1. The distinctive notes, aim, possibility and grounds of metaphysical inquiry.

y. The elements involved in the methods of presenting the validity of metaphysical inquiry.
 Metaphysics is an intellectual questioning to embrace the whole of reality. The thinker that seeks about this should have a willing, at least in principle, to argue and defend his position before the rational criticism of
others. The aim of this inquiry is to inquire explicitly on the ultimate context of all experience, that of reality or being itself, as such. It is to discover the essential, universal, or all-pervasive properties and structures
of all being as real, their ultimate principle of intelligibility, and their interrelationships to form an intelligible whole, or more briefly, the ultimate laws of intelligibility of being as being.
 The possibility of metaphysics is that many modern philosophers claim that metaphysics does not and cannot exist as distinct or meaningful inquiry.
1. Every discipline or school of thought must study some particular class of things, but it is impossible to study all things at once, because being is no distinguishing trait, is perfectly empty conceptually and tells us
nothing in particular.
RESPONSE: Metaphysics may not have distinctive subject matter, but it does have a distinctive point of view. It considers only the most general all-embracing laws of things, precisely as real, as existing. It cannot
be done by empirical observation alone, but only by reflective insight and analysis.
2. Some philosophers says that metaphysics is impossible because the human being is finite and only a small part within the whole reality.
RESPONSE: Yes, the mind of the human is finite but we have our drive to know about all that there is, by its infinite, inexhaustible potentiality or capacity to know, its limitless horizon of inquiry, precisely as
intellect, the human intellect is so mysteriously co-equal with the whole universe. Then every human intellect is thus finite, perspectival vision-of-the-whole.
 The root and ground of metaphysics is our drive to know the whole of reality or the being itself. This radical dynamism of the human spirit is innate to us, the priori condition of our being able to do philosophy, and
to discover the meaning of all things at all.
 Method of metaphysics: since the metaphysics depends on creative and reflective insight to discern basic patterns. As a metaphysician, after organized a form, it should be tried to argue for its validity as to consider
that he is a philosopher and not as a prophet or oracle. As a philosopher he should provide these elements: 1. DESCRIPTIVE- it involves discovery and description of the basic properties and categories of being by
comparative reductive analysis and reflective insight. This is to provide a root model as the source of the framework. 2. EXPLANATORY- in which this phase is the search for ultimate explanatory hypothesis and
this hypothesis must be true.
2. The meaning of the term “being”. the two main paths of its discovery. The intellect and being as correlative. The various personal paths to the realization of existence. The two irreducible orders of being: the real
and mental being.
 The term being simply means “is” or what we called “present”. Being something that exist or present in what we called reality. The two main paths of discovering the being are; 1.) Uncover the most basic level of its
actual presence, that is, most fundamental predicate or attribute. E.g., that is a cat that is a ballpen that is a dog, and etc. 2.) by penetrating the horizon of inquiry and reach the ultimate all-embracing horizon of the
universe as a whole.
 Intellect and Being are having their mutual relationship and as correlative. Being is the ultimate objective in relation on our drive to know, and this drive is what we called as intellect. As what we know that being is
what we define as some “real” or “reality”. Intellect is radically for being. Its search is always for what truly is and how it is. Being itself is the intelligence which brought light of consciousness that is unveiled to
mind.
 Various realization of our personal existence are: 1. Threat of loss of one’s own existence or that of loved ones. 2. Intense love experience. 3. Intense hope. 4. Contemplative wonder. 5. Profound religious experience.
6. And radical boredom, despair, and existential anxiety.
 Division of being: REAL BEINGS are present by its own intrinsic act of existence outside of an idea or mind that is not just as being thought about. While the MENTAL BEING present by its own intrinsic act of
existence but only within an idea that is as being thought about. There are divisions of mental being: the Abstraction, which drawn from real but as abstract existing only in the mind. The Possible, which does not
exist but could exist, e.g., Angels. The Past and Future, which were and will be but are not. And lastly, the Mental Construct, which can never exist outside the mind but help us to think about the real.
3. The two most significant properties of the idea of being; transcendental and analogous. The main types of analogy. The relationship between proper proportionality and analogy of participation.
