UDERSTANDING THE SELF LEARNING MODULE
WEEK 2
February 7, 2022—February 12, 2022
COURSE NUMBER : PERDEV 100
COURSE TITLE : UNDERSTANDING THE SELF
INSTRUCTOR : MS. MA. RAYM KAYLEIGH TRABAJO
Course Learning Outcome Student Learning Outcomes
The Self from Various Perspectives:
The first part of this course seeks to understand the 1. Discuss the different presentations and conceptualization
construct of the self from various disciplinal perspectives: of the self from various disciplinal perspectives;
philosophy, sociology, anthropology, and psychology—as 2. Compare and contrast how the self has been represented
well as the more traditional division between the East and across different disciplines and perspectives;
West—each seeking to provide answers to the difficult but 3. Examine the different influences, factors, and forces that
essential question of “What is the self?” and raising, shape the self;
among others, the question: “Is there even such a construct 4. Demonstrate critical and reflective thought in analyzing
as the self?” the development of one’s self and identity by developing a
theory of the self.
LEARNING CONTENT: THE SELF FROM VARIOUS PERSPECTIVES (Cont…)
Note: For the supplementary lecture presentation, head to this link: https://prezi.com/p/vvd_muae2cvo/?present=1
A. LESSON CONTENT
c. MEDIEVAL PHILOSOPHY
Medieval philosophy is a term used to refer to the philosophy that existed through the Middle
Ages, the period roughly extending from the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Medieval
philosophers are also known as Scholastics and founded scholasticism. It is defined partly by the
process of rediscovering the ancient culture developed in Greece and Rome during the Classical
period, and partly by the need to address theological problems and to integrate sacred doctrine
with secular learning.
1. St. Augustine
Saint Augustine of Hippo was a Roman African, early Christian theologian and philosopher from
Numidia whose writings influenced the development of Western Christianity and Western
philosophy. He was the bishop of Hippo Regius in North Africa and is viewed as one of the most
important Church Fathers in Western Christianity for his writings in the Patristic Period. Among
his most important works are The City of God, On Christian Doctrine and Confessions.
Definition of Self: St. Augustine had the perspective that humans can think. He believed that the
forms of humans were ideas in the mind of God. He also said that a man is divided into two
branches, the one is imperfect and persistently trying to be with the divine and the other is capable
of reaching immortality.
Based on the philosophy of St. Augustine, human beings are free to choose between good or evil,
however, he said that God who connected everything did not create evil, that evil exists to test man
on whether he is eligible to be with God. St. Augustine believed that “man has the responsibility
to be with God.” Though human beings have free will, he is still not totally free to do everything
he desires. That is why rules and laws are being implemented such as God made his testaments.
Also, according to him there are two types of evil: the physical evil and the moral evil. Physical
evil are things that might harm our body like disease, disaster, mishap, and any other events that
may occur naturally and might harm us. While moral evil is the swerve from the norm of just and
good action, actions that human beings know are bad but voluntarily act on it.
2. St. Thomas of Aquinas
Saint Thomas Aquinas OP was an Italian Dominican friar, Catholic priest, and Doctor of the
Church. He was an immensely influential philosopher, theologian, and jurist in the tradition of
scholasticism, within which he is also known as the Doctor Angelicus and the Doctor Communis.
He was the foremost classical proponent of natural theology and the father of Thomism; of which
he argued that reason is found in God. His influence on Western thought is considerable, and much
of modern philosophy developed or opposed his ideas, particularly in the areas of ethics, natural
law, metaphysics, and political theory. Unlike many currents in the Church of the time, Thomas
embraced several ideas put forward by Aristotle—whom he called "the Philosopher"—and
attempted to synthesize Aristotelian philosophy with the principles of Christianity.
Definition of Self: St. Thomas of Aquinas is a philosopher who believed that faith is not through
physical contact where eyes could see to believe but, rather, to believe without asking any
explanation. He believed that those who acknowledge that God exist need not further investigate,
and that those who think differently will remain confused because of their narrow viewpoint “to
see is to believe.” St. Thomas Aquinas explained that oneself is composed of two parts such as
matter and form where matter symbolizes the human body and anything that is physical, while
form is the soul that makes us who we are and that is our essence.
As an influencer of Christian philosophy, he believed that once a man receives his death, his soul
will remain and will go to the place where everyone wants to be, called “heaven,” the kingdom of
God. He also stated that God who created everything made his children according to his likeness.
d. EARLY MODERN PHILOSOPHY
Early modern philosophy (also classical modern philosophy) is a period in the history of
philosophy at the beginning or overlapping with the period known as modern philosophy.
1. René Descartes
René Descartes was a French philosopher, mathematician, and scientist. He theorized that in order
for knowledge to be perfected, it must necessarily be deduced from first causes; so that, to study
for its acquisition, one must begin by searching for these first causes. He then called this process
philosophizing which needed first causes, or Principles.
