Ideal self- the one you become in the future[affected by

Self concept environment, mentor

[how you look into yourself]

Actual self- who you are right now

Philosophers

1. Socrates-Socrates, (born c. 470 BCE, Athens [Greece]—died 399 BCE, Athens), Greek philosopher whose way
of life, character, and thought exerted a profound influence on ancient and modern philosophy.

-I know that I know nothing-I could say that there is always room for us to learn and grow, but I think there
is more to it.
I don’t believe it’s intended for us to stop learning unless someone chooses to stop living.
Having talked with thousands of people over the years I have noticed that those who are angry, bitter and resentful with
life are the same people who have given up on learning at some point in their lives.
Sadly, they have stopped living.
Instead of making the decision to continue to learn they choose to give up. The result from their choice is a life marked
by misery, anger and bitterness.
Their mindset is that everyone else is to blame but themselves.
It's one thing to learn in an academic sense but another to learn through experience. One learns facts taught them
whereby the other learns from free will and choice through their experience.
Learning is not limited to school it's a life-long adventure.
Beware of head knowledge, which may give the appearance of having wisdom but in the end, it’s just someone’s puffed-
up head.
This kind of knowledge lacks empathy and is usually displayed by the mentality of always being right. It’s facts without
the experience which means they haven’t earned it nor do they own it for themselves. In other words, the knowledge
never made it to their heart to produce any positive change.
Socrates had it right!
If you understand that you don't know everything and have a desire to learn you will never lose. In fact, you will
continue to grow both inwardly and outwardly.
The mindset of wanting to learn and choosing to learn will always enrich your life.
Learning through experience produces humility because your knowledge has been earned by blood, sweat and tears.
The wisdom Socrates speaks of is the realization that our search for knowledge has no end because there is always
something new for us to learn.
Even when we have learned something new, life seems to bring us to another lesson to be learned. This is what makes
life an adventure not a chore and gives our lives meaning and purpose.
2. Plato, (born 428/427 BCE, Athens, Greece—died 348/347, Athens), ancient Greek philosopher, student
of Socrates (c. 470–399 BCE), teacher of Aristotle (384–322 BCE), and founder of the Academy, best known as
the author of philosophical works of unparalleled influence.
Building on the demonstration by Socrates that those regarded as experts in ethical matters did not have
the understanding necessary for a good human life, Plato introduced the idea that their mistakes were due to
their not engaging properly with a class of entities he called forms, chief examples of which were Justice,
Beauty, and Equality. Whereas other thinkers—and Plato himself in certain passages—used the term without
any precise technical force, Plato in the course of his career came to devote specialized attention to these
entities. As he conceived them, they were accessible not to the senses but to the mindalone, and they were
the most important constituents of reality, underlying the existence of the sensible world and giving it what
intelligibility it has. In metaphysics Plato envisioned a systematic, rational treatment of the forms and their
interrelations, starting with the most fundamental among them (the Good, or the One); in ethics and moral
psychology he developed the view that the good life requires not just a certain kind of knowledge (as Socrates
had suggested) but also habituation to healthy emotional responses and therefore harmony between the three
parts of the soul (according to Plato, reason, spirit, and appetite). His works also contain discussions
in aesthetics, political philosophy, theology, cosmology, epistemology, and the philosophy of language. His
school fostered research not just in philosophy narrowly conceived but in a wide range of endeavours that
today would be called mathematical or scientific.

