1 UNDERSTANDING THE SELF
PHILOSOPHY
Philosophy comes from the Greek words Philia and Sofia.
Sofia - wisdom
Philia - love, desire for, interest in
Philia and Sofia join by Pythagoras-600 B.C.
The LOVE for WISDOM
PHILOSOPHY
A study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence, especially in the academic discipline.
A particular theory that someone has about how to live or how to deal with a particular situation.
The rational, abstract, and methodical consideration of reality as a whole or of fundamental dimensions of human existence and experience.
PHILOSOPHY
An all learning exclusive of technical precepts and practical arts.
The use of reason in understanding such things as the nature of the real world existence, the use, and limits of knowledge, and the principals of moral judgment.
Philosophers of the Ancient Times
The Socratic life: The life of inquiry
"Know Thyself!"
"The unexamined life is not worth living"
Socrates
Every man is composed of BODY and SOUL
This means that all person has an imperfect, impermanent aspect to him, and the body while maintaining that there is also a soul that is perfect and permanent.
Who are we as Socrates wants us to believe?
beings of wonder; capable of reason; passionate pursuers
Plato
Plato: 3 Components of the Soul:
1. Rational Soul - by reason & intellect
2. Spirited Soul – by emotions
3. Appetitive Soul – base desires (eating, drinking etc)
Ideal State: Balance of the 3 souls
Aristotle: Body – Imperfect / impermanent
Soul – Perfect / permanent
Truth and Wisdom
Virtues to Attain
Augustine and Thomas Aquinas
Augustine – Concept of Plato plus Christianity
- Search to be with the divine
Thomas Aquinas – Man is composed of 2 parts
Matter – HYLE – common stuff that makes up everything
Form – MORPHE – the essence of a substance
*It is what it makes it what it is
"The soul is what animates the body, it is what makes us
human"
Philosophers in Contemporary Period
Rene Descartes
Believes that the mind is the seat of our consciousness.
He gave the concept of Dualism – that the mind is separate from the body.
Cogito – Mind
Extenza - Body
"COGITO ERGO SUM" - I Think Therefore I Am
- One cannot doubt the existence of the self. A thing that thinks, therefore cannot be doubted
David Hume
Empiricist – one can only know what comes from the sense and experience
Self – a combination of all experiences with a particular person
- bundle of impressions
- basic object of our experience and sensation
- forms the core of our thoughts
Ideas – forms of impressions
Emmanuel Kant
Mind - organizes these impressions
- apparatuses of the mind
Intelligence – seat of acquisition for all human persons
Gilbert Ryle
Search for the University
SELF – not an entity one can locate and analyze but simply the convenient name that people use to refer to all behaviors that people make
Merlou - Ponty
Body and Mind – instrument that cannot be separated
Living body – thoughts, emotions and experience are all one
Churchland
Eliminate Materialism (ELIMINATIVISM)
- nothing but matter exists
Mind – physical brain
John Locke
Knowledge is something you are not born with but learning and experience
IDENTITY – Man – Physical body
- Person – self – what our identity consist of
Sigmund Freud
Man has consciousness
3 Parts of Consciousness
1. Id – Pleasure Principle – (unconscious) – hunger, thirst, sex
2. Ego – Reality Principle – (conscious/subconscious) - your present situation
3. Superego – Moral Principle – (conscious, subconscious, unconscious) your values and morals
