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 Ethos and Mores both mean “custom” or any repetitive action, habit, routine.
 Ethics is not a study of culture a mere description, but a description.
 There is a MUST or OUGHT that we must follow.
 Human reason prescribes the right or good actions, and tells us to avoid some actions
that are not good.
 Aristotle (384-322 BC) ancient Greek philosopher and scientist, one of the
greatest intellectual figures of Western history.
 Aristotle said that ethics is important in order to create the ideal state (polis).
 For Aristotle, morality (mores) has more to do with the question “how should I be?”
rather than “what should I do?”
 Perhaps this is the reason that in traditional Chinese culture as influenced by Confucius.
 Confucius (551-479 BC) a state man must be knowledgeable about literature, poetry,
painting, morality as to be sensitive to humane feelings.
 For a long time anyone in China who intends to serve in the diplomatic corps must be
morally wise.
 We cannot separate morality and politics.
 Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) felt disgusted with modern politicians who always
talk about businesses instead of virtue.
 The ancient Greek were rationalist meaning they see the essence of being human as being
the rational animal.
 Other animals grow and move, but only human beings are capable of thinking and acting
rationally.
 The negative “must not” is something other animals cannot do.
 Animals may avoid anger by instinct, but humans think in more complex way making
distinctions and arguments to prove that something is wrong.
 Moral reasoning is exclusive to us.
 Humans can go against their own desires and instincts while other animals cannot.
 In the whole 2500 years of ancient Greek and Roman civilizations and the present
Christian civilization our own society, this definition of Homo Sapiens (“sapientia”
wisdom), has created all human institutions like science, religion.
 We believe that according to the Bible, we were created by God (Judaeo – Christian
tradition) who endowed us with freewill and wisdom, the highest in all creation, despite
the fact that only we humans destroy other living things deliberately, we pollute the earth
and can destroy ourselves with atomic bombs and poisonous chemicals. We may not be
wise after all.
 Athenian Democracy is about freedom, equality, and excellence of character.
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 Even thought humanity has never achieved world peace, and Western civilizations have
been cruel, perpetrating World Wars in the whole of 1900s, even today in Ukraine
(Russia and US have always had tensions ever since the end of World War II in 1945).
 The Free Trade economic policies that cause discriminations, slavery, capitalism, and
even earlier the colonization of Africa and Asia, are humans really rational?
 Maybe lower kinds of animals can sometimes behave humanely than humans, and
humans always have the tendency to behave like animals?.
 Freud (1856-1939) “psychoanalysis” Freud believed that people could be cured by
making their unconscious a conscious thought and motivations, and by that gaining
"insight". The aim of psychoanalysis therapy is to release repressed emotions and
experiences, i.e. make the unconscious conscious.
 Charles Darwin (1809-1882) “Theory of evolution” Darwin proposed that species can
change over time, that new species come from pre-existing species, and that all species
share a common ancestor.
 Karl Marx (1818–1883) “Socialist Communism”
 He believed all countries should become capitalist and develop that productive capacity,
and then workers would naturally revolt, leading communism whereby the workers
would become the dominant social class and collectively control the means of
production.
 Socialism, for Marx, is a society which permits the actualization of man's essence, by
overcoming his alienation. It is nothing less than creating the conditions for the truly
free, rational, active and independent man; it is the fulfillment of the prophetic aim: the
destruction of the idols.
 Machiavelli, Thomas Hobbes and Mo Tzu and many other writers are skeptical about
human rationality, our own elevated dignity (that is only our fancy).
 Rousseau, Aristotle, Epictetus, Confucius, the Humanistic psychologists, they all say that
humans are capable of achieving that ideal society, UTOPIA as told for example by
Thomas More 500 years ago.
 The reason why we have created all literature, all sciences and educational institutions,
religious worships, Civil Code, Penal Code and Marriage Code, Constitution of nations is
that we believe human beings are capable of achieving happiness, love and really become
beautiful (not just in beauty pageants).
 Science and technology mean progress for us, Medical breakthroughs like vaccinations,
improvement of hospitals; all mean we want to cure human sickness.
 We want to create a society of peace, equality and brotherhood of freedom. We just don’t
know how.
 Together with the ideas of ethical life, happiness of the individual, justice and rights, one
can not exclude the ideas of social justice, the ideal state or community.