3. St. Augustine, also called Saint Augustine of Hippo, original Latin name Aurelius Augustinus, (born
November 13, 354, Tagaste, Numidia [now Souk Ahras, Algeria]—died August 28, 430, Hippo Regius
[now Annaba, Algeria]; feast day August 28), bishop of Hippo from 396 to 430, one of the Latin Fathers of the
Church and perhaps the most significant Christian thinker after St. Paul. Augustine’s adaptation of classical
thought to Christian teaching created a theological system of great power and lasting influence. His numerous
written works, the most important of which are Confessions (c. 400) and The City of God (c. 413–426), shaped
the practice of biblical exegesis and helped lay the foundation for much of medieval and modern Christian
thought. In Roman Catholicism he is formally recognized as a doctor of the church.
The Objectives Of Augustinian Knowledge Theory
Knowledge is the true understanding of reality and it provides a rational basis on which to act. Behaviours based on
knowledge lead to the achievement of personal and cultural objectives and general progress. Behaviours based on false
understandings of reality are self-defeating and dangerous, and are the first cause of many of the evils that beset
humanity.
Western culture has no agreed theory of knowledge and what is taught in the secular schools and universities is based
on opinions and ideologies. This teaching reflects, broadly speaking, the principles of the eighteenth century
Enlightenment. One of these principles is atheism and students are subjected to ideological pressures to conform to
atheist beliefs.
The Enlightenment position is that theists cannot, and therefore do not, know of any god and that Christianity does not
qualify as knowledge. The obvious response is to show, in the form of a theory of knowledge, how Christians can and do
know of God. A further advantage follows from the possession of a valid theory of knowledge. Since the atheists
themselves do not have a theory of knowledge it becomes possible to insist that the teaching in the culture is based on
true knowledge and not opinions.
The Augustinian Theory of Knowledge therefore has two objectives. One is to show how knowledge of all kinds is
achieved, and how therefore true reality may be discovered. The second is to provide the groundwork for the reform of
cultural education to ensure the proper development of the people through the teaching of knowledge.

The Approach to Knowledge Theory

God created the world and the study of the world and its constituents is at the same time the study of the handiwork of
God. The study of God's creative acts through experience results in knowledge of created reality.
For Augustinian theory the world comprises a set of problems. By selecting problems for solution and coming to
understand those problems through investigation the problem solver gains solutions which are understandings of those
parts of reality being studied.
Problems and solutions are not physical objects but entities of the mind which is, equally with the universe, the creation
of God and therefore part of the God-given reality. The study and understanding of problems and their solutions leads
both to the understanding of the teaching system of God and to the Christian theory of knowledge.
Christian knowledge theory and scientific method are very similar since science emulates the way the mind works. The
pursuit of scientific knowledge comes eventually to the point of trying to solve the problem of how solutions are
produced and new knowledge is created.
By treating the question of innovation of ideas as a problem the problem solver finds himself in communication with
another intelligence coexisting outside his intellect. Further investigation of this intelligent entity leads to the
understandings of both God as the Teacher and God as the Creator. Religious knowledge is therefore the ultimate
achievement of the scientific programme.

4. René Descartes (/deɪˈkɑːrt/, UK also /ˈdeɪkɑːrt/;[9] French: [ʁəne dekaʁt]; Latinized: Renatus Cartesius; adjectival
form: "Cartesian";[10]31 March 1596 – 11 February 1650) was a French philosopher, mathematician, and scientist.
Dubbed the father of modern Western philosophy, much of subsequent Western philosophy is a response to his
writings,[11][12] which are studied closely to this day. A native of the Kingdom of France, he spent about 20 years
(1629–49) of his life in the Dutch Republic after serving for a while in the Dutch States Army of Maurice of
Nassau, Prince of Orange and the Stadtholder of the United Provinces. He is generally considered one of the most
notable intellectual representatives of the Dutch Golden Age.[13]
Descartes' Meditations on First Philosophy continues to be a standard text at most university philosophy
departments. Descartes' influence in mathematics is equally apparent; the Cartesian coordinate system (see below)
was named after him. He is credited as the father of analytical geometry, the bridge between algebra and geometry,
used in the discovery of infinitesimal calculus and analysis. Descartes was also one of the key figures in
the Scientific Revolution.
Descartes refused to accept the authority of previous philosophers. He frequently set his views apart from those of
his predecessors. In the opening section of the Les passions de l'âme, a treatise on the early modern version of
what are now commonly called emotions, Descartes goes so far as to assert that he will write on this topic "as if no
one had written on these matters before". His best known philosophical statement is "Cogito ergo sum" (French: Je
pense, donc je suis; I think, therefore I am), found in part IV of Discours de la méthode (1637; written in French but
with inclusion of "Cogito ergo sum") and §7 of part I of Principles of Philosophy (1644; written in Latin).[14]
Initially, Descartes arrives at only a single principle: thought exists. Thought cannot be separated from me, therefore, I
exist (Discourse on the Method and Principles of Philosophy). Most famously, this is known as cogito ergo sum (English:
"I think, therefore I am"). Therefore, Descartes concluded, if he doubted, then something or someone must be doing the
doubting, therefore the very fact that he doubted proved his existence. "The simple meaning of the phrase is that if one is
skeptical of existence, that is in and of itself proof that he does exist."[61]
Descartes concludes that he can be certain that he exists because he thinks. But in what form? He perceives his body
through the use of the senses; however, these have previously been unreliable. So Descartes determines that the only
indubitable knowledge is that he is a thinking thing. Thinking is what he does, and his power must come from his essence.
Descartes defines "thought" (cogitatio) as "what happens in me such that I am immediately conscious of it, insofar as I am
conscious of it". Thinking is thus every activity of a person of which the person is immediately conscious.[62] He gave
reasons for thinking that waking thoughts are distinguishable from dreams, and that one's mind cannot have been
"hijacked" by an evil demon placing an illusory external world before one's senses.[63]
And so something that I thought I was seeing with my eyes is in fact grasped solely by the faculty of judgment which is in
my mind.
In this manner, Descartes proceeds to construct a system of knowledge, discarding perception as unreliable and, instead,
admitting only deduction as a method.[64]

