CHAPTER TWO: WHAT ARE YOU?

ST. THOMAS AQUINAS Thomas was most probably born in the castle

of Roccasecca, located in Aquino, old county of the Kingdom of Sicily.

His name was Tommaso d'Aquino or Thomas from Aquino, where was born.

At the age of 19, he receive Dominican Habit at Naples, after all his family doesn’t want it.

He died at the age of 44, with a very known argument about Existence of God and that Man has 2 substantial form the Body and the Soul.

He was describe as big man, corpulent (fat, chubby), with dark complexion, large headed (making him smart), receding hairline, refined, affable and loveable. In an argument, he maintained self-control and won over opponents by his personality and great learning. He wrote sixty books by dictating it to his secretaries (sometimes for at once), because he thinks faster than they think.

Two known arguments:

Man is a substantially united body and soul.

Existence of GOD

Man is a substantially united body and soul.

He, like Aristotle, believe that humans are combination soul and body. To allow the possibility of personal or individual immortality, he diverge from Aristotle, declared that the soul was a substantial form that was capable of existing separately from the matter.

Existence of GOD Is this proposition evident or not?- Evident

means to show itself directly, so that it does not need any demonstration. For a proposition to be evident both subject and predicate must be present/known. If they are not the proposition is not evident.

Does this mean that it is not true?- No, this may not evident but may be true, although the truth of this proposition may not have to be demonstrated.

Is this proposition “God exists” evident?- with this St. Thomas proceeds to put forward five demonstration of God’s existence.

The argument from Motion (ex motu) If motion exist in the world, then there must be

a mover, origin of motion. But motion does not exist in the world. Therefore, there exist a mover (and that is God).

Everything that is moved is moved by a mover, therefore there is an unmoved mover from whom all motion proceeds, which is God.

The argument from Efficient Cause (ex causa). If there exist a series of efficient causes in the

world, then there exists a first efficient cause, which is itself uncaused. But there exists in reality a series of efficient cause in which each is subordinated to its superior. Therefore, a first efficient cause exist which is itself uncaused (and that is God).

Everything that is caused is caused by something else, therefore there must be an uncaused cause of all caused things, which is God.

The argument from Contingency (ex contingentia)

If contingent being exists, then there must be a necessary being. But contingent beings exist in the world. Therefore, there exists a necessary being (and that is God).

There are contingent beings in the universe which may either exist or not exist and, as it is impossible for everything in the universe to be contingent (as something cannot come of nothing), so there must be a necessary being whose existence is not contingent on any other being, which is God.

The argument from the Degree of Perfection (ex gradu) If various degree of perfection exist among beings

in the universe, then there must be some being that possesses the highest degree of perfection. But different levels of perfection or development exist among things in the universe. Therefore, there exists a monst= perfect being (and that is God).

There are various degrees of perfection which may be found throughout the universe, so there must be a pinnacle of perfection from which lesser degrees of perfection derive, which is God.

The argument from Design (ex fine) If there is design, then there must be a

designer, the more huge the design, the more intelligent must be the designer. But there exists a huge and amazing design in universe. Therefore, there exists a great designer (and that is God).

All natural bodies in the world (which are in themselves unintelligent) act towards ends (which is characteristic of intelligence), therefore there must be an intelligent being that guides all natural bodies towards their ends, which is God.

3. The Anthropocentric Approach

The Search for Truth. Modo in Latin means “now”: hence modernus or modern. There is nothing special about “being modern”: we are all in fact “modern,” since we are alive “now”. But the way they began to use this term in the 14th century had a very special connotation: it implied a rejection of what had been received from the immediate past.

Rene Descartes Rene Descartes is generally considered to

mark the beginning of modern philosophy. He was born on March 31, 1596 in La Haye,

France. His chief work is the Discourse on Method,

whose starting point is the rejection of all received knowledge, whether from faith, from the past, or from the senses: “This leaves me alone with my thought: I am thinking, (cogito, in Latin).” So, cogito becomes the starting point of philosophy.

Man is an accidental and mechanical union of body and soul

Descarte’s conception of human nature was dualistic. Living human beings, for Descartes, were composed of two entirely different kinds of entitles: body and soul. Descartes splits man into two: instead of distinguishing in order to unite, he separates and dichotomizes. He proposes that the soul of man makes man a thinking thing; while man’s body is a materially extended thing. This is also a consequence of his subjectivism, which makes him accepts ideas only if they are “clear and distinct”, because only they beget “certainty” in the mind: truth is not what matters, but certainty.

Descartes’ Quest. Descartes’ project was to find a secure and

solid foundation of human knowledge. This secure and solid foundation must be something indubitable, undeniable, irrefutable, and unshakeable. It must be clear and distinct in every individual’s own mind insofar as it is self-evident for everyone else. “Clear” he defined as “that which is present and apparent to an attentive mind.” “distinct” he defined as “that which is so precise and different from all other objects that it contains within itself nothing but what is clear.”

Immanuel Kant Immanuel Kant was born in Konigsberg in what was then

known as East Prussia. His parents were poor but devout members of fundamentalist Protestant sect known as Pietism. For most part, Kant’s life is noteworthy for not being noteworthy. He probably never travelled more than sixty miles from his birthplace during his entire life. One biographer said, “Kant’s life was like the most regular of regular verbs,” to which another added, “But it was not a conjugated verb. For Kant never married. Kant lived most of his life on a rigid schedule. According to Kant, our knowledge is formed by two thing: (1) actual experiences; and, (2) the mind’s faculties of judgements. Kant made a distinction between two kinds of judgements, the analytic and the synthetic.

