Dongfang Shuo Xu Kai 丨 Emotional Nature and Moral Transformation - Xunzi On How "Sexual Hypocrisy" is Possible

About the Author丨 Dongfang Shuo, Professor of School of Philosophy, Fudan University; Kai Xu, PhD student, School of Philosophy, Fudan University.

The original article is published in Social Sciences, No. 4, 2018.

Excerpt

Xunzi is mainly evil in nature, and love, sex, and desire have roughly the same meaning in Xunzi, and they are all manifested as the desire for profit and gain. If one follows this lust for profit, one cannot intrinsically like morality. However, Xunzi's sensuality (desire) can be shaped and transformed, and by transforming it, people can have the motivation to pursue moral etiquette, and "sexual falsification is the way to achieve this moral transformation." "Chemical sex" can change the way people's emotional desires are expressed, "falsification" is the further promotion of "chemical sex", which contains cognition, thinking, evaluation and belief, etc., which affect people, which will have the question of "why to seek", "how to seek" and "whether to seek" on a person's desires and desire objects, and then lay the foundation for the emergence of new motivations and the realization of moral transformation.

According to Xunzi, "The nature of today's people is born with good and profitable", "The nature of this man is inherently rude, so he is strong in learning and seeks to have it". Human nature is inherently good and evil, and if there is no teacher, it is only a view of profit. If so, one of the first questions that must be faced with Xunzi's Chengde thought is: How can a person who is naturally inclined to be self-interested develop a morally altruistic motive? How is "sexual falsification" possible?

1. Xunzi's concepts of emotion, sex, and desire

According to Hume's theory, only when a person has the right desires does he have an excitatory reason for action, and because of this, Kant argues that the question of motivation essentially involves the desires of the agent, whereas in Xunzi the problem of desire is closely linked to his concepts of sex, emotion, desire, etc. According to Xun Zi himself, "The sex is also the nature of heaven; the lover, the quality of sex; the desirer, the love should also be." The meaning is that sex is born of nature, emotion is the essence of sex, and desire is the reaction of emotion. Xun zi attributed desire to human emotion, so yun "is good for profit and desire for gain, this person's emotional nature is also"; and desire should be born of "good" feelings, "good" is a manifestation of love, so desire and emotion can be regarded as synonymous; desire is a kind of love, and love is sex, so desire is the possession of sex, so the cloud "desire cannot go, and sexual possession is also". For the relationship between these three, Mr. Xu Fuguan once had a concise explanation, Qiyun: "Although Xunzi conceptually defines sex, emotion, and desire, in fact, sex, emotion, and desire are the three names of one thing. The characteristic of Xunzi's theory of sex lies in the use of desire as sex. According to scholars' statistics, the book "Xunzi" says "sex" ninety-eight times, synthesizing the relevant statements of Xunzi, Xunzi's speech can be roughly divided into two kinds of definitions of form and content, the former such as Xun Ziyun: "The reason why life is so is called sex." The sum of sex is born, the essence of induction, and the nature of nature. "Whoever is of all nature, the heavens are also, cannot be learned, cannot be done... It is unlearnable, it is not possible to do anything, but in man, it is called sex. The latter is also a definition of content, which we can specifically divide into several aspects: First, it is said in terms of human ability, such as Xun Ziyun: "The nature of today's human beings can be seen by the eyes and the ears can be heard; the husband can see the clear without leaving the eyes, can hear the wisdom without leaving the ears, and the eyes are clear and the ears are deaf, and cannot be learned." "Discerning white and black beauty and evil, distinguishing between ears and voices, distinguishing sour, salty, sweet, and bitter mouths, distinguishing fragrant and fishy noses, distinguishing cold and hot diseases from bone and body, is what people are born and has, is the one who has no waiting, and is the same as Yu Chai." The second is to say sex in terms of human physiological instincts, such as Xun Ziyun: "The nature of today's people is hungry and wants to be full, cold and warm, hard and want to rest, and this person's emotional nature is also." The third is to talk about sex from people's psychological desires, such as Xun Ziyun: "If the husband is lustful, his ears are good, his mouth is good, his heart is good, and his bones and skin are good and happy, he is also born of human affection; he who feels natural, and does not wait for things and is born later." "There are many defining statements in the book "Xunzi" from the above three aspects, and they cannot be quoted here. Undoubtedly, from the content of the combing of Xunzi's theory of sex, scholars can observe it from different angles, but whether it is from the perspective of functional ability, physiological instinct or psychological desire, in Xunzi, sex, emotion, and desire generally have a homogeneous and homogeneous relationship. Mr. Chen Daqi believes in this regard, "'Sexual good, evil, joy, anger, sorrow, happiness, so-called feelings', when encountering external stimuli, subjectively, that is, reactions such as good, evil, joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness, and these reactions are especially called emotions. Therefore, if sex and emotion must be separated, it can be said that sex is a state in which it can react to good, evil, joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness, and emotion is the actual activity of good, evil, joy, anger, mourning, and happiness. However, these distinctions are not valued by Xunzi, so although Xunzi defines sex and emotion, he often refers to sex and affection, or temperament, or temperament...".

