Topic 1: The Human Person as an Embodied Spirit

2 General Kinds of Approaches to the Philosophical Study of the

Human Person
• Metaphysical approach
• Existential approach

Metaphysical approach
• It focuses on the kinds of substances or materials and capacities
that uniquely make up a human person
• It examines the essential components of a human person

Existential approach
•It focuses on the kind of life, or mode of existence, that is unique to
a human person.
•It examines the essential features of the human way of life

Martin Heidegger
● He describes the metaphysical approach as dealing with the
what of a human person, while the existential approach as
dealing with the who of a human person.

• Some think that a human person also has a non bodily component,
something that is in addition to his/her body. This other human
component is sometimes referred to as the “SOUL”, sometimes as
the “mind,” and sometimes as the “spirit.

• Some regard these terms as referring to the same thing, but some
distinguish between them.
• Generally, each term emphasizes a certain aspect of the non bodily
human component.

● Soul – emphasizes its life-giving function

● Mind – emphasizes consciousness
● Spirit – emphasizes its non bodily, nonbiological, or
nonphysical nature
1.The unspirited body view

• A human person is essentially just his/her body and nothing more.

• This position naturally results from the belief that humans do not

have a spiritual component.

• If there is no thing as a spirit, then a human person is essentially

just his/her body.

• Supporters of this view include those views which claim that what

we normally call “mental states,” such as our thoughts and

emotions, are actually physical states.

• One of these views is called the mind-brain identity theory, which

claims that what we call the “mind” is nothing but the brain, and

what we call “mental states” are nothing but the neural states of the

brain (Smart, 1991).

• Thus, on this view, to be in pain, for instance, is just for the

C-fibers in the brain to be stimulate.

• Another is called behaviorism, which claims that what we call

“mental states” simply refer to one’s inclinations or tendencies to

show certain behaviors (Ryle, 1965).

• For instance, to be in pain is to be inclined to cry, to remove the

source of pain, and others.

2.The disembodied spirit view

• A human person is essentially just his/her spirit.

• This view maintains that the human person has both body and

spirit but claims that it is the spirit that essentially defines the

human person.

• The body is here seen as a nonessential component of the human

person.

• This view results from the belief that while the body is dependent

on the spirit, the spirit is not dependent on the body. Meaning, the

body will die if there is no spirit, but the spirit will survive even if

there is no body.

• 2 strong supporters of this view are Plato and René Descartes who

both believe that the spirit (called “soul” by Plato but “mind” by

Descartes) and the body are 2 different kinds of entities or

substances in that the body is physical while the spirit (soul or

mind) is nonphysical. This view is often called as substance dualism.

• Plato and René Descartes also believe that the spirit is

independent of the body in that the spirit can survive without the

body while the body cannot survive without the spirit which leads

them to believe in the immortality of the spirit.

• One of Plato’s arguments claim that the soul is immortal otherwise

we can never explain the nature of knowledge as recollection (“to

learn is to remember”). He believes that one learns by remembering

what one once knew but have somehow forgotten. And this can only

be possible if the soul had existed in a state prior to its union with

the body where it acquired knowledge of everything but which it

forgot when it occupied a body

• Another argument claims that since souls are immaterial

(nonphysical) then they are not composed of parts. And if they are

not composed of parts, then they cannot decompose and thus cannot

die (Lorenz, 2009).

• Descartes views reality as composed of 2 different types of

substances, namely, mind (the nonphysical kind) and matter (the

physical kind) (Justin, n.d.). • Mind is conscious but not extended in

space (meaning, not observable and quantifiable), while matter is

extended in space but not conscious.

• Being physical, matter is determined by the laws of nature and

thus is not free or has no free will; while mind, being nonphysical, is

not determined by such laws and thus is free or has free will.

• Descartes then classifies various types of entities according to

matter and mind. Matter includes plants, animals, human bodies,

and the rest of nature, whereas minds include the imperfect minds

of humans and the perfect mind of God.

• Descartes argues that we can doubt that we have a body, along

with the physical world, but we cannot doubt that we have a mind,

for to doubt is to be conscious and to be conscious is to have a mind.

As he famously remarks, “I think, therefore I am.”

3.Embodied spirit view

• A human person is essentially the unity of his/her body and spirit.

