 She is an associate research fellow, an adjunct associate professor and the director of the Institute of Scholastic Philosophy of Fujian Catholic University in Taipei, Taiwan. She will share with us one of her expertise, life education in Taiwan. And after her lecture, we will hear a response from an equally esteemed speaker, our own Filipino Dr. Krishna Ray Palses. Dr. Palses is a faculty of the Philippine Normal University and he is currently serving as a faculty under the College of Graduate Studies and teacher education research. So, without further ado, we give you two esteemed speakers, Professor Dr. Katia Lenehan and afterwards Dr. Krishna Ray Palses. Dr. Katia, please take it away. Okay. Hello, everyone. So, I hope everybody can hear me properly. Okay. I'm very, very happy that the philosophical association of the Philippines invite me to this webinar and especially I have to say thank you, Gina, for helping, for organizing this webinar. Okay. I'm not sure because I cannot see all of you. That's no more. I cannot see you and but I guess I will use the PowerPoint and you can see my, the share screen. I share this to everyone. So, today our topic is life education in Taiwan. Okay. So, first, I would like to talk about a brief history of life education in Taiwan. Okay. First, the life education, the promotion of life education in Taiwan actually started around 20 years ago. 20 years ago in Taiwan, we have a very high suicide rate. Okay. And life education is more like a reaction to this high rate because the government realized that, okay, life education is very important because we have to deal with this high rate, high suicide rate problem. So, in this situation, the ministry of education started to promote life education in Taiwan. That's about 20 years ago. Okay. Then they quickly realized that, okay, the life education is not what's not supposed to deal with this emergency situations only. They realized that life education is very important. It's very fundamental for the students' life. And if we can keep them a good life education, and that will benefit the students' well-being for their entire life. And when I teach the student, when the student asks me why we should learn, we should take this course of life education, I always share them with a click. So, I will try to share this click with you now, you sharing. Okay, while you're, Katya, while you're preparing to share the piece, also make sure that you're, yeah, I want to, it's on so we can also see. Yeah, I would like to share that, so I would like to show that click. So, okay. Can you also turn on your video, please? Yeah, your camera on. Okay. So, I'm, okay, can you see my screen now? Not yet. Not yet. Okay. So, can I play now or can you see the screen? Is your, is your camera also on? Can you turn on your camera? Yes, it's always on. Is it on? Oh, yeah, it's always on, but it looks, but I saw there's a band that, the host banned me from showing my picture. I don't know why. There. Okay, can you see me now? Okay. So, can you see the video? You have to, you have to click share screen again and go to the window to the video clip. I have to share screen. I can't go back to the, I don't know how to go back to the, to the zoom. I cannot see. So, maybe, well, we just continue. I don't think that's necessary to show that clip. Okay. So, anyways, that clip is just describing a crab, you know, in a lot of dishes on the food and the slow was happily, at the end, they got into that shopping. Okay. So, it's cooked, of course. So, live education is just like that. So, when the students see that clip, they realize that, oh, well, sometimes we realize that the direction is more important than the speed or than the, sorry, can you hear me? Okay. Yes, you can. The direction is more, yeah, you can hear me. Okay. The direction is more important than the speed and also more important than the distance. Okay. In our life, especially, it's like that. Okay. You can have a slow speed, no problem. If you have the right direction that at the end, you will get to the destination. But it's the wrong direction, no matter how long and how hard you are working, you will never get to the destination. So, life education is just like that anchor. Okay. The anchor in your life. So, you know who you are. You know what the human being is and that you know what life is. And you, so you will always be on the right direction and gradually, slowly, you will definitely get to the destination. So, that's why life education is so important. It's not just like a discipline, like literature or mathematics or social science or something, something like that. You know, the discipline, we learn knowledge, but all those knowledge should be used in our life to help us to go on the right direction. And finally, we can reach the destination of our life. So, that's why life education is so important. So, so at present, life education course is a compulsory credit. Okay. So in high school, so it means that all the high school students in Taiwan, they have to take this, take this course, life education. That's how important, how the government emphasize on this, on life education. So, but it's only one, it's only one credit, okay, throughout the three, throughout their three years of high school. But they're in elementary schools, we have six years elementary school and also three years high school. So, during this period of time, we will try to help the teachers to develop some lesson plans. They will try to combine the content of life, life education in their own perspective, sorry, in their own respective, okay. So, they are, they don't, in the elementary and in the high school, junior high school, they may not have the course called life education. But in the senior high school, we do have a compulsory credit in our junior high school, sorry, in our senior high school. Okay. So now I would like to talk about the, a little about my job. But now I'm working as one of the consultant members in the LEPDC. LEPDC, I will show you this LEPDC. LEPDC is a life education professional. Yes, can you see my, can you see my slide? No, please share it again so we can see your slide. I have to share it again. Oh, yes, thank you. Share it again. For the rest, for the participants, if you have questions, you may, about the lecture, type in the questions in the chat box and we will entertain the questions or feedback during the open forum later after the talk. Thank you. Somehow I cannot see how, I cannot see that Zoom. Yeah, I go to Zoom, but it doesn't work. Wait a minute. Okay, how about I, I have to go to the Zoom, maybe through the