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SOCIAL AND POLITICAL PHILOSOHY

Philosophy: Its Definition, Nature and Background

“Philosophy is a kind of journey ever learning yet never arriving at the ideal perfection of
truth” (Albert Pike)

LESSON OBJECTIVES:

At the end of the topic learners are expected to:

1. Understand and explain the etymology, nature, processes significance and branches of
Philosophy;
2. Share and relate their own appreciation of philosophy; and
3. Create a draft of their personal philosophy and its relevance to our society.

ACTIVITY 1.

WHO AM I?
On the answer sheet provided (see page 13) answer the following Questions:
1. Who are you?
2. Why are you here?
3. Where is your life headed?

LET’S LEARN!

The last activity aims for us to question on a deeper INTERESTING TO KNOW!

perspective the realization of who we are. How many of
still inquires about ourselves? Most of the time we usually
think that we already know who we really are. But the
question is, do we really know ourselves? Have we
already discovered why we are here in this world? Have
we though of where is our life leading? These and other
questions must be explore for us to be able to find more
about ourselves.
This is the same thing about other things existing in our Image Source:
world. Have we tried to discover more of the our world? https://myhero.com/Pythagoras_dnhs_kt_US_2015_ul

There are a lot things that we can explore in the world According to Pythagoras there are
inasmuch as there are a lot of things that needs to be three classifications of men:
discovered and that is the task of Philosophy! To give
1. Lovers of Pleasure
probable answers to a of questions that is around the 2. Lovers of Success
world. But what is really Philosophy? 3. Lovers of Wisdom

A. Etymological Meaning of Philosophy

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SOCIAL AND POLITICAL PHILOSOHY

Philosophy was first used by Greek Philosopher and Mathematician Pythagoras which is the
combination of two greek words namely: Philos (φιλοσ) and Sophia (σοφία).
Philia or Philos is a kind of Love which demonstrates fondness of the other. Accordingly to
Moseley (2001) as cited by Agdalpen (2019) , the term Philia incorporated not just friendship,
but also loyalties to family and polis (one’s political community, job, or discipline). Thus, it is a
type of love that exceeds simple romantic feelings. Being fond of the beloved, it seeks the truth
of it wether it may be a person, or of any reality. Thus Philosophy seeks the truth which is
wisdom. Being fond, thus brings forth the interest of knowing and understanding more.
In this light, one could understand that Philosophy seeks further. And the more that it discovers,
it wants to know more. However, philosophy is not simply fond of a person or an event. Rather,
it is directed to wisdom. Wisdom must be understood not as mere knowledge. It is seeking the
truth. Wisdom according to Descartes is “a perfect knowledge of all things that man can
know, both the conduct of his life by preserving his health and the invention of all arts.”
Thus, we can view it from the perspective that wisdom, is a correspondence of what the
human being knows and its actual living.

B. Nature and Process of Philosophy Inquiry

Most people who study Philosophy see it as a subject or as a discipline. Though this is true,
philosophy is more than that. Philosophizing involves more than just simply studying a subject
such as math, physics, etc. The British Academic Philosopher David Papineau as cited by in the
book of Edmonds (2010) stated:
“Philosophy is thinking hard about the most difficult problems that there are. And
you might think scientists do that too, but there’s a certain kind of question whose
difficulty can’t be resolved by getting more empirical evidence. It requires an
untangling of presuppositions: figuring out that our thinking is being driven by
ideas we didn’t even realize that we had. And that’s what philosophy is.”
To philosophize is to wonder. The very essence of Philosophy is to question. It is to seek for
answers to questions from simple to complex. However, it is not just merely providing simple
answer. Philosophy seeks for the truth.
In the process of seeking for the truth, philosophy views from all poible perspective through a
process usually referred to as “Rational Inquiry”. A philosopher seeks to understand things by
the utilization of its intellect, with the elimination of possible biases to gain more of an
understanding of a profound truth that it aims to uncover.
In connection hereto, the following diagram shows the philosophical process:

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SOCIAL AND POLITICAL PHILOSOHY

Rational
Wondering
Inquiry
Discovery of a New Partial Truth

The above diagram show a simple perspective how philosophizing occurs.

1. Wondering – in a philosophical inquiry, thinkers have the sense of curiosity and the
desire to understand the reality of the thing being investigated.
2. Rational Inquiry – As a philosopher in turn becomes aware of things, the person then
moves into a thinking process including but not limited to analysis, reflection, etc… the
philosopher seeks answers to the question at hand. The rational inquiry being utilized by
philosophers in not merely based on the “what” question, but more significantly to the
“why’s” and “how’s”.
3. Discovery of a new partial truth – as the rational inwuiry progresses, a philosopher then
unfols realizations about the thing being investigated thus leading to new “partial” truths.
Partial, since many philosopher believes that once an answer is found, another question
arises.
From the above diagram, it may be then realized that the search for truth and meaning is a
continuous process. It never ends and continuously progresses until such a time that a better
“truth” may be discovered and hopefully to find the “absolute truth”.