 The significant characteristics of beings are Transcendence and Analogous. The Transcendental is the idea of being must be all-inclusive, both comprehension and its extension. It signifies all that is everything that
is. (naa sa tanang naa). While the Analogous is the concept or idea of being which must be an analogous and not a univocal concept. It must be flexible or “stretch concept”.
1. Univocal- applied in all instances in exact in the same meaning.
2. Equivocal- applied according to a completely different meaning in each case, e,g. “he is feeling well, he fell into the well”.
3. Analogous- which lies between the univocal and equivocal, partly the same and partly different in each case.
 There are types of analogy:
1. Extrinsic Attribution- this is predicated according to its proper meaning. “this man is healthy; this is a healthy food”.
2. Proportionality- the term is predicated of several analogates in order to express some proportional similarity between them, always rooted in some intrinsic similarity. There are also types of proportionality
which is the improper and the proper.
2.1. The Metaphorical or improper proportionality is to express a genuine similarity in function or action between two different beings. “he is fox; I am a good shepherd”.
2.2. The proper proportionality is the intrinsic similarity between analogates is expressed by a term that is applied to all analogates n its proper and literal meaning. It is understood as participated in diverse
degrees deriving from a common source, and this is called as analogy of participation, an application between God and creatures. Proper proportionality expresses some kind of activity function, or relation
exercised diversely by different agents in each in its own characteristic way. “Mouse knows, man knows, God knows”.
4. The explanation of the problem of the one and the many. The basic types of solutions of the problem. The explanatory theory of Thomas Aquinas on participation in the act of existence through limiting essence.
The implications of Thomas Aquinas’ theory.
 The problem in one and the many are: How all beings compared with each other are at once many and diverse, yet share somehow in common attribute or existence that joins them in one great all-embracing
community of existents which we call the real order, or simply reality?
 Main explanation is, they are one and similar because they are “is”, “exist”, and dissimilar because they are this and not that one. But there are some explanations:
a. Radical Monism- denies all multiplicity and diversity I being as illusion. Being is radically one; pure undivided oneness alone exists. Everything that exist is one.
b. Mitigated Monism- may refers to pantheism or all things are God. All things are modes of God.
c. Radical Pluralism- plurality and diversity of things are real. Being are just mental abstractions. It denies all the unity of our being.
d. Mitigated Pluralism- a certain unity of being is admitted. There can be said to be certain unity of all beings because they all derive from one single being as source. An extrinsic unity of origin, not an intrinsic
participation.
e. Participation Doctrine- a synthetic doctrine that tries to do justice. Fully both the real multiplicity and diversity of the real and also its intrinsic unity, as some kind of participation in a basic common ultimate
attribute.
 The explanatory of Thomas Aquinas is that every being, except God, is constituted by a real metaphysical composition or inner structure of two correlative metaphysical principles within the unity of the being: 1.) is
the Act of Existence which actively present in the universe of reality, 2.) is the Limiting Essence in which exist in this or that particular mode of existence.
 The implication of Thomas’ theory of essence/existence is er should experience a profound supportive feeling of belonging to the one most basic community of all, the community of all real existents. Active co-
presence to the total community of existents. “being is to act of belonging, to exist is to co-exist”. TO BE IS TO BELONG, TO BE TOGETHER, TO SHARE WITH EACH OTHER.
5. The problem of the one and the many on the same level of being: essential form and primary matter. The adapted Aristotelian-Thomistic solution of the problem. Its conclusion, corollaries and implication.
 The new problem: for all beings are not simply unique in what they are, but group together to form levels and classes, kinds of being where in many individuals have in common not only existence but some specific
kind or mode of being. this could be the problem of one and the many in particular sense.
 Aristotelian-Thomistic solution: Participation Structure
1. Principle of similarity- species must possess a principle with in the which explains why they are determined to this specific mode of essence and not another. Aristotle called this as FORM, essential or
substantial form. It is the inner shape of the being that makes it what it is.
2. Principle of distinction- the principle of distinction must be a non-formal or non-qualitative one since two essential forms in the same being would destroy the unity of its essence. Aristotle called it matter,
PRIMARY MATTER. It is the raw material, determinability or pure potentiality. It cannot exist itself but only as structured under some form, correlative co-principle with form or essence. It refers as
quantitative extension or spatial extension. Each new reproduction is destined from every other because it is located precisely here and not there.
