Self refers to a person's essential being that distinguishes them from others.

This
"being" perennially molds and develops through time and through experiences.
Philosophical Self covers the inquiry into the fundamental nature of the self which has
preoccupied the earliest thinkers in the history of philosophy: Greeks. It generally
believes that views on the self can be best understood by revisiting its prime movers
and identify the most important conjectures made by philosophers.
To have a glimpse on how they philosophize, watch Amy Adkin's video entitled Who am
I? A philosophical Inquiry.
Below are some of the well known philosophers who greatly contributed to how we
view ourselves now.
1 | SOCRATES
"Know Thyself!" | “An unexamined life is not worth living.”
Socrates was one of the Greek philosophers responsible for the emergence of Western
philosophy. He utilized socratic method to stimulate critical thinking and draw out ideas
from his students. Socrates was well known for his belief that the only true wisdom
is in knowing you know nothing, which means that you can only gain
wisdom by acknowledging that you are an empty cup that needs to be filled.
Aside from humility (acceptance that you know nothing) and thirst for
knowledge and understanding (you need to learn more), the key to open the
gates leading to endless opportunities for growth is by knowing oneself.

2 | PLATO
“Human behavior flows from three main sources: desire, emotion and
knowledge.”
Plato was another ancient Greek philosopher and was a student of Socrates. He is one
of the world's best known and most studied philosophers because of the
great contributions he had in the expansion of human knowledge and understanding.
One of his many contributions is the concept of dualism, which believes that
one's physical body and soul are separate entities and that one lives on even after
death. Furthermore, he explained that the soul can be divided into three parts and that
these make up who we are and are responsible for our behavior. His theory attempts to
explain why we do what we do and aims to open our awareness of the self to improve
our behavior and make better life decisions. The three parts is briefly described in text
and table below:
( a ) Rational / Logical (Ruling Class) seeks truth and swayed by facts and arguments
( b ) Spirited / Emotional (Military Class) expresses how our feelings fuel our action
( c ) Appetitive / Physical Desires (Commoner) drives you to eat, be sexually
aroused and protect yourself
3 | ARISTOTLE
“Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.”
Aristotle was a student of Plato and known for his exploration of knowledge
through "natural philosophy", which is now known as Science. Like the previous
philosophers, he argued that growth starts from within. According to him, all human
actions are driven by one or more of these seven causes:

o
 CHANCE refers to all the moments whose cause cannot be
determined. (E.g. Carroll Bryant once said, "No matter how many
plans you make or how much in control you are, life is always
winging it.")

o
 NATURE refers to our natural tendencies as a human being. (E.g.
Whenever Rina is hungry she gets really irritable and short-
tempered.)

o
 COMPULSIONS refers to one's irresistible urge to do something, especially
against one's own conscious will. (E.g. Eve has the tendency
to repeatedly check doors, locks, appliances, and other stuff at
home, or else she won't be able to sleep.)

 HABIT refers to the things we repeatedly do for a long period of time. (E.g.
Herbert loves to go to lomian every Sunday because he grew up
eating lomi after attending the Sunday mass.)
 REASONING refers to the actions or responses that are based on logical
reasoning. (E.g. I don't eat junk food because I know that it is not
good for my body.)
 PASSION refers to the responses that aim to satisfy one's feelings. (E.g.
Whenever I am sad or stressed out, I stay inside my room and
express myself through painting portraits.)
 DESIRE refers to one's inclination to pleasant things. (E.g. I want to have
a hair cut just because I want to.)

