View source for Philosophy:Philosophy of self

{{Short description|Concept in philosophy}}
The '''philosophy of self''' examines the idea of the [[Philosophy:Self|self]] at a conceptual level. Many different ideas on what constitutes self have been proposed, including the self being an activity, the self being independent of the senses, the [[Philosophy:Bundle theory|bundle theory]] of the self, the self as a narrative center of gravity, and the self as a linguistic or [[Philosophy:Social constructionism|social construct]] rather than a physical entity. The self (or its non-existence) is also an important concept in [[Philosophy:Eastern philosophy|Eastern philosophy]], including [[Philosophy:Buddhist philosophy|Buddhist philosophy]].

== Definitions of the self ==
Most philosophical definitions of self—per [[Biography:René Descartes|Descartes]], [[Biography:John Locke|Locke]], [[Biography:David Hume|Hume]], and [[Biography:William James|William James]]—are expressed in the first person.<ref>Gaynesford, M. de ''I: The Meaning of the First Person Term'', Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2006.</ref> A third person definition does not refer to specific mental qualia but instead strives for [[Philosophy:Objectivity|objectivity]] and operationalism.{{citation needed|date=November 2020}}

To another person, the way an [[Philosophy:Individual|individual]] behaves and speaks reflects their true inner self and can be used to gain insight into who they really are. Therefore, the [[Philosophy:Intention|intention]]s of another individual can only be inferred from something that emanates from that individual. The particular characteristics of the self determine its [[Social:Identity (social science)|identity]].{{citation needed|date=November 2020}}

== Concepts of self ==
=== Self as an activity ===
[[Biography:Aristotle|Aristotle]], following [[Biography:Plato|Plato]], defined the ''[[Philosophy:Soul|psyche]]'' as the core [[Philosophy:Essence|essence]] of a living being, and while claiming that it did not exist apart from the body,<ref>''De Anima'' 414a20ff</ref> he considered its so-called "[[Philosophy:Passive intellect|intellect]]" part to be immortal and perpetual,<ref>"For whereas the sensitive faculty is not found apart from the body, the intellect is separate." Aristotle, ''[[Philosophy:On the Soul|De Anima]]'' III, 4, 429b3</ref><ref>''[[Philosophy:On the Soul|De Anima]]'' III, 4</ref> in contrast to its organism-dependent vegetative/nutritive and perceptual functions. In his [[Philosophy:Four causes|theory of causes]] and of [[Philosophy:Potentiality and actuality|act and potency]], Aristotle emphasizes beings in relation to their actual manifestation, and in turn the soul was also defined by its actual effects. For instance, if a knife had a soul, the act of cutting would be that soul, because 'cutting' is part of the essence of what it is to be a knife. More precisely, the soul is the "first activity" of a living body. This is a state, or a potential for actual, or 'second', activity. "The axe has an edge for cutting" was, for Aristotle, analogous to "humans have bodies for rational activity," and the potential for rational activity thus constituted the essence of a human soul. He states: "Soul is an actuality or formulable essence of something that possesses a potentiality of being besouled",<ref>''[[Philosophy:On the Soul|De Anima]]'' 414a27</ref><ref name=":1">{{cite journal|url=https://web.stanford.edu/~mvr2j/ucsccourse/soulolshewsky.pdf|title=On the Relations of Soul to Body in Plato and Aristotle|last=Olshewsky|first=Thomas M.|date=1976|journal=Journal of the History of Philosophy|volume=14|pages=391–404|number=4|doi=10.1353/hph.2008.0163|s2cid=170184114}}</ref> and also "When mind is set free from its present conditions it appears as just what it is and nothing more: this alone is immortal and eternal".<ref>''[[Philosophy:On the Soul|De Anima]]'', III, 5, 430a22</ref> Aristotle used his concept of the soul in many of his works; his main work on the subject is ''De Anima'' (On the Soul).<ref>{{cite journal|title=Aristotle's Psychology|url=https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2016/entries/aristotle-psychology/|publisher=Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University|journal=Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Archive|date=2016|first=Christopher|last=Shields|editor-first=Edward N.|editor-last=Zalta}}</ref><ref name=":1" />

Aristotle also believed that there were four sections of the soul: the calculative and scientific parts on the rational side used for making decisions, and the desiderative and vegetative parts on the irrational side responsible for identifying our needs. A division of the soul's functions and activities is also found in [[Philosophy:Plato's tripartite theory of soul|Plato's tripartite theory]]. The problem of one in many is also remembered by Aristotle, nonetheless:<blockquote>If then the soul is of its very nature divisible, what holds it together? Not the body, certainly: much rather the contrary seems to be true, that the soul holds the body together; for when it departs, the body expires and decomposes. If there is some other thing which makes it one, this other is rather the soul. One would then have to ask, concerning this other, whether it be one or of many parts. If it is one, why not call it the soul straightway? But if it is divisible, reason again demands, what it is that holds this together? And so on ''ad infinitum''.<ref>''[[Philosophy:On the Soul|De Anima]]'' I, 5</ref></blockquote>