 CONCLUSION, COROLLARIES, IMPLICATION
1. The ultimate essential distinction between two human beings and other two elements is their material principle or body, and not from essential form they have. It is by primary matter that we differ to each other.
We are belonged to spatial field with the same form yet different space.
2. There is the two great modes of limitation. First is the qualitative, in the sense of formal qualities which gives a vertical scale of a higher and lower level and kinds of being; the second is the quantitative, in the
sense of spatial extension which in a horizontal scale.
6. How do we solve the paradox of self-identity in becoming? the difference attitudes towards change and being. The “I” as synthesis of permanence and process.
 There are different attitudes towards change and beings:
1. Ancient World- changes is a radical falling away from perfection and being, a source of regret and sadness, a threat to true being. TIME for Aristotle is more a destroyer than a builder, for we are not sure that
everything will be reborn but we are sure that everything will be destroyed.
2. Medieval World- maintained the idea of immutability as the highest, most perfect state of being and considered change a imperfection. God is not changing therefore not changing is perfect.
3. Modern World- change is the very law of life and is radically good. it is better to change than to remain the same. “to change is to grow, to remain is to die”.
 PROBLEM: How can the human being be truly one being through time and change? How do we solve the paradox of self-identity in becoming?
 SOLUTION: The ‘I’ as synthesis of permanence and process. (synthesis is a process of combining separate elements of thought into a whole)
There are indeed facts of some kind of genuine self-identity through process or change.
1. some Principle of self-identity through change
a. Memory- as experience in the past.
b. Moral responsibility- being responsible for your own action
c. Promise and Fidelity- there are some actions that needs to be done because you promise about it before.
d. Carrying through a project towards a goal.
* if there is no permanent observer at least throughout a given process of change, then it would be impossible even to know that there is a series of acts.
 2. Principle of permanence and process of change cannot be simply identical.
These two principles are different to each other, if they are identical then no change at all. These are real metaphysical composition. Real because these is real non-identity outside of the mind. Metaphysical because
it is not physical beings but correlative and co-constituents of one composite being. real metaphysical composition simply means a composition that don’t need to be separated.
This composition is called SUBSTANCE-ACCIDENTS. Substance is the being itself that has accidents which is subject for changes yet one remains substance. Therefore, there is a self even with the process of
changes. Even we cannot see the self but we can know it from within.
Substance (being-in-itself) is that which is apt to exist in itself and not in another; Accidents (being-in-the-subject) is that which is apt to exist not in itself but in another.
7. The problem of change and its general definition. The principle of continuity in every change. The Aristotelian-Thomistic solution on the problem of radical or essential change.
 Since we experience many types of changes; then some of that changes lead to lost original being and lead to new being. If this change occurs these would no longer be accidental but rather substantial change.
GENERAL DEFINITION OF CHANGE
Change is the transition from one mode of being to another. This is only concerned only with intrinsic change, i.e, the transition from one intrinsic mode of being to another, and in real order.
 The Act and Potency as the principle of continuity in every change.
A changing being must be different at the end of the change from what it was at the beginning, otherwise, there would be no change at all. This is the principle of ACTUALITY.
There must also be some principle of continuity or permanence in every change and it is the POTENCY. Change cannot be pure process, pure becoming. At the center of every change, there is an element of
perduring, permanence, non-changing. All change is thus as dialectal polarity between permanence and process, being and becoming. This principle is real metaphysical composition.
The principle of continuity must have an intrinsic connatural aptitude or capacity for possessing all its possible modes along the whole gamut of change open to it. Aristotle named this principle a potential subject or
simply potency
Being of a being is subject to change, will not be fully present, fully be all at once, but will unfold successively in time by a process of progressive actualization of ts potency an all areas open to it. In every change it
must possess the real metaphysical composition of act-potency, for it would be impossible for it to undergo change of any kind. God is only pure act and not capable of changing.
 The essential change is the change of something to another something. This is different form accidental change in which it changes while retaining it self-identity. Examples for this are death, chemical compounds or
elements, and nutrition.