4 | ST. AUGUSTINE
“Do unto others, what you want others do unto you.”
St. Augustine's philosophy brings together the wisdom of Greek philosophy and
the Divine Truths contained in the Scripture. He acknowledge that we were created by
an absolute and immutable Living God, who is also the creator of the universe. He
created a new concept of the identity of the self which for him can be achieved through
twofold process:
( a ) Self-Presentation: refers to expressing oneself and behaving in ways that create a
desired impression. We usually start to shape ourselves based on how we want to be
perceived by others but later on we realize that it is just a portion of who we are and
decide to move to the next stage which is self-realization.
( b ) Self-Realization: occurs when we discover who we truly are and realize that we
are more than our physical form.
(E.g. Gretta is a famous influencer who began as a content creator of clothes and
make-up. Before, she consumed most of her time creating the "perfect self-
image" (SELF-REPRESENTATION). But when she got in touch with her fans, she
realized that they follow her not just because of how she looks and dresses up, but
because of the empowerment she gives them as an expressive, independent woman.
Now, she refined herself as well as her vision by refocusing on building a community of
women that empower each other (SELF-REALIZATION).
5 | RENÉ DESCARTES
“Dubito ergo cogito, cogito ergo sum" -- I doubt therefore I think, I think,
therefore I am.
Just like Plato, Descartes supported his idea on dualism. He also emphasized that the
self is the subject that thinks. The self that has full competence in the powers
of human reason. By distancing it from all sources of truth from authority or tradition,
the self can only find its truth and authenticity within its own capacity to think.

6 | JOHN LOCKE
“Our concept of personal identity must derive from inner experience.”
Locke is another western philosopher who was known for popularizing the term "tabula
rasa" which is translated as empty slate. This explains that every one of us was born
with a mind like a blank slate which shall be filled with experiences, sensations and
reflections throughout one's life. He believed that personal identity is a matter
of psychological continuity and is founded in consciousness (awareness).

7 | DAVID HUME
“The self is a bundle of impressions.”
Hume argues that the concept of self is just a basket of perceptions collected from the
outside world. To find our true self is almost impossible because the self changes
through time, shaped by the situation we are in and the people we are with. Who you
are today, is different from who you were and who you will be.

8 | IMMANUEL KANT
“To be is to do.” | "Consciousness is the central feature of the self."
According to Kant, we all have an inner self and outer self which together form our
consciousness. Consciousness or awareness of oneself, can only be achieved if we are
in touch with both.
( a ) inner self: refers to one's psychological states and rational intellect
( b ) outer self: refers to our senses and the physical world

Nature of the Psychological Self

• The self has many facets that help make up integral parts of it, such as self-
awareness, self-esteem, selfknowledge, and self-perception.
• All parts of the self enable people to alter, change, add, and modify aspects of
themselves in order to gain social acceptance in society.
Self (William James)
The earliest formulation of the self in modern psychology derived from the distinction
between the self as I, the subjective knower, and the self as Me, the object that is
known.
James defined a basic duality of the self:
ME: our knowledge of who we are (self concept)
I: the act of thinking about ourselves (self-awareness)
Self ( Donald Winnicott)
While some psychologists view Winnicott’s idea as black and white (true self
= good; false self = bad), others expounded the false self to be classified into:
HEALTHY FALSE SELF
-enables a person to be polite and courteous even when we may feel not like it
UNHEALTHY FALSE SELF
-is the one that fits into society through forced compliance rather than a desire to adapt
Self (Eric Berne)
TRANSACTIONAL ANALYSIS THEORY
Berne proposed that human personality has three ego states: the parent ego, adult ego
and child ego.
PARENT- Behaviors, thoughts and feelings copied from Parents or parental figures.
ADULT- Behaviors, thoughts and feelings which are in direct response to the here and
now.
CHILD- Behaviors, thoughts and feelings replayed from childhood.
Berne considered that the feeling of "Self" is a mobile one. It can reside in any of the
three ego states at any given moment, and can move from one to another.
Self (Carl Rogers)
Rogers believed that there are three versions of self:
Perceived self- How you see yourself
Real Self- Who you really are
Ideal Self- How you would like to be
The difference between the real self and ideal self is called INCONGRUENCE.

