Pointers

1. Faith
2. Religion
3. Philosophy
1. Branches of philosophy
2. Ancient period
1. Plato
2. Aristotle
3. Socrates
3. Medieval Period
1. St. Augustine
2. St. Thomas
4. Modern Period
1. Rene Descartes
2. Empiricism
5. Contemporary Period
1. Existentialism
4. Philosophy in Life
Review Notes

1. Philosophy - is the study of general and

fundamental problems concerning matters such
as existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind,
and language.
Branches of philosophy
a. Metaphysics - is the study of the nature of being and
the world.
b. Epistemology - is concerned with the nature and scope
of knowledge, and whether knowledge is possible.
c. Ethics - is concerned with questions of how persons
ought to act or if such questions are answerable.
d. Aesthetics - deals with beauty, art, enjoyment, sensory-
emotional values, perception, and matters of taste and
sentiment.
e. Logic -  is the study of valid argument forms.
Ancient Philosophy
-the main subjects of ancient philosophy are understanding the
fundamental causes and principles of the universe.

Philosophers:
a.Socrates – “Know Thyself”
- Father of Morality
- Socartes Paradoxes
a. No one desires Evil
b. Virtue – all virtue – is knowledge
c. Virtue is sufficient for happiness
b. Plato – Classical Greek Philosophy
- The Father of Idealism
- Plato’s example works/dialogues
a. Phaedo
b. Republic
Aristotle – a student of Plato
- father of Essentialism/Realism
- one of the most important founding figures in Western
Philosophy
- The Causality
a. The Material Cause
b. The Formal Cause
c. The Efficient Cause
d. The Final Cause
- The potentiality and the causality
 Medieval Period
- Some problems discussed throughout this period are the relation
of faith to reason, the existence and unity of God, the object of theology
and metaphysics, the problems of knowledge, of universals, and of individuation.
St. Augustine of Hippo - he developed his own approach to
philosophy and theology accommodating a variety of methods and
different perspectives
Works:
a. City of God
b. Confessions
St. Thomas Aquinas - was the foremost classical proponent
of natural theology, and the father of the Thomistic school of
philosophy and theology.
Works:
a. Summa Theologica
b. Summa Contra Gentiles
Modern Period
Philosophy in this period centers on the relation between
experience and reality, the ultimate origin of knowledge, the nature of the
mind and its relation to the body, the implications of the new natural
sciences for free will and God, and the emergence of a secular basis for
moral and political philosophy.

Rene Descartes – The Father of Modern Philosophy

- Famous line “Cogito Ergo Sum – I think Therefore I

am”
- Rationalist philospher
Empiricism - the ability of reason alone to yield knowledge of the
world, preferring to base any knowledge we have
on our senses.
Philosophers
a. John Locke
b. David Hume
c. Bishop George Berkeley
Contemporary Period
Philosophy has increasingly become an activity practiced
within the university, and accordingly it has grown more specialized
and more distinct from the natural sciences. Much of philosophy in
this period concerns itself with explaining the relation between the
theories of the natural sciences and the ideas of the humanities or
common sense.
Existentialism - deal with the conditions of existence of the
individual person and their emotions, actions,
responsibilities, and thoughts.
Existentialist Philosopher
a. Soreen Kierkegaard – The Founder/Father of
Existentialism
b. Gabriel Marcel
c. Jean Paul Sarte
d. Friedrich Nietzche