These Principles must meet two conditions: first, they must be so clear and so evident that the
human mind cannot doubt of their truth when it attentively considers them; and second, the
knowledge of other things must depend upon these Principles in such a way that they may be
known without the other things, but not vice versa.
These principles are the following:
1. Existence of his own mind.
Descartes found he could doubt that things in front of him are really there, and even that his body
exists, since he could be dreaming or hallucinating. However, he couldn’t doubt that he has a mind
because he was doubting other things and doubting can only be done by a mind. It is not possible
for us to doubt that, while we are doubting.
2. Existence of a perfect being (God)
One of Descartes’s arguments is existence is a perfection. So, the idea of a perfect being includes
the idea of existence. Considering that existence is already perfect, such perfect thing must have
been made by a perfect being, and to him, that is God.
3. God created everything.
Descartes argued that God is as perfect as possible. He reasoned that it is more perfect to have
created everything than not to have done so.
4. Whatever we clearly and distinctly perceive is true.
Descartes believed that everything that the mind, not the senses, perceives is true. He stressed that
the senses are sometimes deceptive due to illusions, dreams, and hallucinations. He argued that
since God created everything, he created our minds. So, if what we clearly and distinctly perceive
to be true were false, God would be a deceiver. Since God is perfect, he isn’t a deceiver. So,
whatever we clearly and distinctly perceive is true.
Definition of Self: First, Descartes thought that the Scholastics’ (Medieval philosophers) method
was prone to doubt given their reliance on sensation as the source for all knowledge. Second, he
wanted to replace their final causal model of scientific explanation with the more modern,
mechanistic model. Descartes attempted to address the former issue via his method of doubt. The
“hyperbolic doubt” then serves to clear the way for what Descartes considers to be an unprejudiced
search for the truth. He discovered that “I think therefore, I exist” is impossible to doubt and
therefore, absolutely certain. According to him, there is a mind and body problem where the mind
does exist while the body is doubtful and the mind can exist without the body.
Descartes also founded the modern Rationalism. He pressed it to the forces of reason and evidence
in order to achieve the real safely, the purpose of knowledge is to “make us like the master and
possessors of nature.” He discovered that “I think therefore, I exist” is impossible to doubt and
therefore, absolutely certain. Just like when we are unsure of things, we usually doubt it because
we have the mind to think. According to him, there is a mind and body problem where the mind
does exist while the body is doubtful and the mind can exist without the body.
2. David Hume
David Hume was a Scottish Enlightenment philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist, who is
best known today for his highly influential system of philosophical empiricism, skepticism, and
naturalism.
Hume strove to create a total naturalistic science of man that examined the psychological basis of
human nature. Against philosophical rationalists, Hume held that passion rather than reason
governs human behaviour. Hume argued against the existence of innate ideas, positing that all
human knowledge is founded solely in experience.
Definition of Self: David Hume disagrees with all the other aforementioned philosophers. He
posited that “one can only know what comes from the senses & experiences” and that the self is
not an entity beyond the physical body, “you know that other people are humans not because you
have seen their soul, but because you see them, hear them, feel them etc.”
The self, according to Hume, is nothing but a bundle of impressions and ideas. Impressions are
objects of our experience or sensations and they form the core of our thoughts. Meanwhile, ideas
are copies of impressions, and are, therefore, not as real as impressions.
The self, consequently, is a collection of different perceptions which rapidly succeed each other.
It is in a perpetual flux and movement. Humans may want to believe that there is a unified, coherent
self, soul, or mind, but to Hume, it is all just a combination of experiences.
Hume theorized that having impressions is normal for man to create. As human beings try to
communicate with each other, the impressions that are formed grow because of this shared
knowledge. Ideas, on the other hand, are the ones we experience in a second of time. Since people
never stop thinking about anything, this constant process is the reason why ideas exist.
Hume believed that man keeps on progressing because of his experiences in life, whether good or
bad, which then makes him human. Through this process, man is able to create his own impressions
and ideas.
3. Karl Marx
Karl Marx was a German philosopher, economist, historian, sociologist, political theorist,
journalist and socialist revolutionary. He was born in Trier, Germany. His best-known titles are
the 1848 pamphlet, The Communist Manifesto, and the three-volume Das Kapital. His political
and philosophical thought had enormous influence on subsequent intellectual, economic and
political history and his name has been used as an adjective, a noun and a school of social theory.
Definition of Self: Marx started the consideration of the philosophical notion of alienation that
man is a producer who creates his life physically in order to satisfy his basic needs. The Alienation
to self is defined as a success through the determination of the number of works or deeds man has
done.