Psychology is universally defined as the scientific study of behavior and mental

processes. In this field of study, the notion of the self refers to a person's experience as
a single, autonomous being that is separate from others, experienced with continuity
through time and place. The experience of the self includes consciousness of one's
physicality as well as one's inner character and emotional life.
MEAD&theSOCIALSELFTHEORYOFSOCIALSELF
The social conception of the self entails that individual selves are the products of social
interaction and not the logical or biological preconditions of that interaction.
MEAD&theSOCIALSELFTHEORYOFSOCIALSELFMEAD&t
heSOCIALSELF
There are three activities through which the self is developed:
1. L A N G U A G E
2. P L A Y
3. G A M E
THEORYOFSOCIALSELFMEAD&theSOCIALSELF
LANGUAGE allows individuals to take on the “role of the other” and allows people to
respond to his or her own gestures in terms of the symbolized attitudes of others.
THEORYOFSOCIALSELFMEAD&theSOCIALSELF
During PLAY, individuals take on the roles of other people and pretend to be those
other people in order to express the expectations of significant others.
THEORYOFSOCIALSELFMEAD&theSOCIALSELF
In the GAME, the individual is required to internalize the roles of all others who are
involved with him or her in the game and must comprehend the rules of the game.
M E A D : t h e “I” & “M E”
I – the spontaneous, driving force that fosters all that is novel, unpredictable, and
unorganized in the self.
Me – the objective self; the image of self seen when one takes the role of the other.
How Mead matters to us today…
We think of ourselves as individuals, to be sure, but we are only able to do so by virtue
of being a part of a larger social community.
SELFinFamilieSELFinFamilies
Sociologists focus on the different institutions and powers play in the society, the most
prominent is the
FAMILY. S E L F i n F a m i l i e s
The kind of family that we are born in, the resources available to us, and the kind of
development that we will have will affect us as we go through life.
SELFinFamilies
• Family serves as basis of person’s progress.
• One is who he is because of his family for the most part.
Train up a child in a way he should grow, and when he is old, he will not depart from it.
PROVERBS 22:6
From before you even wake up in the morning, your day is being encoded into digital
data. Your phone understands when you are active versus when you are asleep. Social
media sites know when you’ll make your first post and which triggers they can plant in
your inbox to ensure you do. Soon, several device makers know you are listening to the
morning news, as you do every weekday. Your search engine and many other services
know that you are trying to make the perfect pancake for your kids. A number of
databases are recording the fact that you are at home later than usual today and not
requesting a ride anyplace. And this is all before you’ve put on your slippers.
Selling out your digital half
Those are just some of the most vivid examples of the personal data that continuously
builds the digital representation of you. Inside your technology, applications work with
the digital you to do other work on your behalf, optimize or manipulate the real-world
you, or probably most frequently, sell you products and other things. While you may
know that these digital representations are nothing like you, your opinion doesn’t really
matter to those technologies that interact with your digital self.
The whole process of creating the digital self has mostly crept up on society without any
widespread planning. Only a few decades ago, the digital self wasn’t much more than
your email handle and the contents of your inbox. Today, your digital self spans
everything from your text messages to your sexual preferences, your brand loyalties,
your family’s pregnancy statuses, your point-to-point trips, your recent and upcoming
job status, and many other significant and insignificant points in between.
Our digital self has become a vivid representation of our wants, needs, motivations, and
insecurities. While it’s pretty amazing how much of our lives become data today, the
demand for new dimensions of personal data will continue to increase as algorithms
and the technologies that use them become more sophisticated. In my hand-wavy chart
above, I’m making an assumption that demand and ability to collect personal
information is growing on some unknown exponential function.
The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the
exponential function. — Albert Bartlett
It’s pretty amazing to think about what we can do, as individuals and as society, with
access to the digital half of our existence. Too bad none of us really control our digital
halves. For lack of a better analogy, our digital halves are something like indentured
servants. We hand over long-term rights to these digital representations of ourselves to
most of the digital services we use today, our digital self goes to work each day for other
companies while we benefit from some new social interaction with a well placed ad. In
some cases, just participating in the real world is enough to sign over the right to your