link again, because I just, no, I'm sharing. Finally, I found it. Okay, all right. So can you see, see it probably now? Okay, good. Okay, so I'm going to introduce some of my job. So it's a LEPDC Life Education Professional Development Center. It is the one center, it's a center in the Ministry of Education in Taiwan. Okay, this is very important, helping to train all the teachers to develop their lesson plans and to help them to understand what the education, life education is, and to help them to build up the learning group. Because we find out that the learning groups are very important because the principles of the elementary school, for example, the principles, maybe this principle knows a lot about life education. So he is able to do a good job on life education in his school. But you know, the principles will go to different schools. So once this principle, you know, left, then everything is gone. After how many years, the ministry, the center realized that, oh, that it's not working if we can build up this learning group to gather all the teachers who are willing to dedicate to life education. We cannot gather them together in a former learning group. And this kind of situation will happen again and again. So we focus on a lot on helping all the different schools to build up their own learning groups. Okay, and also I joined this, the life education program of the National Taiwan University because what I talked about, what I just mentioned are the life education in the elementary school and the high school, right? But we haven't talked about the life education in higher education in Taiwan. So higher education is also important. But this promotion of life education in higher education just starts only maybe two years ago. Okay, so it's kind of relatively late that our ministry of education realized that the higher education, life education is also important in higher education. So I also joined the program to try to build a life education curriculum in different Taiwan University. Okay, so that's about what I'm doing now. So now I want to talk about, I want to put our emphasis on this core competencies and or literacy that we want to, one of the students to put that. So this five competencies for literacy, that it's written in our syllabus. Okay, so first I'm going to talk about the thinking literacy, then anthropology, then ultimate concern, and the value speculation, and the spiritual complication. Okay, so there actually is a very holistic picture of life. Okay, so this, what life education should include. Okay, so there's all written on our in the syllabus. Okay, so I want to talk about the thinking literacy. Thinking this literacy is treated as a methodology because we have this five different subjects. Okay, but no matter which subject, we need to think properly. Okay, so we need to think properly to solve the problems, to face our life, to think properly, to pursue the values in our life. So this is the methodology, which is throughout the whole discipline. Okay, so, sorry, this is thinking, I think, what is, okay, sorry, I think that I make this PPP quickly, so I think that I made a little mistake, but so just listen to me. Okay, what's the thinking literacy? For example, thinking literacy, we emphasize logic, of course, we have to think logically, right? But in life education, logic is not the most important thing. Why? Because we also need the proper affections and the proper attitude to think properly. So if you, we must have experienced a lot of situations when we don't have proper attitude, we cannot think properly. Okay, or we have a different affections or when our emotions are not, for example, our emotions are too, when we are too emotional, we cannot think properly either. So life education emphasized that it's, logic is important, but mere logic is not enough. Okay, we also needed the proper attitude. Okay, for example, like prejudice, okay, prejudice, prejudice in our life always affects our, you know, our thinking of everything. For example, we also have, for example, we have experienced this, that one young person in the bus, and this young guy saw an old elderly person, and he was not willing to give the seats to this elderly person. So I saw that once, and I saw that situation twice. Then I started to conclude it, I started to conclude that, okay, now all the young people are not willing to give their seats to the elderly people. Okay, so it's only a couple small experiences, but I conclude, I made a conclusion that, you know, all the young people are like this, and we made this kind of mistakes all the time in our life, but we are not aware of that, okay, in, for example, like this. So the thinking literacy is so important. So when we try to judge this, judge the situation, or try to say all this young guy is doing something wrong, when we are trying to judge him, okay, we always base it on our pre-judgment, okay, and the worst thing is the student is not sensitive, is not aware of their prejudices. So this thinking literacy is, that's why it's so important. So in every, later on we'll realize that in anthropology, and also in ultimate concerns, bio-staculation, and spiritual cultivation in every part of this discipline, we will use this thinking literacy, okay. So the second one is the anthropology. So I'll put more time on this topic, why, because the anthropology is something that is my specialty, okay. So my approach is philosophical, but we also accept the different approach, such as the natural sciences, okay, that's also important. So, so what is human nature? So anthropology, we have to answer this question, what is human nature? Because in Taiwan, it's a, it's a multiple cultures. There are multiple cultures in Taiwan. So when we try to introduce anthropology to students, we have to use different approaches. So not only Chinese philosophy, but also Western philosophy, but also nature sciences. But in Taiwan, we find out a very interesting phenomenon. I don't know about the Philippines, maybe you have this problem too, but Taiwanese students, they kind of worship nature sciences, okay. So everything, you know, if it can be proven by the nature sciences, they think of it as the only truth, that's very true. So the other thing, they don't care, okay. They don't think that's something true. They don't, they don't think in a different way, okay. But the nature sciences, don't get me wrong, I think nature sciences are very important. But we have to let the student understand that nature, nature sciences is not the only way how we understand human beings. So that's very important, okay. So they have to