Chapter-1-philosophical-perspective-of-the-self.pptx

CHAPTER 1

-Is it really essential to understand the self? -What are the different notions of the self from different standpoints of various philosophers across time and place? -How do we compare those varying standpoints? -How do I examine myself using these different standpoints or perspectives?

▪ Philosophy- “Love for wisdom” ▪ Answers questions regarding the nature of and

existence of man and the world.

▪ (Socrates, Plato, St. Augustine, Descartes, Locke,

Hume, Kant, Freud, Ryle, Churchland, Monty-Ponty).

▪ All to answer the basic question, who are you?

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Philosophically, discussion of the self is a basic search for meaning and purpose in life.

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Determination, rationalization, and identification of self; sets the direction from which an individual travel to fulfill his identified purpose in life.

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Inability to define oneself leads to a lot of contradiction in life later on, hence, it is one of the many imperative of life to know oneself and to go on with the business of leading a life charted by oneself.

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We only know Socrates because his illustrious students (from Plato to Aristotle) spoke eloquently and generously about his knowledge, wit, wisdom and intellect. Socrates left no known writings, his highly regarded student Plato though, wrote extensively about Socrates.

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According to Socrates it is the state of our soul, or our inner being, which determines the quality of our life. Thus it is paramount that we devote considerable amounts of our attention, energy, and resources to making our soul as good and beautiful as possible.

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Socrates believed the next step in the path towards self knowledge was to obtain knowledge of what is good and what is evil.

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Most people dogmatically assume they know what is truly good and what is truly evil.

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All human beings naturally strive after happiness, for happiness is the final end in life and everything we do we do because we think it will make us happy

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We therefore label what we think will bring us happiness as ‘good’, and those things we think will bring us suffering and pain as ‘evil’.

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There is one supreme good, he claimed, and possession of this good alone will secure our happiness

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Virtue is defined as moral excellence, and an individual is considered virtuous if their character is made up of the moral qualities that are accepted as virtues.

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“gnothi seuton”= “know thyself.”

If you know who you are, all basic issues and difficulties in life would be gone in a simple snap of a finger. If you know who you are, then everything would be clearer and simpler. One could now act according to his own self-definition without any doubt and selfcontradiction.

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(Cont’d) ▪

“Socractic method” or the art of questioning

His simple technique of asking basic questions such as “who am I?”, “what is the purpose of my life?”, “what am I doing here?”, “what is justice” were all questions predicated on the fact that humans must be able to define these simple things so as to move forward and act accordingly based on what is the definition of the said individual.

(Cont’d)

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Possession of knowledge is a virtue and that ignorance is a vice, that a person’s acceptance of ignorance is a source or a springboard for the acquisition of knowledge later on. So, one must first have the humility to acknowledge one’s ignorance so as to get or acquire knowledge.

▪ Answers will always be subjective.

(Cont’d)

▪ There is really no right or wrong answers

to the questions posited by Socrates, the quality and quantity of answers is dependent on the respective person ▪ Answering these basic premises and his

subsequent actions is best understood on how he defined himself. ▪ Thus, the constant reminder of “know

thyself”. ▪ Historically, he is known as the first martyr

of education, knowledge and philosophy. For lighting up the minds of his students, he was literally charged with corruption of minors. Socrates is even considered to be so ugly, that only his own mother could love.

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He is the acknowledged author of the groundbreaking book “The Republic” which became the bedrock of democracy as we now know it today. This book talks about justice, balance, equality, how best to rule and how to prepare for ruling. It talks about statecraft, how to run a country, how to govern with the best interest of people at heart.

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Theory of Human Nature – The Tripartite Structure of the Soul. ▪

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Appetite Soul- needs and wants that are to be satisfied (physical urges) Spirited (will )Soulcourageous part of the person; one who wants to do something or right the wrongs Rational (reason) Soul- “the conscious mind”; decides, plans, and thinks.

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Plato also emphasized the social aspect of human nature. We are not self-sufficient, we need others, and we benefit from our social interactions, from other person’s talents, aptitudes, and friendship.

