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“Harmonious Technology is a must-read for anyone interested in the philos-
ophy and ethics of technology. While the effects of technology are global,
the frameworks to understand and evaluate them are still local, dominated
as they are by western approaches. In six fascinating chapters and the epi-
logue, the authors convincingly and profoundly demonstrate how a ‘mul-
ticultural turn’ can substantially enrich the ethics of technology. Without
any doubt, this book is a solid foundation for much exciting work to come.”
—Peter-Paul Verbeek, Distinguished Professor of Philosophy
of Technology and Co-Director of the DesignLab, University
of Twente, and author of What Things Do (2005) and Moralizing
Technology (2011)
“Refreshing, stimulative, and timely, Harmonious Technology makes an

important contribution to developing a Confucian philosophy of technol-
ogy. I highly recommend this book to everyone who is interested in this
propitious field of study.”
—Chenyang Li, Professor of Philosophy, School of
Humanities, Nanyang Technological University, and author of
The Confucian Philosophy of Harmony (2013)
“Although there have been an increasing number of English language

studies devoted to reassessing Confucianism in general terms and present-
ing it as a challenge to Western ethics, this is the first to tackle a range of
issues in the ethics of technology from a Confucian perspective broadly
construed. It represents the important work of a new generation of inter-
nationally engaged Chinese philosophers of technology.”
—Carl Mitcham, Professor Emeritus of Humanities, Arts,
and Social Sciences, Colorado School of Mines; International
Professor of Philosophy of Technology, Renmin University of
China; author of Thinking through Technology (1994) and Steps
Toward a Philosophy of Engineering (2020)
“[...]For those long engaged in such multicultural approaches to philosophy

of ethics and technology, this volume represents a most welcome and sig-
nificant contribution, one signaling a new level of engagement across these
diverse traditions: it is simply delicious reading to be savored and learned
deeply from. For those somewhat newer to these territories, the volume
will be especially valuable as a primer in Confucian thought [...]. I simply
cannot recommend it strongly enough.”
—Charles M. Ess, Professor Emeritus, Department of Media
and Communication, University of Oslo; author of Digital Media
Ethics, 3rd Edition (2020)
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BK-TandF-BIGO_9781138589919-200144-FM.indd 14 16/10/20 6:36 PM
HARMONIOUS TECHNOLOGY
Technology has become a major subject of philosophical ethical reflection in recent

years, as the novelty and disruptiveness of technology confront us with new possibil-
ities and unprecedented outcomes as well as fundamental changes to our “normal” ways
of living that demand deep reflection of technology. However, philosophical and
ethical analysis of technology has until recently drawn primarily from the Western
philosophical and ethical traditions, and philosophers and scholars of technology
discuss the potential contribution of non-Western approaches only sparingly. Given
the global nature of technology, however, there is an urgent need for multicultur-
alism in philosophy and ethics of technology that include non-Western perspec-
tives in our thinking about technology. While there is an increased attention to
non-Western philosophy in the field, there are few systematic attempts to articulate
different approaches to the ethics of technology based on other philosophical and
ethical traditions. The present edited volume picks up the task of diversifying the
ethics of technology by exploring the possibility of Confucian ethics of technology.
In the six chapters of this volume, the authors examine various ideas, concepts, and
theories in Confucianism and apply them to the ethical challenges of technology; in
the epilogue, the editors review the key ideas articulated throughout the volume to
identify possible ways forward for Confucian ethics of technology.
Harmonious Technology revives Confucianism for philosophical and ethical analysis
of technology and presents Confucian ethics of technology as another approach to
the ethics of technology. It will be essential for philosophers and ethicists of technol-
ogy, who are urged to consider beyond the Western paradigms. More broadly, the
volume will be of interest to students and scholars in the fields of philosophy, science
and technology studies, innovation studies, political science, and social studies.
Pak-Hang Wong is Research Associate at the Research Group for Ethics in IT

in the Department of Informatics, Universität Hamburg, Germany.
Tom Xiaowei Wang is Associate Professor of Philosophy of Science and Tech-
nology in the School of Philosophy, Renmin University of China.
BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-FM.indd 3 21/12/20 11:43 AM

HARMONIOUS
TECHNOLOGY
A Confucian ethics
of technology
Edited by Pak-Hang Wong and

Tom Xiaowei Wang
BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-FM.indd 5 07/11/20 4:57 PM

First published 2021
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
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Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2021 selection and editorial matter, Pak-Hang Wong and Tom
Xiaowei Wang; individual chapters, the contributors
The right of Pak-Hang Wong and Tom Xiaowei Wang to be identified
as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their
individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and
78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced
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or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and
explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
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by KnowledgeWorks Global Ltd.

CONTENTS
List of Figures ix
Notes on the Contributors x
Acknowledgementxii
Introduction: Why Confucian Ethics of Technology? 1

Pak-Hang Wong, Tom Xiaowei Wang
1 Confucian Ritual Technicity and Philosophy of Technology 10

Tom Xiaowei Wang
2 Dao, Harmony, and Personhood: Toward a Confucian

Ethics of Technology 29
Pak-Hang Wong
3 Technological Mediation in and for Confucianism-Based

Cultures 50
Ching Hung
4 Self-Cultivation of the Confucian Engineer: What

Engineering Ethics Education can Learn from
Confucian Moral Theory 66
Qin Zhu
5 Artificial Intelligence, Personal Decisions, Consent, and the

Confucian Idea of Oneness 79
Pak-Hang Wong

viii Contents
6 Confucian Personhood and the Scientific Spirit:

Ren as the Foundation of Confucian Ethics of Technology 95
Fei Teng
Epilogue: The Future of Confucian Ethics of Technology 110

Tom Xiaowei Wang, Pak-Hang Wong
Index 115

FIGURE
1.1 Photo of Yokeback Armchair in the Metropolitan

Museum of Art by Beatrice Pinto. Available in the
public domain via https://www.metmuseum.org/
art/collection/search/3949318

CONTRIBUTORS
Ching Hung is Adjunct Assistant Professor at National University of Kaohsiung

and Feng Chia University, Taiwan. He received his PhD from the University of
Twente, the Netherlands in 2019, and his dissertation “Design for Green” won the
Excellence Award of STS Dissertation 2020 from the Taiwan STS Association.
He has published in Taiwanese Journal for Studies of Science, Technology and Medicine,
Frontier of Philosophy in China, and contributed to several university textbooks.
He is also a columnist for various Taiwanese newspapers and magazines, writing
about ethical and political issues concerning technological influence on human
behaviors.
Fei Teng is Lecturer in the School of Philosophy, Renmin University of China.

She obtained her PhD from Utrecht University, the Netherlands. Her research
interests include environmental ethics, ethics of science and technology, and
Confucianism. She is the author of Moral Responsibilities to Future Generations:
A Comparative Study on Human Rights Theory and Confucianism (2018) and other
journal articles in the relevant fields.
Tom Xiaowei Wang obtained his BA, MA in China Agricultural University,

and PhD in Utrecht University, the Netherlands. He is Associate Professor of
Philosophy of Science and Technology in the School of Philosophy, Renmin
University of China. His major research interests include philosophy of
technology, moral theory, and STS. He currently serves as the Director of Youth
Committee of Chinese Society of Philosophy of Science and Technology. Wang
is in the editorial board for the Journal of Responsible Research and Innovation and
has published in Zygon, Environmental Ethics, Frontiers of Philosophy in China, and
other academic journals.

Contributors xi
Pak-Hang Wong is Research Associate at the Research Group for Ethics in IT

in the Department of Informatics, Universität Hamburg, Germany. His research
explores the social, ethical, and political issues of artificial intelligence, robotics,
and other emerging technologies. Wong received his doctorate in Philosophy
from the University of Twente, the Netherlands in 2012 and then held academic
positions in Oxford and Hong Kong prior to his current position. He is the
co-editor of Well-Being in Contemporary Society (2015, Springer) and has published
in Philosophy & Technology, Zygon, Science and Engineering Ethics, and other
academic journals.
Qin Zhu is Assistant Professor of Ethics and Engineering Education in the

Division of Humanities, Arts & Social Sciences at the Colorado School of
Mines, USA, where he co-directs the Daniels Fund Program in Professional
Ethics Education that provides support for faculty to integrate ethics into applied
science and engineering curricula. He is currently the Editor for International
Perspectives at the National Academy of Engineering’s Online Ethics Center
for Engineering and Science, Associate Editor for the Journal of Engineering
Studies, and Program Chair of American Society for Engineering Education’s
Division of Engineering Ethics. His major research interests include the cultural
foundations of engineering ethics, global engineering education, and the ethics
of computing technologies and robotics.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The present volume has been (too) long in the making, as the two editors of this
volume, Pak-Hang Wong (PW) and Tom Xiaowei Wang (TW), met and dis-
cussed the ideas of Confucian philosophy and ethics of technology in Amsterdam
back in 2010 when PW was writing his doctoral thesis at the University Twente
and TW was completing his PhD at Utrecht University. Along the way, they met
and got to know Qin Zhu, Ching Hung, and Fei Teng in different occasions,
and they all share an interest in exploring the relevance of Chinese philosophy
(and, in particular, Confucian philosophy) for philosophical and ethical analysis
of technology. In this respect, we are so pleased to be able to invite Qin Zhu,
Ching Hung, and Fei Teng to work together on this volume and materially realize
Confucian ethics of technology in the form of an edited volume.
There are far too many people to thank personally and properly, but we are
grateful for all the support and encouragement we received for our work on the
volume. PW would like to express his gratitude to Prof. Charles Ess, Prof. Rafael
Capurro, Prof. Soraj Hongladarom, Prof. Mark Coeckelbergh, and Dr. Johnny
H. Søraker for their friendship and the many conversations on various topics
in philosophy and ethics of technology over the years. PW’s colleagues in the
Research Group for Ethics and IT, Prof. Judith Simon, Prof. Ingrid Schneider,
Dr. Gernot Rieder, Laura Fichtner, Mattis Jacobs, Catharina Rudschies, Anja
Peckmann, should be mentioned explicitly for enduring his endless talk about
the applicability and relevance of Chinese philosophy. Finally, PW also wants
to thank Sophia for her love and understanding. For TW, his deep gratitude
goes to Prof. Carl Mitcham for his enthusiasm in and encouragement for the
endeavor to explore Confucian philosophy and the ethics of technology. TW
also want to thank Prof. Li Chenyang, who has been open and supportive of the
prospect of this “unusual” project in Confucian philosophy, and Prof. Marcus
Düwell, who encouraged him to study the interplay between the use of modern

Acknowledgments xiii
technology and the Confucian tradition as his supervisor at Utrecht University.