• This view maintains that the human person has both body and

spirit but claims that the human person is essentially the unity of

these two components.

• This view results from the belief that the body and the spirit

cannot exist independently of one another. That is, each will not

survive with the absence of the other.

• 2 supporters of this view are Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas.

• Aristotle regards the soul as the principle (or cause). Meaning, the

soul is what gives life to something. Nonliving things have no souls,

while all living things, consisting of humans, animals, and plants

have souls.

• The body and soul, for Aristotle, are 2 different aspects of the

human person. The body is the person’s material aspect or “matter,”

while the soul is his/her formal aspect or “form.”

• The form of something refers to the natural capacity, ability, or

function of something; while its matter refers to the kind of material

that it is made up of.

• A soul, in this regard, is a set or system of capacities or abilities

that gives life to something (Hsieh, 2002 and Lorenz, 2009).

• Aristotle distinguishes the souls of the following:

▪ of plants = vegetative or nutritive soul which enables them to

perform activities necessary for nourishment, growth, and

reproduction;

▪ of animals = sensitive soul which enables them to perform

activities necessary for nourishment, growth, reproduction,

sensation, and locomotion; and

▪ of humans = rational soul which enables them to perform activities

necessary for nourishment, growth, reproduction, sensation,

locomotion, intelligence or rational thinking, and freedom or free will

• Because form cannot exist independently of matter (the soul needs

the body to exist), Aristotle does not believe in the immortality of

the soul (including human souls).

• Aquinas agrees with the ideas of Aristotle that the human body

and soul are matter and form, respectively, of the same reality that

makes up a human person.

• Aquinas thinks that the rational soul of humans has a dual nature

– a part that is dependent on the body, and a part that is not

dependent on the body.

• The rational soul’s vegetative and sensitive abilities (the abilities it

shares with the souls of plants and animals) are all dependent on

the body, but its rational ability to think is not dependent on the

body. This is so because the vegetative and sensitive abilities

necessarily need the body to operate but the ability of thinking does

not need any organ of the body to operate.

• Aquinas believes that while the vegetative and sensitive souls are

mortal, the rational souls are immortal (McInerny and O’Callaghan,

2015)

• Aquinas maintains that the human person is the unity of the body

and soul – which implies that the soul that survives after the death

of the human body is no longer a human person

• Aquinas calls the human soul “subsistent” rather than a

“substance” to indicate that the human soul, though immortal, is

incomplete in nature – and which can only be complete again once

the body is resurrected to reunite with its soul.

1. It maintains human freedom, which is negated by the unspirited

view (being just a body, all actions of a human person will be

determined by natural laws)

2. It gives importance to the soul and acknowledges the value of the

body which the disembodied spirit view neglects

3. It can accommodate opposing views

Marks of the mental

2 Levels of Approaching or Dealing with the Question of the Mind’s

Identity

• Particular Level

• General Level

Particular Level

It focuses on how to distinguish mental states from one another, say

how beliefs differ from pains, or how a belief about something that

exists differs from a belief about something that does not exist.

General Level

It focuses on how to distinguish between minds and non-minds, or

between mental states and physical states, say how beliefs, hopes,

fears, and desires differ from tables, mountains, and sunsets.

Properties of the mind or Mental States

1. Consciousness

2. Subjective quality or qualia

3. Intentionality

4. Ontological subjectivity

5. Privacy
• Minds or mental states, accordingly, are those that possess these

features; while non-minds or non-mental states are those which do

not.

•Contemporary philosophers of mind often refer to these defining

features of the mind as the marks of the mental (Crane, 1998).

Consciousness

• Ordinarily identified with awareness

• To be conscious of the things around us, for instance, is to be

aware of such things

● The states of sentience or awareness that typically begin when

we wake up in the morning from a dreamless sleep and

continue throughout the day until we fall asleep again (Searle,

1999)

List of Consciousness Indicator(Maslin 2013)

• Cognitions (knowing, believing, understanding, thinking,

reasoning)

• Emotions (envy, anger, fear, joy) • Sensations (pains, tickles,

itches)

• Perceptions (seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, smelling)

• Quasi-perceptions (hallucinations, dreaming, imagining)

• Conations (acting, trying, wanting, intending)

Subjective Quality

● It refers to the particular way that an individual person is

conscious of their own mental states, or undergoes their

conscious experiences (Mabaquiao, 2017).