▪ Plato made the philosophical allegory of the cave. Slaves born

as such inside a cave facing only the shadows of men, will never have knowledge that there is another set of men representing or creating their respective shadows. That when a

chained slave escapes and learned that shadows are just mere representatives of their captors. If this escapee returns and tell his former slave buddies that what they are seeing and hearing

inside their cave is nowhere near to what is actually a reality, they would doubt him, in fact - they would even doubt his own very existence.

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Follows the notion that everything is better if we devote ourselves to God

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Augustine's sense of self is his relation to God, both in his recognition of God's love and his response to it—achieved through self-presentation, then selfrealization. Augustine believed one could not achieve inner peace without finding God's love.

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The physical body is bound to die on earth while the soul is to anticipate living eternally in communion with God.

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The Big Picture Argument. Just because something considered in isolation seems vile, disgusting, stupid, and the like, doesn't mean that it is evil. For it might be a necessary part of the virtue, beauty, or intelligence of the larger whole of which it is a part.

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The Free-will Defense. God thought that a world with Free Agents in it would be better than one without.

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St. Augustine is credited with the invention of the idea of “original sin.” Augustinian view of man is that we are originally sinful.

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He developed the concept of the church being the city of god. That a city governed by the church is a city governed by god.

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He is best known for quoting “cogito ergo sum”, or “I think therefore, I am”.

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Dualism is the concept that reality or existence is divided into two parts. When discussing dualism in the context of humanity, this division is between the mind and the physical body. In other words, the mind is separate from the empirically studied, physical attributes of the body.

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He begins with an argument known commonly as the Cogito. He comes to understand that if he is capable of doubting – which is precisely what he is doing – then he must exist.

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After establishing the fact of his existence, Decartes goes on to ask himself what he is. He eventually comes to describe himself as a thinking thing.

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He proposed the idea of substance, essence of substance, and modes of substance.

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The mind is the substance The essence of this substance is thought A mind can be seen as something that is defined by thought. The modes of the mind, then, are the various ways of thinking

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This, then, is what Descartes views as the “self”; a thinking thing Man innately knows basic logical propositions.

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Father of Liberalism Was against Augustinian and Cartesian view of man

He holds that personal identity is a matter of psychological continuity. He considered personal identity (or the self) to be founded on consciousness (memory), and not on the substance of either the soul or the body.

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Locke posits an “empty” mind, a tabula rasa, which is shaped by experience, and sensations and reflections being the two sources of all our ideas.

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This is an irony because, he espoused three (3) notable contention in philosophy; empiricism, skepticism and naturalism. He promoted empiricism by basing his knowledge and philosophy on evidences, knowing and proving are two different things. And in life, it is not what you know, but rather what you can prove.

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One can only know through senses and experience.

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Empiricism asserts that knowledge is only attained through the senses.

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David Hume was a known atheist and as such, he believed in the natural cycle of life. Everything is governed by reason, by rationality and as such, there is a natural order of things. There is no permanent “self” The self is a collection of a person’s different impressions and perceptions

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For Hume there is no mind or self. The perceptions that one has are only active when one is conscious Hume appears to be reducing personality and cognition to a machine that may be turned on and off. Death brings with it the annihilation of the perceptions one has.

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Became critical of Hume’s ideas. In this book, he posited the idea that there is a connection between reason and experience. That in order to have solid rationality, one must have a variety of experience and exposure.

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He further contended that there is a correlation between experience and rationality. You cannot have one without the other.

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Immanuel Kant subscribe to the idea of metaphysics, that which is beyond matter, he also subscribes to the idea that pure reason is one of the prime source of morality. That what is right, that what is moral, is best explained via reason and rationality.

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Rationalism is the theory that reason, rather than experience, is the foundation of all knowledge.

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Humans have both an inner and an outer self which unify to give us consciousness.

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The inner self is comprised of our psychological state and our rational intellect.

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The outer self includes our sense and the physical world.

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Apperception is how we mentally assimilate new ideas into old ones. Occurring through rational reasoning, it’s how we make sense of new things.

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Representations are the immediate objects of our awareness.

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Father of Psychoanalysis

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Predicated on sex and aggression with the unconscious mind as the platform.

