philosophical perspectives on the Self

Self

A person's essential being that distinguishes from others

Belief

Acknowledgement that a statement is true or something exists

Concerns

worries / anxieties

Socrates

"Know Thyself" Body and Soul ; body is imperfect and impermanent soul is perfect and permanent

Plato

Believes in Mind and Soul ; Humans are not self sufficient ; needs other people and benefit from social interactions

Plato's 3 parts of the Soul

Rational, Spirited, and Appetitive

Rational

reason and intellect

Spirited

emotion and passion

Appetitive

basic needs : hunger, thirst, sexual

Aristotle

"Soul is the essence of the self" body and soul are one thing

Aristotle's 3 kinds of soul

Vegetative, Sentient, Rational

Vegetative Soul

includes the physical body that can grow

Sentient Soul

sensual desires, feelings, emotions

Rational Soul

what makes a man human

St. Augustine of Hippo

integrates the idea of Plato and Christianity ; Soul is united with the body so the man may be entire and complete "I am doubting, therefore I am"

Rene Descartes

Cogito ergo sum "I think, therefore I am"

Cognito

the thing that thinks (The Mind)

Extensa

the extension (The Body)

John Locke

the self is consciousness ; the human mind at birth is tabula rasa or "Blank State"

Consciousness

necessary to have a coherent personal identity or knowledge of the self as a person

David Hume

self is simply a bundle or collection of different perceptions, which succeed each other with an inconceivable rapidly in a perpetual flux and movement ; there is no fixed self

Immanuel Kant

We construct the self ; self is not just what gives one personality but also the seat of knowledge acquisition for all human persons

Gilbert Ryle

Self is not an entity one can locate and analyze but simply the convenient name that people use to refer to behaviors that people make ; "I act therefore, I am"

Paul Churchland

self is inseparable from the brain and the physiology of the body ; all we have is the brain and so, if the brain is gone, there is no self ; The Self is the Brain

Maurice Merleau-Ponty

The Self is Embodied ; the self can never be truly objectified or known in a completely objective