=== Self independent of the senses ===
{{main|Religion:Avicennism}}
While he was imprisoned in a castle, [[Biography:Avicenna|Avicenna]] wrote his famous "[[Philosophy:Floating man|floating man]]" [[Thought experiment|thought experiment]] to demonstrate human [[Philosophy:Self-awareness|self-awareness]] and the substantiality of the [[Philosophy:Soul|soul]]. His thought experiment tells its readers to imagine themselves suspended in the air, isolated from all sensations, which includes no [[Philosophy:Sense|sensory]] contact with even their own bodies. He argues that, in this scenario, one would still have [[Philosophy:Self-consciousness|self-consciousness]]. He thus concludes that the idea of the self is not dependent on any physical [[Philosophy:Object|thing]], and that the soul should not be seen in [[Philosophy:Relative term|relative term]]s, but as a primary given, a [[Philosophy:Substance theory|substance]]. This argument was later refined and simplified by [[Biography:René Descartes|René Descartes]] in epistemic terms when he stated: "I can abstract from the supposition of all external things, but not from the supposition of my own consciousness."<ref>Seyyed [[Biography:Hossein Nasr|Hossein Nasr]] and Oliver Leaman (1996), ''History of Islamic Philosophy'', p. 315, [[Company:Routledge|Routledge]], {{ISBN|0-415-13159-6}}.</ref>

=== Bundle theory of self ===
{{Further information|Philosophy:Bundle theory}}
[[Biography:David Hume|David Hume]] pointed out that we tend to think that we are the same person we were five years ago. Although we have changed in many respects, the same person appears present as was present then. We might start thinking about which features can be changed without changing the underlying self. Hume, however, denies that there is a distinction between the various features of a person and the mysterious self that supposedly bears those features. When we start introspecting, "we are never intimately conscious of anything but a particular perception; man is a bundle or collection of different perceptions which succeed one another with an inconceivable rapidity and are in perpetual flux and movement".<ref>{{cite book|last=Hume|first=David|title=A Treatise of Human Nature|title-link=A Treatise of Human Nature}} I, IV, vi</ref>

<blockquote>It is plain, that in the course of our thinking, and in the constant revolution of our ideas, our imagination runs easily from one idea to any other that resembles it, and that this quality alone is to the fancy a sufficient bond and association. It is likewise evident that as the senses, in changing their objects, are necessitated to change them regularly, and take them as they lie contiguous to each other, the imagination must by long custom acquire the same method of thinking, and run along the parts of space and time in conceiving its objects."<ref>{{cite book|last=Hume|first=David|title=A Treatise of Human Nature|title-link=A Treatise of Human Nature}} 4.1, 2</ref></blockquote>

In Hume's view, these perceptions do not belong to anything. Rather, Hume compares the soul to a commonwealth, which retains its identity not by virtue of some enduring core substance, but by being composed of many different, related, and yet constantly changing elements. The question of [[Philosophy:Personal identity|personal identity]] then becomes a matter of characterizing the loose cohesion of one's personal experience. (Note that in the Appendix to the ''Treatise'', Hume said without elaboration that he was dissatisfied with his account of the self, yet he never returned to the issue.)

The paradox of the [[Ship of Theseus]] can be used as an analogy of the self as a bundle of parts in flux.

=== Self as a narrative center of gravity ===
[[Biography:Daniel Dennett|Daniel Dennett]] has a deflationary theory of the "self". Selves are not physically detectable. Instead, they are a kind of [[Philosophy:Fictionalism|convenient fiction]], like a center of gravity, which is convenient as a way of solving physics problems, although they need not correspond to anything tangible — the center of gravity of a hoop is a point in thin air. People constantly tell themselves stories to make sense of their world, and they feature in the stories as a character, and that convenient but fictional character is the self.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://cogprints.org/266/1/selfctr.htm|title=The Self as a Center of Narrative Gravity|last=Dennett|first=Daniel|year=1986|access-date=2015-09-02}}</ref>

=== Self as merely syntactic ===
[[Biography:Aaron Sloman|Aaron Sloman]] has proposed that words like ''self'', ''selves'', ''herself'', ''itself'', ''themselves'', ''myself'', etc. do not refer to a special type of entity, but provide powerful syntactical mechanisms for constructing utterances that repeatedly refer to the same thing without tedious and obscure repetition of names or other referring expressions.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.cs.bham.ac.uk/research/projects/cogaff/misc/the-self.html|title='The Self' -- A bogus concept? Yes and no!|last=Sloman|first=Aaron|publisher=School of Computer Science, University of Birmingham, UK|access-date=2019-06-16}}</ref>

