PHILOSOPHY OF MAN

PHILOSOPHY
Pythagoras ( )
-

570 BC, Samos.

495 BC Metapontum

Three types of man

-

Lover of Pleasure
Lover of Success
Lover of Wisdom

Philia- Love

SOCRATES
-

SOCRATES LIFE
-

Sophia- Wisdom
According to Pythagoras
-

Man cannot perfectly possess a comprehensive understanding of all meant by

wisdom.
Man can only continually pursuit the meaning of wisdom.
Only God can be called wise.
We can only be lovers of wisdom and we can never be wise.

Philosophy
As Science it seeks to acquire the knowledge of the causes of things.
As Science of all things- deals with concrete, real and contingent things
-

It is a thing that is not self-existent.

A being that is not self-existent owes its existence to something other than itself.

As Known in Light of Reason- seeks the first causes of things as far as they can be
rationally established by the human mind.
DIVISION OF PHILOSOPHY

Metaphysics- is the study of reality (beings and being)

Epistemology- is the study of validity of human knowledge
Ethics- is the study of the morality of human action.
Cosmology- is the science of the universe
Theodicy- a philosophical study of God or Divine Being/s
Logic- is the study of correct reasoning.

METHOD OF PHILOSOPHY
-

It uses the human reason as its method.

It uses this method to inquire about the nature of things.
The Greek wisdom on man

c. 469/ 470 BC, Deme Alopece, Athens

399 BC (age approx. 71) Athens
Credited as one of the founders of Western philosophy
Sentenced to death by drinking a mixture containing poison hemlock.

According to Plato, Socrates father was Sophroniscus.

His mother Phaenarete
Socrates married Xanthippe
Lamprocles, Sophroniscus and Menexenus
In Xenophons Symposium, Socrates is reported as saying he devote himself only
to what he regards as the most important art or occupation: discussing philosophy.
In The Clouds Aristophanes portrays Socrates as accepting payment for teaching
and running a sophist school with Chaerephon.
He chose to stay for several reason to face death because:
He believed such a flight would indicate a fear of death, which he believed
no true philosopher has.
If he fled Athens his teaching would fare no better in another country as he
would continue questioning all he met and undoubtedly incur their
displeasure.
Having knowingly agreed to live under the citys laws, he implicitly
subjected himself to the possibly of being accused of crimes by its citizens
and judged guilty by its jury. To do otherwise would have caused him to
break his social contract with the state, and so harm the state, an act
contrary to Socratic principle.

SOCRATIC PRINCIPLES
-

The unexamined life was not worth living, Were would be the worth in your
existence?
The most important task in life was caring for the soul. A persons soul was the real
person, Socrates believed that the most important task people faced was realizing
their potential as persons.
A good person could not be harmed by other people, the most important part of a
person is the soul and the soul is not physical but inward then the soul cannot be
harmed.

MAN AND VIRTUE

-

Since the knowledge is born, virtue, likewise is a natural endowment, not an

artificial convention or habit of action to be acquired by education.
Virtue indeed can be taught, but it is not introducing foreign to the mind but merely
awakening the seeds of good deeds that perhaps lie dormant I the mind and heart
of man.

Since virtue is inborn in the mind and self-knowledge is the source of all wisdom,
then the only way to acquire virtue is simply to know what is in the mind, in the
self.
Virtue then depended on knowledge and could be defined as true knowledge of
ones self.
Famous Socratic saying: KNOWLEDGE IS VIRTUE: IGNORANCE IS VICE
True knowledge is the application of this knowledge.

MAN AND THE PROBLEM OF EVIL

-

Evil is the result of ignorance.

Evil which is mostly moral evil is due to ignorance or to the limitation and
imperfection of mans present knowledge.

COMMENTARY
-

In the definition of virtue: Socrates did not give credence to instinct and passion
which can fly in the face of the true good.
As the poet Ovid sings: We know the better course, but we often choose to do the
worse.

PLATO
-

His father wad Ariston

Platos mother was Perictione
Grammar, music and gymnastics
He first became acquainted with Cratylus (a disciple of Heraclitus, a prominent pre
Socratic- Greek philosopher) and the Heraclitean doctrines.
Another tradition suggest that Plato died at a wedding feast. But according to
Tertullian, Plato simply died in his sleep.
Heraclitean doctrines

Flux- all things pass and nothing stays and comparing existing things to the flow of a river,
he says you could not step twice into the same river. (Plato Cratylus 402a= A6)
THE IDEAL MAN, THE PERFECT MAN
-

The true lover of wisdom is always looking for the ON

Greek for being, one
It is the idea behind the things that we see.
This theory is called IDEALISM
The individual things that we perceive exist in space time. These are not real since
they change.
It is the idea behind these changeable, individual, and finite things that alone is
real.
Men are external manifestations, the reflections and the replicas of the unseen
universe, immutable and eternal idea.

MAN AND KNOWLEDGE

-

Man knew all things by direct intuition.

Thus man was omniscient, all knowing
But his separation from the paradise of truth and knowledge and his long exile on
earth, he forgot most of the knowledge he had.
By constant remembering and doing good, he can regain his former perfections.

THE PERFECT MODEL

c.428-427 BC, Athens
c. 348-347 BC (age approx 80) Athens
Rhetoric, art, literature, epistemology ,justice, virtues, politics, education, family,
militarism

PLATOS LIFE
-

THE ONE AND THE MANY

Man in his present earthly existence, is only an imperfect copy of his real original
self.
The perfect man is in the realm of ideas.
Man, now imperfect, can be perfect again by constant recollection and imitation of
his former perfect self. During his long earthly exile and his imprisonment in the
body as a punishment for sin.

Man should live a life of virtue in which true human perfection consists.
HAPPINESS is the fruit of virtue
Is attained by the constant imitation of the divine exemplar of virtue, embodied in
his former perfect self.

MAN AND CONTEMPLATION

-

It is the communion of the mind with the universal and external ideas.
It will free himself (doing contemplation) from his space-time confinement to
ascend to the heaven of ideas and there commune with the immortal, the external,
the infinite and the divine verities.
Contemplation means recollection or remembering of past perfect knowledge of all
things which the soul had already acquired directly by intuition before it was joined
to the body.

CONTEMPLATION AND IMITATION

-

Contemplation does not mean passive thinking and or inaction, much less mere
speculation.
It is not just knowing or appreciating the GOOD, but constant doing of the GOOD.
It means imitating the Good Exemplar and Living the Good by leading a good life.
Happiness consist not merely in constant feeling of goodness but in being and
doing good.