IntroductionRecently, a professor of philosophy at a local university asked me whether China has a history of humanism. I wasn’t familiar with the term, other than a vague idea that it means “humans are important,” so I asked her what it meant. She replied that she also didn’t have a clear explanation but that it could be summed up as “man is the measure of all things.” That quote (though it’s not the full quote) is from the Greek philosopher Protagoras of Abdera (490 – 420 BCE).Plato said th...

IntroductionRecently, a professor of philosophy at a local university asked me whether China has a history of humanism. I wasn’t familiar with the term, other than a vague idea that it means “humans are important,” so I asked her what it meant. She replied that she also didn’t have a clear explanation but that it could be summed up as “man is the measure of all things.” That quote (though it’s not the full quote) is from the Greek philosopher Protagoras of Abdera (490 – 420 BCE).Plato said th...