== Self in Eastern spirituality and philosophy ==
The spiritual goal of many [[Philosophy:Tradition|tradition]]s involves the [[Philosophy:Ego death#View of spiritual traditions|dissolving of the ego]], in contrast to the essential Self,<ref>Cottingham, Jenny. ''[https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/60b7/0a787bc77122ac7d975af8eb36f13ac7ea9c.pdf From the self to the Self: an exploration of the process of Self-realisation in the context of Indian psychology]''. Auckland, New Zealand: Auckland University of Technology. 2015.</ref> allowing self-knowledge of one's own true nature to become experienced and enacted in the world. This is variously known as [[Philosophy:Enlightenment in Buddhism|enlightenment]], [[Philosophy:Nirvana|nirvana]], presence, and the "here and now".{{citation needed|date=November 2020}}

=== Buddhism ===
{{main|Philosophy:Anatta}}
Hume's position is similar to Indian Buddhists’ theories and debates about the self, which generally considers a bundle theory to describe the mind phenomena grouped in [[Philosophy:Skandha|aggregates]] (''skandhas''), such as [[Perception|sense-perceptions]], intellective discrimination (''[[Philosophy:Saṃjñā|saṃjñā]]''), [[Philosophy:Emotion|emotion]]s and [[Philosophy:Volition (psychology)|volition]]. Since the beginning of [[Philosophy:Buddhist philosophy|Buddhist philosophy]], several schools of interpretation assumed that a self cannot be identified with the transient aggregates, as they are non-self, but some traditions questioned further whether there can be an unchanging ground which defines a real and permanent individual identity, sustaining the [[Philosophy:Impermanence#Buddhism|impermanent]] phenomena; concepts such as [[Philosophy:Buddha-nature|Buddha-nature]] are found in the [[Philosophy:Mahayana|Mahayana]] lineage, and of an [[Philosophy:Reality in Buddhism|ultimate reality]] in [[Philosophy:Dzogchen|dzogchen]] tradition, for instance in Dolpopa<ref>Schaeffer, Kurtis R.; Kapstein, Matthew T.; Tuttle, Gray (2013-03-26). ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=VmkMBcsXxdkC&pg=PA410 Sources of Tibetan Tradition]''. Columbia University Press. {{ISBN|9780231509787}}. p. 410</ref> and Longchenpa.<ref>Germano, David Francis. Poetic thought, the intelligent Universe, and the mystery of self: The Tantric synthesis of rDzogs Chen in fourteenth century Tibet. Madison: The University of Wisconsin. 1992.</ref> Although Buddhists criticize the immutable [[Philosophy:Ātman (Hinduism)|ātman]] of [[Religion:Hinduism|Hinduism]], some Buddhist schools problematized the notion of an individual personhood; even among early ones, such as the Pudgala view, it was approached implicitly in questions such as "who is the bearer of the bundle?", "what carries the aggregates?",  "what transmigrates from one rebirth to another?" or "what is the subject of self-improvement and enlightenment?".<ref>Priestley, Leonard C. D. C. (1999) [https://web.archive.org/web/20150316083317/http://ahandfulofleaves.org/documents/Pudgalavada%20Buddhism_Priestely.pdf ''Pudgalavada Buddhism'': The Reality of the Indeterminate Self]. South Asian Studies Papers, 12, monograph 1. University of Toronto: Centre for South Asian Studies.</ref>

The [[Biography:Gautama Buddha|Buddha]] in particular attacked all attempts to conceive of a fixed self, while stating that holding the view "I have no self" is also mistaken. This is an example of the [[Philosophy:Middle Way|Middle Way]] charted by the Buddha and the [[Philosophy:Madhyamaka|Madhyamaka]] school of Buddhism. That absence of a self definition is directed to avoid [[Philosophy:Upādāna|clinging]] to the "I", seek [[Philosophy:Reality|reality]] and attain [[Philosophy:Detachment|detachment]],<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Shiah|first=Yung-Jong|date=2016-02-04|title=From Self to Nonself: The Nonself Theory|journal=Frontiers in Psychology|volume=7|pages=124|doi=10.3389/fpsyg.2016.00124|issn=1664-1078|pmc=4740732|pmid=26869984|doi-access=free}}</ref> and it is found in many passages of the oldest [[Religion:Buddhist texts|Buddha sutras]], recorded in the Pali Canon, such as this:<blockquote>"Bhikkhus, form is not-self. Were form self, then this form would not lead to affliction, and one could have it of form: 'Let my form be thus, let my form be not thus.' And since form is not-self, so it leads to affliction, and none can have it of form: 'Let my form be thus, let my form be not thus.'... Bhikkhus, feeling is not-self... Bhikkhus, perception is not-self... Bhikkhus, determinations are not-self... Bhikkhus, consciousness ([[Philosophy:Vijñāna|vijñāna]]) is not self.... is form permanent or impermanent?..."<ref>Anatta-lakkhana Sutta (Pali Canon). [https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn22/sn22.059.nymo.html Translation by Ñanamoli Thera] (1993).</ref></blockquote>