The theory on the dualism of mind and body is Descartes' signature doctrine and permeates other theories he advanced.
Known as Cartesian dualism, his theory on the separation between the mind and the body went on to influence
subsequent Western philosophies. In Meditations on First Philosophy Descartes attempted to demonstrate the existence
of God and the distinction between the human soul and the body. Humans are a union of mind and body, [67] thus
Descartes' dualism embraced the idea that mind and body are distinct but closely joined. While many contemporary
readers of Descartes found the distinction between mind and body difficult to grasp, he thought it was entirely
straightforward. Descartes employed the concept of modes, which are the ways in which substances exist. In Principles of
Philosophy Descartes explained "we can clearly perceive a substance apart from the mode which we say differs from it,
whereas we cannot, conversely, understand the mode apart from the substance". To perceive a mode apart from its
substance requires an intellectual abstraction,[68] which Descartes explained as follows:
"The intellectual abstraction consists in my turning my thought away from one part of the contents of this richer idea the
better to apply it to the other part with greater attention. Thus, when I consider a shape without thinking of the substance
or the extension whose shape it is, I make a mental abstraction."[68]
5.
John Locke, born on August 29, 1632, in Wrington, Somerset, England, went to Westminster school and
then Christ Church, University of Oxford. At Oxford he studied medicine, which would play a central role in his
life. He became a highly influential philosopher, writing about such topics as political philosophy, epistemology,
and education. Locke's writings helped found modern Western philosophy. Influential philosopher and
physician John Locke, whose writings had a significant impact on Western philosophy, was born on August 29,
1632, in Wrington, a village in the English county of Somerset. His father was a country lawyer and military
man who had served as a captain during the English civil war.
An Essay Concerning Human Understanding is a work by John Locke concerning the foundation of human
knowledge and understanding. It first appeared in 1689 (although dated 1690) with the printed title An Essay
Concerning Humane Understanding. He describes the mind at birth as a blank slate (tabula rasa, although he did
not use those actual words) filled later through experience. The essay was one of the principal sources
of empiricism in modern philosophy, and influenced many enlightenment philosophers, such as David
Hume and George Berkeley. The main thesis is that there are "No Innate Principles", by this reasoning:
If we will attentively consider new born children, we shall have little reason to think that they bring many ideas into
the world with them
and that "by degrees afterward, ideas come into their minds."[2] Book I of the Essay is devoted to an attack
on nativism or the doctrine of innate ideas. Locke allowed that some ideas are in the mind from an early age, but
argued that such ideas are furnished by the senses starting in the womb: for instance, differences between colours
or tastes. If we have a universal understanding of a concept like sweetness, it is not because this is an innate idea,
but because we are all exposed to sweet tastes at an early age.[3]
One of Locke's fundamental arguments against innate ideas is the very fact that there is no truth to which all people
attest. He took the time to argue against a number of propositions that rationalists offer as universally accepted
truth, for instance the principle of identity, pointing out that at the very least children and idiots are often unaware of
these propositions.[4]
6. David Hume, (born May 7 [April 26, Old Style], 1711, Edinburgh, Scotland—died August 25, 1776,
Edinburgh), Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist known especially for his
philosophical empiricism and skepticism. Hume conceived of philosophy as the inductive,
experimental science of human nature. Taking the scientific method of the English physicist Sir Isaac
Newton as his model and building on the epistemology of the English philosopher John Locke, Hume tried to
describe how the mindworks in acquiring what is called knowledge. He concluded that no theory of reality is
possible; there can be no knowledge of anything beyond experience. Despite the enduring impact of his theory
of knowledge, Hume seems to have considered himself chiefly as a moralist.
An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding is an attempt to define the principles of human knowledge. It
poses in logical form significant questions about the nature of reasoning in regard to matters of fact and
experience, and it answers them by recourse to the principle of association. The basis of Hume’s exposition is
a twofold classification of objects of awareness. In the first place, all such objects are either “impressions,” data
of sensation or of internal consciousness, or “ideas,” derived from such data by compounding, transposing,
augmenting, or diminishing. That is to say, the mind does not create any ideas but derives them from
impressions. From this Hume develops a theory of linguistic meaning. A word that does not stand directly for
an impression has meaning only if it brings before the mind an object that can be gathered from an impression
by one of the mental processes just mentioned. In the second place, there are two approaches to construing
meaning: an analytical one, which concentrates on the “relations of ideas,” and an empirical one, which
focuses on “matters of fact.” Ideas can be held before the mind simply as meanings, and their logical relations
to one another can then be detected by rational inspection. The idea of a plane triangle, for example, entails
the equality of its internal angles to two right angles, and the idea of motion entails the ideas of space and time,
irrespective of whether there really are such things as triangles and motion. Only on that level of mere
meanings, Hume asserts, is there room for demonstrative knowledge. Matters of fact, on the other hand, come
before the mind merely as they are, revealing no logical relations; their properties and connections must be
accepted as they are given. That primroses are yellow, that lead is heavy, and that fire burns things are facts,
each shut up in itself, logically barren. Each, so far as reason is concerned, could be different: the contradictory
of every matter of fact is conceivable. Therefore, there can be no logically demonstrative science of fact.
7. Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher during the Enlightenment era of the late 18th century. His best
known work is the Critique of Pure Reason.

