INTRODUCTION
Information
ethics deals with the descriptive analysis
and critical evaluation of moral norms and values within as well as
between
information societies. Although such issues arise today mainly with
regard to
the digital medium, information ethics can and should be concerned with
other
media and epochs building the scope of what is being called
intercultural
information ethics (Capurro 2007).
This
paper deals with the distinction between direct
and indirect speech in the “Far East” and the “Far
West”
following key insights by French sinologist François Jullien
(Jullien 1995,
2003, 2005). The distinction is not primarily a grammatical or
rhetorical but
an existential or moral one. It concerns the relation between man and
world. It
aims at providing a basis for thinking inter-culturally about ethical
questions
of the information society. My argument is that information moralities
and
their ethical reflection in the “Far West” stress the principle of
direct
speech while in the “Far East” the
principle
of indirect speech builds the basis of human communication. This
distinction
should not be understood as an opposition. Furthermore, there is a
complex
tradition of ethical reflection about this distinction. After
explaining this
distinction in the “Far West” in the first part, I show its relevance
and
difference in some classic texts of the “Far East,”
particularly in the Chinese tradition, in the second part. Finally, I
draw some
conclusions about the relevance of this distinction for the information
society
in China..
DIRECT AND
INDIRECT SPEECH IN THE "FAR
WEST"
One
source of
the idea of freedom of speech in the
Western tradition is the Greek concept of ‘parrhesia’
that has been analysed by French philosopher Michel Foucault (Foucault
1983). This
political principle built the basis of Greek ‘polis’
together with two other ones, namely equality (‘isegoría’)
and participation of all
citizens in political decisions (‘isonomía’).
What does ‘parrhesía’ exactly mean?
According to Foucault, the ‘parrhesiastes’
is the one who says (‘rhema’) the
truth to everybody (‘pan’). He – and
the use of masculine is important in this context of ancient Greece –
wants to
speak and communicate his thoughts as clear and engaged as possible
within a
context that can be risky or even dangerous for him. To tell the truth
is not just
a mental event, as Descartes believed, but a verbal activity where the
speaker
is completely sure to own the truth. His courage is a sign of honesty.
But how
can we be sure that the speaker is a ‘truth speaker’? And how can he be
sure
that what he believes to be the truth is, in fact, the truth? The first
question was important for the ancient Greeks and was answered,
according to Foucault,
by Plutarch and Galen. The second question is a modern one.
The
parrhesiastic speaker risks his life when speaking
the truth. This concerns particularly political risky situations. He is
not
interested in giving some proof but in criticizing his addressee. He is
in an
inferior position for instance with regard to a tyrant but also in a
democratic
discussion opposing to the majority. The risk was the exile. In other
words, to
tell the truth was considered a political duty with the goal of helping
others
or oneself. It is the opposite of the art of convincing that the
Western
tradition often conceives as belonging to indirect speech, together
with
silence and falsity. The Athenian ‘agora’
is the place where this kind of free speech appears for the first time
in the “Far West.” There is a
difference between this kind of
political freedom of speech and the Socratic one that takes place in a
face-to-face dialogue and deals with the life (‘bios’)
of the person involved. Along epicurean and stoic traditions
we find the concept of ‘parrhesia’ in
the New Testament in the context of accusations against Jesus because
of
breaking the mosaic law:
“Then
some of the residents of Jerusalem began
to say, ‘Isn’t this the man they
are trying to kill? Yet here he
is, speaking openly (‘parrhesía lalei’), and
they
are saying nothing to him. Do the rulers really know that this man
is
the Christ?’” (John 7, 25-26).
Christian
‘parrhesía’
belongs to the spiritual technologies together with confession and
spiritual
exercises as developed in Modernity for instance by Ignatius of Loyola,
the
founder of the Jesuits (Capurro 1995, 29ff). The secular version of
such
exercises are, for instance, Cartesian meditations – Descartes having
being
educated by the Jesuits – where it is basic that nothing should be
accepted as
true that is not before object of doubt by the cogito.
The
tradition of direct speech in the “Far West”
is important but not exclusive. The philosopher
Leo Strauss has analyzed the distinction between esoteric and exoteric
writing
(Strauss 1988). This distinction was common in Ancient Greece. But,
according
to Strauss, there is a difference between pre-modern and modern
philosophers.