The problem is that, according to xunzi's definition of disposition or concept of sensuality, it does not seem to be compatible or even in opposition to this concept and moral etiquette, in other words, one cannot intrinsically like morality by following the innate sensuality of man. At least Xun Zi himself has a clear theory on this point, such as Xun Ziyun: "The nature of this human being, hungry and full, cold and warm, tired and desire to rest, this person's emotional nature is also." Those who are good at this day and dare not eat first will give way, and those who work hard but dare not ask for rest will have some substitution. The Master's concession to the Father, the brother's giving way to the brother, the Son's substitute for the Father, and the brother's substitute for the Brother, these two elements are all contrary to sex and contrary to affection; but the way of filial piety and the literary principle of etiquette and righteousness are also. Therefore, the smooth nature does not resign, and the resignation is contrary to the emotional nature. According to this statement, we may infer that all acts that are in accordance with morality and etiquette cannot arise naturally and directly from the sentient nature of human beings, but on the contrary, the actions that follow the human nature can only be endlessly contested even between family affections. If there are brothers who divide the wealth and wealth, and are obedient, and they are profitable and want to get, if so, the brothers will rob each other... Therefore, if you are in love, the brothers will fight. ”

However, having said that, looking at the book "Xunzi", we can indeed find that some of Xunzi's statements when talking about human feelings, likes and dislikes seem to be ambiguous, so that people will inevitably have questions about whether there is a consistent theory of human nature in Xunzi's thought. In his famous essay "The Wicked Man in the Mind of Xunzi", D. J. Munro listed several passages in the book "Xunzi" that seemed to be obviously contrary to his sexual evil theory, and believed that Xunzi's statement would cause "confusion" to people. According to Mengdan, the main concern of Xunzi is to avoid the confusion and division brought about by the imbalance of "more desire and less", but the traditional view is that Xunzi's concern is rather a proof of the evil of human nature, so Meng Dan believes: "I suspect that the purpose of Xunzi's theory may not be to develop the theory of human nature, otherwise it will not leave a mess in his theory." In Meng Dan's view, there are many passages in the Xunzi that point to or assume that people have innately positive traits, such as a passage in the "Strong Country": "Why is Fu Chai seal lost?" And tang wu also got it? Yue: There is no other reason, the chai sealer is good and the evil of the people, and the good of the tang warrior is also good for the good. What is the evil of man? A: Dirt, contention, greed is also. What is the good of man? A: Courtesy, resignation, and faithfulness are also. For the interpretation of this text, the most striking thing is undoubtedly "what people do and what is good", is this "good and evil" inherent in human beings, or is it acquired? Or is there something special to refer to? If this "good and evil" is innate in man, that is, man is born with a preference for righteousness, resignation, and faithfulness, then how can this statement be consistent with Xunzi's theory of sexual evil or with Xunzi's understanding of emotion? Meng Dan believes that in Xunzi, people naturally "love, righteousness, loyalty, faith, and other virtues, and so on, and their endowment or natural pattern of behavior can make them do so." This explanation shows that people are born with moral preferences, but this statement cannot be reconciled with Xunzi's sexual evil theory.