broaden their understanding of human beings. They have to realize human being is a very, a very complicated idea that we cannot use, we cannot simplify it. Okay. If we simplify the nature of human being, so at the end, our understanding of human being is very narrow, and we may make one decision in our lifetime, you know, in our life. So that sometimes that decision can be crucial, okay. So let's see. For example, in the class, I will introduce the Aristotle's statement, because Aristotle states that the human being has the rational principle, okay. So it means man is a rational animal. So that's the definition. And we can see the mentions, okay. The mentions is the one important figure just to follow confusion, okay. The mentions that the feeling of concern for the well-being of others is the humanness. And the sense of the shame and the disgust is the fairness. And the sense of treat others with courtesy and the respect is the propriety. And the sense of right and wrong is wisdom, humanness, fairness, propriety, and wisdom are not melded into us from the outside, which means there are something within us that's our nature. But we can see that in the Chinese philosophy, it's so clear. Chinese people think how they think about the human being. They think that they regard the human being as the moral values, okay. We should respect other people. We should have a humanness. We should have this moral subject, that's how Chinese people see human being. And also, we have this, I use the Catholic philosopher from friends, Jacques Mehidan, okay. Jacques Mehidan said that a human being is a person, okay. So man must complete through his own will what is sketched in his nature. So something is sketched in our nature. And we should use our will, through our will, we should try to develop these powers in us, to perfect our powers, including our intelligence, including our will, which try to perfect these powers until we become a person, until we perfectly use these powers, okay. So this is a person who has good inclinations in us, but we have to develop it. So person, in Chinese, in Chinese, we don't have other way to express this word. We always call it Ren. So Ren is just like a regular, you know, just like a, it can be a, it's hard to explain. So a person for us, we don't understand that person is the image of thought, okay. So we don't have this idea that a person is something with dignity, okay. So, but why we think a human being has dignity, just like the man just said, because human being has this, the moral values in the human being. Human being can do a moral behavior, moral judgment. So that's why human being has dignity. So after I introduced all these different approaches, I always asked my students, you know, what, which one, which statement is right, you know. So whose statement is right. So if I ask all of you, what's your answer, what's your answer. So then, actually, students are wiser than we expect. They always tell me that they are all right, okay. Human being is not only a moral subject, and that the human being is also a subject who has this powers, not only intelligence, but also the good will, okay. So because of that, we have this invaluable dignity, because human being has this moral values, human being have this powers, the important powers like the will and like the intelligence. So human being has this invaluable dignity, okay. So, you know, this webinar is also about the pandemic, right. So when we, I remember I saw a news, if I remember to write, that should be the news from Italy. There was a doctor who said that he didn't know what to do because there are two people who got to the COVID-19 and the first one is elderly one. The elderly one maybe passed 30, sorry, takes over 60 years old. And this elderly one came first to the hospital. And the young one came later, but somehow he has only one breathing machine, right. So he, what can you do? He should give this breathing machine to the elderly one, or he should give this breathing machine to the younger one, okay. That's really a dilemma, right. So this is loose, loose situation. It's not wing wing situation, it's loose, loose situation. So why he has this, what kind of situation that he can make, it's all based on his understanding of human being and understanding of human being and dignity, okay. So in the extreme situations, the judgment will depend on our understanding of human dignity and the essence of human being. So that's why the anthropology is so important, okay. If he's the utilitarian and he doesn't have any idea of the human dignity, he will, he would, you know, definitely, you know, he immediately made the decision and I should give the breathing machine to the young one because the young person can survive, has a better chance to survive. So he doesn't have a second thought. But is that really the right thing to do? The elderly people have no dignity. The elderly people does not worth living, okay. So this kind of dilemma is so, it's so important that we realize how important that we have to form properly our understanding of human being and his dignity, okay. So that's about the anthropology. I don't know how much, how much time do I have now. So Gina, should I continue? Gina is here. Yes. Okay, anyways, if no, should I continue? It's okay, right? Because I don't know how you'll give me another 10 minutes or five minutes. Sure, sure. It's fine, okay. So now I would like to talk to the third subject. The third part of the life education is the ultimate concern. This ultimate concern is in line with the question, you know, why should we live, okay. Why or what am I living for? Okay, the ultimate concern. So we will try to introduce the student that let them pay attention to their, in their own, they have a transcendental dimension of human nature because they want to transcend themselves to become a better self. Now, we'll try to, you know, wake up, you know, the, the, the awareness of their transcendental part. Okay, this is so important. So we will try to help them to think the finite from the finite to the infinite, infinite is so important. So the, the, in the ultimate concern, usually we'll ask the students, you know, can the ultimate concern help you to find the meaning of life. So in this part of life education, we usually introduce religious wisdom. Okay, religious wisdom. Why? Because the religious wisdom usually offer us an answer that why our life is meaningful. Okay, so in this situation, we will also reject kind of a pure materialism. Okay, because the pure materialism, people may just think that, you know, human beings are nothing but