The Self from Various Perspectives

Socrates
Socrates believed that man has a soul which is divine, immortal, intelligible, uniform, indissoluble, ever self-consistent, and
invariable. Argued that the ruler of the body is the soul. It preexisted the body and is what makes it alive. Death is the release of
the soul. The body is vulnerable to basic emotions and actions while the soul controls them through proper judgement and
reason.

Plato
The soul, conceived of as self, has three parts: the Rational soul, Spiritual soul, Appetitive soul.

The Rational soul is located in the head and enables the person to think, reflect, analyze, and do cognitive functions. The
Spiritual soul is located in the chest and enables the person to experience emotional feelings. The Appetitive soul is located in
the abdomen and is the part of the soul that drives the human person to experience physical pain, hunger, thirst, and other
physical wants.

St. Augustine

A soul can’t live in this world without a body for it is considered as a unity of body and self. He believed that the times present of
things past, present, and future coexist in the soul and that the memory of the past is significant in the anticipation of the future
and presence of the present. As far as consciousness can be extended backward to any past action or forward to actions to
come, it determines the identity of the person.

Rene Descartes (the self is what you think)

The self is nothing else but a mind-body dichotomy. Thought (mind) always preceeds action (body). Everything had always
started as a thought. Humans are self-aware and being such proves their own place in the universe. Humans create their own
reality and they are the masters of their own universe.

John Locke

John Locke’s main philosophy about personal identity or the self is founded on consciousness or memory. For Locke,
Consciousness is the perception of what passes in a man’s own mind. He rejected that the brain has something to do with
consciousness as the brain as well as the body may change, while consciousness remains the same. He concluded that personal
identity is not in the brain but in one’s consciousness.

David Hume (there is no self)

There is no self as a mental entity for “what we call a mind is nothing but a heap or collection of different perceptions”. The self is
a bundle of perceptions (objects of the mind) of interrelated events. The soul is the product of imagination. Any concept of the
self is simply memory and imagination.

Immanuel Kant (the self is subjective)

Consciousness is formed by one’s inner and outer sense. The inner sense is comprised of one’s psychological state and intellect
while the outer sense consists of one’s senses and the physical world.

Apperception is the faculty that allows for the application of concepts. The act of apperceiving allows one to synthesize or make
sense of a unified object. The central feature of the mind is to unify consciousness and apperception; organize sensations and
thoughts in a manner that makes sense to a person.

Prepared by RKFalogme 11:13 pm 04/09/2022

Sigmund Freud

The self is multi-layered and composed of three parts: Id, Ego, and Superego.

Id exists since birth, pertaining to instinct and operates on the pleasure principle - seeking pleasure and avoiding pain. It is driven
by the so-called libido (sexual energy). Ego operates according to the reality principle. This structure’s role is to maintain
equilibrium between the demands of the Id and the Superego in accordance to what is best and practical in reality.

Superego operates on the morality principle and ensures compliance with norms, values, standards prescribed by society. It has
two systems: conscience and ideal self. Conscience sanctions ego through guilt while the ideal self rewards us when we conform
with the standards of society.

Gilbert Ryle

The self is a “thinking thing”. The mind is not separate from the body. Mind consists of dispositions of people based on what
they know, what they feel, what they want and so on. People learn that they have their own minds because they behave in
certain ways.

Paul Churchland and Patricia Churchland

The self is nothing else but brain, or simply, the self is contained entirely within the physical brain. The brain and the self are
inseparable but defined differently thus supporting the idea that to understand the self, one must study the brain, not just the
mind.

Maurice Merleau-Ponty

Distinguished the body into two types: the subjective body, as lived and experienced, and the objective body, as observed and
scientifically investigated. He regarded the self as embodied subjectivity which sees humans as living creatures whose
subjectivity (consciousness) is actualized in the forms of their physical involvement in the world. We know not through our
intellect but through our physical experience.

Sources:
Understanding the Self, Corpuz, et. Al. (2019)
Understanding the Self, Brawner, et. Al. (2018)
https://philonotes.com/2022/05/platos-concept-of-the-self
https://ruelabacolod.home.blog/2018/08/19/philosophical-perspective-of-the-self/

Prepared by RKFalogme 11:13 pm 04/09/2022