Murphy Shimamoto

How does Watsuji’s view of ningen challenge the meaning of an ethical standpoint, as theorized in Western philosophy?

Watsuji commences his philosophical investigation into ethics with the bold declaration that, “The essential significance of the attempt to describe ethics as the study of ningen consists in getting away from the misconception…that conceives of ethics as a problem of individual consciousness only,” (9).¹ Watsuji, by recentering the focus of ethics to what he terms ningen, challenges Western philosophy as it has, in his understanding, approached ethics as a problem to be treated and solved merely within the bounds of individual consciousness. This attempt, however, remains too myopic as, “Ethics is concerned with those problems that prevail between persons,” (12).² This paper will clarify the preceding by outlining the ‘Western’ approach fails, followed by a description of what Watsuji considers to be the proper method of ethical-philosophical inquiry and what counts as an authentically ethical society.

What arguments does he make against this isolated consciousness standpoint?

Watsuji claims, “the standpoint of the ego…is already a step away from concrete human existence,” (9)³ and that “In this way, the field of ethical questions is also confined to the relation between subject and nature” (9-10).⁴ When philosophy originates from an isolated ego/consciousness one has already embarked on an erroneous path. This is due to the concrete fact that human beings already and always exist within a society that has developed historically and climatically. Hence, isolated ego/consciousness philosophy, instead of probing the reality of one’s being which is already inside of an environment with others, leaps into the abstract illusion of radically independent individuals. Yet, such a fallacious leap cannot erase the fact that there is an environment within which human beings inhere. Isolated ego philosophy must then commit another error by interpreting this environment as something opposed to subjects (nature), misconstruing the environment of ningen as a realm of objects encountered by subjects. This double error ends up conceiving of the world in a bifurcated manner in which independent subjects confront a nature from which they are schismed. Watsuji attempts to dispel this conception of subject-object dualism by positing ningen. Ningen’s characteristic feature is betweenness which, “consists in the fact that the self and the other are divided from each other…and at the same time…becomes unified,” (35).⁵ Watsuji’s solution to the errors perpetrated by subject-object dualism is to return to a more fundamental ground of human existence which recognizes and proceeds to analyze the concrete fact that humans exist in a related manner within an environment. The concept of betweenness copes with this fact by emphasizing that an independent human being cannot be, as it is already and always within a particular environment which has shaped him. Watsuji also avoids the reification of that environment by acknowledging that human beings in turn shape their environment. Therefore, “ningen, although being subjective communal existence as the interconnection of acts, at the same time, is an individual that acts through these connections,” (19).⁶ Having discarded isolated ego philosophy as the authentic mode of philosophical investigation, Watsuji then examines ethics from his newly grounded standpoint of ningen.

According to Watsuji, how should we approach a theory of ethics, and why?

Perpetual change is another core aspect of Watsuji’s philosophy. Since everything exists in ceaseless movement, nothing can be thought of as static and thus being beyond the bounds of a mutually determining relation. To do so would be a spurious reification which dogmatizes an unreal abstraction (an error committed both by isolated ego philosophers and those who would invert such a paradigm by having objects determine consciousnesses). A proper understanding of existence, and thus ethics, entails that, “Ningen cannot be thought of as such apart from the constantly moving interconnection of acts,” (19).⁷ The human existence of ningen must be conceived of as individuals existing in a constantly changing society and a society being composed of constantly changing individuals. Thus, “individual persons subsist in their relationship with wholeness…the whole must be regarded as subsisting in its relationship with the independence of individuals…then both individuals and the whole subsist not in themselves, but only in the relationship of each with each other,” (101).⁸ Such a conception resolves the oppositional nature of subject-object dualism by collapsing them both into a mutually determining whole, whence ethics can be properly understood as, “the order or the pattern through which the communal existence of human beings is rendered possible,” (11).⁹ Now, the concrete reality of human existence always consists of a relation of betweenness due to which, “a question arises as to whether ethics is already established,” (11). To this, Watsuji responds that yes, relationships of betweenness always inhere in ningen, however, there still exists an ethical should. This should-be-situation requires understanding ningen’s ethical environment as a society and thus ethics as social ethics.

Finally, what is his account of an ethical society?

Watsuji insists on the fact that human existence has a dual structure which takes the shape of, “On the one hand… an acting “individual” comes to be established only in some way as a negation of the totality of ningen…On the other hand, the totality of ningen comes to be established as the negation of individuality…These two negations constitute the dual character of a human being…a single movement,” (22).¹⁰ Human beings, already finding themselves within a society, negate their society. Therefore, “individuality is…something that exists outside of society,” (108).¹¹ This definition of individuality, however, ties that very notion of individual-existence to a society which is being negated. Hence, there is no such thing as individuality which exists without reference to society. Were one to stop the movement towards a correct understanding of ethics here, at the individual consciousness, a grave misunderstanding would take place primarily for the aforementioned reasons. Thus, in order to arrive at a ‘true’ understanding of ningen’s ethical existence man must again negate this negation through the realization that while he is not an entirely societially-determined entity, neither is he in himself independent of society. Through the negation of his being socially-determined followed by the negation of his being individually-determined, ningen grasps the concrete fact of its existence which is that it exists dually in a society and as an individual in a non-oppositional way. Ningen comprehends that its being consists in a perpetual movement of negation culminating in, “the basic principle of social ethics is the realization of totality (as the negation of negation) through the individual, (that is the negation of totality). This is, after all, the movement of the realization of absolute totality,” (23).¹² It is from this vantage point, absolute totality, that ningen sees its authentic existence and can thus perform authentically ethical actions with other beings. These ethical actions are characterized by benevolence. Watsuji says, “If emptiness as the real feature of the self were truly realized, the self-abandonment and the practice of nonduality would immediately be there. That is to say, the practice of benevolence would arise,” (300).¹³

Before concluding, this paper will preempt a possible objection to Watsuji’s position. One may wish to object that despite Watsuji’s protestations that ningen and its ethical existence (ningen sonzai) establishes a concrete understanding of human existence, Watsuji ends up merely providing a formal conception of ethical existence. This view, however, would be mistaken. For not only does Watsuji stress that ningen’s double negation must take place within a concrete society but, “the way of ningen is realized in a variety of climatic and historical types,” (26).¹⁴ Therefore, one must never lose sight of the fact that societies themselves inhere within concrete climatic and historical circumstances and that it is within such concrete environments, differing worldwide, that ningen perform their double negation. This is why, “According to the history of moral thought, the evaluation of goodness and badness varies,” (288)¹⁵, as the ethical relationships between human beings as understood between individuals in a society, like individuals and societies themselves, are always in flux and being redefined through a movement in concrete historical and climatic circumstances.

Notes

¹ Watsuji, Watsuji Tetsurō’s Rinrigaku, 9.

² Ibid., 12.

³ Ibid., 9.

⁴ Ibid., 9-10.

⁵ Ibid., 35.

⁶ Ibid., 19.

⁷ Ibid., 19.

⁸ Ibid., 101.

⁹ Ibid., 11.

¹⁰ Ibid., 22.

¹¹ Ibid., 108.

¹² Ibid., 23.

¹³ Ibid., 300.

¹⁴ Ibid., 26.

¹⁵ Ibid., 288.

Works Cited

Watsuji, Tetsurō. Watsuji Tetsurō’s Rinrigaku: Ethics in Japan. 1937-49. Translated by Yamamoto Seisaku and Robert E. Carter, State U of New York P, 1996.