THE

PHILOSOPHICAL
VIEW OF SELF
GEC 1- Understanding the Self
SOCRATES: KNOW YOURSELF
 Socrates is principally concerned with man. He considers man
from the point of view of his inner life.
 The famous line of Socrates if “Know Yourself”, tells each man to
bring his inner self to light. A bad man is not virtuous through
ignorance, the man who does not follow the good fails to do so
because he does not recognize it.
Virtue is the deepest and basic propensity of man.
Virtue is innate in the mind and self-knowledge is
the source of all wisdom, and individual may gain
possession of oneself and be one’s own master
through knowledge.
PLATO: THE IDEAL SELF, THE
PERFECT SELF
According to Plato, man was omniscient or all- knowing
before he came to born into this world. With his separation
from the paradise of truth and knowledge and his long exile
on earth. He forgot most of the knowledge he had.
However, by constant remembering through contemplation
and doing good, he can regain his former perfections.
IMMANUEL KANT: RESPECT
FOR SELF
 Man is the only creature who governs and directs himself and his
actions, who sets up ends for himself and his purpose, and who
freely orders means for the attainment of his aims.
 Every man is thus an end in himself and should never be treated
merely as a means – as per the order of the Creator and the natural
order of things. This rule is a plain dictum of reason and justice :
Respect others as you would respect yourself.
RENE DESCARTES: “I THINK,
THEREFORE I AM”
Descartes states that the self is a thinking entity distinct from the
body. His first famous principle was “Cogito ergo sum, which means
“I think, therefore I am.”
JOHN LOCKE: PERSONAL
IDENTITY
 John Locke holds that personal identity (the self) is a
matter of psychological continuity. For him, personal
identity is founded on consciousness (memory), and not on
the substance of either the soul or the body.
DAVID HUME: THE SELF IS
THE BUNDLE THEORY OF
MIND
 Hume is skeptical about the existence of the self, specifically, on
whether there is a simple, unified self that exists over time.
 For him, man has no clear and intelligible idea of the self.
 He posits that no single impression of the self exists, rather the self
is just the thing to which all perceptions of a man is ascribed.
 THE CHRISTIAN OR
BIBLICAL VIEW OF SELF
THE HOLY BIBLE
“God created man in His image, in the divine image. He created
him,; male and female He created them. God blessed them, saying,
“Be fertile and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. Have a
dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds in the air, and all the
living things that move on the earth.”
It is appropriate to think of the “self” as the multi-
bejeweled crown of creation– the many gems thereof
representing and radiating the glorious facets of
man’s self that include the physical, intellectual,
moral, religious, social, political, economic,
emotional, sentiment, aesthetic, sensual and sexual
preferences.
 Religious Aestheti
Emotio c
nal
Moral

Physica
l Sentim
ent
The Crown Creation of
Ration Self Sensual
al and
Sexual
Spiritu
al Econo
mic
Politica
l Social
Intellec
tual
ST. AUGUSTINE: LOVE AND
JUSTICE AS THE FOUNDATION
OF THE INDIVIDUAL SELF
St Augustine believes that a virtuous life is a
dynamism of love. It is constant following of and
turning towards love while a wicked life is a constant
turning away from love.