the workings of the nerve system. Okay, if so, then it's hard to talk about the meaning of life, isn't it? Right? If we only think about the workings of our nerve, then where, where, where are we here? Where we want to learning? Where we want to learn? Where we want to know about our life, and want to know the meaning of our life, that everything will become meaningless. Okay, so in this situation, we will reject a mere materialism, a materialistic perspective. Okay, so the ultimate concern that we will, in this, in this part, we'll introduce different religious wisdom. So in Taiwan, there are some parents, they are very paranoid about the schools, the, the school teach, in the schooling, that the students, the teachers say something about religion. They are very afraid that the teacher will preach, you know, in the class. Actually, this kind of situation makes them reject all kinds of religious wisdom. But, but we have to know that religious wisdoms are very important, because this is our important heritage, heritage, generations from generations. There are a lot of wisdoms inside. We will never preach in the class. We will never preach to the students. You should believe this religion. Otherwise, you will go to hell. We never do that. We just introduce them different traditions, the Buddhism, Catholic, Catholicism. And we also introduce, sometimes we introduce Hinduism. We show them, you know, in other countries, they have their own wisdom. Okay, also Taoism. That's the traditional Chinese religious religions, right? So we show them different ways, different wisdom to help them to find, to help them to pursue the ultimate concern, the ultimate thing that they really cares about. They can be the base for their lives. Okay, so we use the religious approach. We use the philosophical approach. We also use the scientific approach. Yes, that we cannot treat the human being. We cannot regard human being only as the nervous system, okay, the workings of nervous system. But the nervous, the workings of nervous system, they do help us to understand human being, you know, because we have this material part. We also have to understand the, the material part of, of, of our workings, right? So this is also a valuable importance. We are not trying to exclude the scientific approach. So we try to put all together to give them a more broadened, a more broad picture, and a more holistic picture of the ultimate concern, that, you know, what kind of ultimate concern that we have. We can have. And we also reject the, we have a rejection of a nihilism, okay, in an ultimate concern, because the nihilism is, you know, if you believe in nihilism, then there's, there's no reason that we're talking about life, education, anything. Okay, so that's why the ultimate concern is so important. So at the end, you know, maybe it doesn't have to be a personal God, but the ultimate truth in the universe, that can be your, that can be your goal of your life, if you pursue truth for your whole life. That's fine. You have to find something valuable. We reject any kind of nihilism. So that's about the ultimate concern. This is a very difficult topic. So if we have any questions, we can discuss later. And then we'll have also the value speculation. Because one hour ago, I discussed with the professor Hauses, right? He said that in the Philippines, you have value, value education, which I think is so nice, right? The value education is so important. And in the value speculation, we asked the students, okay, we asked the students, you know, value is subjective or objective. You know, if I ask you, can you answer that question? This question is so basic, but no one, you know, can immediately give me a right answer, okay, value is subjective or objective. You know, young, young people, they can just make a quick conclusion. The value is subjective. Because I think, for example, I think that to be, to get a champion is very important. I think it is valuable. Okay. But the other one said, I don't think the champion is something important. I think, you know, we should, the balance of life is more important. We should not, you know, sacrifice our balance of life in order to get the champion. So in this situation, people can just make a quick conclusion that value is subjective. No, we have to tell the students that no value is something. It's in between the subject and the object. That's what the value is. Okay. So the fact is still there. Okay. Health is the value. And we think health is valuable. Health is important. Okay. Especially in the pandemic, we realize that health is so important. Right. So health is the value. So the health, that's a fact. Okay. So the truth, the goodness, the beauty, they are all objective. Okay. We cannot make a conclusion that all the value is subjective in this way. So people will just have an arbitrary life. You know, you will just do whatever you want, whatever you like. It's not right. Okay. There are always good values. There are some objective parts of values, the good values that worth pursuing. Okay. We should give the students this kind of understanding. Okay. And there are different kinds of value. Value has, we have health, justice, and harmony. And we'll help them to, you know, to think through, you know, how to handle the difficult situation. For example, when you have the value conflict, what should you do? Okay. So for example, the harmonious relationship, okay, that's the value, right? That's the good thing. Okay. But self is same. That's also something good. Okay. When these two values conflict one another, what should you do? Because in a class, you know, some, some students insult you or they bully you or something. But you, but you still want to be friends with them. So you try to keep this harmonious relationship. But, you know, in this kind of situation, you may lose your self is same. So what can you do? So in this situation, what you need is the value of speculation, right? To solve all kinds of problems in your life. So we have to think properly. It's related to the literacy, the thinking literacy, and that we can use the proper thinking way in this value of speculation. Okay. And the advice of speculation, the most important thing is the moral value. Okay. So how to make a proper moral judgment. Now we help students to make a proper moral judgment. We make them to understand their different categories. For example, people have a good motive. It doesn't mean that people can do good things for them. Maybe it can be good. But some people, they have bad motives. But somehow, accidentally, he'd do something right. It's benefit a lot