Both PW and TW are also grateful for Prof. Peter-Paul Verbeek for his kind
endorsement of the volume.
PW and TW have presented some of the ideas in their contribution and of the
volume more generally in different places, in particular at HSMC Workshop on
Ethics and Public Policy organized by the Department of Social Science, Hang
Seng Management College (now, Hang Seng University of Hong Kong) in 2016;
The 15th Forum of Philosophical Analysis organized by Prof Cheng Suimei at
Institute of Philosophy, Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences in 2017; and, in
2019, the Workshop on Comparative Philosophy of Technology organized by the
School of Philosophy, Renmin University of China (where Fei Teng also pre-
sented her contribution) and the Workshop on Frontier of Ethics of Technology
organized by Prof. Wang Guoyu at the Center for Biomedical Ethics, School of
Philosophy, Fudan University. We want to thank our audience for comments
and feedback; and, our thank goes especially to Prof. Duan Weiwen, Prof. Liu
Yongmou, Prof. Wang Guoyu, Prof. Cheng Sumei, Dr. Benedict S. B. Chan,
and Dr. Rami Chan for their valuable insights and advice on this project of
Confucian ethics of technology. In addition, TW would also like to acknowl-
edge the support for his work on this volume from the National Social Science
Foundation of China through funding the research project Internet Value Study
(18CZX016).
Chapter 2 is reprinted by permission from Springer Nature Customer Service
Centre GmbH: Springer of a previously published article of Wong, P.-H., “Dao,
Harmony, and Personhood: Towards a Confucian Ethics of Technology” in
Philosophy & Technology, 25, 67–86, 2012.

INTRODUCTION
Why Confucian Ethics of Technology?
Pak-Hang Wong, Tom Xiaowei Wang
Introduction
Technology has become one of the main subjects of philosophical and ethical
reflection in recent years. There is an increased visibility of philosophy and ethics
of technology in both scholarly and public venues, and there we can find scholars
debating questions about, among others, the nature of technology, the relations
among technology, human, and society as well as the impacts of technology on
individuals and society. There are certainly multiple ways to account for the
rising popularity of philosophy and ethics of technology, but we believe the
philosophical interest in technology can be explained in part by referring to its
novelty and disruptiveness.
More specifically, technology provides us with new capabilities. Just think
about autocorrection and the automatic grammar checker in the word processor
we use for completing this Introduction. They enable us to write with less con-
cern for spelling, grammar, and punctuation, thereby offering us a more fluid
experience in writing. However, the new capabilities afforded by technology
may also introduce unprecedented outcomes: what if the word processor auto-
matically changes some of our words into racist slurs? And, what if the auto-
matic grammar checker enforces a specific style of writing and communication,
thereby devaluing other styles? Are we, the authors and users of the word pro-
cessor, responsible for the racist slurs and/or for sustaining a specific writing and
communication style, thereby supporting some forms of linguistic dogmatism?
In other words, the novelty of technology confronts us with new possibilities and
novel consequences that cry out for philosophical and ethical reflection.
Moreover, technology often disrupts our usual ways to conduct everyday life
and the ways society functions because of the new possibilities and novel con-
sequences. For the disruptiveness of technology, we can simply consult the
Internet, social media, robotics, and many other new and emerging technologies
BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Intro.indd 1 27/11/20 9:52 AM

2 Introduction
as examples, and then we should recognize the radical transformations brought

about by technology. In the more extreme forms, Luciano Floridi (2015) and
his colleagues have proposed that with the prevalence of digital technologies
the distinction between our lives online and offline is no longer useful, and
that we need to see our lives as onlife, which is a seamless merging of both.
Likewise, Braden R. Allenby and Daniel Sarewitz (2011) have argued that our
technology now allows us to transform not only human beings but also the
Earth system we live in and depend on, thereby moving ourselves into a new
epoch of Anthropocene, an epoch in which human exerts direct impacts on the
Earth system. These fundamental changes in our lives and in our world have
undoubtedly forced us to rethink who (what) we are and how we can (should)
run our society.
The latest technology-related incidents only heighten the public concern
about the social, ethical, and political issues of technology, and magnify the
need for normative analysis of technology. Fatal accidents involving self-driving
vehicles (see, e.g., Bhuiyan 2018), dire threats to democracy as a result of social
media, profiling algorithms, and target advertising (see, e.g., Confessore 2018),
the harm being done by biased and discriminatory algorithms (see, e.g., O’Neil
2016; Angwin, Mattu, & Kirchner 2016), and many more examples have
reminded us to be mindful of the risks of technology and be critical toward its
development and implementation. Indeed, these incidents highlight the impor-
tance to anticipate the social, ethical, and political consequences of technology in
the early stage of development and steer technology away from the problematic
consequences (Brey 2012). We are, of course, not claiming that technology is all
bad. As Floridi and his colleagues (2018) point out in their analysis of the role of
artificial intelligence (AI) technologies for a good society, technology can be used
to our benefit and create opportunities for individuals and society, it can also be
overused and misused and create risks for us, but also technology can be underused
and create missed opportunities. So, we need to consider the possible good and harm
of technology because failure to realize the benefits of technology is as much a
problem as the failure to prevent possible harm it; and, we contend that philos-
ophy and ethics of technology are necessary to guide our normative thinking
about technology.
The discussion so far has explained why philosophers are turning attention to
technology, but it says nothing of the limited philosophical perspectives in phi-
losophy and ethics of technology despite the growing interest from philosophers
and ethicists. In particular, the philosophical and normative analysis of technol-
ogy proceeds predominately with theoretical frameworks in the Anglo-American
and European traditions, which presume particular normative standpoints and
understandings of what is of value.1 The lack of non-Western traditions in phi-
losophy and ethics of technology is perhaps understandable, given the questions
of modern science and technology appear to originate from the West.2 Indeed, the
field of philosophy of technology is said to be originated from the West as well.3
However, as philosophy of technology has taken numerous turns and improved

Introduction 3
upon itself (see, e.g., Brey 2010; Franssen Vermas, Kroes, & Meijers 2016), we
believe that it is time for the field to take yet another turn, i.e., the multicultural
turn. The multicultural turn aims to diversify philosophy and ethics of technol-
ogy by including other traditions into the discussion, thereby enriching the the-
oretical resources for thinking about technology. Fortunately, there are already
some works that move philosophy and ethics of technology to this direction
(see, e.g., Teschner & Tomasi 2016; Lennerfors & Murata 2017; Mitcham, Li,
Newberry, & Zhang 2018; Wang 2020). In this edited volume, we shall continue
to advance the multicultural turn by exploring what Confucian philosophy and
ethics can contribute to the normative thinking about technology. Before we
introduce the chapters in the present volume, however, we should first reiterate
the importance to diversify philosophy and ethics of technology.
Diversifying philosophy and ethics of technology

In Taking Back Philosophy: A Multicultural Manifesto, Bryan W. Van Norden (2017)
argues that philosophy is in urgent need to diversify because we are in a multi-
cultural world, and the narrow perspective of the Western traditions is insuffi-
cient for a genuine understanding of the multicultural world. Moreover, there
are other cultures and traditions in the multicultural world, and their ideas, con-
cepts, and thoughts can help to advance philosophy. Van Norden identifies three
reasons for diversifying philosophy. Firstly, he points out that the world order is
not anymore dominated by the West, as other countries (and, in Van Norden’s
case, China) have risen—or, are slowly rising—to the world stage in terms
of economic and geopolitical power. As such, there is the need to understand
non-Western philosophy if we are to comprehend the new world order, where
the non-Western countries play a (more) significant role. Secondly, Van Norden
suggests that there is much (Western) philosophy can learn from and draw on
non-Western philosophy. Non-Western philosophy offers ideas, concepts, and
theories, which may not have existed or simply neglected and forgotten in
(Western) philosophy, thereby supplying philosophers with new (or forgotten)
resources to rethink their projects and to ask different kinds of questions. Finally,
he describes academic philosophy’s diversity problem, i.e., the gender and racial
imbalance in academic philosophy, and proposes that diversifying philosophy
helps opening up academic philosophy and therefore is part of the solution.
We agree with Van Norden’s plea for multiculturalism in philosophy. We
believe philosophy and ethics of technology are in even more critical need of
diversity. As China becomes one of the major technological powers, and with
several Chinese technology firms coming into prominence internationally, an
understanding of Chinese philosophy becomes essential to comprehend China’s
view of technology. Indeed, the Chinese approaches to technology governance
often frame policy and regulation in Confucian terms and invoke the tradi-
tional Chinese worldview. For example, the China’s Ministry of Science and
Technology released in June 2019 the Governance Principles for a New Generation

