GNED 08 - UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

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DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES

UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

PART 1 – The Self from Various Perspectives

Learning Outcomes:
1. Discuss the different representations and conceptualizations of the self from various disciplinal
perspectives.
2. Compare and contrast how the self has been represented across different disciplines and
perspectives.
3. Examine the different influences, factors and forces that shape the self.
4. Demonstrate critical and reflective thought in analysing the development of one’s self and identity
by developing a theory of the self.

LESSON 1: FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF PHILOSOPHY

In man’s pursuit of knowledge and truth, thinkers for centuries have searched for explanations and
reasons for everything that exists around him. In Athens of Ancient Greece, approximately 600 BCE, marked
the birth of Philosophy as it influenced Western thought and still has until today. Questions centred on the
universe and what possible role man may play in it. The Greeks in search for knowledge came up with answers
that are both cognitive and scientific in nature (Price, 2000).
For instance, Greek philosophers in Miletus choose to seek natural explanations to events and
phenomena around him instead of seeking for natural explanations from the gods as what was passed down
through the generations. These philosophers observed changes in the world and wanted to explain these
changes by understanding the laws of nature. Their study of change led them to the idea of permanence (Price,
2000).
As these early philosophers laboured to search for explanations into how the world works through
understanding the elements, mathematics, heavenly bodies and even atoms, another group of philosophers
shifted their search and focused on man. They sought to understand the nature of human beings, problems of
morality and life philosophies. From trying to understand nature and the universe, questions now center on the
inner world of man, such as: Who am I? Why am I here? What do I want out of life? (Price, 2000).

 SOCRATES

Of the many ancient Greek philosophers, none can surpass the popularity of the ‘big three.’
These were Socrates, Plato and Aristotle. All three shared a philosophical academic bond. Socrates was
the mentor of Plato, and Plato was the mentor of Aristotle.
When philosophical thoughts shifted to the nature of human beings, Athens was the center of
Western thought. In the 5th century BCE, Athens enjoyed the status of being a city state and a
democracy. During these times, to become powerful, one must do it with words. Athenians settle
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arguments by discussion and debate. People skilled in doing this were called Sophists, the first teachers
of the West. Their arguments were usually about practical things and not with metaphysical
speculations. These debates led to the examination and critiquing of accepted standards of behaviour
within the society of Athens. Then came Socrates (470-399 BCE).
A stonemason with a sharp mind, Socrates wanted to discover the essential nature of knowledge,
justice, beauty and goodness (Moore and Bruder, 2002). However, Socrates did not write anything, he
was not a writer. A lot of his thoughts were only known through Plato’s writing. It was through Plato
where it was learned that Socrates was a brilliant debater and was idolized by many Athenians. This
angered the Sophists who brought him to trial, and where finally he was sentenced to death.
The Socratic Method – Socrates’ method for discovering what is essential in the world and in
people is what is known as the Socratic/dialectic method. This method involves the search for the
correct/proper definition of a thing. The result is a definition that cannot be refuted anymore by Socratic
reasoning. In this method, Socrates did not lecture, he instead would ask questions and engage the
person in a discussion. He would begin by acting as if he did not know anything and would get the
other person to clarify their ideas and resolve logical inconsistencies (Price, 2000).
In using this method, the questioner should be skilled at detecting misconceptions and at
revealing them by asking the right questions. The goal is to bring the person closer to the final
understanding.
“I cannot teach anybody anything. I can only make them think.”
Socrates’ influence was reflected in his famous statement which he fully lived by, ´the
unexamined life is not worth living.’ He believed that his mission in life was to seek the highest
knowledge and convince others who were willing to seek this knowledge with him. His Socratic method
allowed him to question people’s beliefs and ideas, exposing their misconceptions and get them to touch
their souls. The touching of the soul, may mean helping the person to get in touch with his true self.
The true self, Socrates said, is not the body but the soul. Virtue is inner goodness, and real beauty is
that of the soul.
When the Delphi Oracle named Socrates the wisest of all men, Socrates became confused. For
surely, there were others more knowledgeable than him. After much contemplation, he realized what
the oracle actually meant, i.e., people were ignorant of what knowledge is most important: how to live
right and how to make their soul good. Socrates knew the importance of this but was also aware of his
ignorance of it. He then realized why he was the wisest. It was because he was the only one who knew
that he did not know.
According to Socrates, real understanding comes from within the person. His Socratic method
forces people to use their innate reason by reaching inside themselves to their deepest nature. There
may be times when this method would not give answers. This may be expected but what is important
is the process made the person wiser than before.
The aim of Socratic method is to make people think, seek and ask again and again. Some may
be angered and frustrated, but what is important is for them to realize that they do not know everything,
that there are things that they are ignorant of, to accept this and to continue learning and searching for
answers (Moore and Bruder, 2002).

