrated to separate humans from beasts. 

We recognize that we are all on different paths to self-completion (mirroring Augustine). When one is faced with inhumanity, one has an obligation to do self-reflection before reacting. What sort of person are we dealing with? In Mencius 4B:56 Li Lou 2 –

Suppose a man treats one in an outrageous manner. Faced with this, a gentleman will say to himself, “I must be lacking in humaneness and propriety, or else how could such a thing happen to me?” When, looking into himself, he finds he has been humane and proper, and yet this outrageous treatment continues, then the gentleman will say to himself, “I must have failed to do my best for him.” When, on looking into himself, he finds he has done his best and yet this outrageous treatment continues, then the gentleman will say, “This man does not know what he is doing. Such a person is no different from an animal. One cannot expect an animal to know better.”

A Confucian notion of human equality is predicated on every individual having equal dignity. Each person has the potential – and obligation – to cultivate knowledge, self-awareness, and benevolence.  Confucians refer to this as self-cultivation. Humans have these abilities. Animals do not. 

Some humans do not achieve a minimum level of self-cultivation. Frank Bruni at the New York Times went looking for Trump’s soul – he might well have included the GOP as well – and noted that George W. Bush reassured us and Barack Obama fought back tears when consoling the nation about national tragedy.  Bruni asked rhetorically, “Do you remember the moment when President Trump’s bearing and words made clear that he grasped not only the magnitude of this rapidly metastasizing pandemic but also our terror in the face of it?”  Bruni concludes that failures in this regard are more than a failure of empathy, or a failure of decency. It’s a failure of basic humanity.

Confucians tell us that rulers should be junzi – not egocentric or power hungry, but superior practitioners of morality and authoritative but modest leaders to a better future.  Make America Great Again is baldly egocentric – Trump sells the hats – and the future is manifestly worse for all.  A superior practitioner of morality, he is not.  He does not demonstrate the qualities that make one human.

What is to be done?

In the US, we don’t expect leaders to be junzi.  We can scarcely have lower expectations than what we seem to produce now for leaders.  But now with a Confucian perspective, we can at least answer the question of why our dear leader acts as he does.

In Analects Xian Wen 34 Confucius told us to repay injury with righteousness- that is, justice.  Someone behaving badly is in need of correction, and we have an obligation to attempt that. After all, the goal of self-cultivation is to improve others as well as oneself. Trump – and evidently, many of his followers – were reared without good moral training from parents and examples from relatives, friends, colleagues and government.  Mencius tells us that humans are born good, and with cultivation may become excellent.  Even individuals whose actions indicate serious human deficiency have the potential for growth.  We should encourage all politicians to engage in self-cultivation so they might develop virtuous behavior and become people of integrity instead of opportunists.

Let us return Trump to his self-promotion business, where he can be the master of all to his own satisfaction and not harm so many of us. Those who wish to deal with him may do so.  In the meantime, we should instruct Trump and toadies in elemental humaneness – call it Confucian or Christian.  To do otherwise makes us accomplices in tolerating someone who, to all appearances, is less than fully human.

What comes after Don’t Be Evil?

From a comment of mine in 2015 – We are in the crackdown on foreigners in China (for foreigners, one might read, Americans).  When access to the internet is largely blocked for me, even with a VPN, access for many of my German students is still good.  Perhaps spotty, perhaps needing a couple of different VPN to get around, but it works.

Google’s problems in China began in 2010, when it began redirecting searches to its Hong Kong site to get around blocking on the mainland.  After some negotiations, and fits and starts on blocking of gmail, Google chose to leave China rather than submit to censorship.  Those were the old days.  To  be fair, Google was doing some light blocking of its own at that time, and the issue as reported was the hacking of the gmail accounts of activists within China, presumably by the government.

In 2012, Bloomberg published its story about the wealth of the family of Xi Jinping, and Bloomberg was blocked a few days later, still in force (although Bloomberg is trying to get back in as well).  A couple of months later, the New York Times published its story on the family wealth of Wen Jiabao, and was then permanently blocked.     The Times remains blocked in China, although some staffers remain.  Keith Bradsher reopened the Shanghai office in 2016.

Now, in 2018, Google (formerly, the Don’t Be Evil company – the tag line was formally dropped in 2015) seeks to reenter the market in China.  A comment from Time Magazine in 2015 seems prophetic with regard to seeking new investment …

“Don’t Be Evil” had attracted its share of criticism for being ambiguous and potentially hypocritical; Alphabet’s new code of conduct might be looking to attract a new investments beyond its core search and advertising businesses, according to CNET.

… but simply wrong on potentially hypocritical.  By kowtowing (in the real former sense of the word) to the rulers in China, Google cheapens its brand while at the same time emboldening autocratic government everywhere to adopt the Chinese internet model.  Well done, Google.  It refused to lie by dropping the old byline,  now no longer seeking to not be evil.

New Google Parent Company Drops ‘Don’t Be Evil’ Motto.  Time Magazine, October 4, 2015.  End of “Don’t Be Evil”

There has been plenty of comment online and in the business press about the Google move.  Google staffers have resigned over the blatant rejection of ethics in agreeing to be censored … no, worse, to self-censor, in exchange for money from ads in China.  The article from Hackernoon cited below does a pretty good job of explaining the why – that the Google ad business was suffering as a result of no-ad software, and Google needed to generate more money.  Removal of the “don’t be evil” motto was in 2015, the same year that Apple added an app to its phone that permitted ad blocking.  Ad blocking on YouTube further ate into Google revenues. From the Hackernoon piece –

Even those who weren’t blocking ads had trained themselves to ignore them entirely. Researchers dubbed this phenomenon “banner blindness”. The average banner ad was clicked on by a dismal 0.06% of viewers, and of those clicks, roughly 50% were accidental.

Daniel Colin James. This is How Google will Collapse.  April 24, 2017.    No ads, no revenue

The Foreign Policy article below, by Susan Nossel, neatly summarizes the benefit to Russia, Iran, Egypt – authoritarian governments everywhere – from cracking down on openness.  Google needs revenue.  A few tweaks to software, and markets open.  For the governments, wait a while, and business will come crawling back in search of profits.  Marx does seem to be right about the rope.

Suzanne Nossel.  Google Is Handing the Future of the Internet to China. Foreign Policy, September 11, 2018.  available online from Medium – Google’s timely dropping of “Don’t Be Evil”