Critical analysis of Mengzi (3)

梁惠王曰："寡人之于国也，尽心焉耳矣。河内凶，则移其民于河东，移其粟于河内。河东凶亦然。察邻国之政，无如寡人之用心者。邻国之民不加少，寡人之民不加多，何也？"

孟子对曰："王好战，请以战喻。填然鼓之，兵刃既接，弃甲曳兵而走。或百步而后止，或五十步而后止。以五十步笑百步，则何如？"

曰："不可，直不百步耳，是亦走也。"

曰："王如知此，则无望民之多于邻国也。不违农时，谷不可胜食也；数罟不入洿池，鱼鳖不可胜食也；斧斤以时入山林，材木不可胜用也。谷与鱼鳖不可胜食，材木不可胜用，是使民养生丧死无憾也。养生丧死无憾，王道之始也。

King Lianghui said: "I am truly devoted to my country. For example, when Henei had a drought, I transferred some farmers from Henei to Hedong and sent some food to Henei. No other kings are as devoted as me. But population in the neighboring countries is not less and our population is not more. Why?"

Mengzi replied:"Your majesty, since you are fond of wars, I hope to use war as an example. When a war started, some soldier abandoned their weapon and started to run. Some run 50 steps and some 100 steps. The one who run 50 steps laughed the one who run 100 steps. Why is that?"

King said:"I don't know why. No matter how many steps they run, they all did run and they were cowards."

Mengzi said:"Your majesty. That is exactly the reason. If farmers can plant seeds on time, we shall have abundant food. If the fish nets could allow undersized fishes to pass through, we shall have enough fishes. If we collect appropriate amount timber at appropriate time, we shall have a sustainable timber production. If we act according to the course of nature, we shall have no regrets. This is the true ruling of a country."

 

this conversation, Mengzi tried to educate the king about the concept of sustainable development. I have learned the importance of sustainable development during my undergraduate training. But 10 years later, I found that universally, governments still have problems to implement sustainable development. The major difficulties seem to be balancing the short term interests and long term interests. Factories need to release pollutants and law makers need tax dollars. Ordinary people need non-toxic air, water and food, jobs in factories and also protections from governments. How can one quantify the benefit of the sustainable development? Such benefit can only be seen after a decade or possibly a hundred years. But the tax dollars from environmentally unfriendly factories can be easily quantified and they can make an immediate impact on the economic statues of a country.

 

We are logical…but we are often logical on a wrong subject, at a wrong time and at a wrong location….