data (see Equifax). After signing over the rights to our data, we have little to no visibility
into what our digital self is up to any more. We don’t know what work our other half is
doing or to whom it really belongs.
Before reading more, consider joining the Textile Photos waiting list — an application
designed to help keep control of your data.
Many fragmented copies of you
Unfortunately, lack of control is still only part of the explanation of the unhealthy
relationships we have with our digital selves. The more complicated reality is that most
people don’t even think about the lease they sign or what data they hand over to
companies. Because it is unknown, companies tend to try to hide it from their users. In
hiding it from their users, they try to collect as much data as possible without setting off
any alarm bells. It means that they scratch and scrape away at our data to build
incomplete and likely inaccurate digital representations of each of their users. Each
company doing this gets a slightly different set of data and creates a slightly different
and inaccurate copy of the digital you.
Your many fragmented digital selves are now being put to work to train the algorithms
that change the world around you. They optimize your transportation, silence your
phone while you sleep, show you those boots again, and prune the posts you see in
your social network. Some of the algorithms being trained are forming the building
blocks of tomorrow’s AI. Unfortunately, these fragmented versions of ourselves are
often the least creative, most biased, and most simple-minded versions of us. We aren’t
presenting our best and most admirable qualities on the web and taken as a whole we
are probably painting a pretty ugly picture of society.
Did you get a chance to look through your Facebook data export? Have you scrolled
through your Google search history? How about Amazon purchases, or your Instagram
browsing, or your credit card history?
Technology isn’t going to stop. But while that may sound bleak, we also know that
personal data could give us the power to improve the world around us in totally new
ways. So how can we each regain control of our digital self and put it to use in
technology and algorithms that work for us, not over us?
You should own you and I should own me
Imagine a future where you controlled the data behind your social connections, your
fitness, your travel, you browsing data, your key strokes, your medical records, your
coffee preferences, your foot size, and everything in between. If you felt secure in
storing that data, knowing that no agent could be reading or selling it at will, you could
start building the complete and accurate digital representation of yourself. With this data
in your control, you could empower technologies you love to do more work for you and
to do it better. You could help empower the future of algorithms and AI with your best
self. You could drive competitive platforms where applications could come and go but
your digital record would live on forever, in your control.
So why don’t you do it already?
The problem sneaked into our modern existence. The internet wasn’t really designed for
personal data, but so many companies have been designed to collect it. As a society,
we just never had a chance to stop and think about the significance of the digital self in
our daily lives. Today, people are joining this conversation faster than ever, but real
challenges still sit between us and the solution. We currently lack viable models for
personal data ownership that enable us to still drive technology forward. We lack the
mechanisms for individuals to collect and own their personal data outside the virtual
walls of a few huge companies. And, we lack the protocols for a user to grant use-based
permissions to their data and gain ownership over the information generated from that
data.
Decentralization and personal data sovereignty
Chris Dixon’s Why Decentralization Matters makes the case for why we see many of the
consumer platforms we join and love eventually turn into platforms that seem to do
things we hate. A simple point from that blog post is that companies increase their value
by adding new users, and so do everything in their power to appeal to those users. After
time though, their user growth levels off, and they need to find new sources of value
growth. This is the bait-and-switch moment, where users suddenly become the product.
If we want to give ownership of personal data back to the individuals, we must create
decentralized systems that can guard users from being sold out. — tweet it
The lesson of the past decade is that hyper-growth technology companies built as fully
centralized systems overwhelmingly reach that bait-and-switch moment. It also explains
why so few companies give personal data (or the information they derive from it) back to
their users, it would undercut the companies long-term value strategy.
If we want to give ownership of personal data back to the individuals, it is important that
we create decentralized systems that can guard users from that same sell-out moment.
Unlimited storage of personal data
