论方东美生命哲学的时空观

On the View of Time and Space in Thome H.Fang's Philosophy of Life

方东美的生命哲学对时间和空间问题尤为关注。他对于时间的关注,一方面受到西方近代形而上学思潮,特别是柏格森、怀特海的启发,而另一方面则与中国哲学的传统,特别是和《周易》哲学有着清晰的血脉联系。中国古代的时间观是“轮转而无穷”。所谓“轮转”,即流变与循环;所谓“无穷”,则是指时间本身具有开放的维度,即永恒与日新。时间在退入过去、延伸未来的过程中形成新的事物,时间的退却是为了创造性前进,这一整体正是方东美称为的“生生”,即创造之创造的理性秩序,其在循环交泰中日新不已。方东美对西方宇宙观的反思,是建立在中国古代哲学中宇宙论精髓的基础上的。他看重宇宙作为空间的生机性。如果说西方人对于时间的看法,是将时间空间化了,那么中国人对于空间的看法,是将空间时间化了。在中国古人看来,空间的存在与生命的存在密不可分,因为生命本身的流变与日新的力量,空间因此生机而感染,也被转化成了类似的境界。

Fang's philosophy of life is particularly concerned with the problems of time and space.His attention to time is inspired by modern Western metaphysical thought,especially Bergson and Whitehead,on the one hand,and has a clear and strong connection with the tradition of Chinese philosophy,especially the philosophy of Zhou Yi on another hand.The ancient Chinese view of time is"rotation and infinity",the so-called"rotation",that is,rheology and circulation;The so-called"infinity"means that time itself has an open dimension,that is,eternity and newness.Time forms new things in the process of retreating into the past and extending the future,and the retreat of time is for a creative progress,and this whole is what Mr.Fang calls"Sheng Sheng",that is,the rational order of creation and re-creation,which is constantly changing in the cycle.Fang's reflection on the Western cosmology is based on the essence of cosmology in the ancient Chinese philosophy.He values the vitality of the universe as space,and if Westerners'view of time is to spatialize time,then Chinese view of space is to temporal space.In the view of the ancient Chinese,the existence of space is also inseparable from the existence of life,because of the flow of life itself and its force of renewing,the space is thus transformed into a similar realm by this process.