Meng Dan also cites a passage in the Treatise on Etiquette, "Whoever is born between heaven and earth must know that those who have flesh and blood must know, and those who have knowledge do not love their kind... Therefore, the one who has flesh and blood is unknown to man, and the old man is to his relatives, until death is infinite." To the last sentence, "The deceased is infinite to his relatives", B. Watson translates it as "therefore man ought to love hisparents until the day he dies." However, there is no "should" in the original text of "Xunzi", but more inclined to naturally love their parents. In this way, it contradicts Xunzi's theory of sexual nature and sexual evil. Therefore, Meng Dan believes that here Xunzi is very confused about whether human nature is praised or degraded.

Meng Dan also listed the "Wang Ba" chapter: "Husband Gui is the Son of Heaven, rich in the world, named Saint King, concurrently making people, people can not get and control also, is the same desire of human feelings, and the king is also the one who has both." ...... The system is based on Chen, the government decree is coerced, the officials and people who lose their dignity will die, and the princes will be rude and ,...... It is the same desire of human feelings, and the king is also the one who has the right." In this paragraph, Meng Dan believes that this means that "people have feelings of agreeing with the rules that can bring about social order." But if people are really born with this kind of emotion, the result will be inconsistent with Xunzi's sexual evil theory.

Finally, Meng Dan also cited the "Royal System" section "Water and fire have qi but no life, grass and trees are born and ignorant, animals and animals have knowledge but no righteousness, people have qi, life, knowledge, and righteousness, so the most noble in the world", according to Meng Dan, in this sentence, "man has righteousness" refers to "are born with an innate moral sense". However, if people are born with a sense of morality, then the above-mentioned View of Xunzi's Sentimental Nature and Xunzi's so-called "shun temperament, then brotherhood" cannot be explained.

If the above paragraphs appear in the chapters of "Powerful Country", "Etiquette", "Wang Ba", and "Wang System", if Meng Dan's relevant doubts are valid in terms of textual understanding and theoretical elaboration, then Xunzi's theory of sexual evil can at least have a preference for morality or etiquette in a "natural" or "natural" sense, and the question of moral motivation does not seem to be a problem that scholars will pay attention to in the future. To this end, Professor Eric Hutton wrote a special article "Does Xunzi Have a Consistent Theory of Human Nature?" The article sorted out and refuted Meng Dan's relevant questions one by one. Due to space limitations, this article is not intended to restate the specific exposition of Professor Ho Aike here, but only to briefly explain his propositions and conclusions. In Hutton's view, Meng Dan's doubts seem to have a reason on the surface, but if we make an in-depth analysis of text interpretation and ideological diagnosis, we will face many problems. For example, for the passage "Strong Country", Hutton starts from the context analysis of the text, and believes that what people like is only the virtue displayed by Tang and Wu for them, not that people naturally like to be virtuous people or are born to desire this. As for the explanation in the Treatise on Etiquette that "the old man is infinite to his relatives, until death is infinite", Hutton argues that even if Xunzi's human evil means that our desires do not know the boundaries of nature and tend to bring conflicts to us, we have no reason to exclude the tendency of others to favor him, "Xunzi may deny that such altruistic tendencies constitute a major part of our various natural tendencies, but even if Xunzi approves of this altruistic tendency, it will not contradict his theory of human nature." Another example is the understanding of the passage "The Desires of Human Feelings" in the "King's Lord", Hutton believes that the context of this passage clearly shows that people agree with the rules that promote social order in their own "facts", rather than that people are born with the emotion of liking those rules that promote social order. Finally, for the interpretation of the passage "The Righteousness of Man" in the "King's System", David S. Nivison has tried to understand this "righteousness" as a bare capacity or unfilled capacity in order to be consistent with Xunzi's theory of sexual malignancy. Hutton believes that if the "having" of "righteousness" in this paragraph is understood as "born to have", it will naturally form a serious conflict with the relevant statements in the "Sexual Evil"; but if the "righteousness" of this "righteousness" is understood as a simple "ability" without content, as Ni Dewei did, this will be inconsistent with the semantic context expressed in the Xunzi text, because since this "righteousness" is a simple ability that has nothing to do with morality, then why would Xunzi say that people are the most precious because they are righteous? In this regard, Hutton argues that the "righteousness" of "man's righteousness" as Xunzi speaks is not an empty capacity, and the problem is only that the "existence" of "righteousness" is not necessarily understood as "having innately", but can be "possessed" or "possessed" the day after tomorrow, and if so, the "righteousness" of "man's righteousness" can be understood as "a set of norms" created and passed down by the Holy King.