== Self-knowledge ==
{{Main|Philosophy:Self-knowledge (psychology)|Philosophy:Self-knowledge (Vedanta)}}
Both Western and [[Place:Eastern world|Eastern civilization]]s have been occupied with self-knowledge and underscored its importance particularly citing the paradoxical combination of immediate availability and profound obscurity involved in its pursuit.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Self Knowledge in Thomas Aquinas: The Angelic Doctor on the Soul's Knowledge of Itself|last=Lambert|first=Richard|publisher=Author House|year=2007|isbn=9781420889659|location=Bloomington, IN|pages=1}}</ref> For [[Biography:Socrates|Socrates]], the goal of philosophy was to "[[Philosophy:Know thyself|know thyself]]". Lao Tzu, in his ''[[Philosophy:Tao Te Ching|Tao Te Ching]]'', says "Knowing others is wisdom. Knowing the self is enlightenment. Mastering others requires force. Mastering the self requires strength."<ref>{{cite book|last=Laozi|first=Lao Tsu|title=Tao Te Ching|isbn=978-0-679-72434-6|publisher=Vintage Books|year=1989|pages=35}}</ref> The case is the same for the seers of [[Religion:Upanishads|Upanishads]], who maintained that the ultimate real knowledge involves an understanding of the essence of the self and the nature of God.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Hinduism: Analytical Study|last1=Mohapatra|first1=Amulya|last2=Mohapatra|first2=Bijaya|publisher=Mittal Publications|year=1993|isbn=8170993881|location=New Delhi|pages=8}}</ref> Adi Shankaracharya, in his commentary on [[Religion:Bhagavad Gita|Bhagavad Gita]] says "[[Philosophy:Self-knowledge (Vedanta)|Self-knowledge]] alone eradicates misery".<ref>{{cite book|last=Alladi|first=Mahadeva Sastry|title=The Bhagavad Gita with the commentary of Sri Sankaracharya|publisher=Samata Books|year=1992|page=22}}</ref> "Self-knowledge alone is the means to the highest bliss."<ref>{{cite book|last=Alladi|first=Mahadeva Sastry|title=The Bhagavad Gita with the commentary of Sri Sankaracharya|publisher=Samata Books|year=1992|page=500}}</ref> Absolute perfection is the consummation of Self-knowledge."<ref>{{cite book|last=Alladi|first=Mahadeva Sastry|title=The Bhagavad Gita with the commentary of Sri Sankaracharya|publisher=Samata Books|year=1992|page=484}}</ref>

A theory about self-knowledge describes the concept as the capacity to detect that the sensations, thoughts, mental states, and attitudes as one's own.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|title=Self-Knowledge|last=Gertler|first=Brie|publisher=Routledge|year=2011|isbn=978-0203835678|location=Oxon|pages=9}}</ref> It is linked to other concepts such as [[Philosophy:Self-awareness|self-awareness]] and self-conception. The rationalist theory, which [[Biography:Immanuel Kant|Immanuel Kant]] has inspired, also claims that our ability to achieve self-knowledge through rational reflection is partly derived from the fact that we view ourselves as [[Rational agent|rational agent]]s.<ref name=":0" /> This school rejects that self-knowledge is merely derived from [[Observation|observation]] as it acknowledges the subject as authoritative on account of his ability as an agent to shape his own states.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Kant and the Problem of Self-Knowledge|last=Gorgione|first=Luca|publisher=Routledge|year=2018|isbn=9781138385467|location=New York}}</ref>

==See also==
{{main|Philosophy:Outline of self}}
{{div col|colwidth=20em}}
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Ātman (Buddhism)}}
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Being and Time}}
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Centered world}}
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Gnosis}}
* [[Biography:John Locke#The self|John Locke's view of the self]]
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Mirror stage}}
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Open individualism}}
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Other}}
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Personal horizon}}
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Psychology of self}}
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Religious views on the self}}
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Self-realization}}
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Self-schema}}
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Subject}}
* {{annotated link|Philosophy:Vertiginous question}}
{{Div col end}}

==Notes==
{{Reflist}}

==References==
* {{cite SEP |url-id=self-knowledge |title=Self-knowledge}}
* Carsten Korfmacher, [http://www.iep.utm.edu/p/person-i.htm 'Personal Identity'], in "The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy"

{{Navboxes
|list=
{{Philosophy topics}}
{{metaphysics}}
{{philosophy of mind}}
}}


[[Category:Self|*]]
[[Category:Conceptions of self|Philosophical]]
[[Category:Concepts in metaphysics]]

{{Sourceattribution|Philosophy of self}}