4 Introduction
of Artificial Intelligence: Develop Responsible Artificial Intelligence, and the first of

all principles is “Harmony and friendliness”, which states that “AI develop-
ment should begin from the objective of enhancing the common well-being of
humanity; it should conform to human values, ethics, and morality, promote
human-machine harmony, and serve the progress of human civilization […]”
(Laskai & Webster 2019). Similar reference to harmony can also be seen in the
Harmonious Artificial Intelligence Principles (Zheng 2018) and the Beijing AI
Principles (BAAI 2019). Hence, a good understanding of Chinese philosophy is
required for engaging with the Chinese approaches to technology governance
fruitfully.
Technology development often involves multiple groups of technologists in
different parts of the world, and the technological products they make are sim-
ilarly bought and then used by people from around the world. Given the differ-
ent values and interests of people, multiculturalism in philosophy and ethics of
technology is necessary for evaluating the social, ethical, and political impacts of
technology in a global context. To see why the multiculturalism in philosophy
and ethics of technology is necessary in the global context, it is instructive to
review the relation between philosophy and ethics of technology and technology
development and implementation.
Philosophical and ethical analysis of technology is very often more than an
intellectual exercise, i.e., it is intended to inform the development and implementa-
tion of technology. Consider, for example, the idea of responsible innovation, i.e.,
“a transparent, interactive process by which societal actors and innovators

become mutually responsive to each other with a view to the (ethical)
acceptability, sustainability and societal desirability of the innovation pro-
cess and its marketable products (in order to allow a proper embedding of
scientific and technological advances in our society)”.
(von Schomberg 2012, p. 50)
Responsible innovation aims to guide technology development with the values

we (the society) hold dear. As such, responsible innovation necessitates discussion
and debate over what values are important and what values ought to guide tech-
nology development. More explicitly, philosophers and scholars of technology
have proposed the “design turn”, and they are involved in tinkering with the
values embedded in socio-technical systems and technological artifacts during
the design and production process. In the design turn, they look to embed values
in technology through design (see, e.g., van den Hoven 2008; Verbeek 2011;
Simon 2017; Friedman & Hendry 2019). Responsible innovation and the design
turn, therefore, directly link philosophical and ethical analysis to technology
development and implementation and to the related policy and regulation.
One of the dangers of responsible innovation and the design turn is, of course,
the mismatch of values between technologists (and philosophers who provide
them with those values through philosophical and ethical analysis) and the users,

Introduction 5
which can become a form of paternalism by technology (Wong 2013). This dan-
ger is even more acute in the cross-cultural context when the values from a spe-
cific culture are imposed, through technological products, on those who do not share
the values. In effect, the imposition of values through embedding values in tech-
nology can be regarded as a form of technological imperialism. Here, the same
concern of technological imperialism applies to global technology governance as
well. If philosophy and ethics of technology are to inform the values for technol-
ogy development and implementation, and thus the standards for them; and, if
the standards are grounded only on a set of limited values that is not shared uni-
versally, given standards are by definition excluding, those who do not (or are not
willing to) accept the dominant values and the standards based on those values
will be excluded from developing and implementing the technology. In this case,
we have a form of technological imperialism by standardization (Wong 2016).
Against this background, we believe, as Van Norden does for philosophy, that
philosophy and ethics of technology ought to take the multicultural turn. As
we have mentioned earlier, there are already works in this direction. However,
we have yet to see a more systematic account of the potential contribution of
Confucian philosophy and ethics to the normative thinking about technol-
ogy. The present volume aims to pick up this task and explore the possibil-
ity of Confucian ethics of technology. Yet, there is an oft-repeated argument
that Confucianism, with its rigid, hierarchical structure, stifles the freedom to
explore and people’s interest in new things, thereby being an obstacle to sci-
entific knowledge and technology development. Confucianism and science
(and technology), however, are not necessarily incompatible. Indeed, there is a
sustained effort from Confucian scholars to recover the mutual complementa-
rity of Confucianism and science. Insofar as the present volume aims to show
that Confucian philosophy and ethics are relevant to technology development
and implementation, this volume can also be seen as an attempt to bring back
together Confucianism and technology.
Structure of the volume

The present volume contains an introduction, six chapters, and an epilogue. In
the Introduction, we have identified the need to diversify philosophy and eth-
ics of technology and suggest the exploration of the contribution of Confucian
philosophy and ethics to our normative thinking about technology is part of the
multicultural turn. The six chapters in the volume are then organized around
two main questions: I. What resources are available in Confucian philosophy and
ethics for our normative thinking about technology (i.e., Chapters 1 and 2)? II.
How can Confucian philosophy and ethics be applied to ethical analysis of tech-
nology and technology-related issues (i.e., Chapters 3–6)?
Tom Xiaowei Wang starts the volume with Chapter 1, Confucian Ritual
Technicity and Philosophy of Technology. In this chapter, Wang aims to revive a
neglected and forgotten dimension in our encounters with technology that he

6 Introduction
calls “ritual technicity”. Drawing on both the notion of “civilizational given” in

Heidegger’s phenomenology and the postphenomenological approach to analyz-
ing concrete technologies, he examines how Confucian cosmology, as a civiliza-
tional given, works as a macro-horizon through which (technological) artifacts
appear to us. Through a detailed analysis of taishi chairs, Wang demonstrates what
is unique about Confucian philosophy is the Confucian cosmology’s emphasis
on the unity of beings, which brings forth the transcendental/ritual dimension
of artifacts that transcends their practicality and opens up the possibility of yigu
xingwu (以故兴物), i.e., “to summon specific ritual feelings by deploying arti-
facts in the demanded manner”. Confucian cosmology, therefore, enables ritual-
izing (or ethicizing) oneself with artifacts. Wang holds that the ritual dimension
of technology is especially helpful to counter the view that technology can be
reduced to its practicality. For Wang, Confucian philosophy’s focus on rituals
offers an additional way to examine technology.
Chapter 2, Dao, Harmony, and Personhood: Toward a Confucian Ethics of
Technology, is a reprint of an earlier article by Pak-Hang Wong, which serves to
review Confucian ethics for philosophers and ethicists of technology who are
unfamiliar with the tradition. Wong elaborates on three basic normative con-
cepts in Confucian ethics, i.e., dao, harmony, and personhood, and discusses how
they can serve as the building blocks of a Confucian ethics of technology. More
specifically, he points out that Confucian ethics of technology concerns equally
with the good and the right instead of prioritizing the right over the good (as
it is often the case for modern Western ethics and political philosophy). Wong
also argues that a Confucian ethics (of technology) ought to view ethics as a
continuous process of negotiation and adjustment but not a one-off judgment of
right (good) or wrong (bad). Finally, He urges to pay more attention to social
roles and everyday practices that are affected by technology as they are crucial to
individual self-cultivation.
In Chapter 3, Technological Mediation in and for Confucianism-Based Cultures,
Ching Hung examines the applicability and relevance of the idea of technolog-
ical mediation in Confucian-based cultures, e.g., China, Japan, South Korea,
and Taiwan. In this way, Hung makes an important connection between
Confucianism and a major approach in philosophy and ethics of technology,
i.e., the theory of technological mediation. By probing into the theoretical and
practical dimensions of both philosophies, Hung argues that the main focus
of technological mediation for Confucianism will be about the extension of
human-human relations to human-technology relations. He also observes that
collective technological mediation will be more readily accepted in Confucian-
based cultures. So, learning from Confucianism, which emphasizes people as
members of the community rather than autonomous individuals, the theory of
technological mediation may avoid an excessive focus on individuals, thereby
making collectively mediating technologies plausible.
Chapter 4, Self-Cultivation of the Confucian Engineer: What Engineering Ethics
Education Can Learn from Confucian Moral Theory, is written by Qin Zhu. He

Introduction 7
explores how Confucian moral theory can provide a different approach to

engineering ethics education. Zhu argues that a Confucian approach to engi-
neering ethics education places more emphasis on the ontological aspect of
professional education (or, the theory of being that concerns questions such
as who engineering students are becoming in the learning process), and thus
views professional education as a lifelong character-building and moral refine-
ment process. Zhu also introduces the Confucian theory of self-cultivation and
discusses its relevance for engineering ethics education and the professional
formation of engineers. Based on Confucian moral theory, he highlights the
moral significance of everyday, minor and seemingly “amoral” decisions for
engineering ethics education.
Pak-Hang Wong continues to explore the applicability of Confucian phi-
losophy to the normative thinking about technology in Chapter 5, Artificial
Intelligence, Personal Decisions, Consent, and the Confucian Idea of Oneness. He
proposes that the pervasiveness of AI systems has brought forth a new back-
ground condition he calls “the interconnectedness condition”, in which every
individual is tightly and seamlessly connected. Wong argues that, in the inter-
connectedness condition, everyday decision-making and consent-giving are
transformed from self-regarding acts to other-regarding acts, and that the
changing moral character introduces a new moral responsibility to account for
others’ values and interests in making personal decisions and giving consent.
Wong admits, however, that this new responsibility can be difficult for Western
ethics and political philosophy to understand and accept. So, he turns to the
Confucian idea of oneness to elaborate on the new responsibility in the inter-
connectedness condition.
In Chapter 6, Confucian Personhood and the Scientific Spirit: Ren as the Foundation
of Confucian Ethics of Technology, Fei Teng revisits the challenge to (re)integrate
Confucianism with science and defends the New Confucian understanding of
the scientific spirit, which is built on the innate virtue of ren (仁). She starts by
elaborating on the virtue-based account of personhood in New Confucianism,
and then discusses, through the works of New Confucian Tang Jungyi, how
this account of personhood provides a normative ground for the development of
science and technology. For Teng, and for the New Confucians, scientific prac-
tices can be viewed as an externalization of ren and as a moral practice, and thus
scientific research and technology development should be guided by (Confucian)
virtues. In this way, Teng offers an interesting counterpart to the idea of respon-
sible innovation for defending the importance of ethics in scientific research and
technology development.
Finally, in the Epilogue, The Future of Confucian Ethics of Technology, Wang
and Wong review the key ideas articulated in the volume to identify possible
ways forward for Confucian ethics of technology. Together with the other chap-
ters in the volume, we aim to revive Confucianism for philosophical and ethical
analysis of technology and present the Confucian ethics of technology as another
approach to the ethics of technology.

