Japanese Philosophers Nishi Amane and Nishida Kitaro: between East and West

Abstract

The article suggests a brief analysis of the views of the two Japanese Thinkers Nishi Amane and Nishida Kitaro. The considerable impact of Western philosoph­ical theories on these two scientists’ views is also emphasized here. The out­standing Nishi Amane’s role in the field of creating new concepts in use even to­day conveying the meanings of Western Culture in Japan had been stressed. Doing so, Nishi used Chinese characters – and it was his true novelty. Actually Nishi’s system was aimed at the modernization of Neo-Confucian metaphysics by drawing on the experience of Western Positivism and, partly, Utilitarism. Nishida Kitaro appeared to be the most famous Japanese philosopher in the West. His works show the tendency to combine the basic installations of the national (Buddhist-Confucianism) worldview tradition and some European philosophical traits. The both thinkers demonstrated the two-vector nature of Japanese aesthet­ics in intercultural discourse. They constantly used to attract the ideas of Western thinkers, subjecting them to creative reinterpretation in the process of contruct­ing their own philosophical theories.