Synopsis

Immanuel Kant was born on April 22, 1724, in Konigsberg, Prussia, or what is now Kaliningrad, Russia. While
tutoring, he published science papers, including "General Natural History and Theory of the Heavens" in 1755.
He spent the next 15 years as a metaphysics lecturer. In 1781, he published the first part of Critique of Pure
Reason. He published more critiques in the years preceding his death on February 12, 1804, in the city of his
birth. Kant sketches out here what is to follow. Most of these two chapters focus on comparing the situation
of theoretical and of practical reason and therefore discusses how the Critique of Practical Reason compares to
the Critique of Pure Reason.
The first Critique, "of Pure Reason", was a criticism of the pretensions of those who use pure theoretical reason,
who claim to attain metaphysical truths beyond the ken of applied reasoning. The conclusion was that pure
theoretical reason must be restrained, because it produces confused arguments when applied outside of its
appropriate sphere. However, the Critique of Practical Reason is not a critique of pure practical reason, but rather a
defense of it as being capable of grounding behavior superior to that grounded by desire-based practical reasoning.
It is actually a critique, then, of the pretensions of applied practical reason. Pure practical reason must not be
restrained, in fact, but cultivated.
Kant informs us that while the first Critique suggested that God, freedom, and immortality are unknowable, the
second Critique will mitigate this claim. Freedom is indeed knowable because it is revealed by God. God and
immortality are also knowable, but practical reason now requires belief in these postulates of reason. Kant once
again invites his dissatisfied critics to actually provide a proof of God's existence and shows that this is impossible
because the various arguments (ontological, cosmological and teleological) for God's existence all depend
essentially on the idea that existence is a predicate inherent to the concepts to which it is applied.
Kant insists that the Critique can stand alone from the earlier Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, although it
addresses some criticisms leveled at that work. This work will proceed at a higher level of abstraction.
While valid criticisms of the Groundwork are to be addressed, Kant dismisses many criticisms that he finds
unhelpful. He suggests that many of the defects that reviewers have found in his arguments are in fact only in their
brains, which are too lazy to grasp his ethical system as a whole. As to those who accuse him of writing
incomprehensible jargon, he challenges them to find more suitable language for his ideas or to prove that they are
really meaningless. He reassures the reader that the second Critique will be more accessible than the first.
Finally, the sketch of the second Critique is presented in the Introduction. It is modeled on the first Critique:
the Analytic will investigate the operations of the faculty in question; the Dialectic will investigate how this faculty can
be led astray; and the Doctrine of Method will discuss the questions of moral education.
8.