Talk:Laozi/Archive 3

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

some mention of the pronounciation?

zi is pronounced dzuh and i think that's notable —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.176.27.25 (talk) 03:33, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

And how would one pronounce 'dzuh'? Is it /dzu/, /dza/, /dzə/ or /dzɑ/? From my knowledge of Mandarin (which is admittedly little, all I know is some phrases and words and how to count), I think zi is pronounced most like /dzə/, at least if one had to go with sounds found in the English language (I don't know how similar or different Mandarin vowels are to English vowels). Dzuh is ambiguous, while the IPA transcriptions I showed you are not. Therefore, it's not "notable". saɪm duʃan Talk|Contribs 07:12, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Since Mandarin is a tonal language you can't write it own like 'dzuh' since it contains no information about the tone. This is a third tone character, though context usually alters the actual pronunciation as you move from one character to another. See http://www.nciku.com/search/zh/detail/%E5%AD%90/57091 for examples of actual Chinese pronunciation in modern standard mandarin (though who knows how it would have been pronounced over the ages and in different parts of China). I should add that IPA transcriptions do not contain tonal information, which is absolutely necessary in mandarin - there are 5 separate ways of pronouncing 'zi' in standard mandarin all /dzə/ in IPA. Even this character has 2 different pronunciation depending on context (third tone and neutral tome) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.170.76.132 (talk) 13:45, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

@Sam: -uh is always -ə. That said, it's not covered under HELP:RESPELL and most of the respell fonts are terrible, so we can just leave all that alone and use IPA.

@83: This is the neutral one, which means that the tone doesn't actually matter all that much, but thanks for the lecture. — LlywelynII 20:54, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

He's important enough and it's odd enough that we can include pronunciation data, but since there's a name section, let's try to keep the IPA eyesore down there. — LlywelynII 20:54, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

Name Translation

When Laozi is literally translated it means "old baby" because the chinese used to believe Laozi was immortal and was actually born an old man. In the artical it says that it translates into "old master" which is incorrect and should be fixed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sunshinenite (talk • contribs) 03:28, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Isn't the 2nd syllable the same as in Kung fu tse (Confucius), Chuang tse, and other masters? (Sorry about the spellings!)--Nø (talk) 04:03, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

子 is an honorific suffix in classical Chinese, translated to "master". See wiktionary:子#Noun_2, 4th meaning. 66.117.145.231 (talk) 09:52, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

This. Sun's might make for more interesting party discussion, but it's not what's actually going on with this name. — LlywelynII 21:00, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

Lousy article

I did a quick run through and got most of the worst duplications and unhelpful verbiage out; I patched up the name section; but this is still a pretty uninformative, badly sourced, and poorly-written article. Should we revert to the former Good Article state, plus some of the Chinese text for the names? or should this not have been given a GA status in the first place? — LlywelynII 21:08, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

It is six years since it was listed and the GA and FA criteria were interpreted very differently back then. I think a GA review might be an idea.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 00:59, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

Famous quotations

Surely two of the most famous quotes from Lao Tzu are--

(1) The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step (Chapter 64).

(2) Those who know do not say. Those who say do not know (Chapter 56).

Not that these are as central to his thinking as some of the quote you DO give. They're just well known, I would say.

I love Wikipedia, not that interested in becoming active with any of this. But I have read Lao Tse many times, majored in religion long ago. Keep up the good work!

Robslocum (talk) 01:29, 30 July 2013 (UTC)Rob Slocum

• Excellent suggestions, I have added them to the article D A Patriarche, BSc (talk) (talk) 03:44, 26 July 2014 (UTC)

Tao Te Ching

"Some of Laozi's famous sayings include:" should include attributions to specific translations & versions, not just for (c) but esp. as these vary greatly in their rendition. Or would that be overburdening this page? D A Patriarche, BSc (talk) (talk) 03:51, 26 July 2014 (UTC)

Bibliography

Ursula K. Le Guin's Tao Te Ching listed here appears to be the 2nd edition or later, hard cover, including 2 CDs.[1] This edition contains many more pages than the 1st ed. referenced elsewhere in the article. However, one bookseller describes it as "abridged"(!)[2]. I do not have a copy of this edition & have been unable to confirm details online. The ISBN is correct. Note: URL links may be temporary. — Preceding unsigned comment added by D A Patriarche (talk • contribs) 04:35, 26 July 2014 (UTC)

What is this entry at the end of the page?