General Theorem: at the end of the essential change, a new essential mode of being is present not there before. A new essence is present, no longer this being but that new being.
Aristotle called this principle as Essential or Substantial Form, since form signifies the intelligible determining structure of inner law of a being, it answers on question why this being is this and not that that. Essential
change is therefore a transformation from one essential form to another in the same potential subject. PRIMARY MATTER in which potential to all forms yet formless one.
8. The five principal grounds why a Being needs an efficient cause. The nature of efficient cause and its key corollaries.
 Why being needs an efficient cause:
1. EVERY BEING THAT BEGINS TO EXIST REQUIRES AN EFFICIENT CAUSE. Nothing can give what it does not have; that which does not have existence cannot give it to itself or to another. “nemo quod
non habet”
2. EVERY BEING WHICH UNDERGOES REAL INTRINSIC CHANGE REQUIRES AN EFFICIENT CAUSE. Real intrinsic changes are the existence/essence, matter/form, and substance/accident. The reason
for this is the same to no.1. note: efficient cause need not always be completely other being. if a being has many parts, and one part only acquires something new, then the efficient cause may be another part in
the same being. e,g. Growth through nourishment, learning something new I never knew before, etc.
3. EVERY BEING WHOSE ESSENTIAL BEING IS COMPOSED REQUIRES AN EFFICIENT CAUSE. Essential being is composition of either essence and existence or within the essence itself of matter and
form. Being can not be at all except with one or both of these compositions. Composed being is not self-sufficient for its own existence as combined here and now in this way. It points beyond to some unitary
cause, some composer, which is responsible for making the components be together as they are. Every composition needs a composer.
4. EVERY FINITE BEING REQUIRES AN EFFICIENT CAUSE. Nothing can determine its own essential being to be what it is. Hence, it needs an efficient cause to actively determine it to be such finite being
and not some other possible. Every limited or participated being thus points back to another being as its efficient cause, from which it receives the limited degree of perfection which it does possess.
5. EVERY BEING WHOSE NATURE IS BELONG TO A SYSTEM REQUIRES AND EFFICIENT CAUSE. Universe is an intrinsically correlated system of interdependent members. Thus, all elements of our
material universe are bound to each other according to multiple diverse reciprocal bonds or laws of interaction which define the natural properties of each. The nature of being is to complement on the other
beings.
CONCLUSION: being from point of view is not self-explanatory but depends on some other or others as its efficient cause/s. The cosmos as a vast system of interacting beings, each in form both receiving from and
dependency on others and yet giving to and supporting others in return. Thus, to be, a finite being, is to be dependent on another, both for the origin of one’s being and for its continued growth in being.
COROLLARY: there is or must be some being which is self-sufficient for its own existence and perfection, this being must be. 1. Uncaused and eternal, 2. Immutable, 3. Simple in its being with no metaphysical
compositions, 4. Infinite, 5. Not a part or dependent on any system, and 6. Unique.
 The Nature of Efficient Cause: CAUSE in general is anything which contributes positively in any way to the being of another which is called the effect. This should be distinguished from 1. Condition, which that is
without something cannot be, but which does contribute positively to its being. e,g. sufficient light is a condition for doing painting but not really its cause. 2. Occasion, which renders to the occurrence of something
easy or convenient, but is neither a cause nor condition. e,g. a party can be the occasion for closing a deal, not a condition, or cause. EFFICIENT CAUSE is that which contributes positively to the being of another by
its effective action, it is the agent which makes something to be, brings into being in whole part. The act of causality is thus the active communication of being to another, either in a whole or in a part. The origin of
 the term “cause”. a) AITIOS b) AITION c) AITIA – which all means that which is responsible for something happening or coming to be. The causal action is identically the producing-of-the-effect, since it is not yet
causal action until it is actually producing the effect.
 Key corollaries:
1. Action is located in the effect as from the agent.
2. To cause as such does not imply that the cause itself changes or loses anything.
For to cause is to make something new happen in another where as to change is to acquire something new in oneself. Example. The teacher does not lose his knowledge when he teaches it to another, nor does he
will become weaker by doing things.
