• = It is the study of acquiring knowledge through rational thinking and inquiries that involves in answering questions regarding the nature and existence of man and the world we live in.

• Pythagoras – the first person to use the term philosophy.

PHILOSOPHY

• Comes from the Greek words, “philo” which means love and “sophos” means wisdom

• It means love for wisdom, an active pursuit of wisdom

• A human search for meaning in life

The Self in the Greek Philosophy

1. Socrates

➢ “Know thyself ”

➢ “An unexamined life is not worth living”

➢ Socrates was concerned with the problem of the self.

➢ Dualistic - every man composed of body and soul.

▪ Body

 Imperfect

 Impermanent

▪ Soul

 Perfect

 Permanent

• Based on the rationalistic philosophy

• Happiness without morality is impossible.

• The concept of virtue and knowledge is the core of Socratic ethics

• Virtue- the deepest and most basic propensity of man. Some virtue is innate in the mind and self-knowledge is the source of all wisdom, an individual may gain possession of oneself and be one’s own master through knowledge

• How the self can love a morally good life?

First, the self must focus on improving the quality of the soul or moral life instead of indulging in the chase of material things, fame and prestige.

Second, the improvement of the souls can be achieved through the quest for wisdom and truth.

Third, life must be ceaselessly examined for it to be worth living.

2. Plato

- a student of Socrates

- the “soul is immortal”

- philosophy of the self can be explained as a process of self-knowledge and purification of the soul.

- he believed in the existence of the mind and soul.

- mind and soul is given in perfection with God.

Self as a rational substance consisting of body and soul

• According to him, the mind or soul is distinct in its own right and is God given.

• The soul has three parts – The head (exerts reason), the heart (for noble impulses) and the diaphragm (seat of our own passions)

DOMINANCE

o REASON –pursuit of knowledge

o SPIRITED – success and public acclaim

o BODY – money and material gains

Living a morally good life consists of not only knowing or having knowledge but includes maintaining the harmony or balance between the rational element (head) and the irrational ones (heart and body).

The Self in the Medieval Philosophy

St. Augustine (354-430AD)

• One of the two great thinkers of the medieval period whose works to some extent were influenced by Plato’s philosophy

• He contemplated that the self is a tripartite being.

• According to him, self is composed of body, soul and spirit.

• Body – the outer part of the self through which the self can come in contact with the world

• Soul – the inner part which is composed of the mind, the emotions and will

• Spirit – the innermost part or the core self

• The self is secondary concern.

• Faith is fundamental so human reason is meant to

strengthen the faith.

The Self in Modern Philosophy

Rene Descartes (1596-1650) “I think, therefore I am”

• French philosopher who is usually considered the “father of modern philosophy”

• Man is a finite substance composed of two independent substances known as “Cartesian dualism” mind and body

• But what then am I? A thing which thinks. What is a thing which thinks? It is a thing which doubts, understands, affirms, denies, wills, refuses, which also imagines and feels

•Descartes knows that he exists and continues to exist as long as he is a “thing that thinks”

•He stated that the mind and body are independent from each other and serve their own function.

•According to him, man must use his own mind and thinking abilities to investigate, analyze, experiment and develop himself

John Locke: Personal Identity

• Self-identity depends on our having the same consciousness and memories

• He distinguishes between a substance (the soul) and consciousness

• Memory provides an infallible link between what we might call different stages of a person

• John Locke is an English Philosopher and Physician

• He is considered to be the father of Classical liberalism some of his works on this subject matter paved the way to several revolutions to fight the absolute powers of monarchs and rulers of his time that led to the development of governance, politics and economic system.

• the human mind at birth is “Tabula Rasa” which means a blank slate.

David Hume (1711-1776) “The self is the bundle theory of mind”

• A British thinker who belonged to empiricism postulated that the concept of self, in order to be intelligible and meaningful, must be based on sense impressions.

"Causes and effects are discoverable not by reason, but by experience".

