历史进化论的瓦解与重构——从康有为、严复到章太炎

The Collapse and Reconstruction of Social Darwinism--From Kang Youwei,Yan fu to Zhang Taiyan

虽然严复、康有为以及章太炎都接受了社会进化论,但是随着时局的改变,社会进化论所带来的现实政治后果让他们产生怀疑,对于社会进化论的内涵也开始作出各自独特的阐释。严复强调的是一种以“自由”和“竞争”为核心价值的现代文明进化论;而康有为则对西方的民主制度有所怀疑,从而建立起以儒家思想为核心的“仁”的文明进化论;章太炎则从佛学思想中汲取成分,重新构建了种族革命的主体性概念,并且将佛教的轮回思想与菩萨道思想引入到社会进化论中,发展为具有虚无主义色彩的乌托邦蓝图——“五无世界”,从而完成了对历史进化论的重新构建。

Yan Fu,Kang Youwei,and Zhang Taiyan all subscribed to the idea of Social Darwinism,but they grew skeptical of the real world political consequences it brought as the society progressed,and started to each interpret the essence of Social Evolution in their own ways.Yan Fu proposed an idea of evolution of modern civilization with its core centered on“liberty”and“competition”;Kang Youwei established a thought of evolution of civilization revolving around the idea of rew(literally “benevolence”)from Confucianism as a result of his reservations of Western democracy;Zhang Taiyan re-constructed the subjectivity of racial revolution by introducing Buddhist concepts such as samsara and Way of Bodhisattva into his argument of Social Evolution,which can be best categorized as a form of utopianism rather than one of nihilism,or Five Nothingness,and this completied his idea of historical evolution.