THE SELF FROM VARIOUS PHILOSOPHICAL PERSPECTIVE

PROF. EUGENE PAOLO Z. GUADES RN, MA, LPT

INTRODUCTION:
•The history of philosophy is replete with men and women who inquired into the
fundamental nature of the self. Along with the question of the primary substratum that
defines the multiplicity of things in the world, the inquiry on the self has preoccupied the
earliest thinkers in the history of philosophy: The Greeks. The Greeks were the ones who
seriously questioned myths and moved away from them in attempting to understand reality
and respond to perennial questions of curiosity, including the question of self. The different
perspective and views on the self can be best seen and understood by revisiting its prime
moves and identity, the most important conjectures made by philosophers from ancient
times to the contemporary period.

OBJECTIVES:
At the end of this lesson, you should be able to:
-Explain why it is essential to understand the self
-Describe and discuss the different notions of the self from the points-of-view of the various
philosophers across time and place -Compare and contrast how the self has been
represented in different philosophical school
-Examine one’s self against the different views of self that were discussed in this topic.

WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY?
-Greek: (φιλοσοφία, philosophia, 'love of wisdom')
-The original meaning of the word philosophy comes from the Greek words philo- meaning
"love" and -sophos, or "wisdom". -Academic discipline concerned with investigating the
nature of significance and scientific belief
-Investigates the legitimacy of concepts by rational arguments concerning their implication,
relationships as well as reality, knowledge and moral judgment

SOCRATES
-The first philosopher who was engaged in a systematic questioning about self.
-The true task of philosopher is to know oneself
-Man is supposed to attain order to preserve their souls after life -He thought that worst can
happen to anyone is “to live but to die inside”
-Every man is composed of body and soul
-Every human person is dualistic.
-There are two aspects of personhood which means that individuals have an imperfect and
impermanent aspect which is the body while maintaining that there is also a soul that is
perfect and permanent.
PLATO
-believed that the soul is distinct to man and it is God-given. -Supported the idea of Socrates
that man is a dual nature of body and soul.
-Plato added that there are parts of three components of soul:
- the rational soul
- the spirited soul
- the appetitive soul
In his magnus opos, The Republic (Plato 2000)
-Plato emphasizes that justice in the human person can only be attained if the three parts of
the soul are working harmoniously with one another.

•Rational soul – forged by reason and intellect has to govern the affairs of the human body.
•Spirited soul – in charged by emotions
•Appetitive soul – in charge of base desires, like eating, drinking, sleeping and having sexual
intercourse.

ST. AUGUSTINE
-View of the human person reflects the entire spirit of the medieval world when it comes to
man.
-Following the ancient view of Plato and infusing it with the new doctrine of Christianity.
-Augustine agreed that man is of a bifurcated nature.

-There is an aspect of man, which dwells in the world, that is imperfect and continuously
yearns to be with the divine while the other is capable of reaching immortality.
-The body is bound to die on Earth and the soul is to anticipate living eternally in the realm
of spiritual bliss in communion with God.
-This is because the body can only thrive in the imperfect, physical reality that is the world,
whereas the soul can also stay after death in the eternal realm with all transcendent God.
-The goal of every human person is to attain this communion and bliss with the Divine by
living his life on earth in virtue.

THOMAS AQUINAS
-Adopted some ideas from Aristotle
-Man is composed of two parts:
•matter (body)
hyle in Greek, refers to the common stuff that makes up the universe.
•form (soul)
morphe in Greek, refers to the essence of a substance or thing. It is what makes us
human.
-The body of the human person is something that he shares even with animals. The cell in
man’s body is more or less akin to the cells of any living, organic being in the world.
-To Aquinas, just as for Aristotle, the soul is what animates the body. It is what makes us
human

DESCARTES
-Rene Descarte is the Father of modern Philosophy
-He conceived that the human person as having a body and a mind -He thought that the only
thing that one cannot doubt is the existence of the self
-Cogito ergo sum or I think therefore, I am
-The fact that one thinks should lead one to conclude without a trace a doubt that he exist
-The self then for Descartes is a :
-Combination of two distinct entities
Cogito the one thing that thinks, which is the mind
Extenza or the extension of the body, which is the body
-In Descartes view, body is nothing else but machine that is attached to the mind. The
human person has it but its not make a man a man. If at all, that is the mind.

•“But what then am I? A thinking thing? It is a thing that doubts, understands, affirms,
denies, wills, refuses; that imagines also, and perceives.” -Descartes

HUME
-David Hume is a Scottish philosopher, has a very unique way of looking at man
-As Empiricist who believes that one can know only what comes from the senses and
experiences
-Empiricism is the school of thought that espouses the idea that knowledge can only be
possible if its sensed and experienced . Men can only attained knowledge by experiencing

-According to him, the self is not an entity over and beyond the physical body.
-Impression are the basic object of our experience or sensation
-To David Hume, the self is nothing else but a bundle of impressions.
•What are impressions?
-If one tries to examine his experiences, he finds that they can be all categorized in to two:
Impressions and ideas

•Impressions –are the basic object of our experience or sensation. They therefore form the
core of our thoughts
•Impressions are the product of our direct experience with the world
•Ideas- are copies of impression

•What is the self?