8 Introduction
Notes
1 Notable exceptions include Shannon Vallor (2016), who draws from Confucianism and
Buddhism in her works, and Michel Puech (2016), who draws from Daoism, Buddhism,
and Neo-Confucianism. Also, Mark Coeckelberg (2020) includes some discussion on
transcultural philosophy in his recent textbook on philosophy of technology. There are
also philosophers and ethicists in the field of Intercultural Information Ethics (or, more
recently, Intercultural Digital Ethics) who aim to introduce non-Western traditions into
the discussion of information/digital ethics, e.g., Capurro (2010), Hongladarom (2016),
Ess (2020a, 2020b).
2 The terms “the West” and “non-West” as well as other related terms should be under-
stood as the shortcut we use for referring to a specific family of cultures in Europe and
North America that exhibits family resemblance, i.e., “the West”, and to those cultures
that are excluded from this family of cultures, i.e., “non-West”. We are fully aware of the
differences within different traditions in “the West” and in “non-West”, but nonetheless
the terms remain useful to emphasize the dominance of the European and North Amer-
ican cultures.
3 Ernest Kapp first used the term “philosophy of technology” in 1877, and the philosoph-
ical and normative analysis of technology is subsequently picked up by philosophers and
thinkers in Germany, France, the United States, and other Western countries. We shall
not provide an overview of the history of philosophy of technology in this Introduction,
for excellent introductions to the field, see Mitcham (1994), Verbeek (2005), Coeckel-
berg (2020).
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bii.ia.ac.cn/hai/

1
CONFUCIAN RITUAL TECHNICITY
AND PHILOSOPHY OF
TECHNOLOGY
Tom Xiaowei Wang
1.1 Background
Few will doubt that modern life is fully technologically mediated, and that
acquiring some knowledge of technology has become the precondition to sur-
vive and thrive in contemporary society. There is a growing effort dedicated
to philosophy of technology for understanding the nature of technology and
its impacts on every walks of people’s life. However, the scholarly discussion
has until very recently been dominated by Anglo-European perspectives and
almost no other tradition is (re)presented in the discussion. As China has estab-
lished herself into a major technological power in the world, e.g., with prom-
inent technology firms such as Baidu, Alibaba, and Tencent (BAT) competing
with other technology companies in the world market, and to the extent that
technology development and use is informed by local traditions, understanding
Chinese traditions seems to become crucial for comprehending technology and
its impacts across the globe. Against the background of the (post)phenomeno-
logical approach to philosophy of technology, this chapter aims to introduce the
idea of Confucian ritual technicity to think with technology, thereby defending
the relevance of Confucianism in philosophy of technology.
A majority of work in philosophy of technology is concerned with the ethical
implications of technology and intend to address the value conflicts introduced
by novel and disruptive technologies, e.g., how genome editing technology may
challenge human dignity. It is helpful to note that ethical analysis of technology
often does not address the nature of technology, but to explore—taking tech-
nology as a neutral tool—how its use and implementation interact with widely
acknowledged human values (Barbour 1993; Beyleveld & Brownsword 1998;
BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Chp01.indd 10 27/11/20 10:06 AM

Confucian ritual technicity and philosophy 11
Reynolds 2011). Although this approach is useful to provide policy, ethical, and
legal guidelines to real-life technological practices, it does not look into the
essence of technology, leaving the black box unopened, and subsequently fails to
provide us with a deeper insight into the ethical entanglement of technology.1
To address the ethical conundrums we find in technology, we need the help
from philosophy of technology to clarifying and deepening of our understanding
of the relations between technology and authentic human life. In this respect,
Martin Heidegger (1977) made the first attempt to discuss the technology as a
mode of Being, i.e., to treat beings, including human beings, as mere standing
reserve ready to be challenged. Despite referring to various concrete artifacts,
such as bridge, temple, and jug, Heidegger was not actually interested in studying
individual artifacts per se—the effort characterized by him as ontic—he was fully
engaged in discussing the ontology of technology, namely the essence of technol-
ogy as a way of existence. It is fair to say Heidegger was interested in discussing
the ontological condition of technology instead of concrete technologies.
The empirical turn in philosophy of technology, which shifts the focus
from the preconditions of technology to concrete technologies and technological
artifacts, aims to fill the void of classical philosophy of technology (Crease &
Achterhuis 2001). Don Ihde (2009) pioneers the empirical turn by developing
a postphenomenology approach that combines phenomenological investigation
with a pragmatistic analysis of experience. In postphenomenology, experience
is understood as an embodied knowledge developed along with the interplay
between organisms and their environment. As such, Ihde intends to overcome the
subjectivism in the classical phenomenology with his approach of postphenome-
nology. Ihde’s philosophy and the postphenomenological approach to philosophy
of technology have been gaining worldwide popularity. Postphenomenology
pins down the conception of experience, addressing how technological activities
affect our agency, and how human agency, as situated in the tempo-spatial hori-
zon, shapes our understanding and creative use of various tools. To comprehend
the mutual constitution of human and tools is a journey to the ultimate existen-
tial reality of the lifeworld.
With postphenomenology, Ihde (1990) is able to sort human–technology–
world relations into four categories, namely embodied relations, background
relations, hermeneutic relations, and alterity relations2: wearing a pair of glasses
makes individuals embody them as an extension (or, a compensation) of their
eyesight; a heater works in the background, without being noticed, mediates our
experience in and of the world; a thermometer, by displaying numeric figures,
hermeneutically relates us to the reality; and, in withdrawing money from a cash
machine, individuals directly engage with the machine and experience how it
works, as the machine becomes a partner of interaction. The key of postphenom-
enology, and what Ihde labels as relational ontology, is that (technological) agency
is co-constituted by the artifacts, their users, and the environmental embeddings
where they are situated. Postphenomenology views artifacts not merely as inert,
functional objects but as actors that mediate our worldly experience. Peter-Paul

12 Tom Xiaowei Wang
Verbeek (2010, 2011) picks up Ihde’s mediation theory and discusses further the
moral significance of technology in his philosophy of design with an aim to
moralizing technology. Recently, postphenomenology has also received much
attention in China, and the question is how and whether philosophical resources
in China can deepen the postphenomenological approach.
1.2 Phenomenology or postphenomenology?

Classical phenomenology mostly deals with human experience as an epistemology
(Zahavi 2003), whereas Heidegger shifts the focus to praxis, and in doing so, he
studies how we live in the mode of technological Being. For Heidegger (1977),
we view a river merely as a force for the water mill vis-à-vis a floating spirit due
to the fact that we were thrown into a particular mode of Being, namely Gestell
(enframing). We respond to Gestell by representing every being as a standing
reserve to be ordered wishfully. Heidegger resolves to the idea of the thing-
ness of things for a solution. Thingness, i.e., what makes a thing a thing, is a
multi-dimensional horizon through which the fourfold -heaven, earth, mor-
tals, and divinities -gathers and reveals itself (Mitchell 2015). Despite being
notoriously vague in his explanation of the fourfold, Heidegger is much success-
ful in foregrounding the crisis introduced by the technologization of the life-
world. For him, the technological activities, as a mode of Being, impoverish our
comprehensive existence. Heidegger’s critique examines technological practice
at the level of ontology, rendering philosophy of technology a subject of first
philosophy.
However, beyond the critique, there is not much that can be told from
Heidegger’s philosophy of technology. To address technology as an ontological
vis-à-vis ontic matter reveals certain reality but, at the same time, conceals the
complex influences of various technological artifacts. For instance, Heidegger’s
critique of technology requires him to treat modern agricultural technologies as
worse as gas chambers, for they both treat beings—earth or human lives—as a
mere standing reserve to be used, and this is deeply troubling for many. Arguing
Heidegger’s critique as nostalgic, extremely general, and abstract, which dis-
cusses the “transcendental” preconditions of technology instead of any concrete
technologies, Ihde and Verbeek both accuse Heidegger of lacking philosophical
resource to study technologically mediated reality that consists diverse concrete
technological artifacts.
Although postphenomenologists, in particular, Ihde and Verbeek, have argued
the very difference between phenomenology and postphenomenology lies in that
the latter does not think in the wholesale sense that technology reduces our
reality, thereby alienating us from authentic life, postphenomenologists have
not provided an equivalent ontology to refute Heidegger’s thesis (Ihde 1995).
The relational ontology of postphenomenology aims to be merely descriptive,
describing how our experience of the world is mediated and/or co-constituted
by technology; and, furthermore, as Verbeek has endeavored, illustrating the

ethical implications of these experience. Here, the lesson of postphenomenology

is twofold: (i) it informs us of the knowledge that makes various artifacts differ-
ent, (ii) it shows how technology, as individual artifacts, mediates our experience
with the world.
I believe phenomenology and postphenomenology should not be read as
mutually exclusive. Heidegger’s existential ontology needs not to reject relational
ontology and vice versa. We can retain Heidegger’s ontological insight about mod-
ern technology in general, while at the same time take postphenomenology as
a method to analyze how concrete technological artifacts constitute our experi-
ence of the lifeworld. In particular, the notion of “civilizational given” proposed
by Ihde over his reading of Heidegger may work as the ground for combing these
two approaches (Ihde 1979, pp. 106–107). Heidegger holds that no being is given,
but appears differently in different fields, namely the sphere that makes sense of
a particular type of revealing. Technology vis-à-vis craftsmanship is one variant
among the others that transforms the “civilizational given” to a new mode of
Being that reveals beings as standing reserve. The “civilizational given” seem-
ingly consists of both the customs (or traditions) of a particular stage of human
history and the metaphysics behinds them. Heidegger refers to the “civilizational
given” for coping with crisis introduced by modern technology. By discussing
the idea of Techne as Poiesis (bringing forth) of the civilizational given, Heidegger
introduces a notion of the thingness of things, and argues further that it is the
fourfold, i.e., heaven, earth, mortals, and divinities, that characterizes thingness
(Davis 2014). In this way, Heidegger attempts to identify some horizons that help
Dasein to transcend the Gestell, so as to retain our existential freedom.
Ihde adopts the cultural aspect of the civilizational given and applies the
notion to investigate why the same kind of artifacts has taken up various forms
in his multistability thesis. In his experimental phenomenology, culture works
as a macro-horizon that shapes how things appear to us in various forms. With
this in mind, we might be able to reconsider technology by reconstructing the
macro-horizon through which they appear to us. Several scholars have discussed
the multistabilities of technology in different cultures (Bockover 2003; Wang
2016; Wong 2013). Inspired by both Heidegger and Ihde, my question is about
the role of the “civilizational given” in giving rise to the different revealing of
technological artifacts. From the Heideggerian perspective, it means exploring
how this notion helps to free us from the dominance of technological enfram-
ing, whereas from Ihde’s viewpoint, we can ask how the “civilizational given”
enables us to make sense of specific technological artifacts. Here, I argue that
traditional Confucianism embraces a ritual dimension of technology that has
long been missing in the contemporary society, and to restore ritual technicity
of artifacts might help us to lead a more comprehensive life. Ritual, as a part of
and the origin of culture, provides us with a dialectical view on technological
artifacts, which both appreciates and transcends the practicality of technological
artifacts, and, as a result, embraces two general types of human–technology rela-
tions, i.e., to use and to perform.

