THE PHILOSOPHY OF VALUE, THE VALUE OF
PHILOSOPHY
OUR CULTURE OF TODAY
Damage Culture
 Moral culture crisis of such paramount
degree; economic and political instability
 Graft and corruption have become an
accepted way of life
Moral recovery must go hand in hand with economic
and political recovery.
 Requires an understanding of values
What are Values?
 are objects of our intentional feeling
 feelings of something; they are oriented
towards values
 different from the sensory feelings of the
five senses (e.g., pain, tickling), from bodily
vital feeling-states (e.g., tiredness, illness,
health), and from psychic feeling (e.g..
sorrow, joy)
 spiritual feelings such as bliss and despair are
essentially intentional being directed
towards the value of the holy, but other
feelings acts like preferring, love and hatred
are likewise oriented towards values.
 Values are given to us intentional feeling.
 We “KNOW” values by feeling them, they do
not wait for our rational justification in order
to appear in our lives.
 As objects of our intentional feeling, values
are essentially qualities and are not to be
mistaken for goods, though goods are
carriers or bearers of values. The
misconception of value for goods may be
due to our language.
 “ HALAGA” – Filipino word for value
 “ BALE” – Spanish origin, which may also
mean “worth”
-values qualify our life and do not easily give
in to quantification; as qualities, values are
objective and immutable
IMMUTABILITY, THE OBJECTIVITY OF VALUES
 Values, especially higher values, call upon
the person and when the person fails to
respond to a value, it is not the value that is
destroyed but the person himself
 As Qualities – values transcend man
 Justice – “to do injustice is worse than to
suffer injustice.” - Socrates
THE AMBIGUITY OF VALUES LIES IN THEIR
IMMATERIALITY.
Our life attains a quality because values
constantly present themselves to us, and intervene in
our life as:
 Instigators of action
 A prospect for commitment
 A reason and standard for behavior and
expression, norms and principles of conduct
 Criteria for aesthetic appreciation and
economic utility.
A value gives itself in an object to be desired, but
once the goal is attained it affirms itself in the form of
another demand.
It is in this sense that we can speak of the
universality of values—they exercise an influence on
the totality and unity of our life. Values form a kind of
horizon to our life.
VALUES
More especially, values generate an ought-
to-be and an ought-to-do. For instance, because
justice is a value, justice ought to exist and I ought to
be just. Values, in other words, ground our
obligations, beliefs, ideals, and attitudes, without
being identical with them.
HOW DO WE EXPERIENCE VALUES?
 Found in the notion of a human being as a
person.
 A person is the seat of the spirit, which spirits
transcends nature. As spirit, the person is
not part of nature, but apart from it; he(she)
can determine himself(herself), direct
his(her) own life. – Max Scheler
 A manifestation of this is the human being’s
capacity to go against the drive of evolution,
 the instinct for survival—the person can
willingly take his own life.
THE PERSON IS THE UNITY OF DIVERSE ACTS, BUT
AMONG THESE DIVERSE ACTS, THERE ARE THREE
THAT CHARACTERIZE THE PERSON UNIQUELY:
1. The act of reflection or the act of making
oneself the object’s of one’s thinking
2. The act of ideation or abstraction, of deriving
an essence from existence
3. The act of loving
LOVE AND HATRED
They are movements of the heart towards
values.
They open up hierarchy of values.
 Love directs us to higher values whereas
hatred directs us to lower ones.
 The Pilipino word “mahal (love)” also means
“esteem” or “of high value.”
HIERARCHY OF VALUES
 Lowest rank: sensory values (the values of
pleasant and unpleasant, technical values,
and luxury values).
 Vital Values of noble and vulgar, the values off
civilization.
 Spiritual values of justice/injustice, truth/
falsehood, and the Aesthetic values of beauty
and ugliness, both of which are related to ego.
 The highest values are the holy and unholy.
Both spiritual and holy values refer to our
being a person or spirit.
For Scheler, the moral values of good
(positive) and evil (negative) are not to be found
in this hierarchy of values but in their realization;
they, so to say, “ride on the back of the deed.”
A deed is good if it prefers a higher or
positive value in place of a lower or negative one.
On the other hand, a deed is evil if it prefers a
lower or negative value in place of a higher or
positive one.
“To the extent that good is the realiation of
higher values, the spiritual and the holy which
refer to our being persons, and to the extent that
evil is the realization of lower values, the sensory
and the vital which refer to our likeness to the
animals, then good enhances our personhood
while evil degrades our humanity.”
THE VALUE OF PHILOSOPHY
PHILOSOPHY
 The Western Tradition has always
associated philosophy with wisdom,
forgetting the “love” that precedes
wisdom in its original meaning.
 Pamimilosopo means also to be
pedantic, to be theorizing and to juggle
concepts in a dull and narrow manner.
 “ To philosophize” was originally to
search passionately for wisdom, to love
it because one was not in full possession
of it.
EASTERN VIEW OF PHILOSOPHY
The Hindu word for philosophy is “darsana”
which means “to see”, not just with the eyes or the
mind, but with one’s whole being. What is to be seen
with one’s whole being is none other than the truth
or the real, namely, what is unchanging, eternal and
universal.
