Ten Thousand Studies

The Ten Thousand Schools System, Volume One explores the debate over being and nonbeing as a central question concerning the origin of the universe. Taoism takes nonbeing as fundamental, with being and nonbeing giving rise to one another; the Book of Changes uses the Supreme Ultimate to encompass changes between the manifest and the hidden; ancient Greek philosophy asks about the nature of being; Buddhism uses emptiness to dispel attachment and transcend being and nonbeing; and physics reveals the transformation of energy through concepts such as singularities and vacuums. From different perspectives, these systems address the question of ultimate existence, together forming humanity's diverse understanding of the source of all things.