Second, the mode of action of emotional desire and its change

Although Hutton reviewed Meng Dan's relevant questions one by one around Xunzi's theory of sexual evil, and tried to maintain the consistency of Xunzi's theory of human nature, in the face of the nature of people who are good and evil, how people can transform themselves or transform themselves into people who like morality in their hearts must be explained concretely and effectively in theory. According to P. J. Ivanhoe, Xunzi's concern about human nature is malleable, but even so, we still need to explain the specific details of how to be malleable. To this end, scholars have made in-depth explorations from various aspects, such as Ke Xiongwen's attempt to discover the motives of sexually evil people by interpreting a special statement in the "Xunzi Sexual Evil" section that "the desires of mortals are good, and the sexual evil is also". The true meaning of the passage "Man's desire is good, and sexual evil is evil" expresses Xunzi's view of desire, that is, a person's desire logically includes the person's lack of possession of the object of desire. The focus of Xunzi's above statement may not be to prove that human nature is evil, and from the statement "desire to do good", if we understand "evil" as a lack of "good", then this lack will lead us to seek good, in other words, evil will also make us seek good, or give us the motivation to seek good. Bryan Van Norden attempts to propose a unique explanation for Xunzi's moral motives and transformation through the comparison between Meng and Xunzi, and with the help of an analysis of Xunzi's "What the Heart Can Do" in his "Correct Name". In Wan Bai'an's view, Xunzi is different from Mencius, people do not have innate moral desires, and in Xunzi, a person's behavior of conforming to the "Tao" is not determined by his innate desires, but the process of self-indoctrination, that is, the process of sexual hypocrisy, determined by his "what is available", begins when our desires lead us to do evil, and we consciously overcome our desires with "what the heart can do". But Huang Bairui does not agree with this view, according to Huang Bairui, according to Xunzi, the difference between "what the heart can do" and "desire" is actually only the difference in the scope of desire, that is, the choice between a person's "immediately sensual desires" and a person's desires through reflection on long-term interests, so the transformation of emotional desires cannot simply be reduced to the magical ability of "what the heart can". Huang Bairui also found through Xunzi's text that there are many natural emotions in human nature that are "congenial" with morality, and that people will actively seek expression because of the drive of these natural emotions, and liturgy and pleasure are the expression of this natural emotion, and also provide a sufficient and appropriate way for the initial transformation of the morality of sexually evil people.

In a treatise titled Xunzi and the Path of Prudence: Desire as a Motive for Goodness, Kurds Hagen offers an illuminating explanation for Xunzi's disposition and moral transformation. According to Hagen, although Xunzi believes that our innate sexual orientation is hateful, Xunzi is not a pessimist, he believes that people can be good. But how do sexually evil people become good? Xunzi believed that we needed "pseudo-", that is, the composition of human intellect that help us to reshape our qualities, and Xunzi believed that by applying our minds diligently against blind obedience to our innate emotional dispositions, people would be able to develop and maintain conformity with the Tao and achieve harmony.