While pre-modern philosophers struggle for the freedom to communicate their thoughts the philosophers of the
Enlightenment were interested in a universal right to communicate as a
political ideal. They conceived such ideal as the freedom of public
discussion
as well as the possibility of public education (Strauss 1988, 33).
Modern philosophers
such as Thomas More were critics of the “indirect approach” (“obliquo
ducto”)
(More 1964, 50). Nevertheless, Strauss defends pre-modern philosophers
whose
exoteric writings had not only a general educational purpose but also a
more
important philosophical one concerning that “which is indicated only
between
the lines” (Strauss 1988, 36). This was an esoteric message for young
philosophers
in order to be driven towards pure theory beyond practical and
political
interests.
In the
transition from the Middle Ages to Modernity a
new structure of European society based on nobility is developed and
with it
also a new standards of communication based on other moral norms and
values.
Traditional rhetoric is substituted by the art of conversation which
looks for
a balance between speech and silence particularly with regard to what
could be
offensive to other persons. The ‘art du lien’ – a term coined by the
French
communication scientists Olivier Arifon and Philippe Ricaud (Arifon and
Ricaud
2005) – or ‘connecting art’ deals less with opposition or separation
than with
connection. This is called the style
français which is the
language of
diplomacy that gives its shape to European nations since the 17th
until the 20th centuries.
Although
communication morality in the “Far West”
is based mainly on the principle of direct
speech we should not oversee different kinds of refractions and
mutations of
this principle along history in order also to avoid a simplistic
unilinear
cultural evolution. One example of such a mutation is the criticism of
censorship with regard to the spread of printed works at the
Enlightenment no
less than the development of investigative journalism in the 19th
and 20th centuries and today’s ideas and ideals concerning
freedom
of communication in the Internet.
DIRECT AND INDIRECT SPEECH IN THE "FAR
EAST"
The art
of
indirect speech pervades China’s
politics, economy as well as literary and philosophic traditions.
Relations
and not individuals build the core of communication where the goal is
attaining harmony through negotiation. The art of negotiation in the
"Far East" is not based on the idea of mastering the opponent by being
basically against him or her preponderant although not exclusive in the
"Far West," but of convincing
the other. Individuals are then not masters but mediators or
negotiators that can be, for a time, at the centre and be the expert or
"the king" in order to make harmony possible and not in order to impose
his or her will upon the others. Direct speech becomes less important
when the goal is to avoid conflicts similar to the style français of French
diplomacy and negotiation already mentioned
(Arifon and Ricaud 2005, 120-121).
But
although the Western tradition acknowledges
the role of indirect speech as opposed to the ideology of direct
speech, it
remains something morally problematic and related to lying, discretion,
and hint
through disguising and concealing. This tradition goes back to Greek ‘metis’ or ‘cunning’ (Jullien 2000, 44
ff). In poetry, the original place of indirect speech, Chinese culture
discovers that the meaning encoded there is of moral and political
nature. This
is very much the opposite to what happens in Ancient Greece where the
meaning
is related to the soul and the divine. Jullien writes:
“Only
at Delphos, in
connection with Pythia’s tripod one can observe that the indirect style
of
poetic formulations is related to political interests.” (Jullien 2000,
68, my
translation)
But
the oscillation, called mantic, of the oracle between caution
and truth remains a borderline case in the Greek tradition while in the
Chinese
culture it is the soul of everyday life. According to Jullien one key
difference between China
and Greece
consists in the fact
that monarchy and its surrogates have been the only political system in
China
(Jullien
2000, 122-123). But China
has developed a kind of political practice giving intellectuals a
certain kind
of legitimacy in order to provide the well functioning of monarchic
power,
namely the admonition of the sovereign in the name of morality. The
different
forms of admonition are closely related to indirect speech as well as
to ethics
of confidentiality. Under the guise of picture puzzle it is possible to
express
an opinion that can be tolerated by the sovereign similar to the court
jester
in the Western tradition. What is not good about this compromise
between the
intellectuals and power is the fact that language distortion is not
also
regarded as something normal but is even considered a higher value
(Jullien
2000, 132). This apparently changes since the beginning of the 20th
century.
But,
on the other hand, it must be acknowledged that
indirect speech plays a positive role in Confucius “Analects”
(Confucius 2004).
