Global Philosophy Research Interest Group Talk (Eric Hutton, University of Toronto)

The Global Philosophy Research Interest Group is delighted to welcome as guest speaker Eric Hutton, the Richard Charles and Esther Yewpick Lee Visiting Professor in Chinese Thought and Culture at the University of Toronto. His home institution is the University of Utah, where has also served as departmental chair in Philosophy. His research focuses on Chinese philosophy, Greek philosophy, and ethics. On the Chinese side, he focuses on the pre-Qin period, especially Confucianism. On the Greek side, his work centers around the moral/political views of Plato and Aristotle.

Talk Title

On Trust, Politics, and Justice in Early Confucianism and Plato

Talk Abstract

Most studies comparing ancient Greek and Chinese philosophy first identify certain Greek ideas and then argue that the Chinese sources contain similar ideas. In this talk I reverse that direction of comparison by using Confucianism to re-examine Plato. In particular, I focus on Confucian ideas about xin 信 (“trust” or “trustworthiness”) and investigate the extent to which Plato is sensitive to the concerns of the Confucians. I argue that Plato does display an interest in the phenomena on which the Confucians focus, but largely subsumes the relevant issues under the rubric of justice. I end by considering how the Confucians might challenge Plato’s views and vice versa, and what we might learn about trust and justice from such a debate.