Until very recently, decentralized data storage (and personal data storage more broadly)
had very few viable options. Personal data accumulates quickly, meaning storing all
your data on your mobile device or even on your laptop quickly becomes unreasonable.
Even if you could create a local copy of all your data, your data isn’t valuable to you
unless you can put it to work in (mostly) external systems and applications.
Why not just do it in Dropbox, Google Drive, or another service? The first part of the
answer is monopolies, lock-in, and fitness-for-use. The second part of the answer is
that the value of your data in these centralized services is extremely limited, and
primarily limits the value that the creators of these services want to offer you. So as a
consumer, your best choices for storing all of your data aren’t really very good choices
at all.
This is changing rapidly with the rise of decentralized protocols like IPFS and DAT and
storage markets like Filecoin and Storj. We believe that those markets can bring down
the price of decentralized data storage such that every individual could each store a
compete copy of their digital data, forever. Decentralized storage is an ideal fit for
personal data because, combined with secure and verifiable protocols, it can give users
a low energy way to move their data across platforms and it can give developers
dependable mechanisms on which to build future applications.
Building a secure home for your digital self
At Textile, we are tackling personal data collection, storage, and protocols through a
decentralized data wallet, where any users can encrypt, store, and control their personal
data. Textile Photos, for example, allows users to easily populate their wallet with
privately encrypted photos. Every photo can then be stored and backed up across
devices on IPFS or shared in private, peer-to-peer threads. The Textile Photos mobile
application gives us an environment to develop and refine the Textile Wallet.
Our long-term vision is an ecosystem of developers, applications, and platforms across
which users can fluidly move at will. Each time a user joins a new application, they will
know exactly how, and what parts of their data are being accessed because those
permissions will be controled through their private wallet. They also can retain
ownership of any new data or information an application creates for them.
The combination of private encryption — no agent could ever see a user’s data by force
— and decentralization will give new kinds of value to users. For example, even from
the earliest days users are largely protected against the future bait-and-switch dominate
into today’s consumer applications. User’s will never have to lose the data and
information they generate just because a single application goes away.
Developers of applications could build on top of the open source data wallet to provide a
better experience to users. Using a private wallet, leveraged by a user across many
applications, may help each individual application side-step the challenge of
bootstrapping entirely new user networks. Perhaps through decentralized, user-owned
data we can find new ways to compete with today’s existing centralized monopolies, yet
another long-term benefit to end-users.
The future of your digital self
We are excited to think about a future where we each have full control of the full record
of our digital selves. These complete records will play important roles in the future,
beyond interacting with today’s applications. Privately signed personal data, for
example, may help us develop new mechanisms to build digital trust, prove authenticity,
and protect against algorithmic counterfeit (e.g. Deepfake). At a higher level, we can
look for better ways to create models for AI that better reflect our aspirations as
individuals and as a society.
User’s can think about adding more information to their digital self, not finding ways to
censor and delete it. — tweet it
Even in our daily interactions with technology, a personally controlled digital
representation of one’s self may have very noticeable benefits over today’s systems.
With more complete representations of our digital self it should be easier to avoid echo-
chambers, discover useful information, and benefit from services across the internet.
Primarily though, we can start building the digital representations that will stay with us
for the decades to come instead of having fragments of ourselves shuttled away to
private databases we never hear about. User’s can think about adding more information
to their digital self, not finding ways to censor and delete it. This is the way many of us
want it to be: user’s emboldened by choice and security.
If you are excited by the possibility of this future, let us know! We are sending out new
invites to our waiting list nearly ever day, so drop your name into the mix. Your signing
up will get you on the list, and has very real value to us as well, letting us know that
there are people out there looking for, and interested in, alternatives to the systems
we’re locked into today. We’re also always looking for feedback and you can find us
on Twitter, Slack, Telegram or email. We’d love to hear from you.