-A bundle of collections of different perceptions, which succeed each other with
inconceivable rapidity and are in perpetual flux and movement.

-Men simply want to believe that there is a unified, coherent self, a soul or mind just like
what previous philosophers thought, in reality, what one thinks is a unified self is simply a
combination of all experiences with a particular person.

-Men simply want to believe that there is a unified, coherent self or mind just like what the
previous philosophers thought. In reality, what one thinks as a unified self is simply a
combination of all experiences with a particular person.

KANT
-Stated that the mind is not blank, but rather, the mind is capable of acquiring knowledge
through sensory experiences.
-Kant recognizes the veracity in Hume’s account that everything starts with perception and
sensation and perception of impressions.
-However, Kant thinks that 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 this impressions.

-For Kant, there is necessarily a mind that organizes the impressions that men get from the
external world. Kant calls these the apparatus of the mind.
-Along with the different apparatus of the mind goes the self, one cannot organize the
different impressions that one gets in relation to his own existence.
-Kant therefore suggests that the “self” is an actively engaged intelligence in man that
synthesizes all knowledge and experience. -Thus, the self is not just what gives one his
personality. It is also the seat of knowledge acquisition for all human persons.

RYLE
-Gilbert Ryle solves the mind-body dichotomy that has been running for the history of
thought by denying blatantly the concept of an internal, non-physical self.
-For him, What truly matters is the behaviors that person manifests in day-to-day life.
-He suggests that the self is not an entity one can locate and analyze but simply the
convenient name that people use to refer to all the behaviors that people make.

MERLEAU-PONTY
-Is a phenomenologist who asserts that the mind-body bifurcation that has been going on
for a long time is a futile endeavor and an invalid problem.
-Unlike Ryle who simply denies the self, Merleau – Ponty instead says that the mind and
body are so intertwined that they cannot be separated from one another.
THE SELF, SOCIETY AND CULTURE

•WHAT IS THE SELF?

The self, in contemporary literature and even common sense, is commonly defined by the
following characteristics:
• Separate
• Self-contained/Independent • Consistency
• Unitary
• Private

SEPARATE
• Self Is distinct from other selves.
SELF-CONTAINED AND INDEPENDENT
• Because in itself it can exist.
CONSISTENT
• It has a personality that is enduring and therefore can be expected to persist for quite
some time.
UNITARY
• It is the center of all experiences and thoughts that run through a certain person.
PRIVATE
•Means that each person sorts out information, feeling and emotions and thought processes
within the self.

SOCIAL CONSTRUCTIONIST PERSPECTIVE

• Social constructionists argue for a merged view of the “person” and their “social context”
where the boundaries of one cannot easily be separated from the boundaries of the other.
•Social constructivists argue that the self should not be seen as a static entity that stays
constant through and through. Rather, the self has to be seen something that is unceasing
flux, in a constant struggle with external reality and is malleable in its dealings with society.

THE SELF AND CULTURE

-Remaining the same person and turning chameleon by adapting to one’s context seems
paradoxical. However, the French Anthropologist Marcel Mauss has an explanation for this
phenomenon.

2 FACES OF SELF
MOI – refers to a person’s sense of who he is, his body, and his basic identity, his biological
givenness.
• Person’s basic identity.
PERSONNE - composed of the social concepts of what it means to be who he is.
• Means to live in particular institution, a particular family a particular religion, a particular
nationality and how to behave given expectations and influences from
others.

Language is another interesting aspect of this social constructivism.

SAMPLE SHIFT IN PERSONNE
• Adjusting cultures in other countries
• Man courting woman ( tone and mood)
Another interesting facet of our language is being gender- neutral

THE SELF AND DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIAL WORLD

•More than his givenness (personality, tendencies and propensities among others) one is
believed to be in active participation in the shaping of the self.
•Men and women in their growth and development engage actively in the shaping of the
self.
•The unending terrain of metamorphosis of the self is mediated by language.

MEAD AND VYGOTSKY

• The human person develop with the use of language acquisition and interaction with
others. The way that we process information is normally a form of an internal dialogue in
our head.
•A cognitive and emotional development of a child is always a mimicry of how it is done in
the social world, in the external reality where he is in.
• Both Vygotsky and Mead treat the human mind as something that is made constituted
through language as experience in the external world and as encountered in dialogs with
others.

SELF IN FAMILIES
•The kind of family that we are born in, the resources available to us (humans, spiritual,
economic), and the kind of development that we will have will certainly affect us.
•Human beings are born virtually helpless and the dependency period of human baby to its
parents for nurturing is relatively longer than most other animal.
•In trying to achieve the goal of becoming a fully realized human, a child enters a system of
relationships, most important of which is the family.
•Human persons learn the ways of living and therefore their selfhood by being in a family. It
is what a family initiates a person to become that serves as the basis for this person’s
progress.