Someone just added this: "{{Link GA|ja}}" after the last category. It does not appear on my computer, as near as I can tell. Is this some legitimate technical thing I don't know about? or ????? Msalt (talk) 02:29, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

It's a template indicating there is a corresponding Good Article in Japanese, see Help:Interlanguage_links#Featured_articles_and_good_articles — Preceding unsigned comment added by D A Patriarche (talk • contribs) 04:47, 26 July 2014 (UTC)

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Laozi/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

needs better referencing; has a copyedit tag plange 06:20, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

Last edited at 06:20, 30 July 2006 (UTC). Substituted at 21:39, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

Ouch

This article is truly terrible. I hope someone comes along soon to fix it.

There is no mention whatsoever of the huge difference between dao jia and dao jiao - religious taoism and philosophical taoism, essentially. They are totally different. Religious taoism is an amalgamation of prehistoric animal-worship, superstitions and the pantheon of flying people. That group adopted Lao zi as a flying people, but has very little to do with the dao de jing or the (perhaps-real) person.

Philosophical daoism is the discussion of the dao de jing and later works by zhuang zi (if a butterfly flaps its wings ...) Taoism as a "philosophy" is anti-philosophical and anti-intellectual, totally amoral and can be (has been, too) used as a basis for everything from enlightened humanitarian regimes to the most repressive, heartless governments. If our libertarian friends have "adopted" daoism, they will be just one more group in a long line that have extracted what they want to hear from the dao de jing. But with the very first line of the dao de jing explaining that you cannot explain the dao, I fail to see how they can use it as any sort of basis for a philosophy with rules. That was the point. There *are* no rules. Rules and intellectualizing obfuscate the dao.

This article needs help, badly. And can we please ditch Ursula leGuin's "translation" ? She doesn't speak modern Chinese, much less ancient Chinese. How she can have the nerve to create a 'translation' of a language she doesn't understand is beyond my (admittedly limited) comprehension. 210.22.142.82 (talk) 14:02, 18 July 2016 (UTC)

Disputed Existence

Lao Tzu was recently removed from the List of Pantheists article for being of questionable historicity. Is this an appropriate edit? Is the questioning of his historical existence significant enough to remove him from lists of people? NaturaNaturans (talk) 14:02, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

In that case there was also no evidence that he was a pantheist. And yes, I do think there's enough query about his existence to remove him from most lists of people. Obviously the Tao Te Ching was written by someone(s), but who? Itsmejudith (talk) 14:38, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

But several experts of pantheism list him as a pantheist. The source used on the List of Pantheists page is perhaps the leading living authority of pantheism. I am not disputing that his historicity may be questioned, but it doesn't seem it is consensus that he did not exist. NaturaNaturans (talk) 14:59, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

No, he shouldn't be removed from the list because of his questionable historicity. His historicity is on the level of Homer and the ur-text of the Tao Te Ching (whatever the critics or archaeologists determine it to be) can speak to its author's views. On the other hand, he should be removed from the list because the present text suggests he wasn't a pantheist. The Way determines the nature of the 10k things, but it's not identical to them, nor is it identical to any notion contained under the rubric of the English word "God". — LlywelynII 21:08, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

There is no historical evidence an actual "Lao Tzu" as the founder of Daoism. There are no sources provided on this Wikipedia page for the claim that he is a specific person and the dating given. This is troublesome. The article needs to rest of on facts. If there are beliefs, then the phrasing is critical to reflect this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.210.196.253 (talk) 07:23, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Cite for spelling Laozi?

Omnipaedista helpfully added Collins as a cite for 'Lao Zi'. Is there a cite for 'Laozi'? Humanengr (talk) 17:46, 10 October 2018 (UTC)

Spelling Laozi as Lao Zi seems to be an arbitrary spelling convention followed by some dictionaries. This spelling convention does not affect the pronunciation. Both Laozi and Lao Zi are pronounced the same. --Omnipaedista (talk) 20:53, 10 October 2018 (UTC)

thx — Maybe a footnote to that effect to explain the variation (as part of or separate from the Collins cite?)? Humanengr (talk) 21:40, 10 October 2018 (UTC)

Here it is [3] --Omnipaedista (talk) 07:07, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

Old Master or Old One?

