 Xunzi’s fundamental complaint about Hui Shi and Deng Xi is that their “frivolous investigations” do not conform to traditional ritual propriety and righteousness (3.1), an unsurprising criticism given the Confucian’s commitment to ritual training—and thus conventional standards for the correct use of names—along with his general disdain for science and intellectual curiosity (12.3). They are “incisive” and “clever,” but their ideas are “useless,” yield few concrete results, and have no application to government (6.6). They have “no regard for the facts about right and wrong, so and not-so” (8.3). In the eyes of a 3rd-century B.C.E. Confucian traditionalist, then, the 6th-century Deng Xi was emblematic of a bright, talented person who wastes his energy on pointless intellectual games and sophistry, perhaps with a deliberate disregard for the truth, instead of earnestly committing himself to moral training and political administration.