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Present self or personality is greatly shaped by the person’s past experiences.

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Utilized introspection as a tool

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Unconscious, preconscious, conscious ▪ Id- pleasure principle ▪ Ego- reality principle ▪ Superego- morality principle

▪ Ninety percent (90%) of the time, man is unaware of his

behavior and often, his behavior is to feed the libido, residing in the id. According to the theory of psychoanalysis, every individual is composed of the superego, ego and the id. It is the main function of the superego and the ego to regulate and control the id.

▪ Accordingly, man and his unconscious mind is affected by

Oedipus complex, penis envy and castration anxiety. By and large, man’s behavior is an interplay of sexual energies and endeavor, all to facilitate the attainment or near attainment of sexual gratification because of sexual excitation.

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The main concept of Gilbert Ryle is that there is a relationship between the body and the mind. Conversely, the body affects the mind and the mind affects the body.

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The self is affected by the mind and by the body. The self is a combination of the mind and the body.

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While the focus of other philosopher is veered towards the separation of the mind and body, for this British philosopher – self is taken as a whole, with body and mind combination. The self is an integrated whole made up of different parts and systems.

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The ghost in the machine means the consciousness or mind carried in a physical entity. He believed that human consciousness and mind are very dependent on the human brain

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According to Churchland, Folk Psychology will eventually be discredited by scientific inquiry. Indigenous notions, theories, concepts and ideas will be supplanted by scientific method. The “self” is defined by the movements of the brain.

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The main philosophy of Churchland is predicated on “eliminative materialism”. Principally, eliminative materialism contention is that people’s common sense understanding of the mind is false and that most of the mental states that people subscribe to, in turn, do not actually exist.

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The world could be wrong; most people could be wrong and even the mind could also be wrong. In short, everyone and everything could be fallible. There is no such thing as infallibility.

▪ The main articulation of the self-

philosophy of Merleau-Ponty is existentialism. Very briefly, existentialism is predicated on the premise that man gives meaning to his own life. Happiness and sadness are dependent on the individual and his perception of his on reality. Consciousness and perception are related to one another.

▪ Proponent of descriptive psychology,

this by extension - places the current interpretation of reality dependent on the perception, consciousness and appreciation of an individual.

▪ Phenomenology of Perception:

The Body ▪ The Perceived World ▪ People in the World ▪

Socrates (Greek) Plato (Greek) St. Augustine (Numidia, Roman province of Africa) Rene Descartes (French)

Died by drinking of hemlock Student of Socrates Love of knowledge brings happiness

Had a chance to go to exile Wrote the republic Made the doctrine of original sin

Cogito ergo sum

Western philosophy was largely based on his writings Father of liberalism

John Locke (English)

empiricism

David Hume (Scott)

Empiricism, skepticism, and naturalism

atheist

Immanuel Kant (German)

Metaphysics, beyond matter. Reason is the source of morality. Died of cancer of the mouth

Relationship between reason and experience

Gilbert Ryle (British)

Ghost in the machine, concept of the mind, I act therefore I am

Paul Churchland (Canadian)

Eliminative materialism

Father was a doctor who passed on to his children his vast collection of books Wife is also a noted philosopher (Patricia Churchland)

Maurice Merleau-Ponty (French)

Existentialism, consciousness and perceiving are correlated

Sigmund Freud (Prussian)

Addicted to cocaine

Proponent of descriptive psychology

Charged with corruption of minors Founded the academe Developed the concept of the church as the city of god Had an ambition as a military officer

Know thyself

Was a country lawyer and obtained a degree in bachelor of medicine Raised by a single mother, worked as a merchant assistant

Tabula rasa

Man has a soul Doctor of the church Father of modern rationalism philosophy

Although of noble ancestry, had no source of income and no learned profession Young scholar, aptitude for Critique of Pure Reason study at an early age Subjected his own children Oedipus complex, to psychoanalysis penis envy, castration anxiety Body and mind dualism Brothers were also considered to be eminent scholars Folk psychology will eventually be discredited by a scientific inquiry/method Father died at his very young age

The self as a brain, mind and body are separate from one another and they are not related Perception influence one’s understanding