– an editor wants to change the translation of Laozi from "Old Master" to "The Old One" – Encyclopædia Britannica says, "Laozi, (Chinese: “Master Lao” or “Old Master”)" here – is there a reliable source for "The Old One" translation? – thanks – Epinoia (talk) 20:32, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

– the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy favors Old Master - "The name “Laozi” is best taken to mean "Old (lao) Master (zi),"" – here – Epinoia (talk) 20:49, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

- The Internet Encyclopdia of Philosophy also favors Old Master – "Laozi is the pinyin romanization for the Chinese characters which mean "Old Master." – here – Epinoia (talk) 20:52, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

@Epinoia: I even cited sources for my changes and you still deleted them? The sources were clearly reliable too. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Henryhe43 (talk • contribs) 21:38, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

– if not all sources agree, we need to seek consensus on which translations are used in the article – thanks, Epinoia (talk) 21:44, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

@epinoia Seek consensus, what do you mean by that? Furthermore we're the only two people talking right now. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Henryhe43 (talk • contribs) 21:46, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

– posting the discussion on the Talk page provides an opportunity for other editors to weigh in and reach consensus (see Wikipedia:Consensus) – when there are conflicting sources we want to avoid citation overkill (WP:OVERKILL) and we don't want to get into "my sources are better than your sources" – so let's wait for other editors to comment before making any changes to the article – thanks – Epinoia (talk) 21:55, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

@Epinoia Alright. So basically what I have to do is provide my proposed changes then provide reliable sources or evidence to support those changes right? Sorry I'm new to the whole editing process. Henryhe43 (talk) 22:09, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

– yes – I believe the traditional translation of Laozi is Old Master – other translations, such as Old Sage, are synonyms of Master, so my feeling is we only need one translation as additional translations or variations do not help our understanding of the subject – let's wait and hear what other editors have to say and seek consensus – Epinoia (talk) 22:19, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

• Kongzi is translated as "Master Kong," Mengzi as "Master Meng" and Xunzi as "Master Xun". For consistency, I would keep "master" in our literal translation of Laozi: "Old Master". Phlar (talk) 22:23, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Well I disagree with their translation, I think their translation is a bit too academic. But currently no "reliable" sources exist for me to establish a change on the page. Henryhe43 (talk) 03:19, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

@Epinoia You know what I have thought about it and I think the reason it bothers me so much is that their translation is racist. You are literally asking me to find racist sources which will inevitably only support a racist conclusion. Are you a racist? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Henryhe43 (talk • contribs) 03:34, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

@Epinoia to call Lao Tuz master is literally condescending towards the actual spirit of Lao Tzu. Lao Tzu even states in the Tao Te Ching "How do we know the best don't compete? Everyone else chooses nobility. They alone choose humility. Everyone else chooses the pure. They alone choose the base."

You think someone who espoused choosing humility over nobility would want to be called master? Henryhe43 (talk) 03:48, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

References

– see Wikipedia:Contributing to Wikipedia: "This is an encyclopedia, so remember that it's a necessity to include references listing reliable...sources" and Wikipedia:Verifiability: "Even if you're sure something is true, it must be verifiable before you can add it" – if "no "reliable" sources exist for me to establish a change on the page" then the change cannot be made – "Old Master" is an accepted translation supported by reliable sources – as for the charge of racism, please remember to assume good faith (WP:GOODFAITH) and be advised that personal attacks are not allowed (WP:PERSONALATTACKS) – as for what Laozi would like to be called, we do not know and for all we know he might object to being called "Old" – Epinoia (talk) 14:32, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

Inconsistent naming

If the page is titled Laozi, why is much of the intro and Names section written using Lao Tzu as the standard name?--Khajidha (talk) 10:34, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

Good question. @Koenfoo: would you like to explain? Failing an explanation, usage should be reverted back to conform with the article name. -- llywrch (talk) 20:10, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi. Lao Tzu seems to be more common in usage, especially in schools as opposed to Laozi. I have no statistics to back it up, however. Koenfoo (talk) 00:37, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Preliminary google search (yes, I know that isn't the only criterion) shows better than 12:1 Lao Tzu:Laozi. Seems likely that the page should really be at Lao Tzu. --Khajidha (talk) 19:05, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

FYI Ngram Keahapana (talk) 20:40, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Okay, I don't really care which way, but this article has to be changed one way or the other. Change the text to match the page title or move the page to match the text, whichever seems best. --Khajidha (talk) 13:28, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

