對詹康〈韓非論人新說〉的反思

Reflections on Kang Chan’s “A New Approach to Han Fei on Personhood”

詹康在〈韓非論人新說〉中，整理並認為以往學者對於「人論」的研究，無法解釋「人有不同行為」的情況。作者認為，人有「審慎」、「放肆」與「高貴」三種利己行為，是因人「性情心氣」等不同的構造以及對於「美」的嚮往而產生，而人則應該要回到「審慎利己」的原始狀態。 作者雖然在對《韓非子》的研究方法上提出新主張，但是其成果卻與《韓非子》的文本不相符。首先，《韓非子》中的「利己行為」難以找到要將其一分為三的必要性及根據；其次，「性情心氣」四者就文本而言也並非完全屬於「人的構造」；最後，對於「美」的討論，則受到錯解「道德」的影響而有偏誤。雖然有以上的缺失，但仍可以藉著對作者的反思，重新思考以「《韓非子》人論」進一步解釋「人的行為」的必要性。

Kang Chan in his “A New Approach to Han Fei on Personhood” reviews scholars’ studies on Han Fei’s account on human beings before him, and argues that all the scholars’ proposals cannot account for that human behaviors are divergent. According to Kang Chan, there are three kinds of self-interested behaviors: An unrestrained, self-aggrandizing pursuit of self-interest, a prudent pursuit of self-interest conducted within the framework of rules and a noble pursuit of self-interest through attaining goodness and beauty in oneself and by acting altruistically. All these three kinds of behaviors are coming from human’s having human nature, innate dispositions, hearts and vital energy and pursuit of beauty. And humans should go back to the original state, which is, behaving in accord with a prudent pursuit of self-interest conducted within the framework of rules. Although Kang Chan’s proposal is innovative, his idea does not match Han Fei Zi. In the first place, we can hardly finding any reason for distinguishing three kinds of self-interested behaviors. Secondly, it cannot be said that human nature, innate dispositions, hearts and vital energy are constituents of a human being. Last but not least, the discussion of beauty is based on a basic misunderstanding of the aim of morality. Although Kang Chan’s proposal is unsatisfactory, we might get the answer to whether it is necessary to offer an account of human behaviors from Han Fei Zi’s account of constituents of a human via reflecting Kang Chan’s proposal.