Xunzi's "sexual falsification" is often thought to provide a way to transform desires. However, Hagen points out to the point that Xunzi does not provide us with this method, but only develops for us an "auxiliary mo-tivational structure" that can subdue our original desires when this auxiliary motivational structure conflicts with our original desires; when a person successfully transforms all his qualities, the original desires remain and are greatly satisfied. Here, Hagen divides Xunzi's desires into two different forms: one is "basic desire", such as "hunger and appetite", and the other is "specific desire", that is, desire for a specific thing, such as "appetite has a pawn". According to Hagen, basic desires are born and do not change. The relationship between basic desires and concrete desires is that basic desires are the basis of specific desires, and specific desires contain basic desires; and specific desires are mediated by experience and reasoning. In Xunzi, basic desires have some negative connotations because they are connected to hateful sex and emotions, and are often associated with the senses, but when they are channeled to wisdom, this desire is not bad, so in achieving moral transformation, Xunzi does not advocate changing our basic desires. This desire cannot and does not need to change, but we must modify (revamp) our motivational structure so that new motivations and new desires become behavioral motivators that motivate people to conform to the Tao. The problem, however, is that since Hagen believes that moral transformation does not require a change in our basic desires, which in turn manifest as our natural sensuality, how should the "transformation of nature" in "transformational hypocrisy", one of the cores of Xunzi's thought, be understood? In this regard, Hagen criticized two plausible explanations for understanding Xunzi's "chemical nature". One holds that "sexuality" replaces the old sex with a new and different sex; the other holds that "sexuality" is the transformation of "sex" into "pseudo", after which sex ceases to exist, only artificial motivations are retained. Hagen then analyzes in detail the three different statements about "sexuality" that appear in the Confucian Effects and "Sexual Evil", and finally he believes that "sexuality" itself does not cause changes in sex itself, and that sex here mainly refers to the basic desire itself, in other words, "sexuality" changes only our specific desires, so Hagen believes that "when we guide our desires, we can change our specific desires, but we can't change our basic desires, or more accurately, We can change the specific objects of our desires to pay attention to. For reasons of experience, knowledge and training, we find that a particular object of desire is either not really the most desireable after consideration of the whole picture, or conflicts with the new structure of motivation that we have 'accumulated'" For this reason, Hagen quotes Xunzi's "Correct Name" passage that "those who rule with words and treat those who are widowed, and those who are trapped in desires without abstinence" argue that the "festival" here obviously does not mean to reduce desires, but only to require modification of the form of action of our desires.

The next question, however, is, why can't we go along with our desires? According to Huang Bairui (D.B. Wong) explains that the reason for this is that the long-term satisfaction of desire limits our satisfaction of desires in the present moment, such as Xunzi's special attention to "long-term consideration of the future" is very telling. In this regard, Hagen argues that, at least in the early stages, the motivation in the Confucian journey of self-cultivation obviously came from prudent calculation, and for Xunzi, the prudence with foresight provided the initial motivation for self-cultivation. But after the development of virtue, we can develop a quality based on non-prudence, not necessarily out of utilitarian calculations, but out of higher standards such as courtesy or justice, but it is still prudent motives and not something else that encourages us to embark on the path of cultivation. In this sense, Hagen argues, Xunzi's thinking about the problem always seems to be in a deliberate paradigm of desire-based consequentialism. Finally, Hagen put forward his own views on the "nourishment of desires" in Xunzi's Treatise on Etiquette. How exactly to understand what Xunzi means by "nourishing desire"? Is nourishment just the satisfaction of desire? Professor Zhuang Jinzhang once pointed out that Xunzi's so-called "ritual cultivation has the meaning of making oneself elegant through enlightenment", and Hagen further explained that the "refinement" here is not so much a revision and transformation of old tastes as it contains the accumulation of new tastes, in other words, the indoctrination contained in cultivation and the result of the elegance it possesses are actually the development of a new motivational tendency disposition)。 In the beginning, people do not find the intrinsic motivation to follow the etiquette, but need external stimulation, but once people begin to observe the etiquette for the sake of prudence, the experience of practicing the etiquette will give rise to a new structure of motivation. As Xun Zi said: "Now that the people of life have not tasted the rice sorghum, but the chaff of the silent bud is seen, then the foot is here, and the Russian and the millet have the spirit of being a rice beam, and they see it with their eyes: Why is this strange?" If he stinks and earns in the nose, tastes it and is willing to eat it, and eats it and is content with the body, he must not abandon this and take the other. At that point, people have an intrinsic motivation to practice the ritual. If so, the process of sexual hypocrisy can also be said to be a process of "nurturing desires", and the final result is to unite desires with the way of righteousness.