STOP AND THINK:

Can absolute Truth be attained? Write your answers on the space provided.

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SOCIAL AND POLITICAL PHILOSOHY

C. Brief Historical Background of Philosophy

Philosophy has developed since 6th Century BCE (Before the Commone Era) More often , in the
study of Philosophy, its discussion focuses on Western Philosophy. Although, it is also
important to understand that the discipline is not merely centered on the Western Part of the
world since Philosphy also existe in the Eastern Part.
However, in the following presentation, we shall initially review the Historical development of
Western Philosophy and take into account Eastern Philosophy afterwards.
Periods of Western Philosophy
Source: www.philosophy-index.com
1. Ancient Philosophy. Ancient western philosophy began in Greece around
585 BCE with Thales. Thales and other pre-Socratic philosophers began to question the
inconsistency and unfoundedness of ancient Greek mythology and began to develop their
own systems to try and better explain nature, including human nature. Socrates gave birth
to a more recognizable process in philosophy, in which doubt and recognition of one’s
own ignorance play a central role in wisdom. From there, Plato and Aristotle developed
what would become known as the birth of the western philosophical tradition.

2. Medieval Philosophy. When Christianity spread throughout Europe, the landscape of

philosophy changed dramatically. As the Catholic church formed, ideas that seemed to be
in opposition to Christian teachings were repressed, and much of ancient Greek
philosophy went with it.

Gradually, as Christianity’s hold in Europe was secured and intellectual thought began to
hold value to people again, thinkers emerged. Much of the focus of philosophy in the
middle ages focused on the search for proof and knowledge of God. Philosophers like
Anselm sought logical proofs of God, while others like Aquinas adapted the philosophy
of Aristotle to suit the Catholic church.

3. 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
Source:
approaches to philosophy fueled by science,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Logo_phi.png rejections of religious teachings and, on the
other hand, defenses of religion based on the
DID YOU KNOW THAT: new evidence.
The Greek Letter Phi is commonly
used as symbol for Philosophy.
However, this has no proof of its
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universal acceptance since there are
other symbols for Philosophy being
used by other Schools of Thought.
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SOCIAL AND POLITICAL PHILOSOHY

The modern philosophical era also saw the revival of epistemology as one of its central
features, as new forms of science brought forth the question of whether or not empirical
data is a suitable source of knowledge.

4. Contemporary Philosophy. The term ‘contemporary philosophy’ refers to the current

era of philosophy, generally dealing with philosophers from the late nineteenth century
through to the twenty-first.

The nineteenth century also began to see a division in the approach to philosophy being
taken in different areas of western philosophy. In the United Kingdom and North
America, a focus on logic, language and the natural sciences was becoming predominent
in philosophy, and this tradition was labeled analytic philosophy. Those who did not find
themselves in this analytic trend were mostly based in Europe, and the idea of continental
philosophy was born. The names are already considered obsolte, in some senses, but
many philosophers still observe a difference between the logical and scientific approach
of analytic philosophy and the existentialism, phenomenology and other approaches of
continental philosophy.

The division is a largely artificial one, as the terms were first used by universities in
attempts to form courses out of related works in philosophy.

Some Known Western Philosophers by Period

Ancient Medieval Modern Contemporary

Pre-Socratic  Saint Augustine Early modern  Leo Tolstoy 
philosophers  Boethius philosophers  Charles Sanders Peirce 
 Saint Anselm  Friedrich Nietzsche 
 Thales  Saint Thomas  Niccolò  Gottlob Frege 
 Heraclitus Aquinas Machiavelli   Alexius Meinong 
 Empedocles  Saint Thomas  Giuseppe Peano 
 Zeno More   Edmund Husserl 
 Anaxagoras  Francis Bacon  Henri Bergson 
 Leucippus  Alfred North
 Democritus Modern philosophers Whitehead 
 Bertrand Russell 
Socratic and later  Thomas Hobbes   Henry M. Sheffer 
ancient philosophers  René Descartes  Franz Kafka 
 Blaise Pascal   Karl Jaspers 
 Socrates  Baruch Spinoza   Ludwig Wittgenstein 
 Plato  John Locke   Gabriel Marcel 
 Aristotle  Nicolas  Martin Heidegger 
 Diogenes Malebranche  Rudolf Carnap 
 Epicurus  Christian Wolff   Gilbert Ryle 
 George Berkeley  Alfred Tarski 
 Thomas Reid   Karl Popper 
 David Hume   Jean-Paul Sartre 
 Jean-Jacques  Kurt Gödel 
Rousseau   Simone de Beauvoir 

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 Baron d’Holbach   W. V. O. Quine 