Marx believed that man is a social being who works. According to Karl Marx, theoretical
philosophy should be essentially practical. The philosophy should be inseparable from a radical
transformation of society and contributing converted praxis, energy and human social practice to
be able to free people.
e. MODERN PHILOSOPHY
The period of modern philosophy is marked by the development of science and art in which the
Catholic church is beginning to lose power in a Europe that is developing intellectually and
emotionally. As a result, the same intellectual spirit that saw the ancient Greeks questioning
mythology and asking deep questions returned. Modern philosophy, thus, consists of a mix of new
approaches to philosophy fueled by science, rejections of religious teachings and, on the other
hand, defenses of religion based on the new evidence.
1. Gilbert Ryle
Gilbert Ryle is a British philosopher whose ideas in philosophy of mind have been called
behaviorist. He challenged the traditional distinction between body and mind
as delineated by René Descartes. Ryle analyzed propositions that appear irreconcilable, as
when free will is set in opposition to the fatalistic view that future specific events are inevitable.
He believed that the dilemmas posed by these seemingly contradictory propositions could be
resolved only by viewing them as the result of conceptual confusion between the language of logic
and the language of events.
Definition of Self: Ryle denies the internal, non-physical self. He believed that “what truly matters
is the behavior that a person manifests in his day-to-day life.” According to him, the self is not an
entity one can locate and analyze but simply the convenient name that we use to refer to the
behaviors that we make.
2. Jean-Paul Sartre
He is best known as the leading exponent of existentialism in the 20th century. Sartre took over
the phenomenological method, which proposes careful, unprejudiced description of the
phenomena of conscious experience.
Existentialism is a form of philosophical inquiry that explores the problem of human existence and
centers on the experience of thinking, feeling, and acting. The individual's starting point has been
called "the existential angst," a sense of dread, disorientation, confusion, or anxiety in the face of
an apparently meaningless or absurd world. Existentialist thinkers frequently explore issues related
to the meaning, purpose, and value of human existence.
Definition of the Self: Sartre believed in the essential freedom of individuals, and he also believed
that as free beings, people are responsible for all elements of themselves, their consciousness, and
their actions. That is, with total freedom comes total responsibility. He believed that even those
people who wish not to be responsible, who declare themselves not responsible for themselves or
their actions, are still making a conscious choice and are thus responsible for anything that happens
as a consequence of their inaction. Sartre’s moral philosophy maintains that ethics are essentially
a matter of individual conscience. Sartre reveals much about his own ethics in his writings about
oppressive societal structures and the ways in which individuals might ideally interact with each
other to affirm their respective humanities, but he is dismissive of any version of universal ethics.
He is clear in his belief that morals are always first and foremost a matter of subjective, individual
conscience.
Sartre defines two types, or ways, of being: en-soi, or being-in-itself, and pour-soi, or being-for-
itself. He uses the first of these, en-soi, to describe things that have a definable and complete
essence yet are not conscious of themselves or their essential completeness. Trees, rocks, and birds,
for example, fall into this category. Sartre uses pour-soi to describe human beings, who are defined
by their possession of consciousness and, more specifically, by their consciousness of their own
existence—and, as Sartre writes, by their consciousness of lacking the complete, definable essence
of the en-soi. This state of being-for-itself is not just defined by self-consciousness—it would not
exist without that consciousness.
B. TEACHING- LEARNING ACTIVITIES
Exercise: Read the following statements. Identify which philosopher is indicated by the given
definition of self.
______ 1. He believed that the forms o humans were ideas in the mind of God.
______ 2. He believed that faith is believing without any explanation.
______ 3. He believed that the purpose of knowledge is to make man like the master and
possessor of nature.
______ 4. He believed that the self is nothing but a bundle of impressions and ideas.
______ 5. He believed in the idea of Alienation and created through the determination of the
number of works or deeds man has done.
______ 6. He believed that what truly matters is the behavior that a person manifests in his day-
to-day life.
______ 7. He believed in the essential freedom of individuals and that people are responsible for
all elements of themselves.
______ 8. These philosophers were also known as Scholastics.
C. ANALYSIS (Cont…)
Continuing last week’s analysis, resume detailing out the different philosophers that we have
covered for this week and identify how far has the definition of the self progressed.
D. ASSESSMENT
Philosophical Dualism
As an assessment for the topic on the Philosophical perspectives of the Self, make an essay that
compares and contrasts differing perspectives of the philosophers that we have discussed, particularly
that of Ryle and St. Thomas of Aquinas. The essay should contain the following:
Part I. Gilert Ryle's philosophy versus the philosophy of St. Thomas of Aquinas
Part II. Your personal views in relation to the philosophy of Gilbert Ryle OR St.
Thomas of Aquinas
The whole essay should contain AT LEAST twenty (20) sentences.
E. SYNTHESIS
Knowing different philosophical perspectives helps to form a more complete view or system of
the aspects needed to understand the self. The coherent whole that results is considered to show
the truth more completely than would a mere collection of parts.
