LESSON 1: DOING PHILOSOPHY
SOCRATES (6th BC)
• Greek philosopher who laid the foundation for
Western thought
• taught the truth to the youth of Athens
• “The unexamined life is not worth living.”
ELENCHUS (Socratic Method)
• way of eliciting the truth by Q and A
• QUESTIONS – must be welcomed as healthy ways
of communicating w/ the complex reality of the
world
• “TRUE LEARNING is not blind obedience”
ₒ it is always dialogical
ₒ to listen not only with an open mind, but
with a humble heart
DOCTA IGNORANTIA - doctrine
• the only true knowing according to Socrates
• to know that you do not know
• “Who am I?” - we become the question itself that
we intend to answer
• what living an ethical life means
ARETE
• virtue of perfection
• real virtue where true knowledge must lead to
• MORAL WISDOM, not just intellectual wisdom
EDUCATION (for Socrates)
• perfection of the human person – whole person
PHILOSOPHY
• eternal quest for the truth; love of wisdom
• from the Greek words:
ₒ “philo” – love
ₒ “sophia” – wisdom
PYTHAGORAS
• coined the term “PHILOSOPHER” – lover of
wisdom; early Greek thinkers called themselves
WISE MEN
• thought no man could possess wisdom; no man
could justly call himself wise
• WISDOM – comprehensive and profound
knowledge of things; privileged possession only of
God
TRUE EDUCATION
• should begin from the act of philosophizing
• TRUTH – real subject matter of philosophizing
• to truly philosophize, one must go into to the
nearness of beingQUESTION OF BEING leads
to heart and soul of reality – HUMAN LIFE
SOPHISTS
• group of intellectuals who taught ORATORY(art of
public speaking) for a fee
• itinerant teachers who specialized in rhetoric and in
the techniques of philosophy in Athens (5th BCE)
PERSON is a being who is rational
• “all men by nature desire to know" – ARISTOTLE
• PHRONESIS – practical wisdom
• EUDAIMONIA – life of real happiness after the life
of real virtue (led by wisdom)
ICEBERG THEORY
 10% - shown/seen; 90% - hidden/unknown
THE REALITY OF HUMAN LIFE
• not reducible to a biological phenomenon
(GABRIEL MARCEL)
• everything has been figured out, except how to live
(JEAN PAUL SARTRE)
SWIRL OF DISTRACTIONS – FR. MICHAEL MOGA
 world of mere appearances
 “seeming" realities where we often find ourselves
in
 spending time doing things that do not really mean
anything substantial
PHILOSOPHICAL ACT
 effort to bring ourselves closer to the truth—into
the real value of the reality around us
 does not merely analyze the meaning of words; it is
grounded in experience
“Philosophy must self-consciously place itself in the context
and service of human life of which it is a function and
whose direction it has to grasp...”–ROBERT JOHANN
IDEALISM – things are already known even without
experience; knowledge is inborn
EMPERICISM – all knowledge is derived from experience
INSIGHT
• something that emerges when we are thrown into a
situation
• “a kind of seeing with the mind” –FR.
ROQUEFERRIOLS to realize the meaning of
something
ABSTRACTION
• process of arriving at an insight
• derived from two Greek words:
o “ana” – up
o “lusis” – dissolution
dissolutionof an object to its constituent parts
(analysis of concepts of reality)
• to look into the various aspects of objects
– cannot exhaust the whole meaning of an
experience
REFLECTION
• state of mind in which we understand things
through clarification
• has its roots in the daily flow of life; is not
exercised on things that are not worth the trouble
reflecting about (GABRIEL MARCEL)
• a part of life; one of the ways in which life
manifests itself
• BREAK – allows a person to realize something
important, making the event important to his/her
life
2 TYPES OF REFLECTION:
PRIMARY REFLECTION – not a genuine thinking (selfish)
• process of deriving clear concepts about reality
• based on observable phenomena (OBJECTIVE
POV)
• qualities of things are seen (elements such as its
shape, color, or function)
EDUARDO CALASANZ – objective way of looking at
things:
• one takes “each of the parts” – ANALYSIS,
• study their ordering –SYSTEMIZE, and
• arrive at some clear and fixed ideas regarding the
thing itself – CONCEPTUALIZE
SECONDARY REFLECTION – holistic view of reality
• invites us to go deeper into ourselves
• we gather together the fragments of experience
• realization of the inseparability of the situation and
the individual
• subject is part of the thing that is being investigated
• brings us into an awareness of our very own
existence, making us fully aware of ourselves
“We must see human experience beyond what is practical if
we are to see the greater value of human life.”