MODULE 2
Anthropology is the study of people throughout the world,
their evolutionary history, how they behave, adapt to
different environments, communicate and socialize with
one another.
In 2013, Dr. Paul Redmond conducted an in-depth study
about a multigenerational workforce which comprises five
generations: Maturists (pre-1945), Baby Boomers (1945-
1960), Generation X (1961-1980), Generation Y (1981-
1995) and Generation Z (Born after 1995). The research
surveyed over 1,200 employees from a number of leading
organizations. They compared and contrasted their
aspiration, attitude toward technology, attitude toward
career, and more. Below is a visual illustration
summarizing the results.
This is just one of the many things that we can learn from studying how paradigm shift
shape our society thus lead to our evolution. Our environment highly contribute to our
change and development as individuals.
Culture can be defined as the part of the environment shaped by the everyday
practices of humans. Moreover, it refers to the customary beliefs, social forms, and
material traits of a racial, religious, or social group. It draws the line that distinguishes a
group of people from another (Oyserman, 2017).
Urie Bronfenbrenner an American psychologist proposed the ecological systems
theory which explains the importance of studying a person in the context of multiple
environments (Bronfenbrenner, 1979). It tells us that as an individual, we are influenced
by (1) our personal interaction with people around us and (2) the interactions of different
factors around us.
MICROSYSTEM: refers to everything that has direct contact with you (family, friends,
school, work, etc.) in your immediate environment and how they individually affect you.
E.g. Hyacinth loves to go out in the afternoon to play with her neighbors.
MESOSYSTEM: refers to the interaction of your microsystem with each other (family
and school, family and friends, etc.)
E.g. Your parents expressed that they are not comfortable with your current circle of
friends. This may result to you hating your parents or you distancing from your friends.
EXOSYSTEM: covers all the people, institution, organization that has no contact with
you but still affect you (work of your parents, social media, the implemented rules in
your community, etc.)
E.g. Everyone of us (teachers, learners, parents) got affected when De La Salle Lipa
decided to offer borderfree education. We have no direct contact with the Br. President,
but his decision has caused a great change in our lives.
MACROSYSTEM: is when exosystem works in a wider scope, it is influenced by one's
cultural attitudes, beliefs and values.
E.g. Since Philippines is such a family-oriented nation, the restrictions brought by the
pandemic aggravated the situation. We really had difficulty at first because we are so
used to family gatherings and celebrations.
CHRONOSYSTEM: refers to how we are impacted differently in different periods of our
life (time).
Clifford Geertz offered another way of looking at culture by focusing on the role of
"thought of symbols" in society.
When someone is described as cultured, it means that the person has good manners,
is well educated, and knows many things about arts. However, this lesson encourages
us to stretch our definition of this characteristic. Apart from its usage, let us top it with
cultural sensitivity as we unravel the vast diversity of culture.
SELF
MarcelMauss
M O I- a person’s sense of who he is
P E R S O N N E- social concepts of what it means to be who he is
TABULARASA-JohnLocke
The implication is that at birth all individuals are basically the same in their potential for
character development and that their adult personalities are exclusively the products of
their postnatal experiences, which differ from culture to culture.
Ecological systems theory- U r i e B r o n f r e n b r e n n e r
FIVELEVELS
1. M i c r o s y s t e m
2. M e s o s y s t e m
3. E x o s y s t e m
4. M a c r o s y s t e m
5. C h r o n o s y s t e m
1. MICROSYSTEM- smallest and most immediate environment in which the child lives
2. MESOSYSTEM- encompasses the interaction of the different microsystems which
the developing child finds himself in
3. EXOSYSTEM -pertains to the linkages that may exist between two or more settings,
one of which may not contain the developing child but affects him indirectly nonetheless
4. MACROSYSTEM -the largest and most distant collection of people and places to the
child that still exercises significant influence on the child
5. CHRONOSYSTEM adds the useful dimension of time, which demonstrates the
influence of both change and constancy in the child’s environment
E m b o d I m e n t is often defined as "how culture gets under the skin" (Anderson-
Fye 2012, 16)
"If embodiment is an existential condition in which the body is the subjective source or
inter-subjective ground of experience, then studies under the rubric of embodiment are
not about the body per se. Instead they are about culture and experience insofar as
these can be understood from the standpoint of bodily being-in-the-world." Csordas
(1999)
C U L T U R E- C l i f f o r d G e e r t z
Culture is “a historically transmitted pattern of meanings embodied in symbols, a
system of inherited conceptions expressed in symbolic forms by means of which men
communicate, perpetuate, and develop their knowledge about and their attitudes toward
life” (Geertz 1973).
Geertz believes that culture is not something that occurs in the heads of humans.
“Culture is public, because of its meaning” (Geertz 1973). He utilized thick description,
which is an anthropological method of explaining with as much detail as possible the
reason behind human actions.
A nation’s culture resides in the hearts and in the soul of its people -MAHATMA
GHANDI