The master addresses the pupil by pointing to what is at stake (Jullien
2000,
195). The goal of teaching, like in most ethics, is not learning but
doing. This
is the reason why speaking remains on the background:
“The
Master said, ‘Fine words and an insinuating
appearance are seldom associated with true virtue’." (Confucius, 2004,
I,
3)
The
master’s teaching is open to everybody but
indirect speech can only develop itself if the other opens himself or
herself to it. The
goal is
neither the development of a conceptual system nor, as Hegel believed,
just a
moral sermon (Hegel 1986, 142). Confucius does not develop a moral
theory but
follows the “logic of the path” that works more by way of hints about
possible
detours and way outs (Jullien 2000, 211).
It is
still an open question whether the renaissance
of Confucianism in China
today will lead to an information society shaped by this kind of ethics
and
morality. Since some ten years or so the ideal of a “harmonious
society” has
been officially announced in contrast to the concept of class struggle
(Siemons
2006). The model of a Confucian information society and the
predominance of
indirect speech serving the power seem to be opposed to the Western
model that
gives individual freedom the highest value. While libertarian
information
society tends towards atomization and eventually to chaos, the
Confucian model
might grow stiff and end suffocated. Confucius wants to regulate social
communication with the help of morality the most useful instrument
being
censorship. In the “Far West” the
opposite
form of blockage seems to endanger societal development, namely
information
overload for individuals and corporations as well as some forms of
general and
open struggle.
A
possible way out of both models can be found in the
taoist view of indirect speech. At the beginning of Laozi’s “Daodejing”
it is
said:
“A dao
that can be defined.
Is not
the eternal dao,
Concepts
that can be conceived,
Are
not eternal concepts” (Laozi, 2002 , Ch. 1,
1-4)
The
Chinese thinker does not separate reality in two
different levels as the Greeks did. The “dao”
refers indirectly to the beginning of a process of becoming and
growing. In
contrast to the Aristotelian model, the goal (‘telos’)
of this process is not the realization or fulfilment of
potentiality (‘dynamis’) but the passing on itself that
is in permanent danger of solidifying.
Laozi’s
style is based on the principle of giving
hints or pointing to something, avoiding one sidedness or partiality in
order
to keep himself in a kind of “global indifference” (Jullien 2000, 286)
since
the “greatest forms are without shape” (Laozi 2002, Ch. 41, 17).
Instead of a
global information morality ruling (digital) communication from a fixed
perspective, the Taoist sage would probably prefer to look at it as
within the
“dao” in order to keep it in movement
within a never-ending creative process. This implies not only a
criticism of
Luhmann’s hypostatization of communication processes but also of the
present
digital casting of Being that I call digital ontology. If such
interpretation
of Being turns into a fixed and the only true one, it mutates into
metaphysics
and, in terms of politics, into ideology (Capurro 2006). Otherwise it
can
become part of different kinds of assemblages with other media and
remain
flexible with regard to existential, ecological and social needs and
constraints.
While
we in the “Far West”
use different linguistic tools such as myths and allegories in order to
deal
with the unspeakable, for Chinese master Chuang Tzu (2001-2009) words
are
fishing stakes. He says:
“Fishing-stakes
are employed to catch fish; but
when the fish are got, the men forget the stakes. Snares are employed
to catch
hares, but when the hares are got, men forget the snares. Words are
employed to
convey ideas; but when the ideas are apprehended, men forget the words.
Fain
would I talk with such a man who has forgot[en] the words!” (Chuang Tzu
26, 11)
The
difference between the Western metaphor of the veil and the
Taoist fishing stakes is, according to Jullien, that the last one is
purely
instrumental avoiding a metaphysical separation between appearance and
reality.
Chuang Tzu’s critique of language does not lead to silence but to a
strategy
seeking to avoid partiality. It does not only question bias and fixed
perspectives but allows also the coexistence of apparently
contradictory
things. Such kind of relational thinking is different from the
dialectic of
concepts aiming at bridging the gap between the sensory and the
supra-sensory
or transcendent. Both are different strategies for relating the
biosphere and the digital infosphere into an
ecosphere. Otherwise
they tend to become separate realities and even degenerate into
ideologies.
This
problem is similar to the issue concerning the
separation of morality from the flow of life as addressed by Lao Tse in
his
coming together with Confucius (Chuang Tzu 14, 6). A fixed morality is
endangered of becoming separate from the “dao”.