 PLATO

Aristocles (428-348 BCE) was born in Athens to one of Greece’s aristocratic families. He was
nicknamed Plato because of his physical built which means ‘wide/broad’. Plato left for Athens for 12
years after the death of Socrates. When he returned, he established a school known as ‘The Academy’.
Socrates left a strong influence on Plato. Both believed that philosophy is more than analyses but rather
is a way of life.
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Plato’s metaphysics (philosophical study on the causes and nature of things) is known as the
‘Theory of Forms’. Plato explained that Forms refers to what are real. They are not objects that are
encountered with the senses but can only be grasped intellectually. Plato’s forms have the following
characteristics:
1. The Forms are ageless and therefore eternal.
2. The Forms are unchanging and therefore permanent.
3. The Forms are unmoving and indivisible.

In connection with the Forms, Plato also introduced to the West the existence of two realms.
This is known as Plato’s Dualism:
1. The Realm of the Shadows is composed of changing, ‘sensible’ things which are lesser
entities and therefore imperfect and flawed.
2. The Realm of Forms is composed of eternal things which are permanent and perfect. It is
the source of all reality and true knowledge.

He believed that the knowledge lies within the person’s soul (Socrates’ dialectic method). He
considered human beings as microcosms of the universal macrocosm i.e. everything in the universe can
also be found in people – earth, air fire, water, mind and spirit (Price, 2000). Even if the materials of
the human body and the physical world are imperfect, humans have the immortal, rational soul which
Plato believed is created in the image of the divine. In his Republic, Plato described the soul as having
three components:
1. The Reason is rational and is the motivation are for goodness and truth.
2. The Spirited is non-rational and is the will or the drive toward action. This part of the soul
is initially neutral but can be influenced/pulled in two directions.
3. The Appetites are irrational and lean towards the desire for pleasures of the body.

Reason seeks the true goal of man which is to see things in their true nature. Usually, however,
the Spirited and the Appetites want worldly pleasures and can influence reason by making it believe
that sensual pleasures are the source of happiness.
Plato believed that people are intrinsically good. Sometimes, however judgments are made in
ignorance and Plato equates ignorance with evil (Price, 2000).

Plato’s Theory of Love and Becoming

Plato further illustrated his philosophy of the search for knowledge using the ‘Allegory of the
Cave’ – what people in the cave see are only shadows of reality which they believe are real things and
represents knowledge. What these people fail to realize is that the shadows are not real, for according
to Plato, ‘only the Forms are real.’
Once these people get out of the cave and into the light, what they will see are the Forms which
is what real knowledge is. In knowing the truth according to Plato, that person must become the truth.
The more the person knows, the more he is and the better he is. “To know for Plato is to be”.
But how can people get out of the cave and into the world of Forms? In Plato’s Symposium, he
postulated that love is the way by which a person can move from a state of imperfect knowledge and
ignorance to a state of perfection and true knowledge.
Love is the force that paves the way for all beings to ascend to higher stages of self-realization
and perfection. Plato’s love begins with a feeling or experience that there is something lacking. This
then drives the person to seek for that which is lacking. Thoughts and efforts are then directed towards
the pursuit of that which is lacking. The deeper the thought, the stronger is the love.
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For Plato, love is the way of knowing and realizing the truth. Love is a process of seeking higher
states of being. The greater the love, the more intellectual component it will contain. Lifelong longing
and pursuit seek even higher stages of love which lead to the possession of absolute beauty. It is this
pursuit that motivates man and transforms people and societies. To love the highest, is to become the
best.