3. The relationship and meaning of "sexuality" and "falsification"

Undoubtedly, scholars have explored the moral transformation of sexually evil people in Xunzi's thought, and this article cannot sort them out one by one, but in fact, we seem to be able to summarize how it is possible to "transform sex into hypocrisy", as Hagen pointed out, according to Xunzi, "transformation" is the definition of "change in form and reality without being different", "transformation" does not change the nature of "sex", but only changes the way of action of various passions expressed by the second meaning of sex. However, we need to note that in the book "Xunzi", "sexuality" is always associated with "falsification", and Xunzi's words "sex" have two meanings, which is called "the reason why it is born is called sex." The sum of nature is born, the essence of induction, and the nature of not doing anything is called nature"; the word "pseudo" also has two meanings, which is "the mind can be moved by it; the accumulation of worry, the ability to practice, and then become the falsehood". If so, we need to ask, what is the relationship between "sexuality" and "counterfeiting"? Can "chemicalization" itself replace "counterfeiting"? If so, why would Xunzi want to build a house and stack a bed and say "sex and falsification"? In addition, in the understanding of "pseudo", the meaning of "pseudo" in the first sense is relatively clear, but what does the "pseudo" of the second meaning refer to as "cheng" of "later becoming"?

Let's look at the first question first. Some scholars believe that "'chemicalization' relies on the 'custom of error', but the 'custom of error' is actually the accumulation of behavior and habits, that is, the accumulation of the first meaning of 'false'." From this point of view, 'transformation' and 'counterfeiting' are not two stages of kung fu, but two aspects of the same kind of kung fu." But if this statement is true, then why should Xunzi highlight the distinction between sexuality and falsity? Indeed, Xunzi explicitly said, "The wrong customs are noted, so the sex is also.". However, there are two points that need to be discerned here: First, although the wrong custom can be transformed, but the transformation is not equal to the wrong custom; second, the wrong custom is certainly manifested as the influence of tradition, customs and habits on people, but these customs and behaviors are not equal to the "mind and initiative" of the "pseudo" of the first meaning, on the contrary, people are "wrongly marked" in a specific environment, and the influence of their traditions, customs and habits on people's behavior is more manifested as a certain "collective unconscious", and the "pseudo" of the first meaning emphasizes the arrogance , dynamic " far away. Therefore, we advocate that "chemicalization" and "counterfeiting" cannot be regarded as two aspects of the same kind of kung fu. In fact, both "to be" and "to rise" are verbs here, and the emphasis is clearly on "sex" and "pseudo". According to Xunzi, "what cannot be learned, what cannot be done, and what can be done in man is called hypocrisy", as mentioned earlier, Xunzi refers to the sex of the second meaning, and the change of nature is the expression of man's lust, and the change of this way of expression is conditioned by external etiquette to make it conform to the norm. However, "falsification" is different from "chemical nature", which can be understood as the further advancement of "chemical" kung fu, and Xunzi himself also emphasizes that "the birth of sex" and "the birth of falsehood" "have different signs". So, what's the difference? Leaving aside for the moment the truth of the textual context of the Sexual Evil, there are two points that need to be pointed out here: First, we say that what is changed by sexuality is only the expression of concrete desires, but in Xunzi, any specific desire itself is inseparable from the factor of cognition, in other words, simple primal desire alone cannot complete a desire action. For example, "I desire to eat" must know that something can be eaten and delicious in order to become a specific desire or desire action, such as "I want to drink Coke" or "appetite has to be a good" according to Xunzi, that is, a specific desire, this desire must contain the premise of knowing