HUMAN LIFE
• is a MYSTERY
ₒ how one must live a life that is truly
human
ₒ incalculability of human experience –
means that there is really no way that one
can truly organize life on the basis of a
formula
ₒ we get “lost in the directions and
digressions,” in which “one wonders so
many times where ideas lead to”
• is an OPEN-ENDED QUESTION
ₒ it is a question that will lead to endless
possibilities
ₒ a person is always faced with a myriad of
difficult choices, yet it is where hope
dwells
MAKE A CHOICE
• to be able to extract one’s self outside of a
situation
• to be truly fair and just, one has to make a firm
stand
• TAKING A STAND to make a statement that
one actually and truly lives for something– a center
in which life itself is anchored
• what one truly values
THE ALLEGORY OF THE CAVE – by PLATO
(“I” refers to Socrates; “He” refers to Glaucon)
– suggests that most of us dwell in the dark, that we
have oriented our thoughts around the blurred
world of shadows
– PRISON – our world of sight; FIRE – sun
• the darkness of the cave blind people from
the truth (light – truth of being)
HUMAN SENSES are influenced by temporary or
ephemeral things, and we confuse them for the truth.
 CAVE – symbolizes our life; we base the truth on
what we hear and see
 PRISONERS – ignorant/unintellectual
group/people
 COMPETITIONS – people who understand and
want to lead the world
 CHAIN – ignorance
 PRISONER WHO ESCAPED – life of a
philosopher; speaks the truth, yet misunderstood
by the others
LESSON 2: METHODS OF PHILOSOPHIZING
THE ART OF QUESTIONING:
• we are sometimes afraid to ask questions… “dare
to think…” – IMMANUEL KANT
SOCRATIC METHOD (ELENCHUS)
• asking a series of critical questions to unmask the
sophistry of those who claim to hold a monopoly of
the truth
• THE SEARCH FOR TRUTH – true goal of
philosophy and not really the possession of it
DIALOGUES OF PLATO
• contains stories which help the reader describe a
philosophical concept that he wishes to explain
• participant questions, analyzes, and examines
certain claims
PHILOSOPHY allows people to see the big picture
• opens the broad horizon in which one recognizes
unity in diversity, or of the notion of wholeness
where one gets to experience what is most
meaningful
PLATO DIVIDED REALITY INTO 2: – idealism that
truth belongs to the mind or intellect
1: WORLD OF FORMS/IDEAS
• have an independent existence; can persist even
though particular things perish
• is the cause of the essence of a thing
2: WORLD OF OBJECTS
• concrete things that we see
• unreal; mere copies of things in the world of forms
• “the world of senses is not the reality”
REALITY
 dwells in that which remains and stays in the
perfection of its beauty
 its basic criterion is PERMANENCE
Forms are changeless, eternal and non-material essences
or patterns of which the actual visible objects we see are
mere copies.
MAN IS HIS SOUL – Plato
• this soul is TRIPARTITE (consists 3 ELEMENTS)
1) APPETITIVE – bodily pleasures
2) SPIRITED – emotions
3) LOGICAL – reason as the seat of control
• the bodily existence is an imprisonment of the soul
• MAN’S PURE SOUL – where the reality of being
human dwells; BODY – no more than a distraction
in the search for the truth
EDUCATION(for Plato)
• its function is to lead people out of the cave
(allegory) into the world of light
• lifts us to see not only with senses but with our
mind
• true education enables us to understand beyond
the world of becoming – BASIC PRINCIPLES AND
HUMAN VALUES(indestructible)
• process of recollection of what is innate in the soul
• complete turning from the world of appearances to
the world of reality
Truly value the human intellect and free the self from the
imprisonment of sensory perception.
SCIENCE – field in which human being can direct his
questions to tear things into specific of small parts and
arrive at an explanation of reality
NATURE OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE
THOMAS KUHN – introduced the important distinctions
between normal and revolutionary science
(book: The Structure of Scientific Revolutions – central
feature of his theory is the concept of paradigm shifts)
NORMAL SCIENCE
• when scientists work things out on the basis of
existing norms
REVOLUTIONARY SCIENCE
• emerging on a new theoretical development once
an anomaly is uncovered
• puts into question the previous theory (old/past)
NORMAL STATE OF SCIENCE: scientists come up with
new knowledge about the world by interacting with each
other
PARADIGM SHIFT
• nature of scientific revolutions, or
 • fundamental changes in the basic concepts and
experimental practices and culture of a scientific
field or discipline
• happens when an existing theory is no longer
adequate; an alternate theory may replace the old
one
RENE DESCARTES
• METHODIC DOUBT: “Cogita Ergo Sum”
 “I think, therefore, I am.”