● Examples:

• The particular way that a person experiences the hurting sensation

of having a toothache.

• The particular way that a certain kind of music sounds to a person

• The particular way the sunset appears to them

● Philosophers of mind technically refer to the subjective quality

of our conscious experiences as the quale (plural: qualia) or

the “phenomenal / experiential feel” of these experiences

(Mabaquiao, 2017)

Thomas Nagel

He explains that qualia are best understood as answers to the

question of what it is like to experience something.

Examples:

• If we ask a person what it is like to look at a sunset, we are asking

for the subjective quality of the person’s experience of the sunset.

• If we ask a person what it is like to be in love, we are asking for

the subjective quality of their experience of being in love.

Intentionality

It is the property of mental states to be about something or to be

directed at some objects or events in the world (Mabaquiao, 2017)

Example:

● A belief is always a belief in something (ex. belief in the

existence of God) or that something is the case (ex. belief that

the world is round)

The property of the belief to be about something is the intentionality

of the belief.

● The same is true of other mental states such as hope, fear,

desire, etc. We simply cannot have these mental states without

them being about certain things.

It is not only mental states that are intentional, for language, maps,

and signs are also intentional – they are also about certain things

(Mabaquiao, 2017).

The intentionality of mental states is inherent or original in that their

intentionality is not something that we create or decide on

(Mabaquiao, 2017).

In contrast, the intentionality of other things such as language,

maps, and signs, is derived or imposed for it is our creation or

decision that makes them intentional (Mabaquiao, 2017).

Their intentionality is derived from or imposed by the inherent

intentionality of the minds that create or decide on it (Mabaquiao,

2017).

This means that, words, maps, and signs are about certain things

only because we have decided so. They are not intentional by

themselves; they only become intentional because we decided to

make them so. (Mabaquiao, 2017).

Ontological Subjectivity

The property of mental states to exist only in so far as there is a

subject (a person or any other thing) who has them or who

experiences them (Mabaquiao, 2017).

Mental states, in this regard, cannot exist by themselves; for they

are dependent on a subject for their existence (Mabaquiao, 2017).

For instance, there are pains only because there are entities

(persons or animals) that experience them. One simply cannot say

that there are pains and that these pains are not the pains of some

entity. The same is true of other mental states: beliefs and fears

cannot exist by themselves, for they exist only in so far as there are

persons (or animals) who have them. (Mabaquiao, 2017)

Ontological subjectivity contrasts with ontological objectivity –

which is the property of certain things, like physical objects, to exist

by themselves or to exist even without a subject that is conscious of

them (Mabaquiao, 2017).

Example: trees and mountains They exist even if nobody is conscious

of them. They are, in this sense, ontologically objective.

Privacy

● It is the property of mental states to be directly known only by

the subject or person who has them (Mabaquiao, 2017).

Example: headache

● It is only the person with headache who can directly know of

his/her headache. Other people can know of his/her headache

only in an indirect way, through inference from his/her

behavior or verbal expressions. (Mabaquiao, 2017)

● Non-mental states, such as physical objects and events, in

contrast, are objective for any person, in principle, can directly

know them (Mabaquiao, 2017).

Example: Eruption of Mayon

● Volcano It is something, in principle, which any person can

directly know.

● Among the five marks of the mental, consciousness is

considered the most fundamental for the other marks can also

be regarded as properties of consciousness (Mabaquiao, 2017).

 ● That is, the mind is conscious and being conscious is having the

properties of ontological subjectivity, privacy, subjective

quality, and intentionality (Mabaquiao, 2017).

A BEING IN THE WORLD

Metaphysical approach

• It focuses on the kinds of substances or materials and capacities

that uniquely make up a human person

• It examines the essential components of a human person

Existential approach

•It focuses on the kind of life, or mode of existence, that is unique to

a human person.

•It examines the essential features of the human way of life.

Martin Heidegger

The human person, in terms of his/her kind or mode of existence,

has two fundamental features.

1. The human person exists in a world; that is to say, the human

person does not exist in a vacuum, for there is always a context, or a

situation, in which he/she exists.