The Chinese tradition terms philosophy as
“cheh-hsueh”. Hseueh means learning, but cheh is a
compound character made up of a hand, a
measurement, and a mouth; that is to say, philosophy
is learning to measure one’s words with one’s deeds.
THE BEGINNING OF PHILOSOPHIZING
 Plato traces it to wonder, Descartes to
doubt, Jaspers to the limit situation.
Whether it is in wonder, or doubt, or
helplessness that one begins to
philosophize, something of the very nature
and reality of the human situation does
impel the person to do so.
 Robert Johann calls it the tension of human
experience. This tension springs from the
very nature pf the person as openness to
reality, as response-ability to the other
 (nature, fellowman, society, or the
Absolute), as not being identical with oneself
or as self-becoming.
 For Gabriel Marcel, to philosophize is
secondary reflection, to be concerned with
the mystery of being, not in the theological
sense of being unknowable but in a sense of
a “problem” which encroaches upon one’s
own being and that of others.
 To philosophize is to be concerned with
meaning or in Pilipino, kahulugan whose
root is “hulug” meaning “fall” as one would
say in English, “fall into place”. To
philosophize then is to integrate, both past
and future in the act of presenting the
meaning of one’s life, both personal and
social.
MEANING OF SAGEHOOD IN THE ORIENTAL
TRADITION
“Philosophy is the person’s inner longing to
achieve harmony or unity with one’s self, with nature,
with others, with God”.
PHILOSOPHERS LOVER OF JUSTICE AND PEACE
Justice – implies a vision of the totality of the situation
and a respect for the dignity of the human person.
The philosophers must also be a peace
maker or a lover of peace, for peace reconciles the
conflicting forces within and without one’s self.
THE VALUE OF PHILOSOPHY
 Philosophy awakens us from our spiritual
slumber, our take-for-granted attitude in
the same way as does literature or the arts.
 Philosophy not only sensitizes us but also
brings us to level of holistic, critical and
evaluative reflection.
 Philosophy attempts to see the totality of
any human experience, it can provide us
with a vision.
 Philosophy invites us to be integrative.
INTEGRATIVE FUNCTION OF PHILOSOPHY
 Philosophy does not impose but springs from
the responsible freedom of the philosophers
as a human being.
 Philosophy urges us to be moral persons,
persons of integrity who are in self-
possessed because their speech, feelings,
thinking and action are one. This unity
derives from commitment to the value of
persons.
 Philosophy invites us to be true to ourselves
and our humanity, by committing ourselves
to the value of other humans.
FILIPINO ETHICS
VALUES AND ETHICS
“ A FILIPINO ETHICS MUST FIRST AND
FOREMOST BE AN AXIOLOGICAL ETHICS, AN ETHICS
OF VALUES.”
“ AT THE BOTTOM OF OUR ECONOMIC
PROBLEMS AND POLITICAL INSTABILITY IS THE
WEAKNESS AND CORRUPTION OF THE MORAL
FOUNDATIONS OF OUR SOCIETY”. – FORMER
SENATOR LETICIA RAMOS SHAHANI
SOLIDARITY AMONG FILIPINOS
 unity or agreement of feeling or action,
especially among individuals with a common
interest; mutual support within a group,
KAPIT-BISIG
 literally means “link arms” — arms linked in
unity, working together. It is formally spelled
with a hyphen because the components of
this word can stand alone.
RESPONSE-ABILITY
 Recall that response-ability, in its most
succinct iteration, is “an ability to respond,
to respond to the world beyond oneself, as
well as a willingness to recognize its
existence”
 Pag response mo sa iyong responsibilidad o
ang pagganap mo sa iyong responsibilidad
PAKIKIPAGKAPWA TAO
 KAPUWA, Dalawang ngunit pareho. Pay
attention to two words: Kapwa and tao. It is
a common mistake to translate the word
kapwa as others in English. I translate kapwa
as. other-self. Being human (tao) is a shared
identity. It is not the same as saying other
people, but more of "we shared one
humanity."
 Pakikipagkapwa-tao is both an attitude and
an ability to respect other humans as you
respect yourself. As an attitude, Filipinos
give you the respect you deserve as a human
being. We do not discriminate against
people based on color, creed, or wealth. As
an ability, we recognize that we need to
develop interpersonal skills so we can easily
relate with others.
“A PILIPINO ETHICS MUST VALUE TRUTH,
JUSTICE AND, IN CONSEQUENCE, HUMAN
RIGHTS.”
SOLIDARITY FOUND IN TRUTH, JUSTUCE AND
HUMAN RIGHTS
TRUTH
To value truth is to live and die for the truth,
to bear witness to a light is given to me but not
to me alone. Katotohanan is katoto-hanan or
katotoo-hanan: where you and I abide, that
which no single person has a monopoly.
JUSTICE
Katarungan (JUSTICE) is katarung-an, the
straight path that you and I must tread and not
circumvent.
HUMAN RIGHTS
The common thread that unites both truth
and justice is the dignity of the human person, at
once both a singular and social value.