14 Tom Xiaowei Wang
1.3 On Confucian ritual technicity

Heidegger emphasizes pre-modern uses of artifacts much in his analysis, through
which he introduces the notion of thingness, namely the gathering of the four-
fold (heaven, earth, mortals, and divinities). Despite his obscurity, what is clear
is Heidegger’s appreciation of the ritual dimension of technology as an element
of the “civilizational given”. For Heidegger, a casket is not merely a box for the
corpse, but it is rather a gathering of life and death and of hope and despair.
The coffin presents itself not in a void but in the backdrop of a funeral that is
inherently ritualistic. However, Heidegger has not articulated a view of ritual as
the “civilizational given”. Ihde (1986) shows that technology is situated in the
macro-horizon of culture, and yet he also has not specified how rituals play a role
in the macro-horizon. Here, I shall add a ritual dimension to human–technology
relations. A ritualized relationship transcends human experience from the limits
of practicality to sacred truth. The idea of ritualized relationship may sound
bizarre to a modern, secularized individual, and yet the rituality of (technolog-
ical) artifacts has long been celebrated in the Confucian tradition. I hold that
certain aspects of reality are intangible without engaging ritualized artifacts.
Indeed, anthropologists have proposed that Homo sapiens had made more stone
tools than they could possibly use, and the superfluous tools might be made for
ritual purposes.
1.3.1 The case of Confucian archery

I shall start with the case of archery to illustrate the ritual dimension of arti-
facts. Ihde (1986) discusses at length the case of archery in explaining his con-
cept of multistabilities. He points out that the English longbow differs from
the Mongolian horsebow due to the different wood materials, body skills, and
cultural context. The case of archery aims to demonstrate the use of technology
makes sense only against a particular background, in particular a cultural con-
text, as the macro-horizon shapes, through a Gestalt switch, how the technolog-
ical artifact appears to us.
Archery in Confucianism is another interesting variant. It does not only serve
in hunting but it is also considered as one of the seven cardinal skills to be per-
formed by all nourished junzi (Chen 2002; Song 2006). In Confucian archery,
the target symbolizes the right goal to be fulfilled. To shoot the target accord-
ing to various embodied rites represents a junzi achieving his ends according to
the demands of humanity: one’s standing firm and shooting straight symbolize
the junzi’s adherence of the right way and not being distracted by their wanton
desires. Here, it is clear that Confucian archery bears not only a practical func-
tion for hunting, but also a symbolical function for performing moral consum-
mation. It becomes a technological variation that transcends practicality. Indeed,
Confucian archery only makes sense in its cultural context. (Early-)Confucians
believe that one could not embody morality by simply embracing an abstract

moral epistemology. To fully realized humanity, Confucians believe that one

needs to engage their mind and body with materiality and the functions of spe-
cific artifacts in both practical and ritual manner. In short, the ritual dimension
of artifacts is deeply rooted in the Confucian cosmology, which works as a “civ-
ilizational given” for concealing and revealing.
1.3.2 Confucian cosmological personhood

Confucianism differentiates three types of human–thing relations, namely I (a)
see, (b) use, and (c) perform things: to see is to investigate, to use is to serve,
and to perform is to embody. The three relations are different but mutually
constitutive. To articulate the nature of the three relations, we need to first
examine the concept of Confucian cosmological personhood. This concept, as a
macro-horizon, shapes how artifacts appear to Confucians.3
Confucian concept of person differs significantly from that of the Western
philosophical traditions. Taking Kant as an example, Kant holds that it is the per-
sons’ free rational agency that makes them unique. Human beings are different
from other beings, plants, and animals, for instance, in the way that they are not
fully determined by natural laws and instincts. Human beings are free in their
agency, as their reason legislates their own will. Persons are both law-givers and
followers. As such, they are autonomous agents who act upon their own rational
will against their natural desires. Kant ascribes great value to personal auton-
omy, claiming that anything that meets only our natural needs has a finite price,
whereas the condition that constitutes us as ends in ourselves, namely, autonomy,
is unconditionally valuable. As such, persons, as the source of normativity, are
ontologically different from other beings, and technology is thus seen merely as
a tool to be used for practical purposes. Technology contributes nothing to the
agency, as our rational nature is grounded in the metaphysics (Kant 1998).
In contrast to the view of atomic and autonomous person, Confucianism
focuses on the idea of cosmological personhood, which embraces human being’s
differences with other beings, such as mountains, animals, plants, without main-
taining an ontological dualism (Wang 2018). Confucians consider human beings
to be different from other beings as they possess unique conscience that allows
them to understand and actualize cosmological unity, i.e., the ultimate existential
reality of human (Henderson 2011). Here, the cosmology should not be under-
stood in astronomical terms but as an existential realm where human, heaven,
and earth are mutually constitutive to one another. The Confucian cosmos is a
result of qi (气) dynamic. The li-qi (理气) relationship is the most debated topic in
the Neo-Confucianism. Li literally means the heavenly pattern, while qi is often
understood as the material or the practice of li. Li guides qi, while qi actualizes (or
concretizes) li. There are scholars who prefer a more radical ontology, regarding
qi as the very basis of their cosmogony (Chen 2011; Lee 2001; Liu 2015).
For instance, the prominent Neo-Confucian philosopher Liu Jishan proposes
a unique cosmogony and creatively correlates qi with the four basic categories of

16 Tom Xiaowei Wang
impulses/feelings. When the dynamic qi initiates itself, this stage can be identi-
fied as happiness. It represents the faculty of creating or originating and corre-
sponds to the season of spring. When it comes to the objective/intersubjective,
this is called humanity; when it comes to the subjective, this is the heart of
compassion. Like spring bringing beings into life, the heart of compassion is
devoted to making a person feel genuinely happy about others’ presence and to
motivate them to help those whose lives are in trouble. When the qi dynamic is
successfully put into practice, it results in joy. It represents the cultivation of the
heavenly pattern, and corresponds to the season of summer. As an intersubjective
force, it manifests itself in ritual; as a subjective presence, it shows itself as the
heart of modesty. Like summer, which lets every being grow without conflict
and therefore cultivates growth, rituals and modesty teach people how to live
together, and this sort of communal life brings us a sense of joy. When qi restricts
itself, it is called solemnity. It represents advantageousness or fruitfulness and
corresponds to the season of autumn. It means righteousness for the intersub-
jective experience, and a feeling of shame for the subjective. As things become
fruitful during autumn, righteousness and shame grow as people mature, making
them solemn. Lastly, when qi pauses, it is called sadness. It represents firmness
and corresponds to winter. It entails intersubjective wisdom and a sense of right
and wrong within the domain of the subjective. Just as winter is cold and requires
perseverance, wisdom and a sense of right and wrong make people cool-headed
and stable, and the contemplation that comes along with wisdom is perceived as
sadness.
Heaven, with its highness and all-encompassingness, represents dao, i.e., the
constant law that rules; earth, with its firmness and groundingness, nourishes
and supports human life; and, human beings, as unique beings of conscience,
live under heaven through its four seasons (spring, summer, autumn, and win-
ter) and on earth through four phrases of organic life (birth, aging, sickness,
and death), and practice the four grand virtues of originating (yuan 元), pen-
etration (heng 亨), being advantageous (li 利), and becoming correct and firm
(zhen 贞). Heaven, earth, and human correspond to each other, embracing also a
mutually constitutive relation. With heaven, the groundingness of earth appears;
and, earth contrasts the highness of heaven. Both heaven and earth serve as an
existential space where human lives through. Human beings become a person
as they stand between heaven and earth, and because of their unique position,
heaven and earth become meaningful. As they make a constant effort to interpret
their existence as constituted by the heavenly pattern and materiality. With their
effort, heaven, earth, and human exist together as a (sacred) unity. Being situated
and constitutive in this unity, persons home themselves. Confucian cosmological
personhood is characterized by living with the four grand virtues corresponding
to the four seasons and four phrases of earthly life.
I hold that the Confucian view on the correspondence among heaven, earth,
and human should not be read as a scientific project but as an existential one,
and therefore the Confucian cosmology should not be dismissed as unscientific

and superstitious. It does not aim to provide a physical model of the universe
and explain what things are. Rather, it attempts to deliver an existential thesis
through which we make sense of ourselves as related to others in a cosmological
unity and so embedded. We clearly do not experience seasons as changing num-
bers on a modern calendar, but we are embedded in the seasons and live them
through traditional activities. In the Chinese (Lunar) calendar, seasons and days
are viewed as (un)favorable for marriage, funeral, travel, etc. These activities are
arranged and prescribed on the basis of resonation between the nature and our
conscience. For instance, spring brings forth life and vitality, and as we expe-
rience the season of spring as creative and hopeful, it is therefore conducive to
celebrate marriage.
With the cosmological personhood in mind, Confucian sages educate peo-
ple to approach the existential reality through carefully studying, i.e., to see
and investigate, the law of nature (gewu 格物), paying existential attention to
the things they use, as our conscience ontologically corresponds to these things
(Chen 2018; Luo 2012; Shen 2012). Confucian sages encourage people to relate
mundane activities, including the use of technological artifacts, to the culti-
vation of cosmological personhood. As such, Confucian literati have devel-
oped a variety of technics, such as music, calligraphy, and chess-playing, to
nourish themselves. For example, music, which imitates the sound of nature,
is crucial for moral cultivation, as tones and sound are moralized objects
corresponding to our conscience; and, in calligraphy, the force we apply to
brushes and the tempo-spatial arrangement of brush strokes are seen as a way
to achieve inner peace. Similarly, furniture and architecture are displayed
and used by Confucian junzi to achieve and express Confucian virtues. So
construed, daily activities are not merely used as an expression of our agency,
but they constitute our agency, i.e., the performance of these activities makes
who we are.
Along this line, Confucianism has even developed a concept of yigu xingwu
(以故兴物), meaning to summon specific ritual feelings by deploying artifacts in
the demanded manner (Yao 2014). It is believed that by tempo-spatially arrang-
ing artifacts, the materiality and functions of things will resonate with our con-
science, thereby eliciting strong transcendental feelings of cosmological unity
crucial to our authentic existence. Note that the idea of yigu xingwu is radically
different from the idea of simply using artifacts for ritual purposes. The robotic
monks deployed in Japan is a paradigmatic example of the latter kind (Rambelli
2018). The robotic monks do not contribute to the formulation of rituals, and
they are merely used in the well-established rituals with clearly defined roles.
Moreover, their symbolic meaning is exclusively appointed by human intention
without introducing any re-designed/re-tailored physical structure. What I am
interested in is the more nuanced ritual embeddedness in (technological) arti-
facts. I shall take taishi chairs, i.e., an important piece of furniture for Chinese
literati, to offer a more detailed elaboration of the conceptual structure of yi gu
xingwu.