3. Cause and effect are simultaneous.
There can be no time gap between the act of causing and the effect produced. Causing and being caused are not to conceived as two distinct events, following ever so closely one after the other, they form a
single event with two perspective.
4. Causal power as such is not directly observable by senses.
In cause and effect, we first noticed the effect for it is the actuality.
5. No effect can be greater than its cause.
9. Every agent acts for an end. The adequate condition of all action is intelligence. The nature and kinds of final causes. The two basic types of “chance”.
 A human being determines himself to do this or that by choosing some goal or end in view then acting in view of this purpose. This goal or end in view plays the role of new kind of cause, called the final cause (from
finis means end or goal). This final cause works within the agent or efficient cause, but is a distinct kind of cause, contributing to the effect not by active power but as goal attracting and guiding the agent’s use of
power. Aristotelian-Thomasian final causality, is a universal law of all active beings. Wherever there is efficient causality there must also be final causality, or traditionally put: every agent acts for an end. All final
causality requires as adequate sufficient reason an intelligent cause. then final cause is the fact of all causes, without final cause there would be no action at all.
 EVERY AGENT ACTS FOR AN END, that is, every agent acts as interiorly determined by a final cause.
Argument: The Very Nature of Efficient Action
1. From the Side of The Cause.
Indeterminate action is no action at all. The determination and intelligibility of action comes from the affect to be produced. The final causality is the guiding form of an action, the causality of the effect-to-be-
produced, the end to be attained, on the agent while actively causing.
2. From the Side of the Effect.
The cause must contain the sufficient reason not only for its existence but for its mode of existence, for its being this particular effect and not some other. It follows that the agent at the moment of its action must
contain within itself an interior determination of its power to produce this effect rather than some other. This predetermination of the agent towards the effect to be produced is precisely the final cause.
Conclusion: every agent of efficient cause must act for an end, i.e, its action must be finalized, directed, focused from within toward the effect to be produced as end or goal to be attained.
 FINALITY REQUIRES INTELLIGENCE AS ADEQUATE ULTIMATE CAUSE.
1. The final cause is present throughout the action, as guiding influence before the effect is produced in its real being. but in the mode of the real being, the effect does not yet exist until actually produced by the
action of the agent. The final cause therefore exists as a present orientation toward a not yet existent future.
2. The agent as acting must be that power which alone can make the future, the non-existent, present, i,e. Intelligence.
 NATURE AND KINDS OF FINAL CAUSE.
NATURE: 1. Final causality is not active force like the efficient cause. its causal influence is that of specifying or determining the action of the agent toward one effect as to be attained, rather than another. It is the
reason why this is done and not that. It gives direction to the power of the agent; it is a future to-be-done influencing the present. 2. Hence, it is the first of all the cause working in a given activity; for nothing can
happen until the goal of an action is determined. 3. As an end sought for, it has the character of a good for the agent, “loved” or sought for in its own way by the agent.
KINDS: 1. Goal or end-in-view of the action- the immediate goal or end intrinsic to the action itself being done. 2. Goal or end-in-view of the agent- the motivating goal or purpose why he is doing the action at all.
 The chance is an interaction of two or more lines of causality, it could be predetermined by some observer but not the one to whom it appears as chance (swerte2x), or not predetermined or pre-planned and its
independency initiated (coincidence).
Chance and causality- chance by no means involves a denial of efficient and final causality. What is by chance is only the intersection, which is not itself an action done by any agent, but the result of several.
10. The final problem of metaphysics. The structure and strength of arguments to prove the existence of a Transcendent Source. The four main arguments taken from the cosmic path of efficient causality. The main
arguments taken from the inner path, the inner life of the spirit. The main attributes to God.
 The final problem of metaphysics is the search for the ultimate source and ground of being. It is equally the same on the question on the existence of God.
 General structure of any philosophical argument for God: if being is intelligible then God exists. But being is intelligible. Therefore, God exists!
Structure of all arguments: 1. There must be a self-sufficient being somewhere, at least one, 2. Such a being, in order to be self-sufficient, must be infinite, hence unique, or only one.
