qi-dao-unity

This chapter explores Zhang Xuecheng's historicisation of Dao during the Qing dynasty, emphasizing that Dao is not a fixed eternal principle but changes over time and is contextualized within historical and social developments. Zhang critiques traditional Confucian views that treat the six classics as containing an immutable Dao, instead arguing that these texts represent the Qi of their time and that understanding Dao requires a philosophy of history. His approach parallels deconstruction by showing that Dao's existence depends on its manifestation through historical writing, making the study of Dao a dynamic, temporal process.

The chapter examines the ontological crisis in China arising from the disintegration of the traditional Qi-Dao unity under the pressures of modern technological consciousness, critiquing simplistic returns to indigenous cosmologies as inadequate responses to modernity. It further explores Keiji Nishitani's philosophical engagement with nihilism, proposing a Buddhist-inspired transformation from nihilism through the concept of sūnyatā and a privative logic that transcends fixed essences and binary oppositions, thereby offering a foundation for an East Asian philosophy of modern science and technology.