18 Tom Xiaowei Wang
1.3.3 The case of taishi chair

Taishi chair (see Figure 1.1) became prominent in Song dynasty (960–1279). It is
crafted not for just sitting/resting but for performing a ritual of solemnness that
aims to attain cosmological personhood. Taishi chair evolves from the Song to
Qing dynasty with many variations. In the Song dynasty, it took the form of a
well-crafted folding chair, while the round-backed armchair took up the role
in the Ming dynasty. It was later reshaped in the Qing dynasty with a vertical
straight back as well as hard enamel and vertical arms. The yellow pear wood was
replaced by the more expensive red sandalwood. The chair, as a piece of daily
furniture, clearly embraces rituality (Chen 1983; Gao 2004; Hu 1996). Here, I
identify three types of ritual representations in taishi chairs.
FIGURE 1.1 Photo of Yokeback Armchair in the Metropolitan Museum of Art by

Beatrice Pinto. Available in the public domain via https://www.metmuseum.org/
art/collection/search/39493

Esthetics. The esthetics of the ritualized artifacts is constituted by their

form (their shapes, colors, etc.) and materiality (strength and texture of their
materials), and the form and materiality are both considered as embodied.
Wood, for its vitality in the Chinese cosmology, is used for the living person,
while stone, as cold and inert, is for the deceased. Colors also correlate to the
seasons, orientations, and virtues, and are inherently a ceremonial matter.
Circles represent heaven, the unity of the family, while squares represent
earth, the integrity of junzi. The shape, color, texture, and size of taishi chairs
are all ritualized on the basis of Confucian cosmology, with an aim to create
a micro-cosmos in and through using/performing everyday tools, mirroring
the grand cosmos. Yet, it is not too difficult to grasp the rituals in and through
these artifacts, as they build on our immediate existential experience. We
feel awe to gigantic buildings, or soothed when covered by velvet blankets.
These daily activities facilitate the development of Confucian cosmological
personhood.
In the case of taishi chairs, the design renders them very uncomfortable to
sit in. The shape of taishi chairs restricts the sitters’ freedom to sit at ease: their
back has to stay straight, with their hands resting horizontally on the chair
arms. The seat and chair arms are made from hardwood, delivering no com-
fortable sitting experience. However, the result is intended. The straight back
of taishi chairs symbolizes the integrity of junzi, who are expected to follow the
straight path. The top of the chairs’ back often takes the shape of an official’s hat,
which represents the social status of the owners. In addition, the four horizon-
tal bars connecting the four legs of taishi chairs symbolize the hierarchy of soci-
ety with their different height. The person who sits in a taishi chair is supposed
to be a junzi, and the way the person sits in the chair also performs the virtues
directly to himself and others. The esthetic of taishi chairs, therefore, presents
to the spectators plenty of ritual loads. When seeing a taishi chair, a person’s
attention will be drawn into a journey to cosmological meanings. Those who
are confronted with taishi chairs almost immediately grasp their solemnness
by imagining their own body interacting with the chairs. This experience is
certainly not merely practical but also partly esthetic, which transcends human
from sitting as resting to sitting as a ritual for celebrating cosmological person-
hood, i.e., junzi and sagehood.
Function. The virtue-forming character of functional tools has long been
noted by Chinese thinkers. Zhuangzi recalls a conversation between a young
man and an old man on irrigating the old man’s vegetable garden. The old man
uses a jar to water his field, and the young man suggests him to use a water pump
instead. However, the old man rejects the suggestion and says,
“I have heard from my teacher that, where there are ingenious contriv-
ances, there are sure to be subtle doings; and that, where there are subtle
doings, there is sure to be a scheming mind. But, when there is a scheming
mind in the breast, its pure simplicity is impaired. When this pure simplic-
ity is impaired, the spirit becomes unsettled, and the unsettled spirit is not

20 Tom Xiaowei Wang
the proper residence of the Dao. It is not that I do not know (the contriv-
ance which you mention), but I should be ashamed to use it”.
(Zhuangzi, Outer Chapters, Heaven and Earth 11, in Legge 1891)
Zhuangzi’s view is that the very reason behind the function of the (techno-
logical) artifacts is to manipulate things to an extent that human beings can
make most of them. Despite being a Daoist fable, this mentality aligns well
with Confucianism. For example, when Yan Hui asks about governing a state,
Confucius responds,
“Follow the calendar of the Xia, travel in the carriages of the Shang, and
clothe yourself in the ceremonial caps of the Zhou. As for music, listen
only to the Shao and Wu. Prohibit the tunes of Zheng, and keep glib peo-
ple at a distance—for the tunes of Zheng are licentious, and glib people
are dangerous”.
(The Analects 15.11, in Slingerland 2003, pp. 178–179)
Confucius associates licentious melodies with glib people, and suggests that those
who appreciate tunes of Zheng will become glib and insincere. The calendar,
transport, clothes, and music are technics that (co-)constitute human agency and
shape conscience through our bodily interaction with them.
I contend that rituality and practicality are not mutually exclusive. Animal
carcass, as sacrificial meat, is an artifact cooked and presented in a specific way,
and its ritual significance predicates on its edibility. In effect, only edible flesh
is eligible to be sacrificial meat. After the ceremony, the sacrificial meat is often
distributed to the prayers as food. Here, the point of the ritual is to worship the
divinity by offering them what is crucial and precious to human life. Ritual
participants have to consume the meat in a prescribed manner to complete the
ritual. As such, the practicality of artifacts is the precondition for their rituality.
Similarly, artifacts might not be able to fulfill their practical function when their
rituality is not appreciated. For instance, a house is not a home until specific ritu-
als have been performed.4 A house is viewed as a home that protects, unites, and
nourishes its dwellers; without completing the required rituals, a house is merely
a pile of bricks and concrete slab. Rituality, in this sense, can be viewed as the
precondition of the artifacts’ practicality. Accordingly, rituality and practicality
are mutually constitutive.
I hold that the practical function of artifacts should also have the affordance
to invite and persuade their users to engage with artifacts in rituals. Taishi chairs
invite their users to sit in with an uncomfortable but solemn gesture, imbuing
them with a sense of piousness. The gesture also fits specific types of activities,
such as a formal meeting with honorable guests, while unfits for others, such as
having a nap. Besides resting, taishi chairs also serve to form virtuous characters:
people who often sit straight, as a result of the constraints imposed by the chair,
will eventually embody the sitting gesture even when in the public. They will

be viewed as virtuous insofar as the body is considered as the site of expressing

one’s inner virtues. Moreover, to sit properly in taishi chairs, a person has to
develop muscle memory and ritual mentality to be able to sit in the chair for
long. The chair, instead of merely being used, also demands our collaboration,
and through the interaction between the chair and the user, one develops a tran-
scendental experience in sitting, i.e., to perform the sitting as how we are homed
in the cosmos. Here, to sit is not just to rest, but to unchain oneself from any
external force that keeps one constantly being occupied, thereby retaining one’s
existential freedom to contemplate the very existence of beings and leading to a
cosmological experience of all things are in one (sacred) unity. Sitting, therefore,
symbolizes one finding their authentic status in the cosmos.
Prescription. Cultures and traditions also prescribe how technology is to be
used. First, (technological) artifacts are arranged tempo-spatially together with
other things. Taishi chairs are normally placed in pairs, expected to be used in
a particular period of daytime, allocated in the center of the living room, at the
two sides of a tea table and in front of a long, narrow table (Baxinzhuo 八仙桌).
Chinese differentiates between wu (屋 public space) and shi (室 private space).
Wu is the public space for public discussion, whereas shi is the private space for
rest and study. To be public, Baxinzhuo is placed at the focal area of wu, and the
accent wall behind Baxinzhuo is usually decorated with paintings and/or callig-
raphy plagues that express family mottos. The temporal-spatial arrangement of
taishi chairs demands both devoted emotion and ritual skills to actually use them.
One should treat the chairs, including their arrangement with awe and honor.
A person’s facial expression and body gestures should perform and embody the
attitude while managing to sit properly. Here, the chairs are clearly not perceived
as an inanimate object, but a thing related existentially to other things in the
room in accordance with the correlative cosmology. Hence, to sit in taishi chairs
is always simultaneously a practical and ritual activity that enables a Confucian
way of living.
In short, the esthetic, attitudinal, and bodily interactions between human
beings and artifacts constitute our agency. It can be understood as a form of
nourishment/cultivation. A person who uses a taishi chair should live as a junzi in
an effortless manner. Taishi chairs are not only used but also performed. Rituals
can only be performed with full devotion. To perform is not merely to use, as
performing does not presume a subject–object/human–tool distinction nor an
instrumental mentality; performing demands the performers to be fully devoted
to the activities, negating their self-awareness and transcending the divide
between I and that, so as to give themselves fully to the ecstatic experience of
the transcendental. One performs rituals not for any further purposes above the
rituals themselves. Like dancing, a genuine dance performance is performed not
for the spectators but with them to summon a comprehensive esthetic experience,
rituals are not performed for the blessing or impunity from divinities, as rituals
themselves are blessings and salvation. In this section, I have discussed the ritual-
ity of technological artifacts through the case of taishi chair case. The remaining