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 Indeed Aristotle pointed out that ethics is subsumed under POLITICA, theory of
government.
 The Greeks believe that No individual can be happy apart from a state (POLIS).
 Any individual who does not care about the issues of the larger society (polis) was called
IDIOTA; a very private, insensitive person, having no virtue of “politeness”.
 PERICLES (born c. 495 bce, Athens—died 429, Athens) the great statesman of
Athenian democracy highly encouraged therefore the participation of citizens in the life
of polis.
 He encouraged theatre, playwrights, architecture, Olympic sports, and knowledge to
flourish.
 In ancient Athens we see the ideal politics- politicians encouraging artists to create an
environment of excellence, beauty, so adorable was Athens.
 That even in the time of Da Vinci, Michael Angelo, Donatello, Boticelli, etc. these artists
flourished creating the most beautiful artworks.
 Aristotle was indeed right to say, that happiness, excellence, the good are all
interconnected, all rooted in human reason, prescribing us what we must, should, ought
to do.
 The eastern minds like China, Japan, emphasized the idea of VIRTUE with self
discipline, even detachment from pleasure, calmness of mind, harnessing one mind and
physical powers, a kind of warrior attitude.
 The Gurus and Brahmins of India, the Dalai Lama, the Samurai of Japan, the Kungfu
masters of China, Buddhism have created a culture, an ETHICS totally distinct from what
we see in social media fake ideas of virtue and happiness.
 Marxism is a philosophy, while communism is a system of government based on
Marxist principles. Marx envisioned a society in which workers owned the means of
production. In real-world communism, governments own the means of production
 Socrates (469–399 B.C.E.) described himself as performing the task of “midwifery”
since the TRUTH is something delivered like a child with much pain and difficulty from
people.
 Even in his old age he was brought to trial by some powerful citizens who considered
him as an enemy.
 A corrupter of youth who enjoyed his interrogations, his DIALECT method
(argumentations) in the streets of Athens.
 When Socrates was brought to court for public trial as written by his student Plato in the
book APOLOGY (ancient meaning ‘defense’ and not sorry), he said that as long as he is
alive he will never stop searching for wisdom, pointing out their errors: “You are citizens
of Athens, a city greatest and most renowned for wisdom and power. Aren’t you ashamed
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 to care about money, how to make as much of it as possible, about reputation and public
recognition, whereas for wisdom and truth, making your soul good, you do not care? That
is what god tells me to do, to persuade young and old men not to spend time and energy
caring about money, but rather making your souls as good as possible. I ask for no fee in
giving advice to people, and I can easily prove it- my poverty.”
 Perhaps Socrates’ idea of the truth as “getting out of one’s mind” like a child from the
womb, has stuck in our present vocabulary with our use of to CONCEIVE; used for a
child in the womb and for ideas in the mind.
 His dialectic method uses INDUCTIVE METHOD or gathering data or evidence to later
produce conclusions.
 That analytic, dialectic method will be used by later Medieval philosophers and
MODERN SCIENTISTS like Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler, Newton, Francis Bacon to be
the very language of SCIENTIFIC METHOD (and academic-formal writing in thesis,
research).
 Socrates believed that an individual commits mistake out of ignorance, he thinks he will
be happy doing this or that..but ends up being enslaved by habits that destroy him/her.
 There is a difference between the DEINOS (the person who is streetwise, ma-diskarte,
but also cunning, clever).Being VIRTUOUS (SPOUDAIOS) is not about that. Nobility of
character, virtue is about excellence and NOT just knowing and following THE WAYS
OF THE WORLD.
 The Greeks called it DAIMON (something about the mind that can be destructive if not
controlled and disciplined), a kind of powerful force that can control us, and somehow in
our vocabulary this word acquired another spelling "DEMON" or Devil, a spirit. But for
the Greeks the DAIMON must be mastered (our mind must be mastered)
 Socrates even described said there is a DAIMON (inner voice) that functions like a
conscience in him, forbidding him to do wrong.
 His means that the DAIMON is not originally "demon" as in devil. Modern psychology
can interpret this as the Freudian ID (the remnant animal instinct from millions of years
of evolution), that still-animal part of us or also the Super-Ego if understood as
"conscience".
