China

As can be see from the end. this is not a lecture on China, but on the West, and an appeql to hombleness for our arrogant civilisation. Anyway, it suggests a few reflections about my beloved China.

1) American long for a China split into many medium-sized states instead than a huge empire challenging the supremacy of USA. They therefore support the idea that China is not a nation, that chinese is not a unitary language, etc. Anyway, Jaques has some reason to think that China is not a nation in the sens of western nations. Bit this has historical reasons: the national states arose in the Reneissance, but the Reinessance was possible only because the Roman Empire collapsed, and China had not a Reinessance, precisely because the Chinese Empire never collapsed, but slowly evolved into a super-advanced civilisation without ever leaving the Middle Age.

2) Jacques stresses the fundamental point that Chinese see the state as the head of the family. This is a brilliant idea of Confucius: he managed to unite the chinese, simply by stating that China is a single, big family. Western states are not based on familial ties, but on the social contract.

3) Finally, I would like to underscore that the writing system is very different from the alphabet, and this leads to a different way of reasoning: Westerns think is linearly, whereas Chineses think in a ntework - not differently from Jesuits, who in fact had a high esteem of the Chinese people.

Jacques is right in saying that we are ignoran about China. We should ask Chinese to present themselves, abyway, not clever and expert British.