the "good" of "cola" and "dangfeng" for me. However, the regulation or change of this specific desire is not achieved by "transformation", but by "falsification", so Xun Ziyun: "Feelings, and the heart chooses for them, which is called worry." To be able to move for a mind is false. Second, the question of what exactly the "success" of "success" referred to in Xunzi's second meaning is also involved here. Before understanding this question, we can see that Xun Ziyan's "pseudo" seems to pay special attention to the resulting meaning of "later formation" and "later nature", such as on the one hand: "Those who feel that they cannot be natural, and must treat things and then come after them, they are said to be born of hypocrisy"; on the other hand, they are clouded: "Those who can learn and can, but those who can become people, are called pseudo", and cloud: "Thinking about accumulation, being able to practice and then becoming, is called pseudo". In such statements, the "pseudo" of Xunziyan (the second meaning) can be said to be particularly focused on results, and this result falls on people. Of course, the "change" manifested by "transformation" is also a result, but this result is only a change in external forms; the result of "falsification" is the result of learning and doing things, through the accumulation of "worry" and the familiar habit of "ability", and this result cannot be just a change in some external form of man. Chen Daqi and Li Disheng both believe that the "pseudo" of Xunzi's second meaning refers to the personality accumulated by behavior, while Deng Xiaohu believes that the "pseudo" of the second meaning is at least not limited to personality, and etiquette can also be understood as the result of the second meaning of "pseudo". We feel that both of these statements make sense. But whether it is the "personality" theory or the "courtesy" theory refers only to the description of the newly emerging results of one's own formation, we ask, how can the "falsification" of the "one who has become a man" produce such a result? Along the lines of thought, it is reasonable to think that the "success" of falsehood and then success actually includes the generation of new motives, because only new motives based on "artificiality" but on "falsehood" can give birth to "personality" and "righteousness". First of all, from the perspective of the text, xunziyan "falsification" is always connected with "sheng li yi", but how does li yi come into being? The difference between a saint and a man of the castle is not sex, but hypocrisy. Sex is disrespectful and tends to be self-interested, but sexuality only changes the way sex (referring to man's specific desires) is expressed, so that sexuality alone does not generate a new motive, and without a new motive it is impossible to generate a new personality and etiquette. Secondly, from the perspective of Xunzi's language usage of "falsification of nature, birth of righteousness and righteousness of righteousness, and birth of righteousness and legal degree of righteousness", the relationship between "transformation" and "falsification" is not just a simple connection relationship, but a progressive relationship of substantive content, the first step is transformation, the second step is counterfeiting, and we also want to further point out that the reason why "transformation" is possible is actually that the meaning and fundamentality depend on "counterfeiting". According to the dual definition of Xunzi pseudo," when a person accumulates, can learn and then becomes, that is, when a person removes his desire for self-interest and aims at etiquette, then "pseudo" contains the formation of new motives, and only this motivation can truly "give birth to righteousness" and "become personality". In other words, the motivation to give birth to righteousness and personality cannot be generated simply from "transformation", but can only arise from "falsification", which not only contain cognition, thinking, evaluation and belief, but also include the influence of the environment, traditions and customs on people, which will have the question of "why to seek", "how to seek" and "whether to seek" on the object of one's desires and desires, thus laying the foundation for the emergence of new motives and the realization of moral transformation.