 Impressions, the experience of senses such as pain, pleasure, heat, cold, etc. which are “LIVELY” and “VIVID”.

 Ideas, refer to the recalled copies f the impressions. We see, feel taste things, then we remember what we have seen, felt, smelt and tasted.

 The SELF is a collection of different perception. (imagination and memory)

Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) “Respect for Self ”

• German philosopher, probably the greatest philosopher since Plato and Aristotle, who lived in a small town in East Prussia (Konigsburg)

• He said that human knowledge is composed of sensory component and rational component (prori –comes the mind itself and is dependent of sensation

Two kinds of self:

• Empirical self – pertains to a particular aspect of self that makes the self-unique (physical aspects, memories personality, history, culture)

• Transcendental self – the self is in activity or organizing principle that actively interpret, constructs and gives meaning to collections of sensory data

• a German Philosopher that is known for his works on Empiricism and Rationalism.

• “We construct the Self”

• Kant argued that the sense called “Transcendental Apperception” is an essence

of our consciousness that provides basis for understanding and establishing the notion of “self” by synthesizing one’s accumulation of experiences, intuition and imagination goes.

Morality is not the doctrine of how we may make ourselves happy, but how we may make ourselves worthy of happiness.

Immanuel Kant

Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)

• Advocated effort to uncover the hidden nature of self

• The self is composed of the unconscious self or id, the conscious self or ego, and the ideal self or

superego

• He wanted to restore a harmonious balance among parts of mind

Gilbert Ryle (1900-1976)

• He claimed that Descartes’ body-mind dualism created a category mistake which occurs when one category of something is presented as belonging to another category

• The category mistake takes place when the self is thought to be a pure mental entity that exists apart from certain observable behaviour

• The self must be comprehended as a pattern of behaviour or the tendency of an individual to behave in a certain way in particular situations

Maurice Merlaeu-Ponty (1908-1961)

• According to him, there is an intimate and inseparable unity between the self and the body.

• The self is the body, and the body is the self itself

• The self for him is an embodied subjectivity or the body-subject

• The body plays a vital role in perception, knowledge and meaning

The Psychological View of Self

Psychology

• Came from Greek words “psyche” and “logos”, which literally means “soul” and “mind study”

• Scientific study of behavior and mental processes.

• As a science, it is concerned with how we develop our sense of self over the course of its development

Concepts related to self

➢Carl Rogers – a psychologist who is the proponent of Self theory

➢Self – is made up of many self- perceptions,abilities and personality characteristics that are organized and consistent with one another

➢Self-concept or self identity - refers to the global understanding a thinking being has of him or herself.

Two Kinds of Selves

1. Real self – the image or picture of the self based on a person’s actual experiences and represents how he/she really or actually sees himself/herself

2. Ideal self – is based on one’s hopes and wishes which reflects to see himself/herself.

Real self and Ideal self

• Individuals may engage in fusion in their relationships

• This means that they become very attached to roles they paly in a relationship, they have few firmly held beliefs, they are more likely to be compliant and seek approval before making necessary decisions

Psychoanalytic View of Self

• Formulated by Sigmund Freud

• Psychoanalysis: Freud’s Theory of Personality

• Freud’s theory suggest that personality is composed of

the id the id, the ego the ego, and the superego the

superego.

1. ID: the unorganized, inborn part of personality whose purpose is to immediately reduce tensions relating to hunger, sex, aggression, and other primitive impulses.

2. EGO: restrains instinctual energy in order to maintain the safety of the individual and to help the person to be a member of society.

