Chuk Tai Wai 祝大為

1155260199@link.cuhk.edu.hk

Undergraduate in Philosophy, New Asia College, The Chinese University of Hong Kong

What I work on

The question that guides my work came from six service-learning sessions at Chi Lin Nunnery, where I saw how narrow a line of transmission can be. How does a community preserve what matters to it, and what can one build when transmission begins to fail?

Two projects follow from it at present. The first is methodological and asks how classical Chinese texts should be read, since a tradition survives partly through the way each generation interprets it. The second reads Tang Junyi (唐君毅) and Mou Zongsan (牟宗三), both honoured at the Chi Lin Spring Memorial I took part in, on what cultural continuity requires of individual moral cultivation.

Work in progress

Extending Liu Xiaogan’s methodology of Chinese philosophy

Working title. Paper in preparation, under the guidance of Professor Cheng Chung-yi (鄭宗義).

Liu Xiaogan (劉笑敢) sorts interpretive work in Chinese philosophy using a binary distinction. Reading Wang Bi’s (王弼) commentary on the Laozi (老子), I found passages that the binary captures along one dimension and leaves undecided along another. The paper keeps Liu’s distinction and adds a second axis so that those cases can be placed as well. The distinction remains his, and the paper asks how far it can be extended. The argument began as four connected essays written for History of Chinese Philosophy I and II, each extending the framework to a further case. Professor Cheng invited me in my first year to develop the four into a single paper for publication.

Draft available on request.

A Laozian supplement to coexistence theory

Working title. Essay in revision.

Written in English for History of Chinese Philosophy II. The essay reconstructs Professor Cheng Chung-yi’s published account of coexistence, then argues that resources in the Laozi (老子) extend that account in a direction it leaves open.

Draft available on request.

Interests

Coursework

Coursework in Chinese philosophy and in the core areas that support it. Grades appear in my CV.

Completed

PHIL 2020History of Chinese Philosophy I
PHIL 2030History of Chinese Philosophy II
PHIL 2050History of Western Philosophy II
PHIL 2060Philosophy and Human Conditions
PHIL 1310Logic
PHIL 1110Introduction to Philosophy
GENA 1114Service Learning, Chinese Culture
UGFH 1000In Dialogue with Humanity

Current, 2026–27 Term 1

PHIL 4371Seminar on Chinese Philosophy
PHIL 3541Topics in Ancient Chinese Philosophy
PHIL 3211Indian Buddhist Philosophy
PHIL 3383Philosophy of Death
PHIL 2040History of Western Philosophy I