 Plato wrote his books as stories that he remembered about Socrates, the arguments he
expound. In the book The Republic, Socrates asks for definitions.
 He asked a wealthy Athenian "What is the greatest blessing you got from being
wealthy?" The reply was it enables me to become generous, honest and just." Then
Socrates asks for definitions of generosity, honesty and justice. Indeed the person finds it
hard to define these.
 Then THRASYMACHUS angrily answered Socrates i proclaim that what is just and
right, is simply what the stronger people want. For even in governments, they who have
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 power do create laws that serve only themselves, to steal the property of others, to
enslave them. Then these politicians consider themselves as blessed and happy
 In truth people consider injustice as bad only because they’re afraid it may happen to
them, NOT because they care for others.
 “Indeed during the Spartan War with Athens, some said "The strong do what they want,
the weak suffer what they must suffer".
 What is RIGHT and GOOD is what the powerful dictate. Hence we must ask, "What is
justice? Should we seek how to be good or how to be powerful?
 In trying to answer, PLATO, telling what he heard from Socrates, said that we must
consider a picture of the IDEAL society.
 He describes it like the UTOPIA, a garden of Eden, a life close to nature, their needs well
provide .Then he asks why this can never happen in reality.
 Socrates (and Plato) answers: because of greed and luxury.
 People are never contented with a simple life. People are jealous, desiring what belongs
to others. They want to compete, and acquire property endlessly." Any city is in fact two
cities- the city of the rich and that of the poor."
 Man is by nature ungrateful. Plato thus begins his political theory (hence th book is
entitled THE REPUBLIC).
 Supposedly, leaders are STATESMEN who create policies for growth, but they
deteriorate into POLITICIANS, strategists who satisfy their lust for the prizes of public
office
 Any kind of political system is too ready to be rotten: if a group of leaders limit
themselves as an exclusive CLIQUE they will ruin the trust of others.
 An oligarchy ruins itself by chasing wealth. Democracy ruins itself by allowing everyone
the right to rule. The public love flattery, hence the politician flatterer is seen as the
"PROTECTOR OF TH PEOPLE".
 In fact, Roman emperors, Pablo Escobar's drug trade, Napoleon Bonaparte in France,
Hitler in Germany, ERAP'S "para sa mahirap" and many other politicians today use
the same technique.

 Plato comments that we never want anyone to make a shoe unless he is an expert
shoemaker, anyone to cure us unless he is a well trained physician, ERGO we must also
seek only the best trained persons to rule a state (Democracy never does that).
 Plato hence suggests a training for true STATESMEN, true politicians. Plato then
continues his Inquiry from ETHICS to POLITICAL THEORY to establishing two other
theories, those PSYCHOLOGY and EDUCATION (the REPUBLIC is a book on many
things).
 Plato looks at different characters of people.

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 Human Behavior seem to be based on DESIRES (in the tummy and genitals, appetite,
instinct, mostly sexual), EMOTION (what we feel in our heart) and KNOWLEDGE (in
the head).
Individuals have these qualities in different degrees;
1. Some person’s have dominant desires, restless, in quest of material things, lust and luxury,
they’re insatiable.
2. There are those who have strong feelings, courage, who don’t care about sex and material
things but for victory in war. Their pride is in power and not possessions. They want battle
field and not shopping malls.
3. But lastly there are those who delight in truth and quiet meditation, understanding. They
don’t seek the market/malls nor the battlefield but the silence of wisdom.
 These three divisions can work together in a STATE (polis).The first group are the
producers, those who can b in the market and the ordinary people. The 2nd group can be
the military, warrior class. The 3rd must be the statesmen who live exclusively for truth
and wisdom, desiring no wealth or property.
 This is something not new, Japan and India, China, even pre-Hispanic Phils have created
ancient societies that were similar to what Plato was saying.
 The IDEAL POLITICS is said to be that numbers 1 & 2 are guided by the statesmen (3).
 The harmony of the Statesmen, the military and the producers. Plato said that in
DEMOCRACY this ideal set up has been turned upside down.
 Plato has anticipated FREUDIAN psychoanalysis in saying that "in all of us, even in
good men, there is such a hidden wild beast nature, which peers out when we are asleep".