of people. Okay. For example, so the behavior is right. But the bad motive is this that we can say that this person is moral. Can we say that? Or if this good motive and or only when the person has good motive and a good action plan, when these two are combined, then we can say this is a moral behavior. So this kind of speculation, we should introduce students to think properly. We have to help them to think in details, help them to clarify the very difficult situation. Okay. That's the value speculation. Okay. So spiritual cultivation. So the spiritual cultivation is a bit hard to talk about the spiritual cultivation here. So Gina, are you talking? Hello? I just hear something strange. So anyway, okay. So I'll continue. The spiritual cultivation. We try to help the students to to to realize the importance of the unity of knowledge and action. We all know about, we know the knowledge. You know, just like I introduced the life education, so we know the knowledge. But we have to live like a person, right? So how to become a person is something so important. What kind of actions we should we should do so that I can live like a person? Okay. So not only I know how to what person is, but I have to act like a person. So this too has to combine together. And because this part is so hard to to illustrate. So we just gave some rules to help the students that can just follow those rules to practice in their life. For example, we see God, seeing Buddha and the same person in everyone. Okay. In everyone, they have the personal in their person is the dignity that we should act. And then the second, the rules like to be the first to love, be the first to keep something like you just practice. Okay. Practice and to be people, confidence, keep people joy, keep people whole, give people convenience. Okay. Well, we should you should postpone your anger to be sensitive to forgiveness. Okay. You should try to forgive people and have the courage to apologize. Something like it's practice and practice to help them to do the spiritual cultivation. Okay. So I think I hope my my topic is not too heavy. But that's that's what we have. We have to all the ideas that we try to convey to the students in Taiwan about life education. So that's it. I think there are more rules. I think I will just take this part. Okay. Thank you, everyone. Okay. Thank you very much. So, okay. Thank you, Katya. Maybe wish. Okay. Thank you. When I'll listen to Dr. Ray. Okay. So this reaction to the talk please. Dr. Palces, go ahead. Okay. So good afternoon, everyone. Hi again, Professor Katya. Again, I am so happy to be part and to be the one to initially react on your lecture. So I think this timely as well that I was chosen by the PAP to react because as everyone should already know is that life education is a is an implemented curriculum and is compulsory in Taiwan. And I have compared it earlier to values education here in the Philippines. And I am very happy to see particularly in some of the slides that you've shared with us that like the Philippines, we are Taiwan is trying to merge knowledge and action that it is not sufficient to produce, you know, skilled individuals or capable individuals that we must also produce among our learners, moral individuals. And I think that it's a fused horizon that the Filipino system of education and the Taiwan system of education have in common. So again, I've already expressed earlier as well and I'd like everyone to hear that right now the talk of or the lecture of Professor Katya is very timely because recently, earlier this year, the Philippine Senate has approved some kind of reinforcement as well as a review of the values education curriculum here in the Philippines. And that's an opportunity for teachers as well as philosophy majors like me and like Professor Katya and like everyone in this in this in this conference to participate and to give our input to this reformation of of values education in the Philippines, which I think we can learn a lot from the life education being implemented quite successfully in Taiwan. And so my questions are geared about gathering knowledge from Taiwan's experiences, perhaps good experiences and as well as challenging experiences. I'm sure as educators, we all understand that implementing curriculum is very, very difficult. And part of what the lecture has discussed are the parents' worries, paranoia, you know, reactions and and we also have those concerns here in the Philippines. So my my my first observation that I'd like to share, which will be a part of the question that I will also raise, is that when you were showing your last I think maybe that's the last or the second to the last slide, Professor, you displayed giving hope, giving confidence, giving joy, and these are all staple parts of the curriculum of life education if I am not mistaken. But I also know since I have also mentioned earlier that I was the consultant of Foguang Shan, which is in the Philippines, which is a huge religious Buddhist movement in in Taiwan. I also know that that that bullet you just showed me is actually word by word a Buddhist teaching of Master Xing Yun, the founder of Foguang Shan. So my first concern did you master any nation curriculum, which has very obvious Buddhist, let's say, manifestations. I imagine of course, since life education is is is implemented by the state, then it should be secular. However, one of the that you have just shared is actually very, very Buddhist. So how did you get how did you answer you now or yes, yes, you may we may talk about it now. Thank you. Okay. Okay. So exactly. This is from Foguang Shan. Okay. So this is not in the syllabus. Okay, this is not in the syllabus, but in our teacher education in the training of the teacher education, we give them this rules to help them to do this spiritual cultivation, because sometimes they just ask you what is spiritual spirituality. Okay. So this is a very hard word to give the definition. But when you do it, okay, when you practice, you will have your own understanding of the spiritual cultivation. And that is right. This is not in the syllabus, but in our formal teacher training, because they have to pass this training and get a certificate so that they can teach this subject in high school. So these teachers, they will have to practice this rule in their, you know, in their life. And exactly that one keeps people, hope to keep people convenient. And this rule is from Foguang Shan, because we are welcome, we will we will come all the religious wisdom. Okay. In the life education. So that's a this also something very special about life