22 Tom Xiaowei Wang
question is whether the ritual dimension of artifacts might sill bear on and reso-
nate with our contemporary life.
1.4 Ritual technicity and its modern relevance

Intuitively, we can consider a technical artifact to be either practical or ritual,
for it to be both seems to be absurd. Mongolian archery is practical but not
ritual, and Confucian archery is ritualistic. Today, even taishi chairs have lost
their cosmological horizon, leaving us nothing but the beauty of their form.
Nevertheless, in everyday life, we still often treat technology and technological
artifacts with both practical and ritual awareness. When we are marveled by
brain–computer interface or genome editing technology, we are called to ponder
upon our fundamental ways of our existence: what is the ultimate meaning of
life; how do, and should, we relate our current self to the possible self and other
beings; and how do, and should, we situate our life in the cosmos. Technology,
especially novel and disruptive technology, reconfigures the familiarity of every-
day life, and to use them often introduces both practical and ritual experience.
Indeed, the ritual and practical dimension of artifacts are tightly entangled, as
Edmund Leach has argued for a continuity mode of daily activities, as he puts it:
“Actions fall into place on a continuous scale. At one extreme, we have

actions which are entirely profane, entirely functional, technique pure and
simple; at the other, we have actions which are entirely sacred, strictly aes-
thetic, technically non-functional. Between these two extremes we have
the great majority of social actions which partake partly of the one sphere
and partly of the other. From this point of view, technique and ritual, pro-
fane and sacred, do not denote types of action but aspects of almost of any
kind of action”.
(Leach 2000, p. 154)
I believe this anthropological observation is indeed accurate. Daily activities

are mostly practical and ritualistic. Yet, the ritual dimension of artifacts is often
forgotten, or ruled out in philosophy of technology, largely because we tend
to depict human life primarily as scientific. Scientific (instrumental) rational-
ity ensues a form of subjectivity that pits human against their environments,
and perceives human as disembodied, disinterest observers. The interest of sci-
ence is to discover the laws of nature so as to use them to tame the world for
human interests. For scientific rationality, the world is merely an inert, disen-
chanted object, ready to be used by human beings. Modernity is characterized
by this grand narrative of human–world relationship (Whimster & Lash 2014),
and together with consumerism, i.e., to consume is merely to satisfy immediate
desires, modern technology impoverishes the comprehensive human existence.
Insofar as human beings see themselves as the ultimate value-conferrers, who
treat other beings merely as means for their ends, they are being practical. Here,

using something practically does not only mean using it for meeting any needs
but for meeting needs that lack a transcendental dimension.
Scholars have long noted the problem introduced by the dominance of sci-
entific rationality. Émile Durkheim (2001), in his study of sociology and reli-
gion, suggests that the profane life characterized by practical activities breeds
a strong sense of individuality that could tear the community apart. Here, two
hypotheses may help to account for Durkheim’s observation. First and empirical,
practical activities are mostly concerned with the acquisition and distribution
of scarce resources, which gives rise to fierce competition among individuals.
Moreover, practical activities often strengthen human’s self-awareness of their
individual needs, and thus encourage them to acquire more. These two tenden-
cies are further dramatized by the use of technology, as technology is an efficient
tool for accumulating resources and power. Second and ontological, as I have
pointed out, that practicality prioritizes individuals as value-conferrers that mat-
ter. Accordingly, the selfish individual remains at the center of life stage, and the
communal life recedes to the background.
To prevent the collapse of the community, Durkheim refers to ritual activi-
ties as a remedy. Religions, festivals, and ceremonies are non-practical activities
that transcend human as individuals into members of the heavenly kingdom via
a divinity. Individuals can consider themselves as related to the divinity, living
their life through it, and contemplating their death (as the afterlife) in accordance
with it. As such, human beings are able to interpret their existence as communal.
Along this line, I hold that artifacts are both practical and ritualistic even today,
and it is important for the contemporary life to reinvigorate the ritual dimension
of (technological) artifacts for the good life. I shall now turn to critically recon-
sider technology from this perspective.
1.5 Technology reconsidered

Based on the idea of ritual technicality, we ought to question not merely
how technology is used, or how our use of technology endangers freedom,
restricts/enhances certain choices, but to critically reflect on how we perform
technology.
First, we should consider how technology facilitates our ritual imagination.
Here, three questions need to be addressed. First and descriptive, we need
to carefully describe how specific kinds of technology encourage a discourse
of ritual imagination that transcends their practicality. Genome editing tech-
nology, for instance, facilitates a discourse in which the very foundation of
humanity is challenged. The image/esthetics of genome editing technology
points to a utopia where human beings become immortal. Here, the precondi-
tions of the practical function of genome editing technology are: first, we see
human beings as mortal creatures that are biologically limited; second, being
mortal is bad, as mortality (including illness and natural death) is undesira-
ble; third, the cure for mortality is through technological advancement. This

24 Tom Xiaowei Wang
narrative about human and their destiny is inherently religious, and yet the
human beings who are equipped with genome editing technology, and would
become immortal, will certainly reshape the image of human of the old myth.
In this respect, the practical function of genome editing technology affords
ritual imagination. When the Chinese scientists made the first genome-edited
babies, it calls for a phenomenological framework to describe how genome
editing technology is performed by various agents, e.g., He Jiankui, his peer
scientists, and the public, and to explore what the “civilizational given” that
make the particular ritual dimension meaningful. By imagining one’s own
body interacting with this technology, and by socially performing this embod-
ied attitude to the public, genome editing technology is a ritualized activity
that requires detailed phenomenological analysis.
In a similar vein, we also need to explore how the ritual imagination of
technology shapes their practical dimension. Technologists do not necessar-
ily have a clear practical function in mind when they design technology. We
sometimes gradually bring forth technology when performing its prototypes
in the “civilizational given”. If we imagine genome editing technology as a
cure to death, we will most likely use it for human enhancement. The way we
celebrate technological achievements also provide us with a cognitive frame-
work that shapes the form of technology. To reiterate, performing instead of
merely using technology means several things. First, performing things predi-
cated on using it; second, performance is social; and, finally, performance often
serves as a signifier that points to the meaning beyond practicality. In contrast
to using genome editing technology, performing genome editing technology is
always provocative, as it introduces a deeper meaning that goes beyond using
it. It points to immortality, which problematizes the foundation of humanity
that views human beings as mortal creatures. Here, Confucians might reject
genome editing technology insofar as human immortality being incompatible
to the Confucian cosmology.
Moreover, we need to consider how we perceive individual use of technol-
ogy as a public matter. Rituals are inherently a social activity, as they are always
performed by performers and their audience. When taishi chairs are used, they
are always performed in ways that orient oneself to the others, and so the room
where the chairs are placed is thus regarded as a public space. The same can be
applied to other technology as well. Social platforms and various services on
them are made possible because of the massive amount of shared (personal) data
provided and generated by individuals. When we are using these platforms, we
are always using them and, at the same time, performing them to the public. In
the beginning, we expect to use them for networking, but by performing them,
we tend to downplay our privacy, giving away more and more (personal) infor-
mation to the public, thereby making individual acts a public matter, and we
celebrate it as well. Social media becomes a ritual activity that points to a new
understanding of human.

As such, we need to be more attentive to the social nature of performing tech-

nology. We need to be aware of what we are performing, who our audience is,
what our performance means to them, and how others’ performance affects us.
Ritual performance aims to form the cohesion of the community by introducing
transcendental meaning to practical function. For instance, with social media
platforms, it seems a global community is also under way. Here, I am not refer-
ring to various social groups formed on social media platforms based on similar
interests, but to the community of social media platform, i.e., a group of individ-
uals who celebrate social media platforms’ activities, performing as social media
users. In this respect, we need to examine how the ritual/performative dimension
of human–technology interaction brings people together to form a community.
Here, my approach differs from the sociological analysis, which focuses on the
functional feature of social media platforms, the ritual/performative dimension
foregrounds how individuals identify themselves as social media users, and how
they perform this role in various occasions.
Finally, we need to examine how our use of technology, as we perform it,
relates us to authentic existence. As I demonstrated in the case of taishi chair,
Confucian cosmological personhood emphasizes the agency-constitutive role of
performance. By sitting in the chair, with the specific bodily interaction between
the user and the chair, a person’s heart–mind can be cultivated. In other words,
the chair matters not only for meeting practical needs, but also for fulfilling the
ritual purpose of becoming a real junzi and achieving the cosmological person-
hood. Along this line, we can ask how bodily interaction with (technological)
artifacts contributes to our transcendental self-understanding and self-imaging.
Here, two approaches can be further developed. First, as in Confucianism, we
can explore how performing technology in an embodied manner affects our
well-defined self-imaging. This is a retrospective approach that deals with vir-
tues and vices of technology in relation to moral cultivation. The other approach
is to articulate how the embodied experience of technology can transcend a
well-established understanding of lifeworld and introduce a novel interpretation
of human existence.
Peter-Paul Verbeek has also addressed the mediating roles of technology and
argued for embedding moral values in technological artifacts. However, this is
not what I intend here. To embed the value of safety in the speed bump does
change our behaviors, but it does not necessarily transform our moral agency.
Driving over a speed bump at high speed is uncomfortable, but drivers are
likely to return to their old behaviors when the speed bump is removed. The
value being embedded is well-intended but artificial. By contrast, music and
calligraphy cultivate individuals in a different manner. The practical purposes
of music and calligraphy are to learn to sing and write respectively, and yet the
ritual experience of music and calligraphy brings forth non-practical but per-
formative outcomes, as they discipline individuals not by reducing their free-
dom, but by bringing the esthetic/ritual experience of order, tranquility, and a

