NATURALISM

1. NATURALISM Pascual • San Juan • San Miguel • Silvestre Tamayo • Tan • Teodoro • Valencia • Yeung Reporting in ChE 525 March 5, 2016

2. Introduction San Miguel. John Andre N.

3. Introduction • Naturalism/Natural Ethics • method for evaluating morality using objective reasoning devoid of religious or authoritative dogma Objective Reasoning – the use of facts Dogma – a belief or set of beliefs that is accepted by the members of a group without being questioned or doubted • Popular to Free thinkers • Encompasses the three branches of human understanding

4. Branches of Human Understanding

5. Metaphysics “The nature of reality” Relationships between mind and matter, substance and attribute, fact and value View of naturalism: everything is composed of natural entities

6. Epistemology “Nature of knowledge” and “How we come to know” Includes presuppositions and foundation, and its extent and validity. View of naturalism: 1. acceptable methods of justification and explanation are continuous 2. human subject as a natural phenomena 3. the use of empirical science

7. Ethics “Nature of Action” and “What we should do” Set of principles of “right conduct” or system of moral values

8. Naturalistic Ethics "The view that ethical conclusions are derivable in non-ethical natural terms, from non-ethical premises, and that ethical properties are natural properties.  Naturalism takes ethical knowledge to be empirical and accordingly models it on the paradigm of the natural sciences." • “Non-natural” ethical theories – subjective opinions, unverifiable religious faith or authoritative dogma • Conclusion: Moral behaviour = Rational Action

9. Naturalistic Ethics • A form of Moral Reliasm: allows reasoning by “anyone” through the use of emipirical facts • Subject to “on going inquiry and verification” • Derived from what is consistently observable – “empirical facts”

10. Naturalism from Natural Sciences • Biological Naturalism VS Evolutionary Ethics • KEY: both are derived from the view that biology is the most pertinent of the sciences for discerning correct human behavior.

11. Biological Naturalism The view that mental phenomena such as consciousness and intentionality are natural biological phenomena on a par with growth, digestion, or photosynthesis. Implications: 1. the mind is a biological phenomenon, with no immaterial spirits or special 'life forces' involved 2. all human motivation and thought is 'based' on innate predispositions evolved in the mental processing mechanisms of our species.

12. Evolutionary Ethics A body of theory which seeks to locate moral institutions within the main ideas of evolutionary biology. “We value things and persons in accordance with their capacity to sustain and maintain 'survival' in evolutionary terms." “That which facilitates the survival of our species defines ’good'; and conversely, that which deters from the survival of our species defines 'bad'.

13. History of Naturalism Benedict Tamayo

14. History Pre- Socratic Philosophers These philosophers sought to explain everything by reference to natural causes alone. Thales Anaxagoras Democritus

15. History • Atomism- explains everything that exists as the product of atoms moving in a void • Aritotelianism- explains everything that exists as the inevitable outcome of uncreated natural forces or tendencies • Metaphysical Naturalism • Western phenomenon

16. History • With the rise and dominance of Christianity, Metaphysical Naturalism became heretical and illegal • Age of Enlightenment- Materialism

17. Typical Beliefs of Naturalism Corina C. Tan

18. Beliefs: • The universe has either always existed or had a purely natural origin. • Life is an unplanned product of natural processes and luck. • Slow and imperfect evolution by natural selection is the explanation for the rise and diversity of life on earth. • Mental contents exist solely as the computational constructions of our brains, and not as things that exist independently of us.

19. Beliefs: 5. All humans are mortal since the death or destruction of our brain cannot be survived. 6. Humans have developed culture and civilization. • We evolved as social animals. 7. All conduct and behaviour should be directed towards the pursuit of human happiness.

20. Metaphysical Naturalism Areeya Kyra D. Teodoro

21. Metaphysical Naturalism • Substantial view about the nature of reality • Metaphysical naturalism holds that supernatural things (spirits, ghosts, gods) are not real • Denies the existence of a transcendent God “Nature is all there is”

22. Methodological Naturalism Camille Ann C. Valencia

23. Methodological Naturalism • observable events in nature are explained by natural events • Considers supernatural explanations to be outside science • Scientific method is the only way to investigate reality and empirical methods will ascertain natural facts

24. Absolute Methodological Naturalism • Supernatural facts are impossible to be discovered by empirical methods

25. Contingent Methodological Naturalism • Empirical methods are far more likely to uncover natural facts than supernatural ones- • is generally an ill-advised waste of resources to pursue supernatural hypotheses • But if found, supernatural hypothesis would not be impossible to confirm

26. Humanistic Naturalism Angelyn Yeung

27. Humanistic Naturalism • Humanistic Naturalism holds that human beings are best able to control and understand the world through use of the scientific method, because concepts of spirituality, intuition and metaphysics can never progress beyond personal opinion.