education in Taiwan, because we are not we are not trying to reject their religious wisdoms or traditions. We are welcoming them. So that's my answer. Yeah. Okay, thank you. Actually, I agree with you. And I've witnessed that personally when I was in Taiwan, that people are very open minded educators and, and, you know, regular people are very open minded, and they have diverse recognition of the different worldviews of Taiwan. However, I would assume that since you are working in a Catholic university, the end of course, your training is more or less predominantly, let's say, Catholic philosophy, or if you if you allow me to worry that that your life education curriculum, which is supposed to be, of course, secular and fair, has Buddhist influence. Don't you think that that is maybe an avenue for review or for revision or or something like that. Yeah. Thank you for asking me this. Yes, nice. Yeah. I myself is a Catholic. And I have to tell you that the syllabus person, the professor from NTU who wrote this syllabus, I, I work with him now. And he is a Catholic too. Okay, so, but of course, the syllabus has absolutely the Catholic influence. But the professor, you know, I work with him. So I know him very well. He is welcoming different religious traditions. Okay, because, you know, in a religious dialogue, religious dialogue, we have to as a Catholic, you know, I have to say that God can reveal himself in a different way. I will never narrow down God, you know, God can only reveal to people only in this way. But in different cultures, God has his own his own way to reveal to different people. Okay, so in, in this kind of a mentality, okay, the Catholics can welcome, can impress different traditions, different religious traditions. Okay, so we are happy to include the Buddhist rules in the calculation in the spiritual calculation. I am happy to hear that. Don't worry about answering your question. And all I see, well, most of what your response is about is something that I like, which is openness, of course, and inclusion. You're talking about inclusion of religious ideas. And so I'm sure perhaps other people in this conference would pick up on some of the statements from your response to my first inquiry. But I myself would like to move on to a second inquiry that is quite independent of my first question. So again, we are both educators and most of the people in this conference are educators. And one of the most controversial part of educating regarding morality is assessment. I think you already know what I'm trying to say here. But because, for example, when you were, when you were showing us that, you know, for when you were talking about the revelation of God, and that yes, it does vary across culture. And there were also some contents in your slide when you said that life education would reject nihilism, life education would reject pure materialism, and it involves spiritual cultivation. Now, the question here is, and this could very well possibly happen, is what if a student has a personal conviction of maintaining a materialist stance would and that reflects on his final output, what kind of assessment criteria have you set up so as not to discriminate, you know, these views that life education by default may not be let's say to in consonance with, I hope I have made that clear. I hope I understand you. I think you are asking that how about the students who and maybe when we talk about life education kind of discriminate this kind of the students like this, right. But actually, I myself, I have what we should do is to let the student know that there are different views of human beings. Okay, they are different views of human beings more complicated than near one theory. It's hard to imagine, one theory can explain human being completely. Is that right? I think everybody agrees with that. So only one materialistic view, I think. If I ask you, can you believe that? It's probably kind of hard to see that, right? So what we can do is to broaden their understanding. So the materialistic way of to view the human being is, I think, nihilism is more difficult to talk about because some students, they just answer you that I don't believe in anything. But I still think that life is meaningful. I can eat a good food. I enjoy I can enjoy food. I wear good clothes. I make good money. And I think life is meaningful. Why do I have to pursue something else? Okay, this question is more difficult to answer. And we as students, okay, we often, yeah, that's because it's hard to explain to them that at the end, at the end, it's kind of very hard to, yeah, you say that I can enjoy myself, that's enough. Okay, but we will never, I think no one can be confident, so confident that in his whole entire life, he never felt lost. Okay, he only enjoyed those no food, food and clothes. Yeah, yeah, please. Mark, and when it comes to dealing with entertaining or discussing nihilism, and perhaps a student who subscribes to that, it would be, of course, challenging, but again, I am happy to hear that you still have the the attitude of openness to discuss those things, of course, as part of life education, and not discriminate students. But, and right now, I'd like to move forward to a related question, which would be my third question. And I think the best way to phrase it is to simply be specific for example. So my question is, how do you grade spiritual cultivation as a teacher? I mean, how would you assess that? I understand the Buddha has attained spiritual cultivation, according to the story, stay in place, again, this one of the stories, in spite of the sun having traversed the sky. And that is, of course, a supernatural feat, however, in academics and in a very, very, in Taiwan, which is, I think, compared to the Philippines, very strict when it comes to academic standards. How are you going to grade, again, I'm just repeating, how are you going to grade spiritual cultivation? Okay, so actually, because we, I just mentioned that I might work with the professor in NTU who wrote the syllabus, right? And then we are going to have, in this semester, we are going to have a course. It's called the, we just called it the Shenzhen Business School. Anyways, we have a course about the life education. Okay, so we have this problem, how to give students marks, okay, how to assess them. In higher education, we already have this problem. Then think about in the 12 years compulsory education, the teachers, they also have problems to assess, you know, if the students improve in their spirituality. Okay, so that is why, that is why in a compulsory education, no, they just, some