PHILOSOPHERS

AND THEIR
PERSPECTIVES OF
THE SELF
Lecture 1
 Learning Outcomes
1. Explain the development of the self from the
different philosophical perspectives.

2. Construct a concept of self-based on the

philosophers’ perspectives (with the inclusion of
what they say regarding the influences to self).

3. Express students’ deeper understanding of

who they are based on the different
philosophical perspectives.
 SOCRATES

PLATO

RENE DESCARTES

JOHN LOCKE

ST. AUGUSTINE
SOCRATES
 “The only good is
knowledge and the only
evil is ignorance”
(“There is only one good,
knowledge, and one evil,
ignorance.”)
• Man does evil because he is
ignorant or he is not
knowledgeable (absence of
knowledge).
• He believed that man would not
do evil if he knew it is evil.
• He only does evil involuntarily
because he is ignorant about it.
• True knowledge can be surely
attained through disciplined
conversations which is acting
as an intellectual midwife (
dialectic method / Socratic
method / midwifery
method).
 Dialectic Method Understanding
1. Discussion of the Oneself
most obvious 1. Self –
aspects of any assessment
problem. 2. Self – verification
2. All parties involve 3. Self –
are force to
improvement
clarify their ideas.
4. Self –
3. A clear statement
enhancement
of what was
meant.
•True knowledge produces
happiness.
•True knowledge of who you
are (your human nature)
allows you to know what
are required for you to be
happy.
Plato
Plato’s concept of soul
“Human behavior flows
from three main
sources: desire, motive,
and knowledge.”
• That is why we do things.
We want, we feel and we
know/understand.
It’s what drives most
the actions we take on any
given day.
 Rene
Descartes
 “Dubito ergo cogito;
cogito ergo sum.”
(“I doubt, therefore I think; I think
therefore I am”)
•It is to affirm that man is
a thinking thing that
doubts, understands,
affirms, denies, wills,
refuses and which also
imagines and feels.
•Descartes believed
that all must be
doubted except the
truth about man’s
existence, that is,
that he is doubting .
 John
Locke
“All people in the world
started in their life
without knowing
nothing.”
• For Locke, all people’s mind
started from a blank sheet
of paper (which was also
called tabula rasa) and the
writings on it (knowledge)
only happens when
reflection is applied on
sensory experience.
• He believed that man’s
knowledge is composed of and
restricted to ideas that were
generated by the objects he
experienced, which are
sensation and reflection (These
are two forms of experience.).
St. Augustine
“Love brings satisfaction
and happiness.”
• Man cannot avoid to love because
there are incompleteness in his life.
• Man’s love focuses on different
objects such as physical objects
(example, cars, jewelries, etc.), other
persons (example, father, mother,
boyfriend, etc.), or oneself
depending on what is missing in his/
her life.
• For St. Augustine, these
objects of love are not
evil, they are all good
because they all come
from God who is
goodness itself.
• Nevertheless, man still
feel miserable, unhappy,
and restless because of
the kind of love that they
have which is disordered
love.
• Disordered love is characterized by
having more expectation from an
object of love which it cannot
provide. So, when man treat the
objects of love as the ultimate source
of happiness, he/ she is having a
disordered love.
• Disordered love is the source of all
forms of pathology in human
behavior.
• When a man loves other
person more than he/ she
should be loved because of
what this other person can
give him/ her, man’s love
can become destructive.
• Because man tries to get from this
other person more than what
he/she could give. So, appetite
flourishes, passion multiplies and
there is a desperate attempt to
achieve peace by satisfying all
desires. The soul becomes
seriously disfigured.
• Next, it gets involved in envy,
greed, jealousy, trickery, panic, and
unending restlessness.
This disordered love will
produce eventually disordered
person, and consequently,
disordered society is produced.
•This kind of society can
be reconstructed and
have an orderly or
peaceful one by first
reconstructing the self.
• Personal reconstruction is
possible only by reordering love
and loving the proper things
properly. So, we can love a person
properly only if we first love God
because when we do this, we will
not expect to derive from human
love what we can derive only from
our love of God.
•Also, we can love
ourselves properly if
we remove our self-
pride and subordinate
ourselves to God.
•Only the love for
God who is infinite
brings happiness to
man whose needs
are infinite .
Presented by: Ms. Dianne Lumibao