28. Ethical Naturalism

29. Ethical Naturalism • Ethical Naturalismis the meta-ethical doctrine that there are objective moral properties of which we have empirical knowledge • These properties are reducible to entirely non-ethical or natural properties, such as needs, wants or pleasures.

30. Meta-Ethics • Meta-ethics is the branch of ethics that seeks to understand the nature of ethical properties, statements, attitudes, and judgments. Meta-ethics is one of the four branches of ethics generally recognized by philosophers, the others being descriptive ethics, normative ethics and applied ethics.

31. Meta-Ethics • Normative ethics addresses such questions as "What should I do?", thus endorsing some ethical evaluations and rejecting others • Meta-ethics addresses questions such as "What is goodness?" and "How can we tell what is good from what is bad?", seeking to understand the nature of ethical properties and evaluations.

32. Ethical Naturalism • Most ethical naturalists hold that we have empirical knowledge of moral truths. • Ethical naturalism was implicitly assumed by many modern ethical theorists, particularly utilitarians.

33.  Ethical naturalism stands in opposition to: • Ethical non-naturalism - which denies that moral terms refer to anything other than irreducible moral properties • Ethical subjectivism- which denies that moral propositions refer to objective facts • Error theory - which denies that any moral propositions are true • Non-cognitivism - which denies that moral sentences express propositions at all.

34. Ethical Naturalism • The most plausible natural properties are certain psychological properties. The identity claim is a reduction because we have ‘reduced’ moral properties – which we might have thought were a different kind of thing – to psychological properties, i.e. there is nothing more to moral properties than being a certain kind of psychological property.

35. Sociological Naturalism Jamie San Juan

36. Sociological Naturalism • Sociologyis a social science concerned with the study of human social relationships and the various ways these relationships are patterned in terms of social groups, organisations and societies.

37. Sociological Naturalism • the sociological theory that the natural world and the social world are roughlyidenticaland governed by similar principles • closely connected to Positivism, which advocates use of the scientific method of the natural sciences in studying social sciences.

38. Confucius • Everything ‘thrives according to nature’ • Human behavior should avoid extremes and seek moderation when things function in accordance with this principle of the Mean.

39. Principle of Mean provides a standard measure for all things 'relationship of natural dependence', i.e. the principle requires reciprocal cooperation between people and between people and nature. measure of correct behavior correlates to naturalistic ethics. The "reciprocity between people and nature" corresponds to modern concept of ecological awareness.

40. Stoicism CesAngelin C. Silvestre

41. Stoicism • an ancient Greek philosophy • developed by Zeno of Citiumaround 300 B.C. • further developed later by Roman philosophers including Epictetus and Seneca. • The famous emporer Marcus Aurelius • "stoic" ="stoapoikile“=painted porch or colonnade • teaches the development of self-control and fortitude as a means of overcoming destructive emotions

42. Stoicism • Stoicism is not just a set of beliefs or ethical claims, but rather a way of life • The major goal of Stoicism is to lead man to arrive at happiness by achieving the true good thing in life • The Stoics focus on two things: 1. How can we lead a fulfilling, happy life? 2. How can we become better human beings?

43. Stoicism • The Stoic ethical teaching is based upon two principles already developed in their physics: • first, that the universe is governed by absolute law, which admits of no exceptions; and • second, that the essential nature of humans is reason. • Both are summed up in the famous Stoic maxim, "Live according to nature"

44. "Live according to nature" • obviously directed at humans • Nor does the instruction mean to tell us to eat, breathe, bathe etc, • ‘Live according to the way human nature is meant to change and grow' • For this maxim has two aspects: • People should adhere to their environment • People conform to their own essential nature by reason

45. Some things are in our control and others not. • Things in our control are opinion, pursuit, desire, aversion, and, in a word, whatever are our own actions. • Things not in our control are body, property, reputation, command, and, in one word, whatever are not our own actions. • the stoic should try not to desire or have aversions because he who fails to obtain the object of his desire is disappointed

46. Since we all naturally want to be happy, the rational (Stoic) way to live is to train ourselves to limit our desires and concerns to what is up to us, and not to worry about, fear or get upset by things that are not up to us.  • In this respect, Stoicism is a kind of coping strategy.  • The central idea is to try to do the right thing, in every situation, without losing one’s calm, becoming frustrated or getting angry. • “Doing the right thing” • Stoic do not depend on luck

47. Three Topoi (Field of Study) of Stoicism • “The Discipline of Desire”, which has to do with acceptance of our fate • “The Discipline of Action”, which has to do with philanthropy or love of mankind • “The Discipline of Assent”, which has to do with mindfulness of our judgements

48. The familiar Serenity Prayer is thoroughly Stoic: “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”