Lao Tzu is more traditional in English; Lao Tseu is more traditional in French; both reflect the Chinese 老子 whose official Mandarin romanization in the PRC is now Laozi (or Lǎozǐ). The latter is recognized internationally, which may be important for an encyclopædia with de facto international readership like the English Wikipedia. May I offer a parallel? For the capital of China, the traditional English name is Peking, the traditional French name is Pékin, the Chinese name is 北京 whose official romanization in the PRC and internationally is Beijing. Now what's the difference? Answer: For some forty years, the PRC government has been inundating the world with news, tourist information, etc., mentioning its capital exclusively as Beijing. Some countries, such as the UK, followed suit. Others, such as France, didn't, or haven't yet. Ancient philosophers, OTOH, are totally ignored by the PRC government. If it mentioned them, it would romanize their names using hanyu pinyin, no doubt; but it gives them the silent treatment instead. Confucius and Mencius are different: we use a Latinized form of their names. Not so 老子. However, IIUC, the pinyin romanization is gaining ground over all others, not only in the political domain but also (more slowly maybe) in the philological and historic. My guess is that in a few decades the English Wade-Giles, the French EFEO Chinese transcription, and several others, will be a thing of the past, while pinyin will be used everywhere for romanizations of Mandarin Chinese. I may be wrong: we'll see.

The article mentions both the old-fashioned spelling Lao Tzu and the newer one Laozi in its top section, which IMHO is the right thing to do. I suppose that using Laozi systematically in the body of the article would be more consistent with the page title. But I won't make a fuss about it. — Tonymec (talk) 01:44, 8 November 2020 (UTC)

The pronunciation is wrong

"Lao Zi" does not, by a long shot, rhyme with "fear" or "spear." David Agrawal (talk) 00:49, 30 June 2022 (UTC)

- where does it say in the content you deleted that Lao Zi rhymes with fear or spear? - Epinoia (talk) 02:09, 30 June 2022 (UTC)

does the link to Bogar belong?

does it make sense for Boyang in this article to be linked to Bogar without any comment as it is currently? the Bogar page claims Laozi was Tamil, summoned to China telepathically 2603:8001:D300:A631:0:0:0:10D0 (talk) 01:00, 11 December 2022 (UTC)

Pronunciation

A) We need to nix the "Mandarin" pronunciation from the lead. Pinyin is phonetic + no English speaker is going to manage [làu.tsɹ̩], which doesn't currently include the essential tones anyway. You can leave the characters and pinyin for the main name but really WP:MOS-ZH says we're fine leaving all that in the infobox. The only reason to leave it in the lead here is to gloss that it's really a title instead of a personal name, but we have a #Names section for that.

B) We really need to nix the "Mandarin" pronunciation from the lead. Even if it had the tones, it's not actually the correct IPA for the Standard Mandarin pronunciation (cf. wikt:老子). It's /aʊ/, not /au/. That 儿 on the end is possibly accurate in informal speech around Beijing but it's not actually Standard Mandarin. It's Pekinese. The IPA in the infobox doesn't match the lead—it has the right tones, adjusting for samdhi, although it doesn't use the correct IPA format for them—but still has the nonexistant /ɹ/ noise.

C) We really do need the general English pronunciation in the lead (if we don't just keep this all in the #Names section), which we inexplicably don't. It's /laʊdzə/ in American English (e.g. Merriam-Webster) and presumably /laʊtzə/ in the UK, although neither the OED or Cambridge gloss it. Collins transcribes it incorrectly but then their audio file pronounces it the American way as /laʊdzə/.

D) The various transcriptions were always talking about the same Chinese word. Like this guy already noted, it's an active disservice to our WP:READERs to provide a series of historical mispronunciations based on sight-reading bad older systems of Romanization in the lead. It's fine to say people used to pronounce these things these ways in the #Names section, but it's just WP:UNDUE WP:BIASed orientalizing nonsense to pretend that these historical mistakes in any way reflect how people today should generally approach the name. Even those older transcriptions always should have been the same noises as pinyin Laozi; people just didn't know better.  — LlywelynII 02:04, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Add'l names

We're currently missing this entire article here, which includes information that should absolutely be in the lead. It's not just he's a historical figure coopted by the Taoists. He was always a legendary figure and he's generally revered as a primordial god or manifestation of the Tao itself in mainline Taoism. The form Laojun (老君) not only should be included but was the main form of the name in English for a few centuries, albeit in the form Lao-kiune owing to French primary sources. — LlywelynII 02:04, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Especially w/r/t this discussion & this one, this is also probably worth mentioning: the first versions of pinyin advised grouping it Lǎo zǐ—which as noted here becomes Lao Zi in English orthography—but subsequently they emended it to prefer Lǎozǐ. — LlywelynII 02:09, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