1. The human person exists by being-in-the-world

2. The human person has a self that he/she defines as he/she exists

in the world.
2. A human person does not exist in the world as a nobody for

he/she has a self which he/she defines as he/she exists in the

world.

Dimensions of a human person’s being-in-the-world

● Involvement

● Temporality

Involvement

A human person’s being-in or existence in the world cannot be

described simply as a relation in space, in that the human person

just happens to be in a particular space (Mabaquiao, 2017).

Also called engagement which Heidegger refers to as care (or Sorge

in German) (Mabaquiao, 2017).

Heidegger identifies two ways by which a human person gets

involved with things in the world:

1. being-alongside things or entities

2. being with things or entities(Mabaquiao, 2017)

Being-alongside entities

•A human person’s involvement has the character of utility

•Things appear to the human person merely as a form of equipment

or instrument, or as things that he/she can use either for his/her

practical purpose or for his/her theoretical contemplation

(Mabaquiao, 2017)
• For his/her practical purposes, things appear to him/her as things

that he/she can use to satisfy his/her practical needs

• For his/her theoretical contemplation, things appear to him/her a

things that he/she can study or observe (Mabaquiao, 2017)

•Consequently, the totality of entities that a human person is

alongside constitutes his/her equipmental world (Mabaquiao, 2017)

Being-with other entities

• A human person’s involvement has the character of

considerateness (and forebearance) (Heidegger, 1962) which are

best shown in moments when he/she empathizes with his/her

fellow human persons (Mabaquiao, 2017)

• Consequently, the totality of entities that a human person is with

constitutes his/her public or social world (Mabaquiao, 2017)

Involvement

• A human person is ideally alongside mere objects or nonhumans,

and with his/her fellow human persons (Mabaquiao, 2017).

• Ideally, we should use mere objects as pieces of equipment but

regard other human persons as objects of considerateness, or that

we should use mere objects but be considerate with other human

persons (Mabaquiao, 2017).

• Sometimes, it happens that a human person is alongside his/her

fellow human persons, like when he/she relates to his/her fellow

human persons for utility-related reasons

• Ex. slaves (Mabaquiao, 2017)

• Sometimes, it happens that a human person is with nonhuman

persons, as when he/she worships natural objects or human

artifacts or regards them as having some form of consciousness and

preferences (Mabaquiao, 2017)

Temporality

• A very important dimension of a human person’s

being-in-the-world

• It refers to the fact that a human person’s existence in the world

has the dimension of having a past, present, and future (Mabaquiao,

2017)

•This temporality is fundamentally different from ordinary clock

time (Heidegger, 1962)

•Ordinary clock time regards past, present, and future as

unconnected events, and defines reality solely in terms of the

present (Mabaquiao, 2017)

• In ordinary clock time, the past is regarded as no longer real and

the future as not yet real; only the present is real.

• It will be observed that the reality of physical objects has this

dimension (Mabaquiao, 2017)

● Human time or temporality regards the present, past, and

future as forming a unity, and hence defines reality in terms of

such unity (Mabaquiao, 2017).

● For human persons, their past and future are integrally

connected with their present (Mabaquiao, 2017).

Facticity

● A human person’s past, called facticity by Heidegger, refers to

everything about the existence of a human person that can no

longer be changed (Mabaquiao, 2017).

● It includes all the givens that a Facticity human person finds

himself/herself as already having the moment he/she becomes

conscious of his/her own existence, such as the fact that

he/she already exists, his/her given physical features, genes,

and parents and the historical period he/she was born into

(Mabaquiao, 2017).

● Since these givens are acquired by a human person without

being consulted, Heidegger describes this aspect of a human

person’s existence as the phenomenon in which a human

person is “thrown into the world” (Mabaquiao, 2017).

 ● In addition to these givens, facticity also includes a human

person’s previous experiences and decisions, which he/she can

no longer change as well (Mabaquiao, 2017).

Existentiality

● A human person’s future, called existentiality by Heidegger,

refers to all the possibilities that a human person has and can

choose to have (Mabaquiao, 2017).

•This includes all the projects that a human person has and can set

for himself/herself to accomplish in the future.

