This thesis reaches across multiple disciplines, including music psychology, performing arts, and philosophy, to propose using Lao Tzu’s philosophical thoughts in his book Tao Te Ching (also Dao De Jing, daodejing) to cultivate a classical performing musician’s “professional mindset.” “Professional mindset” is defined as the performer’s attitude in dealing with people including himself, and philosophical perspectives in making music. Part I evaluates the recurring traits of classical performing musicians (CPMs) as key for later arguing that Tao Te Ching helps enhance and transform the associated behaviors of a CPM’s recurring traits. These traits include being aloof, intelligent, emotionally unstable, dominant, sensitive, imaginative, self-sufficient, having high ergic tension, along with the associated second-order factors introversion, anxiety, independence, and being unrestrained. Part II introduces Tao Te Ching by building its thinking system map, with each of the book’s components explained and the underlying concepts hidden in the map uncovered via my English translations of the text as found in Chen Guying’s commentary. Part III presents three perspectives that collectively argue how Tao Te Ching cultivates a CPM’s professional mindset. The first analyzes anecdotes from the biographies of flutist Marcel Moyse using the recurring traits of CPMs in order to show how Lao Tzu’s thoughts can enhance or transform the associated behaviors of the recurring traits of CPMs. The second philosophically applies the duality of Lao Tzu to a CPM’s main musical activities and defines his daily performing cycle. The third explains how Tao Te Ching creatively deals with musical matters.

University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities / Department of Portuguese

Dudeism was inspired by a film released in 1998 named The Big Lebowski, which recounts the adventures of a character called the Dude, the namesake of the religion. The Dude is an example of the (mostly) ideal practitioner of Dudeism, which Dudeists mean has existed throughout the ages, expressed differently by different systems of belief and behaviour while retaining an essential Dudeistic spirit.    A superficial overlook of this system of belief and behaviour finds many similarities to early Taoism, a parallel which Dudeism itself encourages, particularly in regards to the Tao Te Ching. It is also clear that many of Dudeism’s central concepts are inspired or borrowed from said work.    This essay explores the relationship between Dudeism and Taoism through comparison, focusing on the teachings of Tao Te Ching in relation to Dudeist thought and practice. It seeks to establish Dudeism’s religious history as a religion firmly rooted in both a modern motion picture and ancient Eastern thought. The essay concludes that Dudeism has adapted the teachings of the Tao Te Ching for a modern, Western audience through the language and imagery of The Big Lebowski, adding its own twists to ancient concepts.

This thesis encompasses a survey of contemporary environmental literature (1970s to the present) as it relates to the tenets of Taoist literature, specifically the Chuang Tzu and the Tao te Ching. The thesis also presents and evaluates pertinent criticisms concerning the practice of relating modern environmental problems to ancient Chinese philosophy. The thesis contains a preface that describes the historic roots of Taoism as well as an explanation of the Chinese terminology in the paper. The environmental literature is divided into three major groups and discussed in the three chapters of the paper. The three groups include mainstream environmentalists, deep ecology, and ecofeminism.