The Self from the Perspective of Philosophy

Vocabulary terms and definitions regarding the philosophical perspectives of the self, covering key thinkers and conceptual frameworks from the lecture notes.

Philosophy of Self

The study of the many conditions of identity that make one subject of experience distinct from other experiences.

Self

A unified being essentially connected to consciousness, awareness, and agency; it is something a person perennially molds, shapes, and develops.

External Self

Made up of ourselves and the physical world where the representation of objects occurs.

St. Augustine

An important figure in Western Christianity whose philosophy brings together Greek wisdom and divine truths from scripture, viewing God as the absolute and immutable creator.

David Hume

A philosopher who rejects the notion of identity over time, claiming there are no 'persons' that continue to exist, only a 'bundle of impression'.

Aristotle

A philosopher who contributed to symbolic logic and scientific thinking, asserting that happiness is the central purpose of human life and a goal in itself.

Internal Self

Composed of psychological states and informed decisions, involving remembering our own state and combining new and old ideas within the mind.

Rene Descartes

Known as the Father of Modern Philosophy, he defined the self as a subject that thinks and famously stated, 'Dubito ergo cogito, cogito ergo sum' (I doubt therefore I think, I think therefore I am).

Gilbert Ryle

A philosopher who rejected the theory that mental states are separable from physical states and proposed the form of Philosophical Behaviorism.

Philosophical Behaviorism

The belief that all mental phenomena can be explained by reference to publicly observable behavior.

Maurice Merleau-Ponty

A philosopher associated with existentialism who argued that consciousness, the world, and the human body are intertwined and that we know the self through experience.

Dualism

The concept that man has a dual nature, composed of body and soul.

Philosophy

A discipline whose basic role is to ask questions and think about the nature of human thought and the universe.

Natural Philosophy

A term used by philosophers like Aristotle for what we would now call science, considered the best way to gain knowledge.