people, and also in the higher education, they treat this credit, the compulsory credit, of life education. They treat it like easy credit, because it's so hard to give the evaluation of the students. So sometimes the teacher only, you know, give them kind of good marks. Okay, so in this way, they treat them, you know, not seriously enough. Okay, especially, you know, when you try to study literature and study mathematics, which will help you a lot to get into a good university. Now, why do you pay attention to your, to the life education? Right, so they just ignore it or they just, you know, write good paper to get a good mark. That's it. Okay, but do they really have this spiritual cultivation? You know, I have to say it's very hard, you know, for the teacher to tell if they really have the spiritual cultivation. But they, but there are still some ways, for example, we ask them to keep a diary. Okay, how they practice this rule. Okay, they keep a diary. The diary doesn't have to be long, but every day you keep a diary. And at the end, they give this diary to the teachers, so that teachers go through the diary. And if some students, if they really, in the class, if they really learned something or reflect about their own life viewpoint, all of this will reflect in the diary, surely. Okay, so they cannot hide that. So if we ask them to keep the diary, you can, you can kind of, in this way, we can give them a kind of really, we can give them a kind of more fair mark. Okay, but that's an issue. Still, a kind of a homework we should give the students and what kind of homework that will really help them to, in the spiritual cultivation, something like that. So I don't have absolutely no answer. I don't have a great answer to this, because this is something that we have to work on. We have to learn more different ways to evaluate the students and help them and give them a fair mark. Yeah. So at the beginning of the lecture, I was actually seeing a lot of differences, or actually assuming a lot of differences between life education and values education, one in Taiwan, one in the Philippines. But hearing from you right now, today, I can see that we can actually have so many opportunities to work together on this, in spite of, of course, our cultural differences. In fact, the hardships that you have been mentioning, the paranoia of the parents, and of course, this challenging standards of assessment, it's actually one of the big questions as well here in values education in the Philippines. So I am really grateful to be part of your lecture and to react to you today, Professor Katya. And as much as I really want to discuss more with you, I believe that to the other members of the PAP. But I will be talking to you again, one way or another, maybe perhaps through Philippine Orbal University. Thank you again. Yeah. Thank you, Professor Katya. And thank you, Tina. And I don't have time to take a look at those questions yet. You know, I can, you know, I kind of old fashioned, I can only focus on one thing. So I hope I have answered some of the questions from the audience. Yes. Yes. Yes, Professor Katya. We have some questions. I am Charlie. I'm Charlie. Yeah. We have some questions in the chat box. If you mind to answer some of them. One question here is, in a world full of suffering and pain, how can life education be of help? Oh, suffering in a pen. Okay. So yes, I think suffering in a pen. How can the life education be help? It's very, I have to say, this is very helpful because no matter you are in what kind of, no matter you are rich or you are poor, no matter you are, you are the president or you are the regular people, you know, everybody will face suffering no matter what. Maybe in marriage life, maybe in, maybe the young students, they're worrying about if they can get into a university or, you know, just to talk about we have this so much high suicide rate in Taiwan, maybe not as high as the pen or as Korea, but it's pretty high. Okay. So everybody will encounter suffering and pain. So that's exactly why we want to give the students life education, because if you really know what's the most important in your life, then when you make the hard decisions, you can choose a better way and then you can make yourself feel better. Because you have so such a solid belief which are a good belief in your life, that will help you to release the suffering and pain. But this is not one day thing, the life education, that's why we are doing the life education in higher education now, because 12 years is not enough and only in high school they have only one compulsory applicatory credit. So then in a higher education, we should continue this teaching. Why? Because that's something that will benefit the students for their entire life. So sufferings and pains, that there's no way that they can face sufferings and pains, especially if you can face either situation, there will be pain. There will be pain for that doctor forever. But if you realize what's the most important values in your life and what human being is, then you make this decision. And you will always try with the best, with the good motive and try the best to make the things better. Then you can try your best. Then now this kind of sufferings and pain can be released. I cannot say it can be removed, that's impossible. They can be released. And especially we should always make decisions on the right direction. Then this sufferings and pains will become a process for you to get the real release in your life. So that's my answer. But this is the kind of hard to discuss, because we don't have cases. But the sufferings and pains, we do believe that after learning the life education, learn something from the life education, we should have a better way to face them. Okay. Okay. Thank you, Madam Katya. Still we have one question here. We have still one question. How about the Atheists? So they will not be ready for such kind of life education because, well, Atheists don't believe in God like that. So they will not be having a spiritual education. Sorry, how about who? Atheists. You say how about the Atheists. Yeah, Atheists. Yeah. Atheists. Those people who don't believe in God like that. So Atheists. Oh, okay. Yeah, Atheists. Yeah. It's a very good question, because I just had this discussion with the professor I mentioned, I work with now. We have, he said that, you know, we should keep the students, when we talk about the ultimate concern, right? We should keep the student the idea of the personal God. Okay. My goodness. So I'm fine with that. That's the professor who had an argument with me. He