This book claims that the ways in which “sameness” and “difference” are conceived in Chinese philosophies differ from how they are conceived in Western philosophies. If this claim is true, then it would be difficult to overstate its ramifications. It would not just illuminate some obscure corner of the Chinese tradition, but would reveal something about its entire logical and ontological orientation, the general assumptions upon which all of its thinking is based. Brook Ziporyn understands the significance of this claim and appreciates its ramifications. He also understands that other scholars, notably David Hall, Roger Ames, and Chad Hansen, have defended similarly comprehensive claims before. Ziporyn advances his position “largely by expanding on their premises” (p. 55) and succeeds in presenting several novel conclusions and insights.

Ziporyn's project is guided specifically by the meaning of the term li 理, which he translates as “coherence.” Li is a term that comes gradually into the Chinese philosophical lexicon. In the earliest period (covered in this book), it is not very commonly used. Ziporyn maintains, however, that its associations are foreshadowed in patterns of thought that precede its emergence as a central philosophical term. It should be noted that Ironies of Oneness and Difference is the “prolegomena” and prehistory to a forthcoming, companion volume that will focus exclusively on li itself.

To summarize (and this is extremely condensed): the early Chinese world is not one that contains fixed, self-same entities (think “realism”); nor is it one that denies the existence of such entities (think “nominalism”). Rather, it is a world in which similarity and difference are negotiated out of a welter of possible coherences. As Ziporyn writes:

Since human purposes determine coherence, disagreements among schools are based not on competing ontologies but on conflicting desires and attitudes. As Ziporyn sees it, “the satisfaction of human desires is the only justification of any position developed by any early Chinese thinker” (p. 200). Furthermore, when Chinese thinkers clash, their differences often reflect different attitudes towards the fundamental nature of coherence itself. Broadly speaking, Ziporyn identifies “ironic” and “non-ironic” positions in this respect. The “non-ironic” positions (call them “Confucian”) pursue coherence guided implicitly by the norms of harmony, goodness or pleasure, and intelligibility (pp. 89, 139). Such thinkers take the resulting coherences very seriously. The “ironic” positions (call them “Daoist”) wish to undermine non-ironic positions by calling upon alternative sources or levels of coherence, appealing to an “unseen subtlety” that contains all opposites (p. 155) or playing the “wild card” that puts every perspective on par with every other (pp. 180–95). Ziporyn thus rehearses the entire history of early Chinese philosophy in terms of disputes about coherence.

Ziporyn's survey is always interesting, often illuminating, and sometimes brilliant. His response to the charge that Zhuangzi is a “relativist” belongs in the latter category (pp. 190–95). The challenge, however, is to provide readers with a clear account of what occurs when early Chinese philosophers engage the world coherently. While Hall, Ames, and Hansen regard the Chinese tradition as “profoundly and overwhelmingly nominalist in orientation,” Ziporyn wishes to establish that “the actual approach taken by Chinese thinkers . . . is neither strictly nominalist nor strictly realist in the Western sense” (p. 56). Finding a language that is adequate to describe this middle ground proves difficult, and readers can sense the struggle. Ziporyn's descriptions of non-ironic coherence as “almost voluntaristic” and “one might even say performative” feel halting and tentative (pp. 126, 122). Readers sympathetic with this book will find themselves searching alongside Ziporyn for terms adequate for his insights, which are often pioneering and difficult to relate in conventional terms.

Being a sympathizer, I found myself on numerous occasions recalling the language of pragmatic naturalism. To identify “human desire as the irreducible starting point of all inquiry” (p. 232) and to connect coherence to “equilibrium” and “growth” (p. 84) immediately calls John Dewey to mind. Ziporyn makes only one mention of Dewey, and unfortunately what he says is inaccurate: he mislabels Dewey as a “nominalist” (p. 44), even though it is well established that Dewey is neither a realist nor a nominalist.Footnote ¹⁰ While this mistake has no bearing on this book's arguments about Chinese philosophy, the point is relevant for comparative philosophers who, in broad sympathy with Ziporyn, are searching for ways to think past realist/nominalist dichotomies and better understand what for Chinese thinkers might have been common sense.