• I exist, and the “I” that exist is the thinking I.
• when we doubt, we think, and when we think, we
exist --- DOUBTING  THINKING  EXISTING
• (the only thing I’m not doubting is that I’m
doubting)
• SKEPTICISM – question everything
EDMUND HUSSERL – founder of phenomenology
HISTORY: Critique on the Cartesian Methodic Doubt
by Rene Descartes employed the (M.D.) on his search for
“certainty” by systematically doubting everything at first.
FOR DESCARTES: Outer reality is separate and
distinct entity that can only be understood in rational terms
through cognitive process of deduction.
PHENOMENOLOGY
• investigation of essence or the nature of
materials/things that appears to us
• came from 2 Greek words:
ₒ “phainomenon” – appearances
ₒ “logos” – reason/study
STUDY OF APPEARANCES; anything that
exists of which the mind is conscious; arises
from the experience of being in the world
• “science of the essence of consciousness”
CONSCIOUSNESS
• always intentional; always intends or that always
tends towards an object
• consciousness of something that is other than itself
– it reaches out to the real objects of our
experiences
• objects of perceptionis reduced to the activity of
human consciousness
• ego-subject must decide on the truth of the
objects of perception
• relation between the self and its objects
It is in the act of consciousness that the reality of the object
is given. Thinking is always conscious of its objects.
gives a real sense of awareness of the reality of
things
ACT OF INTUITION – is the ego-subject constituting the
object of experience
• “neither subjects nor objects exist separately from
other subjects and objects”
PHENOMENOLOGICAL METHOD (EPOCHE)
• study of lived experiences
• process of knowing the meaning of “things as they
are in themselves”
• essence of consciousness
EPOCHE OR BRACKETING – reduction of our experience
• the natural attitude (pre-judgment) about the world
or reality is suspended
• to provide fundamental descriptions, free from all
the distortions or presuppositions and prejudices
• in short: act of suspending judgment about the
natural world to instead focus on analysis of live
experience
– begins by “questioning what we had previously taken
for granted or by wondering at what seems most
familiar”
REFLECTION
• primary mode of consciousness within reduction
• to reflect means looking for the essential meaning
of our lived experiences
• in the process, the object of perception is reduced
to its essence EDETIC REDUCTION
ₒ meaning of the objects of lived experience
is revealed to the subject
SELF-EVIDENCE OF CONSCIOUSNESS REVEALS 2
THINGS:
1: THE OBJECT that is intended by consciousness
2: THE TRANSCENDENTAL SUBJECT–thinking subject
It is by means of reflection whereby consciousness
becomes the extension of the self in which the whole world
is grounded.
UNITY IN ORIENTAL THOUGHT
• aim of philosophy in the East and West
• to know how to live the right kind of life
• about “consciously adjusting one’s conduct to
one’s intellectual convictions”
EAST (ORIENTAL) WEST (OCCIDENTAL)
grounded in the unity of based in the perceptive
things or the inner harmony ways of a rational mind
of nature (logical)
inner unity is a person’s all about reason as the full
sense of self development of truth
oriental thought: BEING and NON-BEING are one
TAO TE CHING – LAO TZU
 all things in the world come from being; and
 being comes from non-being
TAO – nameless non-being (its activity has no action)
• not a concrete, individual thing or describable
• by which all things become what they are
• as a non-being, has a positive character
• is the Way… – by which thing are ordered
TE – perfection of personality
• to obtain te is to make one’s person virtuous
• if one follows Tao, then one is endowed with virtue
• A MAN OF VIRTUE – characterized by moral
qualities, like love and frugality
CONFUCIUS – Chinese philosopher
• idea of REN or human-heartedness
• “Ren has been translated as benevolence, human-
heartedness, altruism, humanity, goodness, etc”
 according to PEIMIN NI
west: REASON is always attached to the empirical world.
BUDDHIST ENLIGHTENMENT
• absolute freedom from all empirical thought
in ZEN BUDDHISM, religion goes beyond any kind of
conceptualization; it belongs to an unobstructed higher
plane
• views the self as attached to the physical words
which leads to suffering
• ULTIMATE FREEDOM – can only be achieved
once the self is overcome or once it can “work
through a principle higher than itself”
• characterized by non-obstruction
ADDITIONAL:
THEODICY – subject of philosophy which concerns the
existence of God
EPISTEMOLOGY – subject of philosophy which concerns
the study of knowledge
WONDERING – first step in doing philosophy
LESSON 3: THE HUMAN PERSON AS AN EMBODIED
SPIRIT
HUMAN EMBODIMENT – awareness of the experience of
our body.
