Liu Qing joined hands with seven university teachers to open the "first philosophy lesson" for Chinese teenagers

Aristotle said, "Philosophy begins with curiosity about the world." "For children who have light in their eyes and are always curious about everything, philosophy is a part of them. It is an instinct for teenagers to get close to philosophy. When they are in this stage of growth, their self-consciousness begins to awaken, they begin to cast skeptical and curious eyes on the world, and they begin to ask "who I am", "what is the difference in my existence", "what is the meaning of life"...

"Starting with Surprise: The First Lesson in Adolescent Philosophy", Liu Qing et al., Republic of Beijing Daily Press, January 2022 edition

Based on the cognitive and psychological characteristics of adolescents, based on the current context, the book "Starting from Surprise: The First Lesson of Adolescent Philosophy" planned by the Republic of China invited eight teachers of the philosophy department of colleges and universities to serve as lecturers, focusing on classic philosophical issues such as self, life, happiness, love, mind, science, etc., in a situational way, combined with examples in daily life, the abstract philosophical concepts were turned into vivid narration, to respond to the confusion of teenagers, and to start their journey of exploration and questioning. In turn, it helps them to break away from their habitual thinking, form their own independent thinking and judgment, and make their hearts rich and profound.

At the same time, for all adults who have had this kind of life question as a teenager or started thinking about it again at some point in their adulthood, this book is also an opportunity for you to embark on a journey of self-reflection again.

The purpose of the book is to return the philosophy that belongs to the child to the child, so that they can regain their curiosity about the world, break the fixed thinking, ask more "why", and return to the essence of education.

Eight teachers participated in the lecture, including: Liu Qing (Ph.D. in Political Science at the University of Minnesota, Professor and Doctoral Supervisor, Department of Politics and International Studies, East China Normal University), Wenjing Cai (Ph.D. in Philosophy, University of Copenhagen, Denmark, Associate Professor of the Department of Philosophy, Shanghai Jiao Tong University), Qian Liqing (Ph.D. of Fudan University, Assistant Researcher at the Institute of Philosophy, Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences), Chen Yong (Ph.D. in Philosophy, Heidelberg University, Germany, Associate Professor of the Department of Philosophy, Shanghai Jiao Tong University), Wu Yun (Ph.D. of Tsinghua University, Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy, Shanghai Jiao Tong University), Shi Xuan (Doctor of Philosophy, Peking University, Associate Researcher, Institute of Philosophy, Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences), Leng Xin (Doctor of Philosophy, Fudan University, Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy, Tongji University), Gao Song (Doctor of Philosophy, Sun Yat-sen University, Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy, Tongji University)

Not only do they have professional philosophical backgrounds, but they are either scholars who are often involved in the popularization of philosophy, or parents, or former secondary school teachers. For the theme of each lecture, they combine the cognitive and psychological characteristics of adolescents, carefully select, and send philosophy to every teenager in an easy-to-understand way.

From Surprise: The First Lesson in Teen philosophy

Introduction To Philosophy and Thought Experiments

Author: Liu Qing

It is a pleasure to discuss with you the thought experiment in philosophy. Seeing the children here, some of them still very young, reminds me of my own childhood. At that time, when I was about 10 years old, at that ignorant and curious age, I met several teachers who were eager to talk to me about strange "esoteric" questions. Their conversations, the stories and the knowledge they tell inspire my whimsy, open up my later learning and exploration, and ultimately make me who I am now. I feel that this is a precious gift that I received from my childhood. Today, I am willing to give this gift back to the children of today, I believe that this is the best reward for the enlightenment teachers of my own childhood, and it is also a treasured link of knowledge and spiritual inheritance.

Your eyes are full of curiosity, and this is the original motivation of philosophy. Aristotle said that philosophy begins with "the amazement of the world." Humanity wants to know what everything we face is, why, what's wrong... This is a concern for our existence, which is innate, but at the same time can be developed into a conscious sense of inquiry. In everyday life, these curiosities may be forgotten and marginalized, but they are never extinguished. And human beings are naturally equipped with a desire for knowledge. Wondering for wonder about the world, there is a philosophical inquiry.