 ST. AUGUSTINE OF HIPPO

Christianity’s influence dominated Western thought after the fall of the Hellenistic-Roman eras.
Christian philosophers of the medieval era were also theologians. Their concern was with God and
man’s relationship with God. These Christian philosophers did not believe that self-knowledge and
happiness were the ultimate goals of man but instead man should rely on God’s commands and his
judgment of what constitutes good and evil.
Plato and the other Greek philosophers see man as basically good and becomes evil through
ignorance of what is good. Christianity, on the other hand, sees man as sinners who reject/go against a
loving God’s commands. Thus Christian philosophy became so powerful that the church ordered
Plato’s Academy in Athens closed. Christian philosophers held faith supreme over reason and logic. A
question is raised then as to whether reason and logic could/should be used to understand Christian
truths.
St. Augustine of Hippo initially rejected Christianity for it seemed to him then that Christianity
could not provide him answers to questions that interested him. He wanted to know about moral evil
and why it existed in people, his personal desire for sensual pleasures and questions about all the
sufferings in the world.
After all his internal and worldly personal battles, Augustine became a priest and a bishop of
Hippo. His thoughts focused on two realms:
1. God as the source of all reality and truth. St. Augustine discovered through mystical
experience that man is capable of knowing eternal truths. This is made possible through the
existence of one eternal truth which is God. According to him without God as the source of
all the truth, man could never understand eternal truths. So God means that those who know
most about God will come closest to understanding the true nature of the world.
2. The sinfulness of man. According to St. Augustine, the cause of sin or evil is an act of
man’s freewill. Evil, therefore does not live in God’s creatures but rather in man. Moral
goodness can only be achieved through the grace of God.

The Role of Love

St. Augustine is in agreement with the Greeks that man searches for happiness. However, he
stated that real happiness can only be found in God. For God is love and he created humans for them
to also love. Problems arise because of the objects humans choose to love. Disordered love results when
man loves the wrong things which he believes will give him happiness. He explains:
1. Love of physical objects leads to the sin of greed.
2. Love for other people is not lasting and excessive love for them is the sin of jealousy.
3. Love for the self leads to the sin of pride.
4. Love for God is the supreme virtue and only through loving God can man find real
happiness.
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 RENE DESCARTES

Rene Descartes is known as the ‘Father of Modern Philosophy.” He introduced what is known
as the Cartesian method and invented analytic geometry. In his method, he asked himself ‘is there
anything I can know with certainty?’ In his search for answers, nothing satisfied him for he saw that
there were always differences in the facts, ideas, and opinions. In his search for an answer to his
question, he had three dreams. These dreams instructed him to construct a system of knowledge using
the power of human reason. Through math, he discovered that the human mind has two powers:
1. Intuition or the ability to apprehend direction of certain truths and,
2. Deduction or the power to discover what is known by progressing in an orderly way from
what is already known. Truths are arrived at using a step by step process.

Descartes believed that reasoning could produce absolute truths about nature, existence,
morality and God. The truths that can be discovered are a priori. Ideas discovered this way do not rely
on some experiences because they are innate in the human mind.
‘I think, therefore I am.’ (Cogito Ergo Sum) This phrase is Descartes’ legacy. This is also the
first principle of his philosophy. He believes that to doubt is to think. What is a thing that thinks? He
deduced that a thinker is a thing that doubts, understands, affirms, denies, wills, refuses and that also
imagines and feels. The cognitive aspect of human nature is his basis for existence of the self.
Descartes considered the soul/mind (also the self) as a substance that is separate from the body.
Based on this, he believed that all bodily processes are mechanical. The body, according to, is like a
machine that is controlled by the will and aided by the mind.

 JOHN LOCKE

Contrary to what Descartes proposed, Locke believed that knowledge results from ideas
produced a posteriori or by objects that were experienced. The process involves two forms; sensation
wherein objects are experienced through the senses and reflection by which the mind ‘looks’ at the
objects that were experienced to discover relationships that may exists between them. Locke contended
that ideas are not innate but rather the mind at birth is a ‘tabula rasa’.
Locke stated further that, “nothing exists in the mind that was not first in the senses.” What the
senses have experienced are simple ideas which are the raw materials from which knowledge begins.
Ideas can also be the result of reflection which demonstrates the power of thinking and volition or will.
Through these mental powers, simple ideas are repeated and compared to become complex ideas.
Since there are no innate ideas for Locke, morals, religious and political values must come from
sense experiences. Mental acts, for instance are acts that produce the ‘greatest possible good’ but
contended that knowing what is good does not necessarily mean that people will always do what is
good. Morality has to do with choosing or willing the good.
Moral good depends on conformity or non-conformity of a person’s behaviour towards some
law. There are three laws according to him:
1. Law of opinion – where actions that are praiseworthy are called virtues and those that are
not are called vice.
2. Civil Law – where right actions are enforced by people in authority (i.e., courts and police)
3. Divine Law – set by God on the actions of man. This is deemed to be the true law for human
behaviour. The divine law is eternally true and the one law that man should always follow.
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 DAVID HUME

