An Introduction to Chinese Philosophy examines the major philosophical concepts, themes and texts in early Chinese philosophy, roughly from the time of Confucius in the sixth century BCE to the Han period (206 BCE–220 CE). This is the period of the origins of Chinese philosophy insofar as the extant texts reveal elements of reflective and systematic thinking. The philosophies discussed here are a representative selection of intellectual debates of early China. The aim is not to present a comprehensive and exhaustive survey of Chinese philosophical themes and texts, an encyclopaedic task. Rather, the topics covered in this book are selective and representative of the field. In this way, we may engage at a deeper level with a number of prominent issues debated by thinkers of the time, and which have continuing relevance today.

This book attempts to achieve a balance between articulating the general spirit and style of Chinese philosophy as a disciplinary field, and identifying the more distinctive features of each of the philosophies. The doctrines discussed include Confucianism, Mohism, Daoism, Legalism, Theory of Names (by the Mingjia and Dialecticians) and Buddhism. Discussions will focus on concepts, themes, conceptual frameworks, elements of philosophical reasoning, argumentative devices in the selected traditions, and on debates and disagreements between them. Understanding the disagreements is at least as important as recognising the distinctive ideas of each tradition, as it draws attention both to contrasts and common elements of those traditions as they evolved alongside others.