 COSMIC PATH
1. From any caused being to an Ultimate Source
 - Nowhere in the whole series will be any sufficient reason for any of the members, since each member refers us back to another in our quest for the adequate sufficient reason why any member is there.
Hence, there must be a self-sufficient being as source of being for the whole chain of non-sufficient, either as first in the series, has no beginning in time.
2. From any finite being to the Infinite
- The only adequate of any finite must ultimately be an infinite.
3. From many existents to one Source
- All beings share in common the basic ultimate perfection of existence itself, the ultimate “act od al ats and perfection of all perfections” as Thomas puts it. Hence, all beings necessarily point back to one
single ultimate source of existence itself, and this source must be unique, infinite, and self-sufficient.
4. From the universe as interdependent system to an intelligent Ultimate Source
- They (some) agreed that each one in the system are dependent on the system as a whole, but they argue, the system itself as a whole may well be self-sufficient, even none of the parts are. This argument has
the advantage of moving directly to an Intelligent First Cause, the logos “in whom all things hang together”. But this grounding intelligence cannot itself be part of the system for it could not operate to set up
the system unless the system itself were already set up and if that so it would not be the ground at all.
 INWARD PATH
1. From the drive of the intellect and will
- It is the discovery of the infinite through the dynamism of the human subject as knowing-willing subject, as oriented towards the infinite by its very nature as to its only fulfilling goal. Knowing and willing
is rooted in an unrestricted inner drive or dynamism of the intellect toward limitless horizon of all beings as intelligible, and of the will toward all being as good (aim of metaphysics) it affirms that we have
innate desire that we cannot deny, i,e. a desire for Infinite.
2. Argument from moral conscience
- The voice of conscience is “absolute, unconditioned moral imperative”: “do this good and avoid this evil”. The only adequate sufficient reason, or source, of this absolute moral imperative with in e is an
ultimate absolute law-giver and judge, who is the ultimate source of natural obligation.
 MAIN ATTRIBUTES TO GOD
1. Attributes of God already explicitly discovered.
a. Unique
b. Ultimate source of goal of all beings
c. Infinite plenitude of all perfection
2. Immediately deducible from above
d. Eternal
e. Simple- no metaphysical compositions
f. Immaterial or Spiritual- beyond space and time
g. Immutable- cannot be subject to change
3. General theory
a. Distinction of attributes – the fullness of God could not be express explicitly by our limited concepts.
b. The attributes of creatures transferred to God.
- It is through similarity between cause and effect, interpreted in terms of participation and analogy. Since every effect receives what is has effect from the cause, it must participate to some degree in
perfection of the cause. it must have some degree of similarity with its cause at least in the basic perfection of existence.
11. The meaning, nature and kinds of Good. how to judge objective goodness or value. The various opinions and the arguments why every being as being is good.
 This corresponds to the other great drive of the human spirit: one aspect of this unified drive is the drive of the intellect towards being as intelligible (the truth of being), then the other drive is that of the will toward
being as good, valuable, which examine in the following.
 MEANING AND NATURE OF GOOD.
1. Discovery. We discover the good from our experience of desiring, loving, valuing various beings, i.e, from the dynamic appetitive side of our nature, which from ad-pelo, means to tend toward something. The
good appears as the correlative of this drive, as the object of our appetitive dynamism of desiring, loving, valuing, admiring, both sensitive and spiritual. Aristotle considers this as “that which all things seek”.
This appetitive tendency is the response to something as valuing or valuation. The good appears as valuable but also called as an act of loving and in some way good is that which is in some way lovable. To call
something good connotes some kind of at least implicit valuation.
2. Relation to being. The good does not add something on to being, it is the being itself that is valued called good not something else that is not. The being itself is the object of valuation, that is, considered in
relation to some valuer.
3. Good as synthesis of objective and subjective poles. If the good id “what we seek or love”, then it is a circle to say that we seek the good, for the good is simply whatever we seek. Then the question arises that, is
something good simply because we seek it or, do we seek it because it is good? Then many modern value theorists hold that there are no objective values in things, value is purely subjective property conferred
 on things by the valuer’s interest in them. Then the critique of this is that we strive for most things because we really believe they will objectively fulfill us, make us happy, be good for us, so that without them
we will not be as happy; it is not enough for us simply decree that something is good for it to turn out truly valuable for us. If that so, we could all be rich with a few pieces of dust, declared to be precious stones.
