Life of Guangzhou - Philosophy in Guangzhou

The pure study on philosophy, completely independent from the Chinese traditional scholasticism in the academe of Guangzhou, began in the early 20th century.

The main achievements of the philosophy-related study in Guangzhou before the establishment of the People's Republic of China includes:

"New concept of Philosophy" which was written by Xu,Chongqing and published in the second volume of the magazine "Xueyi" in Sep. 1917.

Hu,hanmin published "the Material Study in Chinese Philosophy History" in Oct.1919 and "the Criticism toward the Criticism of Historical Materialism" in Dec. in the same year. In the two articles, Hu introduced the historical materialism, disproved the opposite opinions and tried to apply the materialism to the understanding of Chinese philosophy history.

Qu,qiubai's "Society and Science Conspectus" which introduces the historical materialism and is also one of the earliest important works of Marxism philosophy in China was first published in Shanghai in 1923, then republished in Guangzhou.

"Religious Philosophy" written by Xie,fuya in 1927 in Guangzhou was published in 1928 and is the earliest academic work about religion philosophy.

"Cultural Philosophy" by Zhu,qianzhi was published in 1933 by Commerce Press. The work expounds his idea of historical culture and suggests conducting culture philosophy study and culture and society study. In 1940s, the appearances of series works of comparative study of eastern and western cultures and Huang,Wehshan's "Culture Study Theory" won the qualification for Guangzhou as a national culture study base.

In the field of aesthetics, "Aesthetics Sidelight" by Yan,Baoan published in Guangdong China News in 1919 was among the early works which expound the aesthetics thinking. While another aesthetics expert Ma,cai also published several influential works about aesthetics before 1949, such as Hegel's Aesthetics Dialectic, The Development of Art Thinking and so on.

Zhou,Xinming and Cheng,Heng were the pioneers in the field of epistemology in China.

The work about the Chinese philosophy history is generally large in number in Guangzhou, such as, Rong,Zhaozu's Treatise on the Thinkings of He, An and Wang, Bi (published in the first weekly of Zhongshan University Weekly in 1927), Xie, Fuya's The Study of the Existing Commentary books about Laozi Dao De Jing (published in the first periodical of Lingnan Transaction in 1930) and so on.

The important works about the foreign philosophy study included Xie, Fuya's Dao and Logic, Zhou,Xinming's Whitehead Philosophy (both in the first periodical of Lingnan Transaction in 1930), Wu, Kang's Socrates Philosophic Thinking (the second periodical of Zhonghshan Transaction in 1943).

After the establishment of the PRC, there was a group of scholars who were actively in the study. Thus, they gained lots of achievements.

Research on Principles of Philosophy

In the study of dialectic materialism, they discussed that Whether Truth Contains Mistake, Whether Material can Transform into Spirit and vice versa, etc.. Zhang, Jiangming, Liu, Rong, Gao, Qiyun and the like were very active in these discussions by writing relevant papers. For instances: The Negative Negation Question in Socialism Period by Zhang, Jiangming, Explore the origin of Historical Materialism by Li, Keming and Cai, Maosheng etc., books such as The Value of the Science in the Social Development by Zhong, Yangsheng introduced some new topics and enlarged the historical materialism theories.

Create a new subject—Spiritual-Civilization Science

Guangdong is always a pioneer in the spiritual civilization study. Since 1980s, the social scientific academe has worked hard and created the new subject which is one of the key results of the renovation of culture, theory and learning. The most contributive works includes Spiritual Civilization and Socialism by Zhong, Yangsheng and Fang, Yingzhu, Discussion of Spiritual Civilization Study by Fang, Ying and others, the New Three Character Primer etc.

Being a national key research base of De Xiaoping Theory

Guangdong gets lots benefits from De, Xiaoping Theory and the "Three Representatives" important thinking, hence, it always pays great attention to the two theories and becomes one of the seven important research bases in China. The main fruits are showed in the following works: Practice of Deng, Xiaoping Theory in Guangdong Series with Yu, Youjun as the editor in chief, Three Giants of the Century by Gong, Yuzhi, Zhang, Lei and the like, the Study of Deng, Xiaoping Theory—A New Model of Marxism in Present Age by Wen, Xianyuan, etc..