So that the virtue of TEMPERANCE (pagpipigil, pagtitimpi) is necessary by not
engaging in excess nor lack.
 Plato says that MUSIC soothes the unconscious sources of thought. It can cure bodily
diseases. Yet MUSIC, in his Theory of Education, is said to b also dangerous for music
can "soften and melt an individual below what is good".
 Too much athletic training can make a man to hardened like a savage, beast. The
difficulty and hard studies of math, astronomy, physical exercises can be soften by the
study of music.
 Plato also said "knowledge which is given under threat is not effective on the mind. Let
education be an amusement, so you can discover the natural interests of the child".
 The question of Thrasymachus can still be seen today: an old poor person is easily
imprisoned, charged with a large fee for seemingly not following quarantine protocols,
while a rich or powerful police (truly ugly) man can have party disregarding protocols
and not be punished even a little.

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 A rich man connected to a politician can be acquitted after running over a security guard
while jeepney drivers cannot even freely decide for their source of living, their jeepneys
to be replaced according to what the government decides.
PLATO thus saw the danger of democracy and proposes almost an exaggerated cautiousness
in selecting and training candidates for the leadership of the POLIS.
1. To determine who could possibly be trained, based on character type (based on desires,
emotions and knowledge).
2. To have a program of education lasting decades, first to train physical strength and then for
wisdom.
 Hence the true ideal leaders of a polis will be ELDERS, who have gone beyond the FIRE
OF PASSION of youth, to the ripe settled disposition of a mature MIND.
 A leader who thinks in terms of "universality", wholes, forgetting his own career, having
no self ambition at all. Such a leader will be absorbed entirely in managing the affairs,
welfare of the people, that he almost has no private life anymore. He must b strong, so as
not to waste his time thinking of curing his own diseases.
 Indeed, we may ask whether Plato is proposing a creation of a statesman or is it a
Buddhist monk, an ascetic?
 Plato was said to have wandered around the world after witnessing the death of his
master SOCRATES, that he encountered wisdom from Egypt, or probably in China,
India, or even Judaism (we can never know).Just like Pythagoras (who created a
theorem), who was a recluse, ascetic, he believed that even one's diet, food affects one's
virtue.
 We see the seriousness of the idea of politics, that it is related to education, morality and
psychology in those early times. Today people almost know nothing at all about politics.
 What is education today? a means to find financial income later on. What is psychology?
Only a few care to know (that is sad).What is morality today? People mistake it as a
weakness, a set of rules only for children, not for adults.
Describing the life of a true statesman, the IDEAL leader, Plato says;
1. They’re physically strong and well trained in the sense of harmony and gentleness, right
sense of timing (music), sense of universal ideal (philosophy), space and motion
(astronomy), sense of estimation (math)
2. They shall be provided for by the state yet will not live in luxury, and will have no private
house. They will live together as a community.

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 3. They will touch no gold, silver, for they already contain the gold within them. Touching
early metal, gold, silver will only pollute their purity.

4. They will have no business dealing or private enterprise. They will focus on the welfare
of their polis. These descriptions seen to remind us of Marx's idea of the goal of socialist
communism.

 Indeed, Plato may be the forerunner of communist ideals, seeing that democracy is
nothing but mob rule.
 So maturity does not limit itself to age, for it is possible that a young individual can think
in terms of "universals"- seeing the whole, a sort of synthesis of everything instead of
being limited to particular, material objects and small concerns of self recognition,
ambition.
 Someone who aspires for higher things, must go beyond the self. A POLITICIAN is too
particular, meticulous, including his NAME in every project, plastic bags, walls,
ambulance, roof; he fails to see that he is so small, insignificant with his ambition for
position and riches.
 The STATESMAN, on the other hand, is too busy thinking UNIVERSAL concerns- are
all my people having difficulty in their lives? How can I improve their lives? He has
transcended his EGO, his anger, any desires.
 ARISTOTLE- the follower of Plato, yet later disagreed with him. Aristotle was a
naturalist, biologist even in the absence of modern scientific instruments. He uses only
the pure power of reasoning, even without experiments.
 In his school the LYCEUM, he taught while he and his students were walking around
(PERIPATOS), so that they were called as "peripatetic’s”
 He believed that men are by nature social animals. Only within a society can humans
flourish. If a person does NOT need society he is either a lower kind of animal or he is a
god.
