Book Review of《论范例》(On Paradigm) by Dong Yawei
Title: Rethinking Metaphysics through Instancology: A Review of Dong Yawei's On Paradigm
Dong Yawei’s On Paradigm offers a radical reimagining of metaphysics through the lens of what he calls “Instancology” — a system that breaks from traditional Western ontology by redefining the structure of reality not through substance, but through instances. In this book, Dong proposes a fourfold framework: Absolute Absolute (AA), Relatively Absolute (RA), Absolute Relative (AR), and Relative Relative (RR). This architecture encompasses all aspects of existence while preserving the unspeakable background (AA) as the ground of being.
Dong’s work is not just a critique of Western metaphysics but a culmination of it. From Parmenides to Hegel, he sees the trajectory of thought as converging toward the truth grasped in AA — a domain that philosophy has approached but never fully embraced. With clarity and boldness, Dong claims that philosophy, in its search for truth through reality, has reached its limit. Instancology, instead, grasps the Whole as instances and thus concludes the philosophical project.
One of the most profound contributions of On Paradigm is its insistence that the macro world — everything in time and space — can be fully understood only when one recognizes that it is governed not by essences or categories, but by instances arising within the fourfold. This is not only a metaphysical shift, but an epistemological revolution, grounded in what Dong calls WuXing (悟性): a mode of knowing that surpasses rational inference and empirical observation, similar to the “Eureka!” moment in Western thought.
The implications stretch far beyond philosophy. From AI and consciousness to language acquisition and science, Dong’s paradigm offers a new lens that can potentially realign entire disciplines. For readers familiar with Heidegger’s Being and Time or Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit, Dong’s text resonates like a long-awaited sequel — one that dares to complete what others began.
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