Home / Personalities / Laozi
Chinese sage traditionally credited with the Dao De Jing and the founding of Daoism. He advocates wu wei, a ruler who barely governs, small peaceful states, a simple life and distrust of learning, weapons and luxury.
Political axes
Laozi leans further toward biology than 98% of the 617 personalities in the catalog.
Of all the axes, Technology is where Laozi stands furthest from the rest.
On Representation, Laozi sits practically at the catalog median.
Here they share common ground with most personalities.
Ideological proximity
The closest among the 266 ideologies
Republican tradition that idealizes the small landowning farmer as the basis of civic virtue and liberty, advocating wide distribution of land, limited and decentralized government, and distrust of banks, public debt, industry and large cities.
Current of John Zerzan and Ted Kaczynski that sees industrial civilization and agriculture itself as the root of domination, calling for the end of modern technology and a return to small stateless hunter-gatherer communities.
Proudhon's original doctrine, denouncing property as theft and advocating free mutual credit, federalism of autonomous communities and possession by use, with strong moral reservations about progress and customs.
The most distant ideology
Techno-SocialismRadical Left34%
A former mathematics professor who withdrew to a remote cabin in Montana and carried out a nationwide bombing campaign for nearly two decades against scientists and executives, Kaczynski argued in his manifesto 'Industrial Society and Its Future' that industrial technology destroys human freedom and must be reversed through deliberate collapse.
Also close, by dimension
Other similar profiles
Furthest from Laozi
Zapatista territories in southern Mexico, self-governed since 1994 by mostly Maya communities through caracoles and Good Government Councils, rejecting political parties and the state, with cooperative agrarian economy and strong women's leadership.
Also close, by dimension
Furthest from Laozi
A rare society without a central state, medieval Iceland was organized by local chieftains and an assembly, the Althing, settling disputes through laws and private agreements in a decentralized system close to anarchy.
Also close, by dimension
Furthest from Laozi