Hence, the proper understanding of the meaning of the good should include both the objective and subjective poles. If we define good, it is that which is valuable, that is, possesses some positive quality that
renders it appropriate or worthy to be valued by some valuer.
Note 1. Something does not have to be actually valued by something to be properly called good.
Note 2. What ever appeared to be good would be good, as long as the valuer valued it.
Note 3. The good does not have to be consciously valued.
4. Two main grounds for valuing something as good
a. As something perfective of the valuer, to be possessed by the valuer: the good-for-me
b. Something to be admired, approved, esteemed in an objective and disinterested way, the good from the universal viewpoint of being itself.
 KINDS OF GOOD
1. Good is analogous like being just as is the dynamic act of valuing of which the object, depending on the varying kinds of appetites, kinds of objects valued, and kinds of perfective relation involved.
2. Moral and Ontological goodness: Moral Good is the proper to a moral act, as conforming to the moral norm of what ought to be done here and now by a free and responsible person. This is the concern of ethics.
Ontological Good belongs to the order of the “is”, not the “ought”, and signifies that which is in fact valuable or perfective of someone in the existential order. There are some ontological goods that we need to
be considered; Useful good- those that are not valued for themselves but only as a means toward the achieving of some other good. e,g shovel, a can opener. Intrinsic good- those valued for themselves, as in
themselves good, not for the sake of something else. e,g. knowledge, love, happiness, beauty, friendship.
 HOW TO JUDGE OBJECTIVE GOODNESS OR VALUE
There are two main orders of objective value:
1. The Relative Order-- the good in question is restricted to the horizon of particular being or types of beings. Express linguistically such as “this is a good man”, “this is a good friendship” and etc. An objective
good or value for a given being is whatever fulfills in some significant way its natural potentialities—always with a view toward the integrated harmony of these potentialities contributing toward the unified
perfection or fulfillment of the whole being as such. It can be expressed in good-for, such as “jogging is good for John”, “friendship is good for man” and etc. it is considered as objectively good since it fulfills
some significant way on the predicate’s potentialities, bring it to a fuller completion or actualization of its own dynamic nature, oriented towards the fullest participation in the perfection of being that is possible
for its given essence.
2. The Absolute Order of Being itself—declared to be in itself without qualification a good or value in itself, as seen within the horizon of being, that is, on the absolute scale of all being as intrinsically good.
“friendship is good, love is good, beauty is good, humanity is good, plant and animal life are good, God is good.” Here the basic norm is simply how much a being participates in the basic perfection of existence
in the universe, the degree of its fullness of being in relation to the infinite perfection of God as ultimate source of all being.
Note: Relation of Relative to Absolute Order of Good. the relative order of good must ultimately be based on the absolute good. reason. The fulfillment of a particular being is itself a good only because it is a
degree of participation in the absolute value of being itself, by which all particular goods are good.
 EVERY BEING IS GOOD. this means that only existential being or the real beings is properly good, Thomas insists, and precisely because of its acts of existence, the root of all perfection, of which essence is only a
limiting mode. Hence mental beings are not goods and subject to being loved in themselves as mental, except in so far as the projection of them as real draws us and we want to make them real. The good is radically
existential for Thomas.
It also means that every real being is good in some way.
Opinions: Ancient Manicheans believed that there are two Gods, one as the source of all good things and the other is of evil. They insisted that matter is the source of evil. Neoplatonism believes that matte is the
great source of evil, the absence of form, where the radiation of goodness and unity from the Source through form finally dies out in sheer multiplicity. Jewish and Christian thinkers believes that all being is good
because they are made by a good God in his image. All being as being is good, and evil is a form of non-being, the privation or absence of some good that ought to be present and is not. Empiricist they insisted that
being is is a purely brute fact, neutral, neither good nor bad, a value-free.
