The cycle of academic creation and knowledge production does not coincide with that of the earth's revolution. In 2005, the research results of philosophy at home and abroad presented to us were usually brewed, created and edited a year or two ago, and finally made public in this year. Moreover, as a study of western philosophy on the level of academic creation and rational life, it usually does not create a focus event that can attract public attention. Therefore, it is difficult to summarize the research situation of this year with the help of "taking stock of major events" and "focusing on people" as in many fields, and perhaps a historical and reflective vision is needed, "looking back" and "commenting on things". However, we can comment on the occurrence of cultural events. The study of China's western philosophy in 2005 was relatively silent compared with the great fanfare of "Basic Research and Construction Project of Marxism", "Fever of Chinese Studies" and "Fever of Reading Classics", and compared with the concern caused by the 200th anniversary of Kant's death, Derrida's death and Rorty's academic trip in 2004. For example, activities to commemorate Sartre's birthday100th anniversary and paul ricoeur's death are not worth arousing. However, this is precisely the normal state.

This normality reflects that the study of western philosophy is in an ambiguous situation. Domestic philosophical research is usually divided into three main areas: Malaysian, China and the West. It seems that we may have three philosophical traditions, which certainly enrich our philosophical life, but there seems to be more and more dialogues between them and the relationship between them is becoming more and more subtle. Moreover, western philosophy does not have the legitimacy of "Ma Zhe" and "Zhong Zhe" in China, but it has the orthodox position of philosophy in international academic circles. This raises at least two important questions. One is the orientation of China scholars in the study of western philosophy: introduction and criticism, or professional research and education like western philosophers? In addition, what position should this research occupy in the philosophy discipline system? Secondly, letting western philosophy speak Chinese will undoubtedly enrich and change China people's conceptual framework, mode of thinking and expression, and the digestion and absorption of western philosophy will help enhance the creativity of our national philosophy. At this time, western philosophy will not only be foreign ideas, but also become the internal ideological resources of local philosophy; However, how to adjust all kinds of ideological resources, so that the tension between them will not be too tense, and promote effective dialogue and cultural reconstruction, has become a problem worth pondering. Thinking about these two issues has been concerned since 2003 and continues this year.

Of course, with the support of various academic institutions, the study of western philosophy is still progressing. In 2005, the number of authorized doctoral programs abroad almost doubled, reaching 20 in theory. More than 1000 papers have been published in academic journals with official numbers, among which the papers on modern western philosophy are nearly twice as many as those on the history of western philosophy. The most common names of the former are Heidegger, Derrida, Nietzsche, Rorty and Wittgenstein, while the latter are Kant, Hegel, Plato and Descartes. Augustine is the most concerned in medieval philosophy. There are more than 65,438+000 books and series of publications, among which translation accounts for a large proportion. A large number of academic achievements have been funded by various academic funds, with emphasis on projects and topics. Seminars on Phenomenology and Ethics, Analytical Philosophy, Philosophy and Logic of Science, Translation Problems in the Communication between Chinese and Western Philosophy, Philosophy, Religion and Science: Traditional and Modern Perspectives, Academic Conferences in Commemoration of the Centenary of Derrida, Aron and Sartre, Peirce and Dewey were held one after another. The Analytical Philosophy Committee of Modern Foreign Philosophies Society was formally established after Phenomenology Committee and French Philosophy Committee. The study of modern foreign philosophy is much more active than classical philosophy, which makes people feel both happy and sad.

This year, three large-scale western philosophy histories came out one after another (some of them have been published before, but most of them have not yet been published), including the History of Western Philosophy edited by Ye Xiushan and Wang (eight-volume academic edition), the General History of Western Philosophy edited by the Philosophy Department of Fudan University (ten-volume edition) and the translated History of routledge Philosophy (ten-volume edition). In addition, various translations of western thinkers' works, anthologies, anthologies and research documents are also dizzying, and the publishing market is quite prosperous. Following the Complete Works of Aristotle, Plato and Wittgenstein, the Complete Works of Kant translated by Li has also been published in the first four volumes, and two sets of Complete Works of Hegel are brewing and publishing after many twists and turns, and collected works of john dewey and Complete Works of Nietzsche are also being planned.

This leads to the second question worth thinking about. We are constantly translating a large number of western philosophical classics and research documents into Chinese, which naturally contributes a lot; However, it is undeniable that this actually enlarges the gap between domestic scholars in creativity and research level. If creativity or independent innovation ability cannot be achieved overnight, then the research level is expected to be gradually improved. According to the author's reading, although there are many excellent papers published this year, it seems that there is no obvious improvement compared with previous years, and the contribution to academic accumulation needs to be improved. It seems that we should seriously learn from the research results of western counterparts, start research at a higher starting point, avoid a lot of introduction and explanation, and strive for clear and rigorous analysis, demonstration and expression, and go deep into the details of western scholars' argumentation, because if we don't grasp the details, we will inevitably follow suit or be arrogant, and we will not be able to have an effective dialogue. Although the tendency of western scholars, especially British and American scholars, is also worthy of reflection, the problem we face is how to improve the technical content.