Lao Tzu brings fresh air into the symbolic sphere. His ethics is a
symptom that
morality is becoming fixed and autonomous. This issue was newly
addressed in
the “Far West” by Niklas Luhmann with
regard
to fixed moral distinctions in different spheres of society
(Möller 2002,
316-317). There is a way “beyond happiness” consisting in “vital
nourishing” (“yang sheng”) (Chuang Tzu, Chapters 3 and
19; Jullien 2005). Nourishing is the basic verb and norm of life.
According to
Chinese thinking, life should be long and healthy. By contrast, in the “Far West” eternal life is seen as a goal at the
end of a
linear process. “Vital nourishing” means learning to give up the will
to live as
a fixed idea or not to hang on it. Death is not a mistake as Heiner
Müller
believes (Mayer and Müller 2005). The one who only wants to live (“sheng sheng”) does not live.
Taoist
thinking does not teach to look for a fixed
centre like Confucius and Aristotle did but to oscillate following a
logic of
concentration and scattering, by opening ourselves to natural processes
and
particularly to “heaven” (Jullien 2005, 39 ff). “Heaven” is not a
metaphysical
dimension no less than a spiritual view of it but a life process
(Jullien 2005,
62). It does not mean, like in case of the Aristotelian and Platonic
‘in-formation’
process to materialize a super-sensory form but a process of perennial
becoming
(Capurro 1978). The perception of this process is the “dao”-centred
moral consciousness according to Chuang Tzu consisting
in learning to breathe as a medium or communication process between the
world,
the “dao” and the self (Jullien 2005,
71-75). The leitmotif – not the imperative! – guiding our actions can
be
formulated as follows: ‘circulate – instead of blocking!’ which is a
possible translation
of the famous Taoist concept “wuwei”
(Wohlfart 2002, 101).
From
this perspective we should avoid blocking the digital
infosphere, for instance through information overload or censorship,
letting
information circulate and feed our life. Information management does
not mean in
this case applying an external strategy but learning to adapting
ourselves to
different kinds of information flows depending on the context where
‘in-formation’
processes take place. It means also not fixing ourselves on a specific
medium,
including the digital one, becoming dependent or even addicted to it.
In
order to
become good information managers we must first learn to manage our life
nourishing
it calmly and cool. Taoism is an anti-stress life technology. It is a
permanent
exercise in a good mood consisting in getting rid of the imperative to
give
life meaning. By contrast, the “Far West”
is
based on direct speech, temporality and meaning.
PROSPECTS
What is
the
goal of this kind of analysis for intercultural
debates on information ethics? First of all, to learn from each other.
Western information
societies can learn from Taoism and the spirit of the “Far East” not only on how to deal with blocking
processes based on fixed
moralities, exacerbating the primacy of direct speech. Information
societies in the “Far East” might
learn from direct speech, individual freedom
and autonomy as correctives of an idealized harmony that might block
social
changes. In both cases we should be careful not to oversee the
complexity and
richness of our traditions including the difference itself between “Far
East”
and “Far West” that is nothing but a
starting
point for intercultural information ethics that should be both
theoretical and
empirical. Makoto Nakada has done and is doing pioneer work in this
area
(Nakada and Tamura 2005; Nakada and Capurro 2009).
Secondly,
the Internet is not, as conceived in its
early stages, a kind of hyper-sphere where all cultural and contingent
differences disappear and we are all equal (Han 2005). This is a
simplistic and
outdated perception of a medium that in the meantime pervades the real
physical
and cultural world in which we live instead of building a separate
world. We
are in the world with all our linguistic, historical and geographical
contingency. The internet as well as all devices connected through this
medium
are part of such contingency. This is why any cyberethics related to
the
internet as a whole makes only sense if it is mediated with the
specific
situations and traditions in which this technology is being used.
Consequently,
intercultural information ethics should not be identified with a
universal code
of morality for the global information society as developed by UNESCO
(2010),
but as a global space of reflection where we can put into question what
is morally
and ethically given for granted within different cultural backgrounds.
The World Summit
on the Information Society (WSIS) proclaimed an inclusive
information society
and the overcoming of the digital divide within and between nations
(WSIS 2003).
This can be considered, on the one hand, as a Kantian “regulative idea”
or a
universal ideal for the digital era. But, on the other hand, the
history of
media and literature provides examples of information and communication
ideals
both as utopias and dystopias that should be critically analized both
in the
“Far West” and the “Far East” (Grimm
and
Capurro 2008).
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The
author thanks Fernando Elichirigoity (University of Illinois at Urbana
Champaign) for his criticisms and assistance in polishing this text.