The Thinking Mode Of "the Harmony Between Man And Nature" And The Reconstruction Of The Modern Ecological Ethics

The relation between the man and the nature is a basic theme in Chinesetraditional philosophy. The harmony between man and nature is the most commonway of dealing with their relation. It’s not only the most important topic of Chineseculture, but also the integrative expression of Chinese civilization. The concept ofthe harmony between the man and the nature is very rich. It involves the cosmology,ethics, aesthetics and ecological view other aspects. This thesis creatively introduced"the thinking patterns" of the harmony between the man and the nature. In otherwords, this thesis studied their relation in the methodological and epistemologicalperspective ways and thus applied it to the field of ecological ethics in order toexplore the thinking patterns that described "the harmony between man and natureand the reconstruction of modern ecological ethics."The harmony between man and nature" concept originated from the ancient era.After a long history and civilization of precipitation, it has been deeply internalized inthe Chinese national psychology and way of thinking and has become a thinkingpattern. From a methodological point of view,"the harmony between man and nature"is an integrated concept of cosmology, worldview and values of the whole thinkingpattern. Their relation varied from the aggregation to the separation and to thefinal aggregation in the thinking patterns. From the epistemological point of view,"the harmony between man and nature" is different from "object dichotomy," which isthe thinking patterns that paid attention to the harmony between the subject and theobject. At present, our human beings are facing to the serious ecological crisis, so theecological ethics is emerging and flourishing as a new discipline. In the progress tosolve this problem, scholars created the school of "anthropocentrism" and the schoolof "non-anthropocentrism. These two schools debated with each other, but they didnot get rid of the Western tradition of object dichotomy. At the same time, theirdebates and attacks leaded both of them into the dilemma of theoretical research. Infact,"the harmony between man and nature" is a treasure to our Chinese and it hadmade an outstanding contribution to our human thought. What’s more, it brought newideas to us in each different time. Especially,"the harmony between man and nature"is quite rich, unique and different from the Western view in the relationship betweenman and nature. It looked at the unity of subject and object in a holistic andcontradictory way. It has abandoned the "two doctrines" who speared the subject andthe object. It has gone farther than the debate between" natural value" and "naturalrights". The thinking patters of "the harmony between man and nature" built a solidthinking foundation for the new ecological ethic of "post-anthropocentrism". It alsoprovided the understanding and methodological guidance, and it is very important forthe reconstruction of modern ecological ethics.The originalities of this thesis can be divided into two parts. First, it takes apioneering role domestically in studying the idea of "the harmony between man andnature" from the methodological and epistemological perspectives which holes thetheory. Second, how to sublate the conflict and contradiction betweenanthropocentrism and non-anthropocentrism and then how to rebuild eco-ethics are urgent theoretical problems hard to solve. From the thesis, the author considers thatthe ideological mold of "the harmony between man and nature" is the theoreticalorigin of "post-anthropocentrism" which would be pushed forward to be birthed bysublating anthropocentrism and non-anthropocentrism and overstepping natural valueand rights.