Lesson 5.

The Universe in Your Hands

Philippine Politics and Governance

General Academic Strand | Humanities and Social Sciences
 Learning
Competencies

•  Show that care for the environment

contributes to health, well-being and
sustainable development. 

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Learning
Objectives

• you should be able to explain that caring for

the environment leads to a better life.

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Check Your
Progress

How can a better world affect my life?

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Universe in your Hands

There have been many

teachings, and thousands of
ideologies that pertain to
man’s relationship with
nature.

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Universe in your Hands

One of it is from the Judeo-

Christian perspective that
there is a God who made the
world, and that He made
human beings in order to take
care of this world.

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Universe in your Hands
St Thomas Aquinas

a philosopher from the

Medieval period, called God
as the summum bonum.

“highest good”

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Universe in your Hands
St Thomas Aquinas

summum bonum is seen as

the end goal of life – that
people go on with their lives
in search of it. Some define it
as happiness or virtues

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Universe in your Hands
St Thomas Aquinas

Christian perspective of St.

Thomas, it was God.

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Universe in your Hands
5 ways of ST Thomas
Aquinas
Unmoved mover

 If there were an infinite series of movers, all

waiting to be moved by something else (this is
called infinite regress),

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Universe in your Hands
5 ways of ST Thomas
Aquinas
Unmoved mover

then actual motion could never have got started,

and there could be no motion now. But there is
motion now, so there must be a First Mover
which is itself unmoved. We call the First
Mover God.

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Universe in your Hands
5 ways of ST Thomas
Aquinas
Uncaused cause

there cannot be an infinite regress of essentially

related efficient causes, for unless there is a first
cause of the series there would be no causality
in the series.

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Universe in your Hands
5 ways of ST Thomas
Aquinas
Uncaused cause

Therefore, there must be a first un-caused

efficient cause of all efficient causality in the
world. Everyone gives to this the name of God.

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Universe in your Hands
5 ways of ST Thomas
Aquinas
God as a necessary being
every existing being does not owe its existence
to itself. There are beings that begin to exist and
cease to exist, that is, possible, contingent
beings. But not all beings can be possible
beings, because what comes to exist does so
only through what already exists

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Universe in your Hands
5 ways of ST Thomas
Aquinas
God as a necessary being
Therefore, there must be a Being whose
existence is necessary, that is, one that never
came into being and will never cease to be.
There must be a first Being which is necessary
in itself, and not dependent on another for its
existence. We call this Being to be GOD.

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Universe in your Hands
5 ways of ST Thomas
Aquinas
Gradation of beings
here exist gradations in things that there are
different degrees to perfections among beings,
for some are more nearly perfect than others.
But things cannot be more or less perfect unless
there is a wholly perfect being.

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Universe in your Hands
5 ways of ST Thomas
Aquinas
Gradation of beings
Whatever is perfect is the cause of the less than
perfect (the higher is the cause of the lower).
Therefore, there must be a perfect Being which
is the cause of perfections of the less than
perfect beings. This perfect being is God.

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Universe in your Hands
5 ways of ST Thomas
Aquinas
Argument by Design
behavior of things in the world implies a Grand
Designer or Architect. We see that things that
lack knowledge, such as natural bodies, act for
an end. They achieve their end not by chance,
but by design

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Universe in your Hands
5 ways of ST Thomas
Aquinas
Argument by Design
Now whatever lacks knowledge cannot move
towards an end unless it be directed toward that
end by some being endowed with knowledge
and intelligence, as the arrow is directed by the
archer.

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Universe in your Hands
5 ways of ST Thomas
Aquinas
Argument by design
Therefore some intelligent being exists by
whom all natural things are ordered to their end.
This being is referred to as God.

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Universe in your Hands
St. Augustine of Hippo

saw that a union with God is

the object of life. Augustine’s
main point was on his
advocate of many virtues that
would purify one’s soul in
order to be worthy of a union
with God.
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Universe in your Hands
St. Agustine of Hippo

Judeo-Christian perspective of
the theologians rests on the
idea that man would be
rewarded by God in heaven if
he lives his life in the mortal
world in accordance to His
will.
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Universe in your Hands
Utilitarianism

John Stuart Mill

Jeremy bentham

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Universe in your Hands
Utilitarianism

action is considered right and

good if one can get any use or
a utility out of it.

Consequentialism which is a
view that examines the
consequence of an action
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Universe in your Hands
Jeremy Bentham

thought that man is governed

either by pleasure or pain. For
him, the goal of life is to
maximize the pleasure and
minimize the pain.

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Universe in your Hands
Jeremy Bentham

Will this act or thing be

considered useful for me and
reduce my pain and uplift my
pleasure

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Universe in your Hands
Confucius

The Analects​, the wise

teacher taught of one of the
major ethical guidelines that
is revered until today: the
Golden Rule.

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Universe in your Hands
Confucius

The Golden Rule generally

reminds us to take action only
on things we also want to be
done to ourselves.

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Universe in your Hands
Confucius

“What you do not want to be

done to you, don’t do unto
others.”

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Universe in your Hands
Confucius

In times of natural calamities

when lives are lost, the
general public often jump to
conclusions that it is the way
nature takes revenge for all
the bad actions

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Universe in your Hands
Confucius

And, if we are going to apply

the Confucian teaching on the
Golden Rule, it would show
that we should not destroy
the environment so it would
not destroy us too.

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