Chapter 1: Philosophical Perspectives on The Self

THE SELF FROM VARIOUS PERSPECTIVES CHAPTER 1  Lesson 1 Socrates & Plato Aristotle, St. Augustine, Rene Descartes, John Locke, Karl Marx David Hume, Philosophical Gilbert Ryle, Perspective of the...

THE SELF FROM VARIOUS PERSPECTIVES CHAPTER 1  Lesson 1 Socrates & Plato Aristotle, St. Augustine, Rene Descartes, John Locke, Karl Marx David Hume, Philosophical Gilbert Ryle, Perspective of the Self Sigmund Freud, Paul Churchland, Merleau-Ponty  Intended Learning Outcome At the end of this chapter, you will be able to: 1. Discuss the different representations and conceptualizations of the self from various disciplinary perspectives. 2. Compare and contrast how the self has been represented across different disciplines and perspectives 3. Examine the different influences, factors, and forces that shape the self 4. Demonstrate critical and reflective thought in analyzing the development of one’s self and identity by developing a theory of the self (SDG 7)  Who Am I? Place your hand on a clean white paper Trace After tracing, write your endearing characteristics on each of the fingers of their palm. Opposite the characteristics, write the factors that caused them to develop such endearing qualities.  Analysis Small and Big Group Sharing: 1. How do you view yourself based on the characteristics you have identified? 2.What does it tell you about yourself? 3.How do you view the Self? 4.How do you see the development of yourself?  Who Am I, now? The need to understand the self and other human beings is as old as civilization. But that need has never been more important than it is today. Self-awareness is about learning to better understand why we feel what we feel and why we behave in a particular way. We rarely take the time to contemplate the real nature of our existence, to ask the question - Who Am I, or who am I now?  “Self” as defined by SOCRATES "Know thyself", a concept invented by Socrates "Man must stand and live according to his nature”. “Man has to look at himself.” Two fundamental questions »To find what? » By what means? Socratic method- a dialogue between the soul and itself “I know that I don’t know”  “Self” as defined by SOCRATES - For Socrates, the self has a role of a "questioner" "Without this work on yourself, life is worthless" An unexamined life is not worth living. Socratic Self- knowledge means working on oneself, with others, to become the sort of person who could know himself, and thus be responsible to the world, to others and to oneself, intellectually, morally and practically.  “Self” as defined by PLATO “Good actions give strength to ourselves and inspire good actions in others.” If we truly understand human nature we can find individual happiness and social stability. We are not self-sufficient, we need others, and we benefit from our social interactions from others and we benefit from our interaction with others.  “Self” as defined by PLATO Individuals and societies can participate in justice, liberty, or equality, but in this world, we never encounter the perfect forms. The most prominent of all the forms is the form of “good” He believed that the soul or mind attains knowledge of the forms.  “Self” as defined by PLATO According to Plato, the soul is divided into 3 parts a. reason- seeks philosophical and self-knowledge b. appetite (physical urges)- if dominated, they are profit and seeking material gain. c. will (emotion, passion, spirit)- victory loving and seek reputation. In order to avoid mental conflict, then these 3 parts should not be in conflict. Good societies help produce good people who in turn help produce good societies.  “Self” as defined by ARISTOTLE “The Soul exists independently from the body and is immortal.” THE SOUL IS THE ESSENCE OF THE SELF. He defined man as a rational animal for we have free will and intellect. Only man in God’s creation has the ability to think.  “Self” as defined by ARISTOTLE Aristotle was Plato’s prized student, best known as the founder of formal logic. Like Plato, he postulated 3 kinds of soul: »Plant soul- the essence of which is nutrition »Animal Soul-contains basic sensations of desire, pain, pleasure and the ability to cause movement »Human Soul-essence of which is the reason.  “Self” as defined by ARISTOTLE The last soul is capable of existence apart from the body He also mentioned about the most natural function of man and animals in which is to beget another being similar to itself in order that they attain as far as possible the immortal and divine. This is the final cause of every creature-LIFE  “Self” as defined by ST. AGUSTINE “All knowledge leads to God” Self-presentation leads to self-realization. Self is identified by one's relationship with God. Humans are morally responsible for their actions. Each person is characterized by self-awareness, and this faculty is thought fundamental for the conscious process of Christian salvation.  “Self” as defined by ST. AGUSTINE “Grant Lord that I may know myself that I may know Thee” A necessary condition for knowing oneself is that he must come to himself, stop wandering and start the journey to selfhood. The soul needs to seek its true home and journey to it like a “peregrine” –a foreigner in a strange land striving to return home.  “Self” as defined by ST. AGUSTINE The aspects of the self/ soul according to St. Augustine’s are: 1.It is able to aware of itself. 2.It recognizes itself as a holistic one. 3.It is aware of its unity  “Self” as defined by Rene Descartes “cogito ergo sum” Father of Modern Philosophy He claimed that the person is composed of the cogito (mind) and the extenza (body, which is the extension of the mind) A person should only believe the things that can pass the test of doubt. Therefore, the only thing that a person cannot doubt is the existence of the “self”, “Our identity comes from the mind, I think therefore I am.”  “Self” as defined by Rene Descartes “cogito ergo sum” The first principle of Descartes’ theory of knowledge and the keystone of his concept of self. What makes a person is therefore the mind, and the body is just some kind of a machine attached and controlled by it “But what then, am I?”A thinking thing. It is a thing that doubts , understands, conceives, affirms denies, wills, refuses; that imagines also and perceives”  “Self” as defined by John Locke “the self is the conscious thinking thing. No man’s knowledge can go beyond his experiences.” The human mind at birth is “tabula rasa” Theorizes that experience is of 2 kinds – sensation and reflection. Knowledge, in other words, is based on the careful observation of sense experience and/or memories of previous experiences. Reason plays a subsequent role in helping to figure out the significance of our sense experience and to reach intelligent conclusions.  “Self” as defined by John Locke Personal identity or self is founded on consciousness or memory and not on either body or soul. True to his philosophical commitment to grounding his ideas in sense experience, Locke, in his essay entitled “On Personal Identity” (from his most famous work, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding) engages in a reflective analysis of how we experience our self in our everyday lives. In his initial passage, Locke makes the following points, implicitly asking the question of his readers, “Aren’t these conclusions confirmed by examining your own experiences?”  “Self” as defined by John Locke 1. To discover the nature of personal identity, we’re going to have to find out what it means to be a person. 2. A person is a thinking, intelligent being who has the abilities to reason and to reflect. 3. A person is also someone who considers itself to be the same thing in different times and different places. 4. Consciousness—being aware that we are thinking—always accompanies thinking and is an essential part of the thinking process. 5. Consciousness is what makes possible our belief that we are the same identity in different times and different places.  “Self” as defined by Karl Marx "the essence of man is no abstraction inherent in each separate individual." Man's potential, for Marx, is a given potential; man is, as it were, the human raw material which, as such, cannot be changed, just as the brain structure has remained the same since the dawn of history. Yet, man does change in the course of history; he develops himself; he transforms himself, he is the product of history; since he makes his history, he is his own product. History is the history of man's self-realization; it is nothing but the self-creation of man through the process of his work and his production: “The whole of what is called world history is nothing but the creation of man by human labor, and the emergence of nature for man; he therefore has the evident and irrefutable proof of his self-creation, of his own origins.  “Self” as defined by Karl Marx "the essence of man is no abstraction inherent in each separate individual." constant or fixed ones, such as hunger and the sexual urge, which are an integral part of human nature, and which can be changed only in their form and the direction they take in various cultures, and the "relative" appetites, which are not an integral part of human nature but which "owe their origin to certain social structures and certain conditions of production and communication.“ Marx gives as an example the needs produced by the capitalistic structure of society. "The need for money," he wrote in the Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts, "is therefore the real need created by the modern economy, and the only need which it creates This is shown subjectively, partly in the fact that the expansion of production and of needs becomes an ingenious and always calculating subservience to inhuman, depraved, unnatural, and imaginary appetites."  “Self” as defined by David Hume “The ego (self) is a fictional idea. There is no mind or self. The self is just an illusion" “nothing but a bundle or collection of different perceptions, which succeed each other with an inconceivable rapidity, and are in a perpetual flux and movement […] The mind is a kind of theatre, where several perceptions successively make their appearance; pass, repass, glide away, and mingle in an infinite variety of postures and situations.” Hume’s conception of mind implies a conception of the self which is either thin or non-existent.  “Self” as defined by David Hume “The ego (self) is a fictional idea. There is no mind or self. The self is just an illusion" Sometimes this is called a “Reductionist Theory of Self”; that we are not, fundamentally, anything more than a flux or (at best) a system of various different things. We are no one thing, fundamentally. There is no SELF remains the same..  “Self” as defined by Gilbert Ryle “The self is how a person behaves." Gilbert Ryle argues against the theory that the mind does not exist and therefore cannot be the seat of the self. Ryle believes that self comes from behavior. We are just a collection of behaviors caused by the physical work of the body. the ghost in the machine". Ryle is one of the many philosophers who disagreed. He thought that seeing thoughts as ‘immaterial things’ is wrong. Instead, one can always translate a statement about thoughts into a description of behavior that is equivalent to these mental processes.  “Self” as defined by Sigmund Freud “the ego is not master in its own house.” The concept of self according to Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytic theory centers around two mentioned characters, one being the ego and the other being the unconscious mind. Ego is one of the fundamental aspects of being a self. It is the part of the mind that mediates the desires of the id to the realities of admirations and suppressions that come from the situation or external world. It is part of self-identity that made a person be himself/herself as a distinct character from others. According to his theory of psychosexual development, the complex emerges as the ego develops and the child becomes more and more aware of the need to accommodate what he/she wants and the gratifications of this desires within a moment. This stage starts at the earlier childhood to three years old which is an inborn amount of relatives because of sexual attractive energy. “Self” as defined by Sigmund Freud “The Formation and Structure of the Human Psyche  “Self” as defined by Sigmund Freud “the ego is not master in its own house.” In essence, Freud suggests that the self is always in a state of internal tension and conflict. Fundamental to Freud's case that the self is synonymous with the mind and the body as it is shared by psychoanalysis today. Whilst to employ a psychoanalytic approach is to assume that inner forces are influencing the self, psychoanalysts differ on which aspects of the self are seen as more significant in the process of change and development. Some may focus on the self's capacity to adapt to the realities of life whilst rebelling against the pursuit of pleasure. Others may argue that the self's efforts to defend against internal conflicts and defend against threats to its stability may be the most significant aspect. “Self” as defined by Paul Churchland “it is the physical brain and not the imaginary mind that gives the person sense of self.” advocates the eliminative materialism or physiology of the body and brain which explains that all of us have a brain but if it is gone, there is no self at all. Our brain is not inseparable from our body. For example, how you dress doesn’t define who you are but rather what’s the content of your mind defines who you are. “Self” as defined by Maurice Merleau-Ponty “Truth does not inhabit only the inner man. Man is in the world and only in the world does he know himself” According to him, all the knowledge of every individual comes from the inner world of subjective phenomena of experience that people are aware of in everything within their consciousness. For example, our body won’t function or move unless being said or commanded by our brain, for the two of them are not separated. Thank You!