 The inference is to the possibility of a version of Confucian ethics that fully acknowledges the capabilities of women to become junzi and that supports opportunities for them to achieve that ideal. Some who are sympathetic to this line of development for Confucian ethics have argued for its significant affinities with some strains of feminist thought. Consider ren in its meaning as the particular virtue of care for others. Chenyang Li (1994) has argued that there are important similarities between this central Confucian virtue and the feminist ethic of care articulated by Carol Gilligan (1982) and Nell Noddings (1984). Furthermore, both Confucian and feminist care ethics have conceptions of ethical reasoning that emphasize contextualized reasoning about moral problems rather than deducing solutions top-down from high general principles. Li acknowledges the patriarchal form that Confucian ethics came to take on, but stresses that in a contemporary dialogue between these two ethics, each could have something to contribute to the other.