Defining the Self – Philosophical Perspectives

Introduction

  • Common answers to “Who are you?” rely on external labels (name, origin, parents, accent, physical traits).
  • Re-phrasing the query to “Who am I?” forces inward reflection and self-examination.
  • Course goal: equip students, through the social sciences, to address existential questions:
    • Who am I?
    • What is the essence of my being?
    • What makes me, me?
  • Intellectual courage is required to confront potentially daunting self-reflections.

Lesson 1 – What is Philosophy?

  • Etymology: philos = love, sophia = wisdom.
  • Seeks answers to fundamental questions of existence, knowledge, truth, morality, and human nature by means of rational/​logical thinking (Alata et al., 2018).
  • Serves as a platform for personal insight; it does not supply “final” answers but trains the mind to question and investigate.
  • “Mother of all sciences” because many disciplines branched from it, yet it is not a natural science (does not use the scientific method).
  • Views of the self differ by school:
    • Dualism (body ≠ soul)
    • Cosmic component
    • Aggregate of sensations
    • Product of environmental experience
  • Student task: evaluate which philosophy resonates personally and articulate a personal philosophy of the self.

Lesson 2 – Ancient Philosophy

Overview

  • “Ancient philosophy” refers chiefly to Greek thought before the fall of Rome, but can include Chinese, Indian, Iranian traditions.
  • Strongly intertwined with religion; offers broad, comprehensive world-views.

2.1 Socrates and Plato

Socrates (470–399 BCE)
  • The “wandering philosopher”; practiced public questioning (Socratic Method).
  • Claimed superior wisdom because he knew that he did not know.
  • Ignorance = claiming to possess knowledge one lacks.
  • Popular with youth, despised by authorities; executed by hemlock for “corrupting” the young.
  • View of the self:
    • Composed of two parts:
    1. Tangible, mortal, ever-changing body.
    2. Immortal soul.
    • Humans are innately good; evil stems from ignorance of one’s true nature.
    • Path to self-knowledge: introspection (self-examination of actions, thoughts, perceptions).
    • Self-awareness ⇒ recognition of strengths/weaknesses ⇒ alignment of actions with innate goodness.
Plato (427–347 BCE)
  • Accepted body–soul dualism.
  • Theory of Forms:
    • Physical world (world of senses) is imperfect and changing.
    • Non-physical realm (world of ideas/Forms) contains perfect, eternal archetypes.
    • All earthly entities participate in their perfect Form.
  • Epistemology of recollection:
    • Soul existed in the realm of Forms before embodiment.
    • Birth leads to “forgetting” perfect knowledge; learning = remembering.
  • Tripartite soul (each part must be harmonised):
    • Appetite\text{Appetite} – hunger, thirst, sexual desire.
    • Spirit / Will\text{Spirit / Will} – passion, anger, ambition.
    • Reason\text{Reason} – judgment, wisdom, grasp of eternal truths.
  • Reason must rule; only then can harmony and genuine self-knowledge arise.

2.2 St. Augustine (354–430 CE) – Medieval Synthesis

  • Historical backdrop: “Dark Ages,” Church dominance, suppression of Greek texts.
  • As bishop, Augustine encountered Plato’s works; saw them as a bridge between faith and reason.
  • Re-interpreted Plato’s dualism:
    • Material world & body = mutable, destined to perish.
    • Soul = immutable, eternal, pre-existent in God’s mind.
  • “World of Forms” ≈ the Divine Mind; thus God is the only source of truth and genuine self-knowledge.
  • Therefore: Seek God first to understand the self; philosophy and faith are complementary.

Lesson 3 – Modern Philosophy (Age of Enlightenment)

  • Period prized reason, individual inquiry, encyclopedic knowledge; resisted superstition and authoritarian religion.

3.1 Rene Descartes (1596–1650) – Rationalist

  • Employed methodic doubt: reject any belief that can be doubted.
  • Argument for God:
    • Humans (imperfect) possess the idea of perfection.
    • An imperfect being cannot originate the concept of perfection ⇒ source must be external ⇒ God.
  • Argument for self (cogito):
    • Even if all sensory experience is deceptive, doubting itself is undeniable ⇒ thinking exists ⇒ “Cogito, ergo sum” (I think, therefore I am\text{I think, therefore I am}).
  • Dualism: mind (= thinking substance, governed by reason) and body (= extended substance, governed by physical laws) are distinct but interact.

