Compare and contrast Confucius and Zhuangzi Essay

Compare and contrast Confucius and Zhuangzi - Essay Example The Confucian school of thought in the 5th century B.C. laid the groundwork for the codification and compression of the various strands of Chinese thought into a coherent and accessible whole. Confucius also paved the way for the proper codification of the culture prevalent during his time. The Ethics taught by Confucius is considered by many as a kind of virtue ethics, where the behavior of people are procured by witnessing living examples instead of just following rules that teach behavior. Confucius was born in 521 B.C. into an aristocratic family of a lower order of impoverished knights. He lived during the second half of the Zhou dynasty (1027-256 B.C.) a period of constant civil strife, when feudalism had broken down, and there was a breakdown of government machinery and moral standards had become lax. Confucius was determined to remedy the situation and believed that the only way of doing it, was to go back to the days of antiquity and follow the principles and precepts set out by the wise men of the time. Armed with this determination and backed by the knowledge of the wise of yore, Confucius set up a school. Confucius’ philosophy was centered on humanism and he stressed upon the free will of individuals. Zhuangzhi, also known as Chuang Tzu, is another great Chinese thinker whose writing has a more philosophical tone, albeit it also stresses on what Confucius taught. Both thinkers laid great emphasis on the idea of Dao and De. Dao is the monistic theory that is responsible for the spontaneity that is found in all phenomena, while De or the â€Å"Inner Power† is the manifestation of these phenomena. It is the inherent power in an individual that can be built by practice and lead to a better life. As humans engage in cultivating their inner selves, it creates a ripple effect, and soon the results of the enlightened human are felt by the social and political system. Thomas Berry says

If drugs were legalized, would law enforcement agencies benefit Essay

If drugs were legalized, would law enforcement agencies benefit - Essay Example was 1.3% in 1914, when drug availability restrictions were much more lax. In spite of the strict regulations and the vast amounts of money spent to prevent the free availability of substances that are misused this percentage of drug addiction has remained the same at the turn of the new millennium (Kane, 2000). The second key argument is more important from the perspective of law enforcement. According to this argument a lot of time, effort and money of law enforcement are currently wasted on cracking down on drugs, which could be better utilized on their other functions of crime prevention and crime detection to enable the citizens to live in a more peaceful environment. In essence this argument is for increasing the focus on crime prevention of law enforcement, instead if distracting it with the additional function of curbing the availability and misuse of drugs (Levinson, 2002). Even if the point on the law enforcement agencies efforts to curb availability and misuse of drugs is conceded that does not mean that legalizing drugs would allow the law enforcement agencies to concentrate more effectively on reducing crime and making the country more for safe for its inhabitants. This is because legalizing drugs will make them more freely available and increase the misuse of these drugs, leading to the consequences of increased misuse of drugs. One of the important outcomes of this increased misuse of drugs will be the increase in crimes particularly violent crimes. The increase in crime rates that it will in all probability overwhelm the enforcement agencies and instead of increased efficiency of crime fighting by the enforcement agencies, there will be a deterioration in their ability to cope with the increased number of crimes and the severity of these crimes. The final consequence would be reduced safety of the population of the country and more criticism of the law enforcement agencies (Wilson, 2002). This argument of increased