Analytic Judgement

Is that judgement wherein the predicate is already contained in the understanding of the subject. It is a judgement which only elucidates words. Thus, A bachelor is an unmarried male. The term bachelor entails ‘maleness’ and ‘unmarriedness’. If you told me ‘John is a bachelor’ I would not have to meet John to know that he was unmarried and that he was a man. That is because the term ‘bachelor’ itself tells me these things analytically.

Synthetic Judgement

Is that judgement wherein the predicate is not contained in the understanding of the subject and the subject is not also contained in the understanding of the predicate.

4. The Existential approach With existential approach, the search for

truth has become the search for meaning and conditions of human existence. Contemporary philosophers assert that people actually make decisions based on what has meaning to them rather than what is rational. Rejection of reason as the source of meaning is common theme of this approach.

Jean-Paul Sartre Was born on June 21, 1905 in Paris. He lost his

father at an early age. His grandfather, Carl Schweitzer, raised him. Sartre was an awkward child and cross-eyed. His mother would find a place that other kids would accept him, but usually to no avail. So Sartre immersed himself in reading and writing. His rise to fame as a writer began in 1938 when he published Nausea, his first novel and a best-seller. Four years later Sartre resigned his professorship and for the rest of his life was able to live on his literary income alone.

Sartrean Existentialism

Man, Sartre said, is abandoned, by which “we mean that God does not exist,” According to him, the abandonment of man – that is, the non-existence of God – has drastic philosophical implications. Basically, there are four (and these embody the main tenets of Sartre’s existentialism) to wit:

First, because there is no God, there is no maker of man and no such thing as a divine conception of man in accordance with which man was created. This means Sartre’s thought, that there is no such thing as a human nature that is common to all humans; no such thing as a specific essence that defines what it is to be human.

Second, because there is no God, there is no ultimate reason why anything has happened or why things are the way they are and not some other way. This means that the individual in effect has been thrown into existence without any real reason for being. But this does not mean that an individual is like a rock or a flea, which also (because there is no God) have no ultimate reason or explanation.

Third, because there is no God, there is no divine plan that determines what must happen, there is no determinism. Thus, “man is free,” Sartre wrote, “man is freedom”; in fact, he is condemned to be free. Nothing forces us to do what we do. Thus, he said, “we are alone, without excuses, by he meant simply that we cannot excuse our actions by saying that we were forced by circumstances or moved by passion or otherwise determined to do what we did.

Fourth, because there is no God, there is no objective standard of values. “It is very troubling that God does not exist,” Sartre wrote, “for with him disappears every possibility of finding values… there can no longer be any good a priori.” Consequently, because a Godless world has no objective values, we must establish or invent our own values. Summarily, according to Sartre, it is only through acceptance of our responsibility that we may live in authencity.

Soren Kierkegaard

Born in Copenhagen, Denmark, Soren Kierkegaard was the youngest of seven children. The first great influence in his life was that of his father, who was not a highly successful merchant, but also a devout and pious Lutheran.

Kierkegaardian Existentialism

The theme of kierkegaardian Existentialism can be explained by making a distinction between the spectator (knowing the truth) and the actor (being in the truth). He illustrated this distinction with several analogies. Kierkegaard speaks of three stages or levels of existence, viz.: aesthetic, ethical, and religious.

The Aesthetic Stage (Man is ruled by passion) Is characterized by the pursuit of pleasure, not

just in art and music, but especially in the pursuit of sensual pleasure. This a way of life that cultivates easy, uncommitted enjoyment, a life whim and caprice, focus on the here and now. This takes place when the love of joy guides the person’s life. Life is defined as a search for beauty and joy and the person who lives in this stage lives as animals do. Individuals in this stage opt to live an aimless, superficial, or floating existence.

The Moral Stage (Man is ruled by societal norms)

Involves in making a commitment to the norms, principles, and customs of society. This ethical life is devoted and obedient to general principles. An ethical person, therefore, lives in accordance to the standards and structures imposed to the members of society. This is where an individual begins to take on a true direction in life, becoming aware of and personally responsible for good and evil and forming a commitment to oneself and others. Thus, a faithful and happy marriage is more satisfying than the pursuit of ceaseless, increasingly meaningless seduction after seduction. Here women are not man’s properties and are not just there to tempt and be seduced; they have personalities of different types and try to find their spiritual road to perfection. In this stage, the individual is determined to discharge his responsibilities and, by using his free will, makes moral choices. Accordingly, his behavior has general regular patterns and he leads a life of positive being alongside other people.

The Religious Stage (Man is ruled by total faith in God)

Is the stage where God becomes the basis of one’s act. In this stage, the distinction between good and bad is ultimately dependent not on social norms but on God who is the foundation of one’s sacred life. Kierkegaard states that an action done on God’s account is an action done out of duty and it is more difficult compared to actions done out of obedience to social norms.

5. The Phenomenological Approach (The Philosophy of Essence

Many people feel that the approaches to the study of man that we have examined, from cosmological to anthropological, are too distant from human reality. In trying to understand man, their philosophies have reduced it to abstractions, giving little concern with our concrete existence. But there is nothing abstract about existence. Existence is what is real as it involves the human individual who exists. We find this emphasis on human existence in existentialism and its predecessor, phenomenology. Phenomenology and existentialism share a number of outlook on reality and thus general similarities.