said that only personal God can be the ultimate reality. But I told him that, you know, the ultimate truth or ultimate beauty, ultimate goodness, maybe it's not personal, but some people there, they will pursue truth for his whole life. And it cannot be that the person's ultimate concern cannot be something that the value that he pursued for his whole life. So actually, I'm open to this question. I will not say that, you know, only the person of God can be the guide or only the, so even, I have to say, even the Atheists, they don't believe in personal God, but then somehow they must have believed that there are better values, values right in our life, and find out that better values. Okay. And if we try to think deeply, maybe the ultimate ultimate situation is the ultimate level related to the personal God. Okay. So the Atheists, they reject the personal God, but it doesn't mean that all the Atheists rejected the ultimate values in their life. Okay. So that's maybe one way that we can keep the Atheists, the students, a direction, okay, a direction for them. So there, even though there are some people who reject the personal God or their Atheists, but they can still have the good direction in their life, I will not, I will not reject this kind of possibility. I hope my answer, I hope I answered your question, but I think this is really a very important question. Okay, ma'am. Thank you, ma'am. Can we have one last question on me? Okay, sure, of course. We are aware that, you know, we have religious discrimination. We have different religions. So I suppose also there are different kinds of spirituality, and it is a fact that religions discriminate each other. Well, do you have some recommendations of a better dialogue among these religions? So the question is the dialogue of religions. Yeah, yeah. You mean in life education, if there are some dialogues of the religions? Okay, yeah. Yes, in life education, for example, in my class, I introduced them different religious traditions, and I draw out the common places of different religions. So because there are some good values shared in different religions. Okay, so I always highlight these common places for the students. You know, even in different places, in different countries, you know, somehow human beings find out these values is something worth to pursue, to pursue, right? So I highlight these kind of common places. I use this way to open the kind of religious dialogue. But of course, if the students are smart enough, they may ask, you know, can we really talk about only the common places? There's just a lot of differences between different religions. That's also possible. For example, NTU is the best university in Taiwan, and the students are very smart. Okay, they can ask you this kind of question. So how can you open the dialogue? All the culture is heterogeneous. That all the religions can be heterogeneous. Every religion is heterogeneous. It means there's no comparison between them. Then how can we open the dialogue? So when they ask me this question, I'll tell them that, when you say that all the religions are so different, on what kind of faith do you say they are different? Okay, so we always stand on a common place. Then we say, okay, they are different. So ask them to go back to that common place. I think that's a kind of a better way for them to find out a more constructed dialogue between religions. We try to, religions can help each other, not to destroy each other. They will build up this kind of understanding. We should learn from other religions because they are something good about them. We should learn from them. And they should learn from us, too. If you have something good, you should share it to others. That's my answer to the religious dialogue. Okay. Okay, thank you, professor. Okay, thank you. Okay, thank you for faithfully answering all the questions. I think it's about the time, right? So we should say goodbye to the audience. Not yet, not yet. Dr. J. G. Joaquin will present to you the certificate. Oh, wow. Thank you. I'm very glad. I didn't expect this. On behalf of the philosophical, it's very sweet. Yes, representing you in the certificate. Very sweet. Thank you. Okay, for sharing your insights with us as speakers in this third installment of the TAP webinar series. So Dr. Cathy, I thank you very much for this one. So I'm a warning. Okay, thank you all. Thank you, all of you. Thank you. Okay, so thank you and bye-bye. So before we end this webinar, I just have to make some announcements for the TAP. Okay, so we have a scheduled TAP general assembly this coming November 14. At least that's a tentative date. It will be done by Zoom as well. So it's from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. And there we will have a membership. So if you want to join that general assembly, please do do your membership duties diligently. Okay, and then we will also announce the winner of the Don Isabello de Las Reyes Prize on Filipino philosophy. So this prize is for, okay, so this prize will be for the research program proposal on Filipino philosophy for the future. And the grand prize will be 25,000 pesos. It's a starting research grant for you. We will also announce the winner of the TAP Public Intellectual Prize. So it's the inaugural prize for this one from our donors, the Friends of TAP, Jeremy De Chavez and Cesar Junson. And the prize will be 10,000 pesos for this one. All right, so for those who will join the the PAPGA will make the announcement in the Facebook group. Thanks very much and see you guys next time. Bye-bye. Thank you for the evaluation link. After an hour, we will close the link. Please fill out the evaluation form to receive the certificate. Thank you everyone to our basic education teachers, graduate students, philosophy enthusiasts, philosophy professionals. Thank you for your participation. For the members of the PAP board, please stay on it because we will have a short meeting. Thank you. Hello. So members of the PAP board, are you still here? Sir Charles, how are you? Loc Pa, welcome. Okay, so I'm just removing people from the... here. Veer is not here. Hello, hello everyone. Hello Pao, how are you? Long time no see. Hello, hello. Okay, just a minute. I just removed someone else. Is Katya still here? Sorry Pao, I'm not here. Pao, are you here? Yeah, I'm here. No, sorry, I'm not here. Okay, so welcome. I'll just put some people in the waiting room down there. How are you? How are you, Jeans? I'm fine. How are you? Hello guys, thank you for coming. We'll start the meeting in a while. Jeans, you're the host. You can go out first. Give back.