Argument why every being as being is good: let us meditate first on beings precisely in their positivity as what actually exists, not in what they lack which should be there or in some evil effects they may produce. To
see being is its positivity is to see it as good. every being, is a participation in the great central perfection of the universe, the act of existence, the source of all perfection, value, goodness, hence an image of the
Infinite Plenitude of all goodness from which all existence ultimately comes.
12. The different opinions on the nature and status in being of evil. The three steps as the solution to the problem of evil as worked out by St. Augustine, refined by St. Thomas and other medieval thinkers. What is
the cause of evil? Is God responsible for evil?
 Metaphysical problem: the existence of evil raises serious metaphysical problems for the metaphysician, especially if he holds, as we do, that all being is good.
 Meaning of evil: we call evil whatever we experience as the opposite of good in some way that is whatever our appetitive or valuing dynamism turn away from or disapprove, disvalue, as not perfective, valuable,
lovable, desirable, but harmful, destructive, repugnant, unpleasant, etc.
 NATURE AND STATUS IN BEING OF EVIL.
Opinions:
 1. Evil is a positive being or aspect of being. ancient Mazdeim (Persia) and Manichean, both agreed that good and evil are positive beings deriving from two distinct ultimate Sources of Gods, a God of good and of
evil, who are in conflict over the mastery of the world. Many modern thinkers hold that evil is a positive reality and it is “fatuous, blind, unrealistic theistic optimism” to deny it, it means that we are not all
excused in this reality and its existence.
2. Evil is matter, as the source of evil. For Plotinus, matter is a kind of “real”, non-being, formless, chaotic, unintelligible, resistant to form, order, beauty, the last outpouring of the emanation of the One-Good as it
fades out into the darkness of matter beyond all form. If the soul allows itself to become absorbed in it, it tends to blind the soul b attachment to sense pleasure, so that the soul forgets its true spiritual nature and
destiny, “loses its true self”. Gnostics and heretical Christian sects carried on this tradition underground, considering the body, especially in the form of sex and marriage, evil.
3. Evil is merely metaphysical status of all finite things as imperfect, lacking some perfection, affecting all things below God.
4. Evil is subjective illusion, due merely to our incomplete finite view of the universe from the limited human perspective.
 SOLUTION:
1. Evil cannot be a positive being or mode of being. it is impossible to locate evil in any positive property of a being or situation. It simply deprives someone of the positive property such as blindness because it
deprives us of the positive good +of vision, death of life, hate of love, and etc. the core of evil is never located until we find some absence, some deprivation that evil can be said properly to exist. The evil itself
properly resides only where the negation and the deprivation reside. The cause them-selves are not evil in their own positive being. To conclude, evil is not a positive being in itself but some form of negation
non-being.
2. Evil cannot be simply a negation. Evil must be that special kind of negation that we call a privation. Evil is the absence of some good o being that should be present, that is evil is the deprivation of some due
good. it is the gap between what is and what ought to be.
3. Evil is essentially a parasite on the good. It can exist only within some positive good being. It is the absence in some positive being of some good that should be there. If there is nothing positive there which
lacks something, there can be no evil either, it destroys its own base.
 THE CAUSE OF EVIL.
Problem: A cause is which makes something to be in some way. If evil is non-being, how can it be caused properly speaking, be an effect at all? Evil as non-being cannot be the direct result of any productive
efficient cause, since real effect of a real efficient cause is always some real being or mode of being. Hence, evil is the side-effect or a result from a causal process that directly produces some positive effect.
a. Evil can result from the defect of power in the agent or some defect or obstacle in material worked on, so that the effect produced lacks the full perfection it should have. Example; deformed baby due to
defective genes.
b. Evil can result from the fact that the cause, in pursuing or producing one positive effect or good, thereby excludes from being some other higher good which should be present.
 IS GOD RESPONSIBLE FOR EVIL?
a. Not for moral evil. He is not responsible for the prior saying “no” to a higher good in which precisely lies the evil. Since he is a positive act, it is our responsibility alone. Hence, he is not the cause or responsible
for moral evil, which could always avoid because it must be deliberate and free, but only permits or allows it, for his own good reasons.
b. He is responsible for physical evil. Resulting from the actions of non-free agents, because he gave them such natures to begin with, such that they can or will inevitably produce some evils along the way. At
least he is ultimately responsible.