At the time he was enrolled at the University of Edinburgh, he lost his faith. He became cynical
about almost everything except philosophy and general learning. After reading the philosophy of
Locke, ‘he never again entertained any belief in religion’.
Hume was credited for giving empiricism its clearest formulation. At the beginning of his
philosophy, he relied on the scientific method, believing that it could analyse human nature and explain
the workings of the mind. As he examined the process of how ideas are formed, he discovered the
limitations of the mind and his optimism turned into scepticism.
Hume’s analysis proceeded this way: the mind receives materials from the senses and calls it
perceptions. Two types of perceptions according to Hume:
1. Impression are the immediate sensations of external reality. These are more vivid than the
ideas it produces.
2. Ideas are recollections of these impressions.

These two together make up the content of the human mind. It all begins with impressions.
Without impressions, there will be no formation of ideas. The imagination has the ability to connect
two ideas to form a complex idea.
The self is nothing else but a bundle of impressions. What is the Self then? Self, is simply “a
bundle or collection of different perceptions, which succeed each other with an inconceivable rapidity,
and are in a perpetual flux and movement” (Hume and Steinberg, 1992). Men simply want to believe
that there is a unified, coherent self, a soul or mind. In reality, what one thinks is a unified self is simply
a combination of all experiences with a particular person. There is no permanent/unchanging self.

 IMMANUEL KANT

Kant argued that the mind is not just a passive receiver of sense experience but rather actively
participates in knowing the objects it experience. In addition Kant stated, that instead of the mind
conforming to the world, it is the external world that conforms to the mind. The things that men perceive
around them are not just randomly infused into the human person without an organizing principle that
regulates the relationship of all these impressions. Thus the self is not just what gives one personality.
In addition, it is also the seat of knowledge acquisition for all human persons.
Kant held that those bundles of sensory impressions (as seen by Hume) imply a unity of the self
without which there would be no knowledge of experience. When the self sees an object, it tends to
remember its characteristics and applies on it, the forms of time and space. Therefore, a self must exist,
according to Kant or there could be no memory or knowledge. The term he used for this experience of
the self and its unity with objects is transcendental apperception.

 SIGMUND FREUD

Freud’s then revolutionary ideas of the probable factors that determine human behaviour pave
the way for science to look into the workings of the unconscious mind. Repressed thoughts and
memories have enough psychic energy to impose its control on the person’s consciousness. Kept hidden
and unexpressed, these repressed memories resurface and are manifested as some form of
psychopathology (hysteria). In Freud’s clinical practice, therapy involves several techniques that would
help the person recognized these thoughts and thus bring him back to emotional stability. Freud made
use of methods like free association and dream analysis.
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Structures of the Mind

A closer look on Freud’s psychodynamic theory would tell that the workings of the mind or
one’s mental life impacts strongly on the body resulting in either emotional stability or psychological
dysfunctions. To further clarify how this may be possible, Freud presented the topography of the mind.
He made use of a typical iceberg to show how the mind works based on his theorizing. The tip of the
iceberg represents conscious awareness which characterizes the person as he deals with his external
world. The person’s observable behaviour, however, is further controlled by the workings of his
unconscious/subconscious mind.
Freud further explained that the subconscious serves as repository of past experiences, repressed
memories, fantasies and urges. The three levels of the mind are structured by the following components:
1. Id – The structure that is primarily based on the pleasure principle. It demands immediate
satisfaction and is not hindered by societal expectations.
2. Ego – The structure that is based on the reality principle. This structure mediates between
the impulses of the id and the restraints of the superego.
3. Superego – The last structure to develop and is primarily dependent on learning the
difference between right and wrong. Morality of actions is largely dependent on childhood
upbringing particularly on rewards and punishments.