3.2 British Empiricists: Locke, Hume, Kant

Empiricist core: Knowledge must be verifiable by sensory experience.
John Locke (1632–1704)
  • Mind at birth = tabula rasa (blank slate).
  • All ideas arise from sensation and reflection on experience.
  • Self = continuity of memory across space and time; spread throughout the bodily entity, not confined to a single faculty.
David Hume (1711–1776)
  • Radical empiricism; skeptical/nihilistic about enduring self.
  • “Self” = bundle of perceptions in rapid, perpetual flux; no fixed entity.
  • Memory only preserves images; therefore, across moments we would have ∞\infty transient selves.
  • Analogy: a film strip appears continuous movement though comprised of discrete frames.
Immanuel Kant (1724–1804)
  • Found Locke & Hume unsatisfactory.
  • Experience is continuous, not disjointed.
  • Mind contains innate a priori categories that organise sense data (e.g., space, time, causality).
  • Self = transcendental unifying principle that synthesises sensations into intelligible experience; it is the subject of cognition rather than an object inside consciousness.

3.3 Physicalists: Gilbert Ryle & Paul Churchland

Gilbert Ryle (1900–1976)
  • Rejects “ghost in the machine” dualism; focuses on observable, measurable phenomena.
  • Self = disposition / pattern of behaviour displayed in given circumstances.
  • Inner entities (soul, consciousness) unnecessary for explanation.
Paul Churchland (b. 1942)
  • Eliminative materialism: only matter exists; anything non-empirical is fictional.
  • Self is the brain; personality & identity emerge from neuro-chemical processes.
  • Entities not directly accessible to the senses (e.g., soul) are inadmissible in ontology.

Lesson 4 – Contemporary Philosophy

  • Moves beyond the mind-body debate; emphasises lived experience, free will, personal meaning.
  • Rejects predetermined essence; existence precedes essence (you author your essence).
  • Life is intrinsically meaningless until the individual assigns meaning through choices.

4.1 Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908–1961) – Phenomenologist

  • Mind and body are intertwined, not competitors.
  • Knowledge comes from direct, lived experience; phenomenology studies such experience.
  • Self = totality of past & present experiences, emotions, thoughts, behaviours.
  • Identity is constructed by perceiving and interpreting one’s own experiences.

Assessment Overview (for reference)

  • Part I: 10 True/False items covering definitions, introspection, dualism, empiricism, physicalism, existentialism.
  • Part II: Matrix task – choose 22 philosophers, state their key idea of the self, and reflect on their guidance for university life & future profession.

Cross-Lecture Connections & Implications

  • Ethical consequence of self-knowledge (Socrates, Plato): knowing the good ⇒ doing the good.
  • Faith–Reason synthesis (Augustine) anticipates later debates on science vs. religion.
  • Scientific method vs. philosophy: Physicalists echo contemporary psychology & neuroscience.
  • Existential freedom (contemporary thought) underpins modern therapies (logotherapy, CBT) stressing meaning-making.
  • Educational relevance: recognising diverse conceptions of self informs pedagogy, counselling, and personal development programs.

Key Terms & Concepts (quick recall list)

  • Introspection\text{Introspection} – inward examination of mental states.
  • Theory of Forms\text{Theory of Forms} – Platonic realm of perfect archetypes.
  • Tabula rasa\text{Tabula rasa} – blank slate mind at birth (Locke).
  • Bundle theory\text{Bundle theory} – self as fleeting perceptions (Hume).
  • A priori categories\text{A priori categories} – innate organising principles (Kant).
  • Behaviorism\text{Behaviorism} – study of observable behaviour (Ryle).
  • Eliminative materialism\text{Eliminative materialism} – rejection of non-physical mental entities (Churchland).
  • Phenomenology\text{Phenomenology} – philosophical study of structures of experience (Merleau-Ponty).

Practical Study Tips

  • Use Socratic questioning on yourself: “What do I actually know about X?”
  • Apply Descartes’ doubt to filter unsupported beliefs.
  • Keep an experience journal (Locke, Kant, Merleau-Ponty) to observe how memory and perception shape identity.
  • Practice behavioral self-observation (Ryle) to notice habit patterns.
  • Engage in interdisciplinary reading (physics, neuroscience, theology) to appreciate the physicalist vs. dualist debate.