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Concept
School of Names
Summary
The School of Names (), sometimes called the School of Forms and Names (), was a school of Chinese philosophy that grew out of Mohism during the Warring States period in 479–221 BCE. The followers of the School of Names were sometimes called the Logicians or Disputers.
The philosophy of the Logicians is often considered to be akin to those of the sophists or of the dialecticians. Joseph Needham notes that their works have been lost, except for the partially preserved Gongsun Longzi, and the paradoxes of Chapter 33 of the Zhuangzi. Needham considers the disappearance of the greater part of Gongsun Longzi one of the worst losses in the ancient Chinese books, as what remains is said to reach the highest point of ancient Chinese philosophical writing.
One of the few surviving lines from the school, "a one-foot stick, every day take away half of it, in a myriad ages it will not be exhausted," resembles Zeno's paradoxes. However, some of their other aphorisms seem contradictory or unclear when taken out of context, for example, "Dogs are not hounds."
They were opposed by the Later Mohists for their paradoxes.
Warring States era philosophers Deng Xi, Yin Wen, Hui Shi, Gongsun Long were all associated with the School of Names.
A contemporary of Confucius, Deng Xi (died 501 BC) is associated with litigation. He is said to have argued for the permissibility of contradictory propositions, likely engaging in hair-splitting debates on the interpretation of laws, legal principles and definitions. Deng is reported to have drawn up a code of penal laws and is cited by Liu Xiang for the origin of the Shen Buhai's principle of Xing-Ming, comparing minister's performances with their job titles.
In the Han Dynasty secretaries of government who had charge of the records of decisions in criminal matters were called Xing-Ming. The earliest literary occurrence for Xing-Ming, in the Zhan Guo Ce, is in reference to the school of names, although Han dynasty Sima Qian (145 or 135 – 86 BC) and Liu Xiang (77–6 BC) attribute it to the "Chinese Legalist" doctrine of Shen Buhai (400 – c.
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