•It will be observed that how a human person exists in the present

is affected by his/her facticity and existentiality. (Mabaquaio, 2017)

•What a human person is involved in doing at the present is

determined both by the things and circumstances he/she did not

choose for himself/herself and the goals that he/she chooses for

himself/herself (Mabaquaio, 2017)

● This is the sense in which a person’s sense of reality is defined

by the unity of his/her past, future, and present (Mabaquiao,

2017).

•Connected to a human person’s existentiality and facticity is a

unique phenomenon referred to by Heidegger as a “thrown

possibility.”
•It is unique for being a “possibility” it belongs to the future, while

for being “thrown” it belongs to the past or to the things we can no

longer change. (Mabaquiao, 2017)

•This thrown possibility refers to the death of the human person

(Mabaquiao, 2017).

Falleness

•Heidegger refers to the present of the human person as falleness.

•It is the state a human person is in when he/she lives an

inauthentic existence, referring to the kind of existence in which a

human person is not the one making decisions for himself/herself

(Mabaquiao, 2017)

•This does not mean that the human person is always living or is

bound to live an inauthentic existence (Mabaquiao, 2017).

•This means that most human persons for the most part of their

existence are living an inauthentic experience (Mabaquiao, 2017).

•This is something unavoidable at the initial part of a human

person’s existence, for when he/she was born into this world, the

other people who took care of him/her were the ones making the

decisions for him/her (Mabaquiao, 2017).

• Falleness is thus only a general description of the state of

existence that human persons live in the present (Mabaquiao, 2017).

• And the implication is that there is a way to free oneself from it

and thus live an authentic existence (Mabaquiao, 2017).

TRANSCENDENCE & LIMITATIONS

Transcendent

● (adj.) 1a: exceeding usual limits: SURPASSING; b: extending or

lying beyond the limits of ordinary experience; c in Kantian

philosophy: being beyond the limits of all possible experience

and knowledge

Jean Paul Sartre

● Human capacity for transcendence is rooted in the property of

human consciousness called intentionality (Sartre, 1956).

● Intentionality is a fundamental and an inherent property of

consciousness.

● It is a fundamental property of consciousness because it is

more basic than the reflexivity of consciousness, referring to

the ability of consciousness to be about itself.

● The consciousness that is directed at things outside of itself is

called intentional consciousness

● Self-consciousness is the consciousness that is directed

towards itself
● Example of self-consciousness: when we reflect on our own

thoughts and emotions

● Intentional consciousness is primary because self

consciousness is a later act of consciousness. →That is, we are

conscious of things in the world outside of our consciousness

before we are conscious of our own consciousness or our own

thoughts and feelings.

● Example: When we are angry, our consciousness is first

directed at the object of our anger, which may be a person or

an animal, but later on when we reflect on or examine this

anger then our consciousness is directed towards itself.

● Intentionality is an inherent property of consciousness because

it is something not up to us (or not something for us to decide).

● Ex. beliefs

● This contrasts with the intentionality of language which is just

conventional or something that we just agree upon

● Why is consciousness primarily and inherently directed at

things outside of itself?

● This is because of another essential feature of consciousness as

being incomplete, a lack, a deficiency, or nothing.

● Consciousness is reaching out for things outside of itself

because it is trying to fill in a gap or hole within it, or it is

trying to complete itself

● The transcendent consciousness comes in 2 ways:

1. The things that consciousness is primarily directed at are

outside or transcendent to consciousness.

2. Consciousness is always transcending itself because in being

continuously conscious of things outside of itself, it is

continuously filling in gaps within itself.

● Example: When we desire to know a certain skill, it is because

we do not have that skill yet. And we desire to have that skill

because there is something in us that we are trying to fill in.

Still, in desiring to have it, which we do no have yet, we are in

the process of transcending ourselves; for once we have that

skill then we have gone beyond our former self – who did not

have that skill yet.

● The intentionality of consciousness is closely tied up with its

freedom and lack of a fixed essence (an essence that can no

longer be changed)

● Consciousness is free with regard to the objects to which it will

direct itself. We are free what to believe, think, desire, and

hope, or to choose the action that we intend to perform

● Consciousness lacks a fixed essence because it is incomplete,

always transcending itself (Mabaquiao, 2017).

● Something that has a fixed essence has a nature or purpose

that is already predefined (or defined even before it exists)

(Mabaquiao, 2017).