3. SUPEREGO: the rights and wrongs of society and consists of the conscience and the ego-ideal.

•Oral stage ( 0-1 year)

1. Oral region (erogenous zone)

2. Infants derive much pleasure in sucking activities such as sucking fingers,toes and nipples

3. If not satisfied with this stage, needs may continue to resurface at a later period in life in such forms as eating or smoking

•Anal stage (2-3 years)

1. Emphasis on toilet trainings

2. Over attention or lack of attention to children’s toilet training may cause problems associated with fixation of development at this stage: Compulsive need to be clean and orderly, Frugality and Greed

3. Obstinate insistence on doing things at one’s own rate even at the expense of one’s patience, time, excessive massiveness and disorderly habits

•Phallic Stage (4-6 years)

1. Genital region (erogenous zone)

2. Derive pleasure from activities associated with striking and manipulating their sex organs

3. Oedipus complex – boys experience rivalry with their father for their mothers attention and affection

4. Electra complex – girls experience a similar crisis at this time of life. Girl sees her mother as rival for her father’s attention but fear for mother is less

•Latency Stage (6-12 years)

1. Calm and stable period

2. Disturbing and conflicting feelings of children are buried in the subconscious mind

3. Energies are absorbed by school learning, peer relations, sports and other recreational activities

•Genital stage (13 years onwards)

1. Starts with onset of puberty

2. Oedipal feelings are reactivated and directed toward other persons of the opposite sex

Psychosocial theory of development

• Formulated by Erik Erickson

• According to him, for each stage of development, some kind of psychosocial crisis is likely to occur

• First five stages occur during childhood and adolescent years while the last three stages occur during adulthood

•Stage 1 (0-2 years) – Trust vs. Mistrust

1. Child learns either trust or mistrust

2. If mother or the substitute mother is consistently affectionate and loving, the infant develops feeling of security and trust. Child becomes open to new experiences

3. If the mother is cold, inattentive and rejecting, abusive or inconsistent in discipline, the infant becomes insecure and distrustful. Child becomes close to new experience

•Stage 2 (2-3 years) – Autonomy vs. Doubt

1. Child learns to walk, talk and use his hands

2. Child begins to make choices and express his will

3. If encouraged, he develops a sense of autonomy and independence

4. If unwanted, child may develop a sense of doubt and shame manifested in feelings of worthlessness and incompetence feeling

•Stage 3 (3-6 years) – Initiative vs. guilt

1. Child begin to explore his social and physical worlds discovering what he can accomplish

2. Child begins to identify with appropriate adult sex role and imitate aspects of the adult’s behavior

3. However, if punished for attempts to establish initiative behavior, he may develop a sense of guilt. He may adopt a passive pattern of behavior that will guide his future behavior

Stage 4 (6-12 years) Industry vs. Inferiority

• Technical skills are learned and feelings of competence enlarged

• Child enters the new world of neighborhood and the school

• Striving to master great number of activities in order to win acceptance and prestige in their peer group

• If children come to believe that they cannot achieve according to their expectations or to the expectations of their school, family or peers, their sense of mastery will give way to personal inferiority

Stage 5 (13-19 years) Identity vs. identity confusion

• Identity-formation crisis

• “who I am and what can I do when I become adult?”

• When it becomes too difficult for adolescent to establish a clear picture of his self-identity, a sense of role confusion results

• Establishment of their ideal of who he is and what he can be as an adult, becomes prepared to move on to the 6th stage

Stage 6 (20-39 years) Intimacy vs. Isolation

➢Age of intimacy

➢Individual develop warm intimate relationship with another person

➢If sense of intimacy is not acquired during this time of life, a sense of isolation develops instead

Stage 7 (40-65 years) – Generatively vs. Self-Absorption

➢Productive years of adulthood

➢Individual’s productivity is gauzed by hiscontributions to his family and society

➢Person who fails to develop this sense of generativity becomes preoccupied with his personal needs and interest or both with sense of self absorption

Stage 8 (66 onwards) – Integrity vs. Despair

➢This is the fulfillment and culmination psychosocial development of the previous stages

➢This is the achievement of a sense integrity resulting from identification with mankind

➢If a person develops an attitude of regret and fear of the end of life, then sense of despair emerges

Note