UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

GEC02 |PRELIMS|1ST SEMESTER

PHILOSOPHICAL PERSPECTIVE OF THE SELF

PLATO
PHILOSOPHY SELF IS THE REASON OR INTELECT
Came from the Greek Words Academy
→ Philos which means love or loving → Plato founded the world’s first university
→ Sophos which means wise → School in Athens and the first institution of higher learning in the Western
→ Philosophy = Love of Wisdom World

It employs the inquisitive mind to discover the ultimate causes, reasons, and ➡He believe in the soul (as a student of Socrates)
principles of everything. ➡For him, it is distinct to man and it is God-given. Thus, it inhibits the body as
Example: Notebook “knower,” “thinker,” and “determiner”
Cause: for us to write
Reason: for us to have something to write one 3 PARTS OF THE SOUL
Principle: to review what we write 1. Reason
→ enables us to think deeply, make wise choices and achieved a true
Understanding the self is one of the prime focus of philosophers and thinkers understanding of eternal truths
2. Physical Appetite
SOCRATES → basic intellectual needs including hunger, thirst, love, and sexual desire
SELF IS THE SOUL 3. Spirit or Passion
“an unexamined life is not worth living” → basic emotion such as love, anger, ambition, and anggressiveness
“know thyself” *Reason shoul be the ruler among the three as it has the responsibility to sort things
➡First to suggest that we should rely on rational thought and introspection out to restore the balance between these elements
➡For him, a person can have a happy and meaningful life by knowing one’s own
significance which can be achieve by soul-searching or introspection ARISTOTLE
SOUL IS THE ESSENCE OF THE SELF
Socratic Method Lyceum
→ way of teaching or learning by asking questions → founded his own school, where he become veru productive intellectual
→ a conversation where both sides explore an idea together → Aristotle serve as a mentor of Alexander the Great

TWO DICHOTOMOUS REALMS ➡He is the most famous and has the advantages over Socrates and Plato because
Physical Realm he modifies the studies of them.
→ changeable, transient, imperfect ➡He is the first person to put into writing and explanation about behavior of man
→ ex. physical body ➡He also believe in the soul (as a student of Plato)
Ideal Realm ➡He also offered the concept of Potency and Act
→ unchanging, eternal, immortal → POTENCY - it is what something can become, but has not yet
→ ex. soul → ACT - fullfillment of the potential

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UNDERSTANDING THE SELF
GEC02 |PRELIMS|1ST SEMESTER

→ a being may carry withing itself certain potencial (potency), but it requires → God the Father - source or origin
to be actualized (act)
2. Intelligence
3 FUNCTION OF THE SOUL → intellectual activities
1. Vegetative → God the Son - embodies wisdom and knowledge
→ basic maintenance of life
→ food, water, shelter 3. Will
2. Appetitive → making schoices and decision
→ desires and motives → God the Holy Spirit - inspires and empowers act
3. Rational
→ geverns reasons that is located in the heart RENE DESCARTES
SELF IS THE THINKING SELF
4 CAUSES OF BEING “I think therefore I am”
1. Material Causes Cogito ergo sum
→ corporeal, possessed, made up of physical materials ➡Father of Modern Philosophy as he brought an entirely new perspective to
→ ex. organs philosophy and the self
2. Formal Causes
→ shape refers to the form of the being DUALISM
→ ex. soul 1. Mind
3. Efficient Causes → spiritual entity
→ something which brings about the presence of another being → thinking self
→ ex. parent 2. Body
4. Final Causes → physical or material entity
→ end or goal → physical self
→ ex. to live a fulfilled life
JOHN LOCKE
ST. AUGUSTINE OF HIPPO SELF IS CONSCIOUSNESS
SELF IS THE RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD ➡He introduces the idea that all experiences may be analyzed
➡He is a Catholic saint introduced the method of introspection where in an
individual tries to describe his own conscious process Tabula Rasa
➡Through introspection, the soul could know what was true and known by faith → a blank state of which at birth, the mind is just a blank sheet that collects its
➡”knowledge can only come by seeing the truth that dwells within us” and the truth contents through experiences
is knowing God
Basically, the mind was passive, and could only do two things.
SOUL WORKS LIKE TRINITY OF 3 FUNCTION 1. First, it could receive experiences from the outside world: this involved the
1. Memory act of sensing. Locke was actively concerned with the whole process of
→ stores and recall past experiences sensation, since it was the primary source of all knowledge.

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UNDERSTANDING THE SELF
GEC02 |PRELIMS|1ST SEMESTER

2. Second, the mind could reflect upon itself. It was basically through this GILBERT RYLE
process of reflection, or what we call it today as introspection, that it SELF IS THE SAME AS BODILY BEHAVIORS
became possible for people to engage in the process we call thinking. “I act, therefore I am”
(Lundin, 1991). Mind-Body Dichotomy
→ idea that the mind and body are two fundamentally different things
DAVID HUME
SELF IS NOTHING BUT THE PHYSICAL BODY ➡For him, what truly matter is the behavior that a person does
➡He believed that the mind is nothing but a heap or collection of different ➡He concludes the human minds is the totality of human person
perceptions, unified together by certain relationships

➡To Hume, what people experience is just a bundle or collection of different MAURICE MERLEAU-PONTY
perceptions. He maintains that if people carefully examine the contents of their SELF IS
experience through introspection, they will find that there are only distinct entities: ➡He said that mind and body are intertwined that they cannot be separated from
→ impressions: one another
o basic sensation such as hate, love, joy ➡According to him, one cannot find any experience that is not an embodied
o strong and lively experience. Because of this, he also dismissed the Cartesian Dualism which he
o core of our thoughs described as a plain misunderstanding. The living body, thoughts, emotions, and
→ ideas experiences are all one
o thought and images from impressions
o less lively and vivid PAUL CHURCHLAND
NO BRAIN, NO SELF
IMMANUEL KANT
SELF IS “WE CONSTRUCT THE SELF” ➡Paul Churchland is a Canadian philosopher and author who is known for his
➡He is a German Englightment philosophers who brought our attention to the fact "eliminative materialism", the view that the mind is the brain.
that we, human being have the faculty called rational will, which is the capacity to
act according to principles ➡The self, therefore, is inseparable from the brain and the physiology of the body.
Hence, "no brain, no self." For him, the physical brain and not the imaginary mind,
Faculty gives people the sense of self. The mind does not really exist because it cannot be
→ inherent mental capacity experienced by the senses.
→ he opposed John Locke that the mind is a blank state but rather according
to him it is capable of acquiring knowledge through sensory experiences

Rationality
→ consists of the mental faculty to construct ideas and thoughts

*human can act according to reasons while animals act according to their impulses

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