DISCOVERING THE SELF:

WHO AM I?
 PANGALAN
Dr. Stephen Mr. Edgar

Mrs. Christine Ms. Liza

Father Murdok Professor Rhea

Sir Tony Mam Nicole

Sir Bruce
DISCOVERING THE SELF:
WHO AM I?
 WHAT IS A SELF?
2 problems

1.Duality of Body and Soul

- The body is separate and distinct from the
soul

- The soul is the aspect in our being that is

not material

- Soul or spirit is often referred to as “mind”

(faculty/ ability to reason)

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 PLATO’S CONCEPT OF THE BODY

- The human soul exists prior to the body and

even after the body is long gone.

- Connected to the Theory of Forms where

the material world is separate from the
eternal realm of forms (world of ideas)

- The soul is immortal and learning is mere

remembering or recollecting what the soul
once knew
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 RENE DESCARTES
- Expressed dualism by stating that a
doubt requires a doubter

- He acknowledges that he is a body that

is bounded by some figure and can be
located in some place and occupy
space.

- He that exists is a thing that thinks – a

mind or a reasoning being.
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 2. UNITY OF BODY AND SOUL
St. Thomas Aquinas

- The body is one being made up of matter and form (Aristotle)

- Although the body is the matter and the soul is the form, a being
cannot remain a being if matter and form are not united.

- A human person ceases to exist in death because the matter and

form that make up that being is no longer complete.

- The whole is a sum total of its parts. Remove a part and it is no

longer whole.

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 HUMAN BEING’S
UNDERSTANDING OF HIMSELF
Immanuel Kant
- Kant claims that the human person has the
responsibility of respecting other people in the
same way he respects himself.

- “Who am I?” is a question that deals with a

person’s concrete and specific historicity, a
questions that encompasses a person’s self-
being

- Every human person is endowed with reason

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 HUMAN BEING’S ENCOUNTER WITH
EXISTENTIAL LIMIT SITUATIONS
• In existence, human being is always in concrete
situations, and he is always confronted with
various situations.

• According to Karl Jaspers, these situations are

boundary situations which are inescapable and
inevitable breaks of the ordinary patterns of
human existence

• Death, suffering, conflicts, tragedy, sickness,

failure, communication, struggles and guilt

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 HUMAN BEING’S ENCOUNTER WITH
EXISTENTIAL LIMIT SITUATIONS
• These boundary situations break the
conventional pattern or ordinariness of life.

• They cause pauses and give opportunity to look

into the question “Who am I” seriously; and
even question the usual answers or discourse
about the question.

• For Jaspers, these situations lead human being

to a deeper consciousness and experience of
his limitations and finitude.

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• These boundary situations lead human
being into a deeper reflection on his
own self-being and begins to ask
questions such as “Why am I
experiencing guilt or death, or pain?”
or “Why am I suffering this kind of
illness or suffering?”

• Human being is not the only one

questioning, but at the same time, he
is now the question.
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 ATHEISM

Disbelief in the
existence of God.
Agnosticism (Lack
of Belief)
THANK YOU

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