 He discussed ETHICS in his book the Nicomachean Ethics, treating ethics as a separate
inquiry from politics. He says that money, fame are NOT the goals of ethics, for we
pursue them NOT for their own sake. We seek them for happiness
 Happiness is the ultimate GOOD (agathos,).Happiness is not an inheritance of fortune,
nor fortune because of hard work. Happiness is rather an activity of the SOUL
(psyché).Happiness is acquired by our OWN ACTIONS, not by fortune.
 This is related to POLITIKA, the science of making the citizens (polites) do fine actions.
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 To think of HAPPINESS as "pleasure", satisfying the lower instincts, is something more

proper to animals than to humans. What is given to us humans by nature/by birth is
something NOT to our own merit.
 The eyes, ears are not something we did strive to have, but are given to us as features of
humans.
 Hence they are not to be praised. VIRTUE and GOOD actions (which result to
happiness) are a result of freewill, habituation and decision, hence we get full MERIT
from it.
 External goods, material objects and luxurious possessions are completely
IRRELEVANT then, to virtue and happiness.
 What is given by birth, like strength of body, tallness? It becomes something of MERIT
to us only because of WHAT ACTIONS we do with it .Family fortune, wealth because of
hard work also become OUR MERIT only because of what we intend to do with it (NOT
simply because we have a lot of money then we r virtuous already.
 Indeed we can even be worse because of it).Is HAPPINESS (virtue, good) a FEELING?
Aristotle says we are never praised or blamed because of "having feelings" of anger, fear,
love, pity etc. It has NO relation with human action, unless we DO something virtuous or
bad because of what we feel. Then, after ACTING we can be praised or blamed
 Virtue is about the decisions we make, the actions we do NOT the feelings, emotions we
feel.
 We do not envy, praise an individual because of a physical feature s/he has, as we see in a
picture, a style, a brand of clothing, sports car he drives. These have nothing to do with
individual ABILITIES.
 We praise a person for the ACTIONS that s/he decides on, for it is all based on his/her
MIND, soul (psyché).The ancient Greeks value the human mind as the highest, indeed
the only defining trait of humans.
 From his naturalistic studies, as he grew older, Aristotle stated being busy thinking of
human conduct and character, yet he was still a naturalist: saying no super naturalistic
ideals, he said that human ideal is based on nature, and everything natural has its own
perfection and development.
 Just as a tree grows, the goal of the eye is to see clearly, hence the natural goal of man in
his conduct is to be HAPPY. We choose honor, pleasure, intelligence because we believe
it will make us happy.
 Hence we must base our idea of happiness on something natural to humans. What makes
humans "human"? It is our power of thinking. Its development will give us happiness.
 .Happiness will be based on self control, clarity of judgment, not possession...yet this
results from the experiences that shape a fully developed human.
 Moral choice is something within our power, according to Aristotle. Excellence and bad
actions are within our power. Practical wisdom (phronesis) is a capacity to act based on
deliberate choice.
There are four conditions for a moral action:
1. Knowledge of what you are doing
2. The action is willingly done; it is your own choice
3. It is based on right motive
4. The decision is based on a firm and stable character
 Even to this day, this framework is the basis for judging actions in jurisprudence. Even
the word "prudence" (prudentia)is the translation of moral wisdom (phronesis)
 Aristotle's word for happiness "eu-daimonia= beautiful or excellent thinking" has no
relation to emotions (euphoria) but a clear-headed decision. His description is beautiful:
The excellent person does not expose himself to danger when not necessary, since there
are a few things important to him/her. Yet in great crisis s/he will b willing to give his
own life. She is disposed more to give, very hesitant to receive a favor. He does not like
public displays .She is never fired with blind admiration.
 He is frank about his likes and dislikes. He never feels malice and forgets injuries
quickly. She is not fond of talking, not caring whether she is praised or not. He does not
speak ill of others, even his enemies. She is not violent. He bears the misfortunes of life
with dignity and grace, like a general who plans in war with his limited forces (Leonidas
and the Spartans).
 She takes delight in solitude, being a best friend with herself, while a person with no
virtue and excellence is afraid of being alone, because she herself is her own worst
enemy.