Of course, as mentioned earlier, simple "transformation" cannot produce new motives, and new motives can only come from "falsification", but this statement itself is yet to be analyzed, and if this statement is interpreted as too extreme, it does not conform to xunzi's meaning. On the one hand, Gai Xunzi emphasizes the "distinction between sexual hypocrisy", but on the other hand, he also emphasizes "sexual pseudo-union and then the name of the saint", "sexual pseudo-union and the rule of the world", "asexuality is false and nothing, and no hypocrisy is that sex cannot be self-beautiful". In this way, in Xunzi's case, if the emergence of man's new motives leaves "sex" and relies solely on "pseudo", it seems that it is difficult to be strongly convincing in both theory and the text. Based on this understanding, we see that although Aaron Stalnaker}T .C. Kline } , Bryan Van Norden and even P. J. Ivanhoe et al. particularly reinforce the fundamental significance of cognition, evaluation, or "what the mind can do" for the emergence and formation of a person's new motivation (here the broad concept of motivation, the narrow concept of motivation tends to regard cognition or the "can" of "what the heart can" as an evaluation), but this view still seems to have two questions to be explained in theory: First, how does the reason for action derived from cognition or "what the heart can" achieve an effective transition between itself (reason) and motivation? This can probably be seen as a "Humean problem" problem. Second, this view does not fully take into account Xunzi's "sexual pseudo-union" proposition in the text. The question, however, is whether the "sex" of "sexual pseudo-union" that Xunzi refers to here refers to the "sex" of the first sense or the "sex" of the second sense? Many scholars tend to think that the "sex" of Xunzi's "sexual hypocrisy" is the second meaning of sex, that is, the union of sex and "pseudo" manifested as concrete desires. However, this understanding does not seem appropriate in theory. First of all, from the textual context of Xunzi's "sexual pseudo-union", it is in line with "sex, the original material is simple; the hypocrite, the literary longsheng also", here Xunzi understands "sex" as the original material (original material park), which is quite different from the "sex" of "sexual evil" and "honor and disgrace" and other articles that understand "sex" as a specific emotional desire such as good and evil, and perhaps because of this, Li Disheng believes that "this number of words is quite different from the sexual evil theory." The reason why Li Shi has this doubt may be because he does not take into account that Xunzi has two definitions of "sex", if we understand the "sex" of Xunzi's first meaning, that is, the "sex" of "the nature of the nature that is born to be called sex", that is, there will be no "quite different" confusion between it and "the original material". Secondly, from the analysis of the content of "sexual pseudo-union", we know that in Xunzi, the specific desire expressed by the second meaning of sex, such as "I want to wear a suit", must have added the factors of cognition and even evaluation, while the "pseudo" expression of the mind's worries, energy movements, and accumulation of thoughts and habits themselves include cognition and evaluation. Therefore, to understand the "sex" of "sexual pseudo-union" as the "sex" of the second sense, there are only two logical results: when the cognition contained in the specific desire is completely consistent with the cognition contained in the "pseudo", there is no pseudo-pseudo-synthesis; when the cognition contained in the specific desire contradicts the cognition contained in the "pseudo", there is no "sexual pseudo-union". In this case, we believe that the "sex" of "sexual hypocrisy" should refer to the union of the first meaning of sex and hypocrisy. We agree with the understanding of the first sense of nature as a non-specific psychological tendency or physiological drive that is innate in man, and this sex is roughly in line with what Xunzi calls "nature" of "being born." Some scholars also advocate that this nature of Xunzi be understood as "all the natural qualities of human life", and another way of saying "qualities" is actually "knowing", which is the ability of human beings to be born with and without positive content, we can also call it "potential capacity", or understand it as the "will power" that must be sought outside, but this "sex" as an abstract ability is always in the state of intention or target search. Since it does not have a positive moral content in itself, like a tray, it is not enough to independently achieve a moral motive, but it must join the "pseudo" of the day after tomorrow to give birth to a new motive, and according to this new motive to give birth to personality and etiquette, and then make the world come under the rule and conform to the Tao, so Xun Ziyun: "Sex is also, I can not do it, but it can be transformed into also; the one who accumulates it, not what I own, but can also be." This should be the true meaning of Xun Zi's words of "sexual hypocrisy" and "sexual hypocrisy and rule the world".

4. A short conclusion

In the text, Xunzi speaks of sexual evil with the specific connotations of the three concepts of emotion, sex, and desire, so in the internal structure of Xunzi's theory of human nature, there is no "ready-made" moral tendency, but if we look at it from the perspective of "epigenesis", it is not impossible for Xunzi to do moral things without any internal motives, otherwise, Xunzi's propositions of "righteousness before righteousness and then profit" ("Honor and Disgrace") and "profit by righteousness" ("Righteousness") cannot be solved. Here, the comprehensive factors contained in Xunzi's "transformation of sexual hypocrisy" are the comprehensive factors of learning to remove the ugly, careful thinking and discernment, and the teaching of the teachings of the teacher, as well as the specific value beliefs they have formed, which can produce reflection on whether and how desirable a person's desires and desire objects can be, and then form a new motive and moral transformation, and even to the end, according to Xunzi, a person can achieve "making the eye is not desireless, making the mouth is not wantless, and making the heart is not desireless." And as for its good, the five colors of good eyes, the five sounds of good ears, the five tastes of good mouths, and the world of heart benefit."