There is an interesting question that philosophical inquiry may not lead to a definite answer in the end, unlike many other disciplines.

In the early days, at least in the West, all the disciplines of the world belonged to philosophy. Later, natural philosophy evolved into science; philosophy continued to derive, and the question of the mind had psychology, and psychology was now combined with neuroscience and cognitive science; questions about society had sociology; questions about economics had economics...

You know Adam Smith, right? He is considered the father of modern economics, but in reality he sees himself as a philosopher. Reading his biography, I found that the prevailing mainstream economics has a great misunderstanding of Adam Smith, whose proposition is not completely market deterministic, only focusing on economic returns and efficiency, he is philosophical.

Going back, philosophy has spawned many disciplines that have relatively clear answers to the questions they ask, and when the answers are seriously challenged, they look for new answers. But many of the most fundamental questions of philosophy do not have a uniform standard answer. For example, what is the purpose of people's lives? This is a question of the philosophy of life.

Many major philosophical questions have remained "inconclusive" for thousands of years, so is philosophy therefore futile? In fact, obtaining the ultimate standard answer is not the whole meaning of philosophy, or even where its main value lies. One of the important points of philosophy is to help us stimulate thinking and clarify our thoughts: each of us relies on ideas when we act, and behind all actions there are ideas, and these ideas are premised, and they are hidden there, and you are not aware of them. Philosophical discussions reveal them, examine the fallacies of logic, change the perspective or focus of your inquiry, and discern the key and difficulty of the problem. For example, if a parent says that his child's academic performance is not good enough, he may ask the child: Why do you pay so much effort to achieve good grades? Is your learning method right? However, there is a hidden premise in saying this, that is, children should and even have to achieve good grades and get into good schools. In fact, the focus should be on what kind of person do parents want their children to become? What kind of person does the child want to be? What kind of life does he want? This changes the context and perspective of the whole issue. Philosophy will pull you out of a habitual pattern, a process Heidegger calls "extraordinary questioning" and "extraordinary thinking." This is also a process when we explore the world of public life or politics, and later we will talk about the relationship between fairness, freedom, and efficiency, and so on, and you can see this.

Philosophy is not just reasoning, there are stories in philosophy, and these stories are often presented in the form of "thought experiments". The "thought experiment" is a "sharp weapon" for clarifying thought, a way of philosophical inquiry (and certainly not the only way).

So, what exactly is a thought experiment? I can give a rough and simple definition. In philosophy, the usual thought experiments are: (1) presenting an imagined scenario and plot ;(2) thereby provoking intuitive or speculative responses, as well as related discussions; and (3) thus examining the validity of specific ideas and principles (especially those we take for granted). It is a reminder that the role of thought experiments in philosophical arguments is controversial among professional scholars, but we do not have to get involved in such complex professional discussions now.

For students who have good English and are particularly interested in philosophy, I recommend a particularly good online resource, the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. It is a dedicated philosophy website, written by the world's best professional philosophers, each entry, which is completely free and constantly updated, which also has the term "thought experiment", which discusses the subject in considerable depth. In addition, there is a popular book on thought experiments, which is also very suitable for you to read and reference, and is recommended here to everyone - Julian Baggini, a popular writer of British philosophy, "A Pig That Wants to Be Eaten", which is a Chinese translation of the English work. The original English edition also has a subtitle – "And 99 Other Thought Experiments". "A Pig Wanting to Be Eaten, this is a thought experiment, and there are 99 other thought experiments in the book, for a total of 100. Many of the examples I have given in this lecture are from this book, but some of the formulations and interpretations may not be the same.

In this course, I will explain concrete examples of some of the thought experiments in the fields of epistemology and ethics, illustrate how they lead us to think more keenly and clearly, and how they enlighten us to know the truth of the world, understand moral practice, and explore spiritual life.

Nandu reporter Zhu Rongting