26 Tom Xiaowei Wang
sense of belonging. The same can be applied to the use of technological artifacts
as well: Global positioning system (GPS) is developed for navigation, but with
the deep integration of GPS in everyday life, people have developed embodied
experience of their particular existential space in which everything is ready to be
picked up. GPS may then introduce a device paradigm and transform individuals
into mere consumers, and it is the agency-constitutive role that is relevant for the
Confucian reflection of technology.
1.6 Conclusion
There is much left to be elaborated on, but this chapter aims to develop an alter-
native perspective for philosophical analysis of technology, i.e., the Confucian
philosophy of technology. The idea of ritual technicality should help to high-
light the performative dimension of human–technology relations that has so far
been underexplored. We do not only use but also perform technology, and by
performing technology, our existential agency is subjected to certain dynamics.
We project a certain image to technology, prescribing how, when, and to what
extent we use technology not merely for its practical function, but also in accord-
ance with the ritual imagination.
Technology in pre-modern Confucian society possesses ritual technicity,
which situates the technology in a cosmological backdrop. Modern mentality,
however, tends to reduce technological practice to mere practicality, whereas
the ritual/performative dimension of technology is barely discussed and made
explicit. To become aware of this, and to systematically explore how the ritual
dimension unwittingly affects our technological practice, is an urgent task for
philosophers of technology. The Confucian resources I referred to are indeed
peculiar to a specific cultural tradition, but the ritual/performative dimension of
technology should remain a useful concept and applicable across different cultures.
For instance, Christian cultures can make use of their own traditions to approach
the ritual technicity unique to them, and to examine how their ritual narratives
help in broadening their horizon for the philosophical analysis of technology.
Notes
1 Alternatively, while the analytic philosophy of technology aims to open the black box
by probing into the engineering of artifacts (Kroes 2012), the analytic approach’s exces-
sive focus on technical details yields few results for broadening our understanding of
technology.
2 Also, see Hung’s “Technological Mediation in and for Confucianism-based Cultures” in
this volume.
3 Here, I shall remind of the diversity within the Confucian tradition.There are numerous
schools of Confucianism flourished in various period of time. What I attempt in this
section is to provide one, among many others, interpretation of Confucianism that is
relevant for discussion in the philosophy of technology.
4 In China, for example, when upper beams of the house are raised, a set of ancient rituals
will be performed for blessing, and when the house is completed, other rituals will be
practiced for house-warming purposes.

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2
DAO, HARMONY, AND
PERSONHOOD
Toward a Confucian Ethics of Technology
Pak-Hang Wong
2.1 Introduction
Until recently, non-Western philosophical traditions are either absent or margin-
alized in philosophy of technology. Philosophers, notably those who are inter-
ested in inter-/cross-cultural issues and those who are in the field of bioethics and
environmental philosophy, have sought to introduce non-Western philosophical
traditions into the debates. However, there are few systematic attempts to con-
struct and articulate general accounts of ethics and technology based on other
non-Western philosophical traditions.1 This situation is understandable, for the
questions of modern sciences and technologies appear to originate from the West;
at the same time, the situation as such is undesirable. Joel J. Kupperman (2010a)
has pointed out, the lone focus on Western philosophical traditions has an inevi-
table narrowing effect. The overall aim of this chapter, therefore, is to introduce
a different account of ethics and technology based on the Confucian tradition. In
doing so, it is hoped that this chapter can form the basis of the Confucian ethics
of technology.
Immediately, there are two major challenges for this task. First, the Confucian
tradition covers an enormous field of study including its metaphysics, epistemol-
ogy, and ethics, which is impractical, if not impossible, to include in the present
chapter. Second, there are numerous conflicting interpretations of Confucianism
from its early inception to the present. It is, therefore, more appropriate to speak
of many Confucianisms than the Confucian tradition. To answer the first chal-
lenge, I shall restrict my discussion only to three notions that, I think, are most
relevant for an account of ethics and technology in a Confucian perspective, i.e.,
BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Chp02.indd 29 21/12/20 3:46 PM

30 Pak-Hang Wong
dao (道), harmony (he 和), and personhood. To answer the second challenge, I
shall elaborate the least controversial interpretation of Confucianism by identify-
ing the basics that are shared or, at least, can be shared, by various interpretations.2
2.2 Dao: the foundation of Confucianism

The term “dao” is often linked to Daoism, i.e., a major rival to Confucianism, but,
as a matter of fact, it is one of the most important notions in Chinese thought.
At the same time, dao is also one of the most elusive notions. It is so because the
notion has been the focus of debates within and between various Chinese philo-
sophical traditions, resulting in a variety of understandings of the term. 3 Yet, for
its importance in Chinese thought, an account of dao is necessary in order to have
a proper understanding of it. Since this chapter focuses on Confucianism, I will
look specifically at the notion of dao in Confucianism. Confucians believe that
the universe is organized and governed by a specific principle, which they called
dao. While Confucians use the term “dao” to refer to the organizing and gov-
erning principle of the universe, the term is also being used in other ways. In a
summary of the meaning of the term “dao”, Bryan Van Norden pointed out that
“[Dao] has several related senses. (1) The original sense was ‘way’, in the
sense of ‘path’ or ‘road’. It came to mean (2) ‘way’, in the sense of ‘the right
way to do something’, or ‘the order that comes from doing things in the
right way’, (3) a linguistic account of a way to do something, or ‘to give a
linguistic account’, (4) a metaphysical entity responsible for the way things
act”.
(Van Norden 2000, p. 24)
As the summary shows, dao has different connotations, i.e., it is, at the same time,
metaphysical, epistemological, and ethico-political. In its metaphysical connota-
tion, i.e., (4), dao is most often associated with Heaven (tian 天).4 In Confucian
thought, Heaven refers to the universe, and/or when in conjunction with Earth
(di 地) to the nature and the material world. Confucians believe Heaven is the
source of all meaning and value. Heaven is said to have its own dao, i.e., the dao of
Heaven or the Heavenly dao (tiandao 天道), which is the principle that organizes
and governs the universe and/or the material world. Although the exact meaning
of Heaven is disputed in Confucianism, there are two common understandings
of it. In the spiritual, religious understanding of Heaven, it is understood as
the Supreme Being, who is responsible for organizing and governing the mate-
rial and human world(s) (Huang 2007; Ivanhoe 2007). And, in the naturalistic
understanding of Heaven, it is conceptualized as the nature akin to the Natural
Law tradition in modern European philosophy (Liu 2007). Either way, Heaven
is conceived as the ultimate source of normativity.
It should be pointed out that the normative role of Heaven in Confucian
thought is not merely negative but also positive and proactive, and that the

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Ebook Harmonious Technology A Confucian Ethics of Technology 1St Edition Pak Hang Wong Editor Online PDF All Chapter

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Harmonious Technology A Confucian

Ethics of Technology 1st Edition

The Ethics of Ordinary Technology 1st Edition Michel

Ethics in Information Technology 6th Edition Reynolds

Technology and Anarchy A Reading of Our Era

Charge Coupled Device Technology Japanese Technology

Biodiesel Technology and Applications Technology and

History of Technology Volume 1 1st Edition A. Rupert

Ethics in Information Technology - A Practical Guide

Cybersecurity A Technology Landscape Analysis Applied

“Refreshing, stimulative, and timely, Harmonious Technology makes an

“Although there have been an increasing number of English language

“[...]For those long engaged in such multicultural approaches to philosophy

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-FM.indd 1 21/12/20 11:43 AM

Technology has become a major subject of philosophical ethical reflection in recent

Pak-Hang Wong is Research Associate at the Research Group for Ethics in IT

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-FM.indd 3 21/12/20 11:43 AM

Edited by Pak-Hang Wong and

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-FM.indd 5 07/11/20 4:57 PM

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-FM.indd 6 07/11/20 4:57 PM

Introduction: Why Confucian Ethics of Technology? 1

1 Confucian Ritual Technicity and Philosophy of Technology 10

2 Dao, Harmony, and Personhood: Toward a Confucian

3 Technological Mediation in and for Confucianism-Based

4 Self-Cultivation of the Confucian Engineer: What

5 Artificial Intelligence, Personal Decisions, Consent, and the

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-FM.indd 7 21/12/20 3:59 PM

6 Confucian Personhood and the Scientific Spirit:

Epilogue: The Future of Confucian Ethics of Technology 110

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-FM.indd 8 07/11/20 4:57 PM

1.1 Photo of Yokeback Armchair in the Metropolitan

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-FM.indd 9 07/11/20 4:57 PM

Ching Hung is Adjunct Assistant Professor at National University of Kaohsiung

Fei Teng is Lecturer in the School of Philosophy, Renmin University of China.

Tom Xiaowei Wang obtained his BA, MA in China Agricultural University,

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-FM.indd 10 07/11/20 4:57 PM

Pak-Hang Wong is Research Associate at the Research Group for Ethics in IT

Qin Zhu is Assistant Professor of Ethics and Engineering Education in the

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-FM.indd 11 07/11/20 4:57 PM

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-FM.indd 12 07/11/20 4:57 PM

technology and the Confucian tradition as his supervisor at Utrecht University.

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-FM.indd 13 07/11/20 4:57 PM

Pak-Hang Wong, Tom Xiaowei Wang

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Intro.indd 1 27/11/20 9:52 AM

as examples, and then we should recognize the radical transformations brought

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Intro.indd 2 27/11/20 9:52 AM

Diversifying philosophy and ethics of technology

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Intro.indd 3 27/11/20 9:52 AM

of Artificial Intelligence: Develop Responsible Artificial Intelligence, and the first of

“a transparent, interactive process by which societal actors and innovators

Responsible innovation aims to guide technology development with the values

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Intro.indd 4 27/11/20 9:52 AM

Structure of the volume

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Intro.indd 5 27/11/20 9:52 AM

calls “ritual technicity”. Drawing on both the notion of “civilizational given” in

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Intro.indd 6 27/11/20 9:52 AM

explores how Confucian moral theory can provide a different approach to

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Intro.indd 7 27/11/20 9:52 AM

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Intro.indd 8 27/11/20 9:52 AM

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Intro.indd 9 27/11/20 9:52 AM

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Chp01.indd 10 27/11/20 10:06 AM

BK-TandF-WONG_9780367263492-200362-Chp01.indd 11 27/11/20 10:06 AM

1.2 Phenomenology or postphenomenology?

Introduction: Why Confucian Ethics of Technology? 1

1 Confucian Ritual Technicity and Philosophy of Technology 10

Epilogue: The Future of Confucian Ethics of Technology 110