● Ex. The essence of a mango tree to bear fruits

● Because consciousness is always transcending itself, it is

always in the process of defining its essence, nature, or

purpose.

● As long as we are conscious, we will always be choosing what

to direct our consciousness to.

● We cannot avoid being free, so consequently, we will always be

in the process of defining our essence.

● “Man is condemned to be free.”

● 2 Fundamental Kinds of Existence (or “Domains of Being”)

Being-for-itself →Consciousness

Being-in-itself →Nonconscious

● Being-for-itself is everything that being-in-itself is not.

● Being-for-itself → conscious, a lack, incomplete, free, and has

no fixed essence

● Being-in-itself → nonconscious, full, complete, unfree, and has

a fixed essence
 ● • In this regard, as a human person consists of a body and a

mind, he/she is a combination of a being-for itself (his/her

consciousness) and a being-in-itself (his/her body)

(Mabaquiao, 2017).

Factors that Possibly Limit One’s Transcendence

● The natural environment

● The body

● Other people

Factors pertaining to the natural environment

● Natural laws or forces such as gravity
● Natural events such as storms, earthquakes, or the simple
natural fact that it is raining

Factors pertaining to the body

● It refers to the various characteristics of the body such as,
among others, genetic make-up, physical attributes such as
height, weight, complexion, etc, nationality, gender, social
class, ethnic race, sickness, disabilities, age, previous
experiences, and impending death (Mabaquiao, 2017)

Factors pertaining to other people

● This includes our concrete relations with them and their
perception of us (Mabaquiao, 2017)
● These factors, which generally refer to the facticity of a human
person, no doubt sometimes limit human transcendence and
freedom in that they serve as obstacles to the accomplishment
of a person’s goals (Mabaquiao, 2017)

● Whether something limits our transcendence or not ultimately

depends on our choice (Sartre, 1956).
● The idea is that something becomes a limit or an obstacle to
our transcendence or freedom only because we have made
certain choices (Mabaquiao, 2017).
● How our past will mean to us, whether it will limit us or not, is
still our choice (Mabaquiao, 2017)
● Sartre conceives freedom simply as the ability to make choices
for oneself regardless of whether or not one can perform or put
one’s choices into actions.

●
THE ENVIRONMENTAL CRISIS
● The environmental crisis is one very concrete problem that
threatens the existence of various species, including our own,
currently inhabiting our planet (Mabaquiao, 2017).

Possible Causes of Environmental Crisis

● Physical causes
● Legal causes
● Socioeconomic causes
● Attitudinal causes

Physical Causes
•These refer to those that can in principle be studied by the
sciences.
•They are, in this regard, observable and quantifiable, and their
processes are governed by the deterministic laws of nature.
•May be natural or human-induced
•The occurrence of the natural physical causes is brought about
solely by the processes of nature. This means that they happen
independently of any human intervention or regardless of any
human action.
•Ex. storms, earthquakes, volcanic eruption, etc.
•The occurrence of human-induced physical causes is brought about
by human intervention in the process of nature.
•Ex. pollution, global warming, depletion of natural resources, oil
spills, etc
•We are not responsible for the occurrence of natural physical
causes, for there is nothing we can do to prevent them.
•In some situations, there is something, however, that we can do to
minimize their damaging effects.
• We are directly responsible for human-induced type of physical
causes for their occurrence is something we can prevent.

Legal Causes
• These include existing laws of the land that have something to do
with the environment (Mabaquiao, 2017).
● These also include absence of laws that would effectively
prohibit practices damaging to the environment, and of legal
 mechanisms that would effectively punish those violating
existing environmental laws, especially those occupying
positions of power such as public officials and private
corporations (Mabaquiao, 2017).
• These generally refer to those causes of the crisis that are within
the control of the government (Mabaquiao, 2017).