Freud also presented two kinds of instincts that drive individual behaviour. These are
eros or the life instinct and thanatos or the death instinct. The energy of eros is called libido
and includes urges necessary for individual and species survival like thirst, hunger and sex.
There are cases however, wherein man’s behaviour is directed towards destruction in the form
of aggression and violence. Such according to Freud are manifestations of the thanatos.
Freud’s psychoanalysis sees man as a product of his past lodged within his subconscious.
Man’s behaviour by his pleasure seeking life instinct and his destructive death instinct is said
to be born with his ego already in conflict. Man then lives his life balancing the forces of life
and death – opposing forces that make mere existence a challenge.

 GILBERT RYLE

An English philosopher whose ideas contradicted Cartesian Dualism. In his book

entitled, The concept of the Mind, Ryle argues that dualism ‘involves category mistakes and is
a philosophical nonsense’ (Ryle, 1949). The category mistake involved in the mind-body
problem is how a non-material mental substance known as the ‘mind’ can influence a physical,
material body.
For Ryle, looking for and trying to understand a self as it really exists is like visiting
your friend’s university and looking for the “university.” One can roam around the campus,
visit the library and the football field, and meet the administrators and faculty and still end up
not finding the “university.” This is because the campus, the people, the system, and the territory
all form the university. Ryle suggests that the ‘self’ is not an entity one can locate and analyse
but simply the convenient name that the people use to refer to all the behaviours that people
make.
Gilbert Ryle also touched on two types of knowledge. He distinguished between
‘knowing-that and knowing-how.’ The former refers to knowing facts/information and the latter
to using facts in the performance of some skill or technical abilities. Just ‘knowing that’ is
considered as empty intellectualism. What is more important is how to make use of these facts.
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A person may acquire a great bulk of knowledge – but without the ability to use it to solve some
practical problems to make his life easier, it will be deemed worthless.

 PATRICIA AND PAUL CHURCHLAND

Modern scientific inquiry looks into the application of neurology to age-old problems in
philosophy, one of which is the mind-body problem. This brought about the study of what is
now known as neurophilosophy. This term was coined by Patricia Churchland, a philosopher
who claims that man’s brain is responsible for the identity known as the self, together with
husband Pail, a Canadian philosopher, was dissatisfied with the particular approach of
philosophers and instead sought to guide scientific theorizing with philosophy and guide it with
scientific inquiry.
The biochemical properties of the brain is really responsible for man’s thoughts, feelings
and behaviour. Contentions that are forwarded by neurophilosophy resulted from cases where
individuals’ deviant thoughts, feelings and actions stemmed from anomalies and aberrations in
the brain’s anatomy and physiology. It seems that what and who the person is – how he makes
decisions, control impulses and how he sees himself is largely determined by his neurons,
hormones and overall genetic make-up.
These data provide information on how normal brain functioning facilitates accepted
social behaviour and how a compromised brain gives rise to aberrant behaviour patterns.

 MAURICE MERLEAU-PONTY

Merleau-Ponty developed the concept of body-subject and contended that perceptions

occur existentially. Thus, the consciousness, the world and the human body are all
interconnected as they mutually perceive the world. This is tantamount to saying that all
knowledge is perceived through the body with all its sensory functions which take place in here
and now.
The world is a field of perception, and human consciousness assigns meaning to the
world. Thus man cannot separate himself from his perceptions of the world. In addition, he
stated that perception is not purely the result of sensations nor is it purely interpretation.
For instance, when perception towards a particular object takes place, the perception is
not constant i.e. the meaning assigned to this particular object is subject to change depending
on the perspective upon which it is seen. It is therefore possible that one object may be perceived
from various perspectives.
As this phenomenon takes place, the individual is now faced with several perspectives
related to this one object. What happens then is, the body seeks clarity for the meaning of this
object by constituting a perceptual gestalt (German word for ‘good form’).
The focus is on the relationship between self-experience and the experience of other
people.

Questions to ponder:
1. Why do philosophers differ in their explanations of the self?
2. How has the concept of the so called ‘self’ changed over the centuries when human nature remained
basically the same?