NONVIOLENCE
Pilipinos are a peace-loving people. They
hate violence, conflicts, and direct confrontation
with others. They prefer to harmonize with
others, to be at peace with them.
THE VALUE OF THE HOLY
 A Pilipino ethics cannot deny the value of
God or the Holy. Pilipinos in general have
never doubted the existence of God; indeed
to prove His existence is rather alien to the
Pilipino mind. The question perhaps ought to
be “how real is God to us? God is not so
sacred that He is cut off from the secular.
 “Nasa Diyos ang awa, nasa tao ang gawa”
(Man proposes, God disposes) to mean that
god is the god of history, that he is one with
us in the making of our history as one
people. “Isang bansa, isang lahi, isang
pananampalataya” (One nation, one race,
one belief).
CRITIQUE OF VALUES
 A Pilipino ethics must now re-evaluate and
be critical of the traditional Pilipino values
and traits of bahalana (resignation), kanya-
kanya (self-centeredness), utang-na loob
(indebtedness), pakikisama (family), pamilya
and colonial mentality.
 These cultural values are ambivalent, they
can be used positively or negatively, for the
common good or for self-aggrandizement at
the expense of others.
VALUES EDUCATION AND THE PHILIPPINE
SOCIETY
EARLY HISTORY OF EDUCATION IN BOTH WEST AND
EAST
 “values-oriented and Character Formation
was always a dimension running through all
of the educational enterprise.”
 The Greek used poetry epics the values of
courage and respect for authority
 Kung Fu Tze or Confucius trained his
students, who were prospective rulers, to
cultivate not only a “right mind” but also a
“right heart”.
The character of the ruler is like the wind and that
of the people like grass. In whatever direction the
wind blows, the grass will always bend.” –
Confucius
  In our own archipelago, our tribal forbears
educated the young through epics, poetry,
proverbs, riddles (bugtong) and the like.
 The early Christians communicated the
values of the love and the need of
repentance not through the dry question-
and-answer catechetical lessons, but by
retelling the parables of the Good Samaritan
and the Prodigal Son.
Values Education
 We should realize that our various courses
must seek not only knowledge but also
character formation and, thereof, the
cultivation of that overarching, central core
value-respect for human dignity.
TWO SOCIAL THEORIES
1. Coercion Theory
 With force, power, coercion
 Makes power the predominant factor
 Power is placed in the hands of an individual
or a group of individuals who wield to shape
society in conformity to their wishes and
self-patronage.
Coercion Theory Impacts to Values
- Values are in the service of power which
may be gained by money or patronage.
- Values are important and needed;
hence they are imposed or propagated
through an intricate propaganda
machinery.
2. Concensus Theory
 Preliminary emphasis on common values,
attitudes, views and perceptions—shared
culture
 People cooperate, work together, and
observe laws and customs because they
have agreed to do so.
 Power has role in society but a subordinate
one
 Power is in the service of the values that bind
the community together
REDIFINING VALUES
 Serafin Talisayon
- Physicist- turned-social-scientist
- Insisted that underneath our enormous
and complex social, political, and
economic problems lies a crisis of values
- Problem before us is about morality.
- Re-define values and goals, which are
effective predicators of the future
- “National temper or character is a
mirror of the long-term future of the
nation.”
UNDERSTANDING THE FILIPINO VALUE SYSTEM
VALUE PHILOSOPHY
- A Filipino experiences family closeness
and solidarity (pagpapahalaga sa
pamilya), politeness (use of po or ho),
hospitality (tuloy po kayo), gratitude
(utang na loob) from “within”, that is,
subjectively and emotionally.
FILIPINO VALUES
 Pakikisama
 Amor Propio (ego ,personal pride, self-
esteem)
 Economic Security (the ability of people to
meet their needs consistently)
 Bahala Na (Trust in God)
 Tipong-mukhang kuarta (an avaricious
look)
 A tipong-politiko (political type)
 Tipong siyentipiko (scientist type)
 Tipong artista (actor type)
 Agham (science) and sining (art)
 Tipong madasalin (pious type); may
exemplify kabanalan (piety).
Golden Mean
English : Doctrine in the Middle
Greek : Medan Agan
Roman : medio stat virtus
Filipino : hindi labis, hindi kulang, katamtaman
lamang
FILIPINO VALUES : NATURE, CONSTELLATION
AND CONTEXT
Filipino “nationalistic” tradition

FILIPINO VALUES: AMBIVALENCE AND SPLIT-LEVEL

CHRISTIANITY

 The truth is that Filipino values are

ambivalent in the sense that they are a
potential for good or evil, a help or hindrance
to personal and national development,
depending on how they are understood,
practiced or lived.
 Split- level Christianity or double-standard
morality, the immortality and hypocrisy of
many so-called Filipino Christians, is a
scandal to both Christians and non-
Christians alike.
 Filipino values are not static, i.e., they are
not simply what they are, but dynamic, i.e.,
they become. From a historical perspective,
the question to ask about Filipino values is:
Ganito kami noon: paano kayo ngayon? How
are we to know towards what goal or
direction Filipino values ought to move or
become?