Socioeconomic Causes
• These are factors that are brought about by social arrangements
and the economic status of human persons (Mabaquiao, 2017).
• These include over-population, which naturally results in the
competition over limited resources, which in turn contributes to the
depletion of these resources (Mabaquiao, 2017).
• These also include poverty
• Because of poverty, people most often prefer cheap but
non-environment-friendly products and practices over expensive but
environment friendly products and practices (Mabaquiao, 2017).
● Poverty is the environmental villain; poor people are its
victims. Impoverished people often do plunder their resources,
pollute their environment, and overcrowd their habitats. They
do these things not out of willful neglect but only out of the
need to survive. They are well aware of the environmental
amenities that affluent people enjoy, but they also know that
for them the journey to a better environment will be long and
that their immediate goal must be to escape from the clutches
of poverty. They cannot navigate this long journey without
assistance – assistance from generous institutions, nations,
and individuals and from sincere and effective policies of their
own governments. – Jack Hollander (2003)

Attitudinal Causes
• These refer to the beliefs and values held by humans about nature
that allow them or make it permissible for them to cause damages to
the natural environment.
Examples of these beliefs are the ff:
• natural resources are there simply for human consumption or to
satisfy human interests;
• only humans can be recipients of moral duties;
Examples of these beliefs are the ff:
• natural resources are inexhaustible or are unlimited (some call
this belief Frontierism); and
• we are only responsible for those parts of nature that are owned
by humans or are governed by property rights of humans
(Mabaquiao, 2017)

Charles Spretnak
• Homo Economicus: The belief that economic well-being is primary
and will bring about well-being in all other areas
• Progressivism: The belief that the human condition will gradually
improve through abundance. This includes the unquestioned trust
that technology will solve human problems
• Industrialism: The belief that mass-production and rationally
designed institutions and programs are the best way to perfect
human society and achieve the abundance needed to sustain human
consumption.
• Consumerism: The belief that well-being is achieved through
abundance and consumption. The unquestioned acceptance of
advertising and the near religious dedication attached to shopping in
‘Western’ societies is the product of ‚relentless advertising
campaigns designed to convince the society that there is neither
peace nor joy, neither salvation nor paradise, except through
heightened consumption‛ (Berry, 1998).

Environmental Philosophy
•It is the discipline that studies the moral relationships of human
beings with the environment and its non-human contents.
•Philosophers believe that the human person has the ability to
change the environment to suit his purposes. It will enable them to
become aware of their relationship and its related issues in our
society and their impact on the lives of human persons. (Valmores,
2020)

The Role of Philosophy

•With regard to the natural environment, the role of philosophy is to
critically examine the bases of the beliefs about the natural
environment (Mabaquiao, 2017)
•To determine whether these beliefs are correct, and then to
distinguish which beliefs about the natural environment would lead
humans to do damages to the environment and which would not
(Mabaquiao, 2017)
•To address the attitudinal causes of the environmental crisis,
primarily to determine whether the beliefs that lead to practices that
damage the environment are true and justified; because attitudinal
causes can influence other kinds of causes (Mabaquiao, 2017)

● Biocentrism: This pertains to the belief that humans are NOT

the only significant species on the planet.
● Ecology: It is a science that deals with the relationships
between groups of living things and their environments.
● Prudence: What do you call the ability of the human person to
govern and discipline oneself by the use of reason?
● Frugality: What do you call the act of using resources wisely
and practically?
● Lack of resources: What may be a sign of an environmental
disorder?

Herbert Marcuse
● For him, humanity had dominated nature. There can only be
change if we will change our attitude towards our perception of
the environment.
George Herbert Mead
● For him, as human beings, we do not have only rights but
duties. We are not only citizens of the community but how we
react to this community and in our reaction to it, change it.
Erich Fromm
● He proposed a new society that should encourage the
emergence of a new human being that will foster prudence and
moderation or frugality toward environment.
Pythagoras
● He is a Greek philosopher who described the universe as living
embodiment of nature’s order, harmony, and beauty and our
relationship with it in terms of biophilia (love of other living
things) and cosmophilia (love of other living beings) (Ramos,
2016).
Anaximander
● He is an early Greek philosopher who employed the term
“boundless” to convey the further thought that Nature is
indeterminate – boundless in the sense that no boundaries
between warm and cold or the moist and dry regions are
originally within it (Solomon & Higgins, 2010 through Ramos,
2016)
Immanuel Kant
● He believes that the orderliness of nature and the harmony of
nature with our faculties guide us toward deeper religious
perspective. This vision of the world is not limited to
knowledge and freedom or even faith, in the ordinary sense of
the term. It is a sense of cosmic harmony.