"Old Master"

This discussion was also correct. 子 (lit. "son") can be treated as a title of nobility meaning viscount, a honorific meaning "Master", and an enclitic basically equivalent to "One". It's true that the general English gloss has been "Old Master" but "The Old One" or "The Venerable One" are just as valid, even if the "Old Child" meme is nonsense. It's probably worth specifically debunking: see this earlier discussion & this one. — LlywelynII 02:31, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

WP:ERA

Per this edit, the era format of this page was established as BC/AD and the only discussion of changing it since then was very much inconclusive, if anything supporting retaining it. Things may have changed since then but, pending a new consensus to the contrary, we should maintain the original era consistently. — LlywelynII 04:28, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Bogar

I know it's easy to miss in the shuffle of all the other fights about this guy's romanization, pronunciation, actual beliefs, historicity, &c. but...

hopefully we can all come together and agree that Laozi was probably not a misplaced Tamil merchant. If whoever created that WP:UNDUE WP:FRINGE hilarity tries to restore links here or claims about an identity with Laozi on the Bogar page, kindly insist on bulletproof evidence or continue to remove it. — LlywelynII 06:54, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Future improvement

Thorough and well documented overview here

• Barnwell, Scott (21 October 2011), "Classical Daoism—Is There Really Such a Thing?", Warp, Weft, and Way: Chinese and Comparative Philosophy.

that could be helpfully incorporated into the article. In any case, I've cleaned up most of the lead and name section now. The name section might still benefit from an overview paragraph about Laojun and other religious titles. It's also probably the appropriate place—as a concluding paragraph—to deal with the Tang titles. In fact, nevermind. I'll just fix that now.

Anyway, for the rest of the article, right now we have

#Historical views
#Tao Te Ching
#Taoism
#Influence

with #Historical views in particular being a complete hash that inexplicably starts with modern scholarship and then seesaws all over the place through legend, archaeology, and textual criticism ending with Laozi's birth. Obviously the article should begin with #Traditional accounts that provide an overview of the major sources for premodern information about Laozi: the Tao Te Ching itself, Sima Qian, &c. It should begin with his birth and end with his death/enlightenment/apotheosis. Barnwell (above) could be used to at least get through the greatest hits. Then #Tao Te Ching, its influence, and timing, and then #Modern scholarship and #Veneration. Alternatively, #Legends (including Guang Chengzi & Laojun), #Worship, and #History followed by dealing with the Tao Te Ching more briefly in a #Works section. The #Influence section should actually go through the Chinese influence and major impacts in Europe.

If that seems overwhelming, realize that this article has been pretty long and well organized for most of its existence. Just picking at random (eg) there's this old version of the page that—aside from the Goatzex vandalism—is in most respects far superior to the current mess in the treatment of Laozi's life and sources. Hell, so is this account from 1870: it's out of copyright so we could just put it in as the new treatment and then slowly let people add more recent scholarship. — LlywelynII 09:35, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

I can't say I'm surprised that this notoriously convoluted subject has a WP article of similar confusion. As you alluded to above, the Names section is also rather ridiculous, though I suspect it is (like much of the article's content) an accumulation of cruft by random editors over time. The SEP article might also be consulted further for ideas on reorganization. Aza24 (talk) 05:38, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Oops well I came here to open up a section about the smol reorg I just did, to find a different one proposed. I'll start with saying I'm not super familiar with Daoism, but pretty familiar with early Chinese texts.

I think it's important to put right up front how little we know about Laozi outside the fact that the Dao De Jing is attributed to him. Literally everything else flows from that relationship. I don't think it's particularly helpful to try to structure this article like a regular biography, in terms of a chronology or anything. I want the reader to come away with the idea that we could substitute without loss of generality the person of Laozi with the manifestation of an author from the existence of a text.

Unsure how much daoism concepts, influence, etc to include, since we have full articles on those topics and I have no resources by which to assess their relative importance, but we could definitely use a brief overview of the influence of Daoism in Chinese thought throughout history in the Influence section. Folly Mox (talk) 02:51, 6 April 2023 (UTC)