Another reminder of just how irrelevant Confucianism is to young, urban, middle class, tech savvy Chinese people these days (and, for that matter, Americans of similar demographic profile).  Here, thanks to CDT, is a comparison of the most widely searched terms on Baidu and Google:

What are the top ten "What is" questions searched by Chinese Internet
users – according to Baidu (the most popular Chinese search engine)?
1.   What is a mutual fund?
2.   What are warrants?
3.   What are stock-index futures?
4.   What are stocks?
5.   What is e-commerce?
6.   What is love?
7.   What is 3g? (Third generation wireless technology)
8.   What is corporate culture?
9.   What is "scientific view of development?"
10. What is OEM? (Original Equipment Manufacture)

The top ten "What is" questions by English users around the world, according to Google:
1.   What is love?
2.   What is autism?
3.   What is rss?
4.   What is lupus?
5.   What is sap?
6.   What is bluetooth?
7.   What is emo?
8.   What is java?
9.   What is hpv (human papillomavirus)?
10. What is gout?

    We have to say that those young Chinese (I am assuming they are young because they are internet users) are nothing if not consistent: the top five questions are all about money and getting rich.  Number six  – what is love – is notable, but its placement, and the priority of money questions, suggests that some folks might be realizing the money can’t buy you love….

     Do these priorities demonstrate an absence of Confucian morality?  On the face of it, yes.  But let’s push things a bit further.  Maybe Confucian virtues are so deeply ingrained in Chinese youth that they don’t have to search for answers to the obvious Confucian questions: What is Humanity?  What is Duty?  What is Ritual? (questions I find myself asking myself all the time…).  Maybe but….not so much.  This admittedly biased and narrowly-focused data simply corroborates other evidence that contemporary China is swept up in a mad rush for money that the Master would find depressing.  Remember the Analects:

The
Master said: “The noble-minded are clear about Duty. Little people are clear about profit. (4.16) 

The
Master said: “If there were an honorable way to get rich, I’d do it, even if it
meant being a stooge standing around with a whip. But there isn’t an honorable way, so I do
what I like.” (7.12)

     My purpose here is not to be a Confucian scold, wagging a disapproving finger at degenerate Chinese youth (I was a degenerate youth myself once).  Rather, this is just another brick in the "China is not a Confucian society" wall, which I tend to from time to time.
   
      It should also be noted that the image of the US that emerges from this comparison is rather unflattering: lovelorn, autistic, gout-ridden, virus-infected, technologically ignorant, pop-cultural  isolates (I can say I know what "emo" is because I have a teenage daughter!).  Although they may not be thinking of Confucianism  and Taoism, it would seem that Americans could certainly use them!