GENDER AND THE SELF

• Another important aspect of the self that is important to mention here is Gender. One of
those loci of the self that is subject to alteration, change, and development.
• The sense of self that is being taught make sure that an individual fits in a particular
environment, is dangerous and detrimental in the goal of truly finding one’s self,
self-determination, and growth of the self.
• It is important to give one the leeway to find, express, and live his identity.
• Gender has to be personally discovered and asserted and not dictated by culture and
society.

THE SELF AS COGNITIVE CONSTRUCT

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

THE SELF AS HAVING TWO ASPECTS

The “I” and the “me”

William James (1890)

“I” -“is the thinking, acting, and feeling self.
“Me” - ) The “me” on the other hand, is the physical characteristics as well as psychological
capabilities that makes who you are.

Carl Rogers’s (1959)

“I” as the one who acts and decides
“Me” is what you think or feel about yourself as an object

Self are identify and self-concept.

Identity is composed of personal characteristics, social roles,
and responsibilities, as well as affiliations that define who one is

Self-concept is what basically comes to your mind when you are asked about who you are

Self-Schema (Carl Rogers)

Are categories of knowledge that reflect how we expect ourselves to think, feel, and act in
particular settings or situations

Self and identity is mental constructs,

created and recreated in memory. Current researches point to the frontal lobe of the brain
as the specific area in the brain associated with the process concerning the self

Id, Ego, and Superego (Sigmund Freud).

Id - the pleasure principle (if it feels good, do it), and nothing else.
Ego- operates based on the reality principle, which strives to satisfy the id's desires in
realistic and socially appropriate ways.
Superego - The superego holds the internalized moral standards and ideals that we acquire
from our parents and society (our sense of right and wrong).

Id- Instincts
Ego- Reality
Superego- Morality

Symbolic Interactionism, G.H. Mead (1934)

The self is created and developed through human interaction. Basically, there are three
reasons why self and identity are social products
1. We do not create ourselves out of nothing.
2. We need others to affirm and reinforce who we think we are.
3. What we think is more important to us may also have been influenced by what is
important in our social or historical context.

Social Interaction and Group Affiliation

Vital factors in creating our self-concept especially in the aspect of providing us with our
social identity or our perception of who we are based on our membership to certain groups.

Self-awareness
is the ability to focus on yourself and how your actions, thoughts, or emotions do or don't
align with your internal standards

Self-awareness also known as Self-consciousness

Identified two types of self that we can be aware of:
1. The private self or your internal standards and private thoughts and feelings, and
2. The public self or your public image commonly geared toward having a good presentation
of yourself to others

Self-awareness also presents us with at least three other self-schemas: the actual, ideal, and
ought self.
The “actual “self is who you think you are at the moment,
The “ideal” self is who you like to be, and
The “ought” self is who you think you should be

The Loss of Individual Self- awareness and Individual Accountability in Groups

A lot of people will attune themselves with the emotions of their group and because the
large crowd also provides some kind of anonymity, we may lessen our self-control and act in
ways that we will not do when we are alone.
Our Group identity and self-awareness also has a great impact on our self- esteem, one of
the common concepts associated with the "self. It is defined as our own positive or negative
perception or evaluation of ourselves

SELF- ESTEEM- Is your overall opinion of yourself — how you feel about your abilities and
limitations .

Social relationship affects our self-esteem is through social comparison. According to the
social comparison theory, we learn about ourselves, the appropriateness of our behaviours,
as well as our social status by comparing aspects of ourselves with other people
Social comparison We create a positive self-concept by comparing ourselves with those who
are worse off than us. By having the advantage, we can raise our self-esteem
Upward Social Comparison which is comparing ourselves with those who are better off than
us. While it can be a form of motivation for some, a lot of those who do this actually felt
lower self-esteem as they highlight more of their weakness or inequities
Social comparison also entails what is called SELF-EVALUATION maintenance theory. Which
states that we can feel threatened when someone out-performs us, especially when that
person is close to us (i.e., a friend or family) In this case, we usually react in three ways.
First, we distance ourselves from that person or redefine our relationship with them and
some will resort to the silent treatment, change of friends, while some may also redefine by
being closer to that person, hoping that some association may give him a certain kind of
acknowledgment also.
Second, we may also reconsider the importance of the aspect or skill in which you were
outperformed. If you got beaten in a drawing competition, you might think that drawing is
not really for you and you will find a hobby where you could excel, thus preserving your
self-esteem.
Lastly, we may also strengthen our resolve to improve that certain aspect of ourselves

Narcissism
Is a “trait characterized by overly high self-esteem, self-admiration, and self-centeredness".
There is a thin line between high self-esteem and narcissism.

People with high self-esteem are commonly described as outgoing, adventurous, and
adaptable in a lot of situations. They also initiate activities and build relationships with
people. However, they may also dismiss other activities that do not conform to their
self-concept or boost their self-esteem.

Research on self-esteem concluded that programs, activities, and parenting styles to boost
self-esteem should only be for rewarding good behaviour and other achievements and not
for the purpose of merely trying to make children feel better about themselves or to
appease them when they get angry or sad