LET ME KNOW YOU THROUGH . . .

Let’s Ponder these Questions!

1. Why is caution needed before one posts one’s status in
Facebook?
2. If ‘my wall, my rules’ applies to your own account, why is
there a needed to consider the way your posts affect others?
3. Social media is social construction. In what way are your
actions reflective of that social construction?
The Making of the
Person of Human
Action
Learning Objectives:
1. Understand the role of social media in today’s
society.
2. Apply tips on how to be a responsible user of social
media.
3. Determine what makes a person act in a certain way.
 10 THINGS HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS
SHOULD NEVER POST ON FACEBOOK
• Over- the- Top Party Pictures
• Insensitive Jokes
• R- rated Memes
• Relationship Drama
• Insults about teachers
• Bullying classmates
• Anything You Wouldn’t Want Your Parents to See
• Anything You Wouldn’t Want a College Admission Board to See
 The Process of Doing Human Act
 The interplay of will and intellect sheds light on how complex human
acts are.
 The genius of St. Thomas gives us a clear structure of this processes
that are involved when a human act is being scrutinized.
 In his Summa Theologica, following Aristotle’s philosophy of the
telos of act, every acting involves the end of action, the means of
carrying out, and the actual carrying out of the act.
Step One: I like something. One acts because something good catches your
attention.
 Step Two: I will will it. Because there is something good, the faculty of the
will is activated.
 Step Three: It is so good, I wish or desire it. The quality of that something
good is confirmed, and once it intensifies, it becomes a desire or wish.
 Step Four: I intend to desire it now. The will immediately creates that
intention, even though the means of doing it is not yet considered.
Step Five: I exercise good judgement first. The intellect comes in the process, and
through deliberations consider the means of achieving it. A kind of “internal debate”
happens here.
 Step Six: I decide to go for it. The will finally gives in to the voice of reason; a
decision is made. A decision involves: choice and consent.
 Step Seven: I must do it now. This is the part where the intellect’s command to do
something finally executed by the will.
 Step Eight: I am doing it now . As a final step in the process. You gather all the
means to carry out what you wanted to do, and it is presupposed that what you do
gives you a sense of fulfilment or enjoyment.
 The Role of Good Character:
Temperance
 “It is better to be on the side of caution than haste.”
 A cautious person is a person of deliberation. According to Deirdre N.
MacCloskey, “A virtue is an acquired human quality the possession of which
tends to enable us to achieved those goods which are internal to practices and
the lack of which effectively prevents us from achieving such goods.”
 In his book, The Bourgeois Virtues, he rieterates that the virtue of
temperance has to be rediscovered anew.
In the pursuit of happiness , things can go wrong when
they are contrary to what we expect them to be.
Although perfection is an elusive human ideal,
temperance can help us go near it. The virtue of
temperance, if developed as a habit, makes the act of
deliberation easily manageable and effective.
 Putting it to Practice
• Deliberation is a skill. As Aristotle says, excellence of
character is a matter of habit; we become what we
repeatedly do.
• There are three levels in which deliberations can happen:
(a) experience, (b) interpretation, and (c) analysis.
 Experience
 Experience is apprehended by the five senses and
beyond as it involves feelings within us, and
intuitions about others’ experiences.
 In this level of deliberation, the experience is simply
described (that is, no judgement must be done);
simply what it is.
 Interpretation
It happens because we want to make sense of what is
going on.
There are many factors that may come in: you may
employ ideas of what you think is right, what is
appropriate, or what your cultural influences to you is
appropriate or right.
 Analysis
 It is the level where opinions are
distinguished from facts, and the
difference between opinion and true
knowledge is considered.
You are angry because of what your classmate did
to you.
EXPERIENCE
What your classmate did to you was wrong. So if
he/she spreads gossips about you, you think
spreading gossip is wrong.
INTERPRETATION
So you think it is okay to be angry, and not feeling guilty you are
feeling angry, because something wrong was done to you.
Now, the crucial question can be asked:
Did your classmate really do something wrong?
Is gossiping really something wrong?

ANALYSIS
When you subject your actions to the
three levels of deliberation, then action
can be properly done.