“The experience of our body is the first datum of we have of
ourselves one that is far clearer in consciousness than
even knowledge of our persons or of the self.” (Fr. Jose
Cruz)
PAUL RICOEUR
 the body is not the object of action but essentially
the organ by which human action is fulfilled.
 It is through body that one is able to do something
for someone, suffer on behalf of other, and live a
for a noble cause.
 Actuation of our body reminds who we really are to
someone.
 You are what you do, as you are who you are,
always to someone.
EXPERIENCE IS MY BODY.
The body is not an instrument, thus a possession.
You are not just a body, you are your body.
HUMAN SUBJECTIVITOY
- Incarnate reality of man.
- Freedom of human person
FREEDOM OF THE HUMAN BODY:
Embrace sense of self  consciousness  capacity to
decide  limits of action
CONSENT – understand infinite horizon and enjoy
accepting possibilities. (To be free means to be responsible
for this freedom.)
SUBJECTIVITY – the ability of the human person to
transcend and realize his potentials.
Our body is not only to do things, it is something for
someone. (responsible for the world)
THEREORE!!!
 The necessity of bodily existence does not mean I
am essentially bound to be sinful.
 Necessities implies that I am finite,thus my
possibilities are always finite.
 Fr Albert Alejo – limits of my freedom reveals finite
existence.
QUESTION OF BEING
MARTIN HEIDEGGER – brings us back to the question of
being or how dasein (being there) exists in the world.
 Being of man = being in the world
 (Man has the power to be in the world)
 The being of beings is not a being.
 ONTIC – refers to their existence as entities.
 ONTOLOGICAL – deeper structure of reality.
 ALETHEIA – being of beings. Process of revealing
and concealing where beings or things emerge into
our consciousness.
 WESTERN METAPHYSICS – metaphysics of
presence.
 Nothing = non-being (metaphysics)
 Noting = veil of being (Heidegger)
 Nothing = source of being.
 Nothing = dasein’s potentiality of being.
HISTORICITY AND HISTORICAL ACTIONS:
RAMON REYES = Filipino philosopher. “the human self is
an individual unique person and a certain form of an ideal.”
 Man is a historical being.
ALBERT DODEYNE = human nature is not a datum of
nature.
 Human freedom means that we make our own
destiny.
 Historicity is determined by fate or God. It is
characterized by turning points – events that have
shaped the future of humanity.
LESSON 4: THE HUMAN PERSON IN THEIR
ENVIRONMENT
DEEP ECOLOGY
- People grow with nature
- to keep asking more questions about the real
meaning of human life, society and nature.
- Oriental approach
- Two important aspects: self-realization and bio-
centric equality
- Self realization – spiritual in nature. It is not the
Western ego. This ego self detached from nature.
- Different way of looking at man’s relationship with
nature.
- It is grounded in the interrelatedness of the species
as co-inhabitants in the planet.
- Solve environmental problems in holistic way.
- We are one with nature
- HOLISTIC: it fuses together the spiritual and
material aspect of human life.
BIO CETRIC EQUALITY
- All things in biosphere develop to reach their own
unfolding or self-realization.
- Each has equal worth/value in the whole unfolding
of the universe.
STEWARDSHIP
- Caretaker of environment
- Design livable communities that freely interact with
natural environment and other species.
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
- All improvement in the economic scientific,
physical, social infrastructures should not harm the
environment.
- Relationship between human and environment.
SUSTAINABILITY
- We are able to fully provide for our basic needs
today without necessarily compromising the future
generations.
ANTROPOCENTRISM = prioritize human needs. Man as
the center of everything.
MAN AS THE CENTER OF ALL THINGS
- Humans determine what is to become of his
natural environment and other species.
MARY MIDGLEY
- The problem is human selfishness
- Man has been utilizing the resources in his
environment and all other species.
CLIMATE CHANGE AND CLIMATE JUSTICE
-banned CFCs (Chlorofluorocarbons)
- rampant logging - dimunition of forests.
CLIMATE JUSTICE
- fair treatment of all people and freedom from
discrimination with the creation of policies that
seeks to address the impact of climate change.
- environmental justice
Protecting the environment means that we value life and
each human being, now and in the future. 