What is "philosophy"? "Philosophy" is a noun, a noun, that is, the name of a thing, which can be shortened to "name"! So, what does the term "philosophy" mean? That is, to ask, what does the term actually refer to? Actually, it can be referred to as "real"! In this way, to answer the question "What is philosophy", we must first clarify the relationship between "name" and "reality"!
Studying the relationship between "name" and "reality" is also a science, that is, "famous science", and those who study "famous science" are "famous masters", note that the "famous masters" here and the "famous people" in the context of modern Chinese are not the same thing! If what the famous people say goes straight to the essence of things, that is, the "most reasonable and famous sayings", the words of many famous people are often very reasonable, and their famous remarks are also called "the most reasonable famous words", which quietly implants the background of "famous people" for these famous people.
From the comparison here, it can be seen that "philosophy" and "famous science" have a great overlap, yes, this is the inevitable examination of the world after human beings enter civilization, so "philosophy" is "the study of inquiry", this "word" comes from the West, but this "learning" is not only a source in the West, the three major birthplaces of recognized philosophy are ancient China, ancient India and ancient Greece, people in different regions have made different interpretations in different directions, ancient Greece interpreted "philosophy", ancient India interpreted "Buddhism" Ancient China interpreted the truth.
The people who preached the truth were The Taoists, Taoists and "famous masters" were very active during the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, and there were many other schools of thought that coincided with them, and also produced many famous figures of various schools, and we call them and their academic system "Hundred Sons and Hundred Schools". "Taoism" is more famous and more influential than "famous family", coupled with the fact that "famous family" in the sense of the school is invaded by the word "famous family" in the modern Chinese context, so that "famous family" fades out of the sight of many people, and some people have distorted their interpretations due to the one-sided understanding of famous masters, for example, some people think that famous masters are "sophists", in fact, at that time, the hundred sons and hundreds of families, the eloquents were not only famous people, but also other families. Here are some examples:
Hui (Zi) Shi and Gongsun Long (Zi) are representative figures of famous artists, Keiko is known for "contract differences", and Gongsun Longzi is known for "leaving Jianbai". Zhuangzi's Taoist representative figures, "Qi Wu" is one of Zhuangzi's claims, which is close to Keiko's "similarities and differences", but their understanding of specific things is still different.
Zhuangzi and Keiko tour Haoshui together, and on the Haoshui Bridge, Zhuangzi looks at the small fish in the river and says, "What a happy little fish!" Keiko said, "You are not a fish, how do you know that fish are happy?" Zhuangzi said, "You are not me, how do you know 'I don't know fish are happy'?" Keiko said, "I'm not you, so I probably don't know what you think, you're not a fish, so you can't know what a fish thinks (the same thing)."
Zhuangzi said, "Wait a minute, let's make another squeeze, what did you start saying?" You ask me, how do I know fish are happy? You ask me how I know, and this sentence tells me that you have judged that I know that fish are very happy, otherwise you would not ask so, and now I tell you how I know, I know on the Haoshui Bridge! Keiko questions what Zhuangzi knows, and Zhuangzi analyzes the structure of the sentence for Keiko, which is a logical concept of stealing! It can be seen that Zhuangzi is also sophistry.
When Gongsun Long was a guest to Pingyuan Jun, qin guo said to other countries, who dares to beat me? Zhao Guo said, I dare to hit you! Qin Guo said, who dares to fight us both? The other countries did not dare to squeak! So the State of Qin and the State of Zhao made a pact, and we cooperated to hang the countries! The State of Qin went to fight the State of Wei, and the State of Wei wrote a soft article to the State of Zhao, and the State of Zhao went to save the State of Wei.
Qin Guo was very upset, so he sent someone to rebuke Zhao Guo: We said well, help each other, help each other, how did you break the contract? I went to fight Wei Guo, you should help me, why did you still go up? King Zhao was embarrassed to ask, so he went to ask Pingyuan Jun how to reply to Qin Guo! Gongsun Long went to give Zhao Sheng an idea: Zhao Guo can also send envoys to rebuke Qin Guo: We are about to help Wei Guo to build infrastructure, you Qin Guo should help me, and work with us to help Wei Guo to build infrastructure, if you don't help Zhao Guo help Wei Guo, you have already defaulted, how can you greet and not make a sound, and still do it? Why did you break the covenant first, but why did you blame us? Gongsun Long has such a sophistry behavior that is not a matter of course, and it is not surprising that people regard famous artists as "sophists".
From the above example, it can be seen that the hundred sons of the pre-Qin dynasty are already studying the relationship between thinking and existence, which is a typical category of philosophical thinking, but the thinkers of the pre-Qin Dynasty do not call it so, and give their respective names, such as The Taoists call it "Truth", the famous family is called "Famous Science", perhaps, the above example is not intuitive enough, let's look at an academic example of Gongsun Long.
Gongsun Long's proposition is "correct name", that is, the relationship between concrete objects and abstract names is straightened out, and "positive" means "straightened out", so that its name and reality are consistent. The name is abstract, it is the result of thinking, the physical object, it is concrete, it is an objective existence, an animal, you name it "dog", if you give it a nickname called "cat", it will confuse the boundaries of the two animals, is the sound category of Guo Degang's research, not the field of "famous science".
For example, "horse", the definition of the horse is the sum of all animals with the characteristics of the horse, and "white" is the definition of a color, white and the horse are not the same thing, they are defined from different angles, if "white" is a set, "horse" is a set, their intersection is "white horse", white horse is a subset, "horse" is a complete set, "subset" is "complete set"? Since the subset is not a complete set, isn't it obvious that the "white horse" is not a "horse"?
In the same way, the hardness and whiteness of the stone are not the same thing, white and hard are two concepts, which should be distinguished and interpreted separately, which is "away from the solid white". Gongsun Long's views of "white horse not horse" and "leaving Jianbai" are interpretations of "fit the name". Incidentally, Gongsun Long was a famous thinker in Handan in the pre-Qin period!