 Immanuel Kant  Albert Camus 
 Jeremy Bentham   John Rawls 
 G. W. F. Hegel   Thomas Kuhn 
 James Mill   Hilary Putnam 
 Bernard Bolzano   Edmund Gettier 
 Arthur  Jürgen Habermas 
Schopenhauer   Harry Frankfurt 
 Ralph Waldo  Jaakko Hintikka 
Emerson   Jacques Derrida 
 John Stuart Mill   Carl Ginet 
 Søren  Alvin Plantinga 
Kierkegaard   John Searle 
 Karl Marx   Thomas Nagel 
 Henry David  Robert Nozick 
Thoreau   Alvin Goldman 
 Saul Kripke 
 Frank Jackson 
 Jonathan Dancy 
 Peter Singer 
 David Chalmers 

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Socrates (4 – 3 Century BCE) was a Greek philosopher and is considered the father of

western philosophy. ... Although Socrates is generally regarded as initiating the discipline
of philosophy in the West, most of what we know of him comes from Plato and so this
honor is, rightly, challenged.
Source: https://www.ancient.eu/socrates/#:~:text=Socrates%20(469%2F470%2D399,the%20father%20of%20western
%20philosophy.&text=Although%20Socrates%20is%20generally%20regarded,honor%20is%2C%20rightly%2C
%20challenged.

D. Branches of Philosophy
Throughout the development of Philosophy not merely as a discipline, there have been various
sub-fields or branches that have emerged in order to give light to the various queries in the
world. However there are Major areas of Philosophical Inquiry that is given great importance as
the following fields are likewise vital in any philosophical inquiry. The fields are:
1. Metaphysics – from the words “meta” and “physica” meaning beyond existence,
metaphysics is an attempt to discover the nature of things. It aims to provide discover the
causes (i.e., material, formal, efficient, and final) of an entity’s existence thus discovering
the reality of it.
2. Epistemology – also referred to as “theory of knowledge” it came from the Greek
words epistēmē (“knowledge”) and logos (“reason”). The field aims to discover the
nature, origin, and limits of human knowledge. It sees to give light on how human beings
know and understand.
3. Ethics – From the Greek term “ethos” which means custom or character, ethics seek to
give light on the morality of human act whether an act is good or evil.
4. Logic – from the Greek term “logos” which originally meant as the word of what is
spoken, it is commonly referred to as “reason”. Logic, as a field of philosophy is defined
as the art and science of correct reasoning. It aims to give light to how people should
think and come out with sound reasoning/judgment.
From the four major fields of philosophical inquiry, several other philosophical fields have
likewise been developed thus, providing a bigger scope of man’s search for truth. Some of these
fields are as follows:
1. History of Philosophy
2. Philosophy of Mind.

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3. Philosophy of Religion.
4. Philosophy of Science
5. Political Philosophy
6. Social Philosophy
”We do not escape into
7. Philosophy of Law philosophy, psychology, and
8. Medical Ethics
9. Business Ethics.. art--we go there to restore our
10. Philosophy of Art (Aesthetics).  shattered selves into whole
11. Philosophy of Language
12. Theodicy  ones” (Anaïs Nin)
Why study Philosophy?

Philosophical studies is of vital importance, as it is not just simply a course to be studied.

Philosophy aids the human being understand more of the complexities of life. It may provide a
human person a guide towards the direction that he or she must move forward to in this world.

As the writer Anaïs Nin stated: ”We do not escape into philosophy, psychology, and art--we go
there to restore our shattered selves into whole ones”. In the study of philosophy, we learn more
about ourselves and everything around us. We discover more of the questions surrounding our
lives thus realizing the worth and truth of everything.

REFERENCES
Gaarder, Jostein,(1994). Sophie's world : a novel about the history of philosophy. New York :Farrar,
Straus and Giroux)
Agdalpen Renato T. (2019)Humanities 6 – Social Philosophy: Being Social Being. Manila:
Mindshapers Co. Inc.
Edmonds, David (1964) Philosophy Bites. Oxford: Oxford University Press
Online Sources:
Philosophy Index. URL: http://www.philosophy-index.com/
 Tim, "What is Wisdom ? Philosophical Definition, May 26, 2012, " in Philosophy & Philosophers,
May 26, 2012, https://www.the-philosophy.com/wisdom-philosophical-definition.
https://www.ancient.eu/socrates/#:~:text=Socrates%20(469%2F470%2D399,the%20father%20of
%20western%20philosophy.&text=Although%20Socrates%20is%20generally%20regarded,honor%20is
%2C%20rightly%2C%20challenged.
https://www.ethicssage.com/2010/12/what-is-ethics.html
https://www.britannica.com/topic/epistemology
https://www.britannica.com/topic/metaphysics/Problems-in-metaphysics
https://www.apaonline.org/page/undergraduates

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