UNDERSTANDING

CHONA P AGUSTIN
THE SELF
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR 5
 TOPIC 1:
Unit 1: PHILOSOPHICAL
The Self from PERSPECTIVE
Various ( VIDEO OF THE Philosophical perspective)
Perspectives https://youtu.be/3sMCmtFsWrA
https://youtu.be/ybCAXqkzPhw
https://youtu.be/5lo3c5u73vw
 He explored his philosophy of immortality in the days
following his trial and before his sentence to death was
executed.
According to him, an unexamined life is not worth living.
This statement is reflected in his idea of the self.
He believed in dualism that aside from the physical body
(material substance), each person has an immortal soul
(immaterial substance).
The body belongs to the physical realm and the soul to the
ideal realm. When you die, your body dies but not your soul.
There is a life after the death of your physical body. There is
a world after death.
According to him, in order for you to have a good life, you
SOCRATES must live a good life, a life with a purpose, and that purpose
is for you to do well. Then there you will be happy after your
(470-399 BC) body dies.
https://youtu.be/o0InjgHFpco
 He was greatly affected by Socrates’ death.
Socrates was Plato’s teacher.
He believed that the self is immortal and it consists
of 3 parts:
Reason – the divine essence that enables you to
think deeply, make wise choices and achieve an
understanding of eternal truths;
Physical Appetite - your basic biological needs such
as hunger, thirst, and sexual desire and;
Spirit or Passion – your basic emotions such as love,
PLATO anger, ambition, aggressiveness, and empathy.
The 3 components may work together or in conflict.
(438/427-348/347 BC
https://youtu.be/bge5EUL89BE If human beings do not live in accordance with their
nature/function, the result will be an injustice.
 He was a great explorer in his youth and young
adulthood; he spent great times with his friends and
up to the extent of fathering an illegitimate child.
His explorations led to his conversion to Christianity
wherein he spent the remainder of his day serving
the bishop of Hippo and writing books and letters
including his idea of the self.
At first, he thought the body as the “slave” of the
soul but ultimately, regarded the body as the
“spouse” of the soul both attached to one another.
He believed that the body is united with the soul, so
that man may be entire and complete. His first
principle was, “I doubt, therefore I am.”

ST. AUGUSTINE
The self seeks to be united with God through faith
and reason and he described that humanity is
created in the image and likeness of God, that God
(354-430) is supreme and all-knowing and everything created
https://youtu.be/A5N0uV2JrYk by God who is all good is good.
 Descartes was a scientist in his professional life and during his time,
scientists believed that after death the physical body dies, hence the self
also dies.

He was a devout Catholic who believed in the immortal souls and

eternal life. By having the idea of both the thinking self and the
physical body, Descartes was able to reconcile his being a scientist
and a devout Catholic.

The self is a thinking thing, distinct from the body. The thinking
self or soul is nonmaterial, immortal, conscious while the physical
body is material, mortal, non-thinking entity, fully governed by the
physical laws of nature.
RENE DESCARTES “Cogito ergo sum” (I think, therefore I Am) is the keystone to his
(1596-1650)
https://youtu.be/B0vVVy4dFuA concept of the self. The essence of existing as a human identity is
https://youtu.be/AlorG2V9XDI the possibilityof being aware of oneself.
 The intolerant and charged atmosphere in England kept Locke
to stay abroad and freedom from political intrigues and duties
allowed him to develop his philosophy.
According to Locke, the human mind at birth is a tabula rasa
(“blank slate”). The self or personal identity is constructed
primarily from sense experiences which shape and mold the
self throughout a person’s life.
Personal identity is made possible by self-consciousness. In
order to discover the nature of personal identity, you to have to
find out what it means to be a person. A person is a thinking,
intelligent being who has abilities to reason and to reflect. A
person is also someone who considers itself to be the same
thing at different times and different places.
JOHN LOCKE Consciousness means being aware that you are thinking; this
what makes your belief possible that you are the same identity
(1634-1704) at different times and in different places. The essence of the
https://youtu.be/afR9roPfaaw self is its conscious awareness of itself as thinking, reasoning,
reflecting identity.
 He left the University of Edinburg at the age of 15, to
study privately. Although he was encouraged to take up
law, his interest was philosophy. It is during his private
study that he began raising questions about religion.

For him, there is no “self” only a bundle of perceptions

passing through the theatre of your minds.

According to him, humans are so desperately wanting

to believe that they have a unified and continuous self
or soul that they use their imaginations to construct a
DAVID HUME fictional self. The mind is a theatre, a container for
fleeting sensations and disconnected ideas and your
(1711-1776) reasoning ability is merely a slave to the passions.
https://youtu.be/qDhidRr_PWs Hence, personal identity is just a result of imagination.
 Although Kant recognizes the legitimacy in Hume’s
account, he opposes the idea of Hume that
everything starts with perception and sensation of
impressions, that’s why he brought out the idea of
the self as a response against the idea of Hume.
For Kant, there is unavoidably a mind that
systematizes the impressions that men get from
the external world.
Therefore, Kant believed that the self is a product
of reason because the self regulates experience by
making unified experience possible.
IMMANUEL KANT We construct the self. The self exists
(1724-1804) independently of experience and the self goes
https://youtu.be/rNtrwtyJxb0
beyond experience.
 Freud develops his theories during a period in which
he experienced heart irregularities, disturbing dreams
and periods of depression. He read William
Shakespeare in English throughout his life.
Based on him, the self is composed of three layers,
conscious, preconscious and unconscious.
The conscious mind includes thoughts, feelings, and
actions that you are currently aware of; the
preconscious mind includes mental activities that are
stored in your memory, not presently active but can
be accessed or recalled; while the unconscious mind
includes activities that you are not aware of.

SIGMUND FREUD According to him, there are thoughts, feelings,

desires, and urges that the conscious mind wants to
hide, buried in your unconscious, but may shed light
(1856-1939)
https://youtu.be/Gfrrl8_U1Ac to your unexplained behavior.
 His father was a general practitioner but had a keen
interest in philosophy and astronomy that he
passed it on to his children; they had an impressive
library where Ryle enjoyed being an omnivorous
reader.
He graduated with first class honors in the New
Modern Greats School of Philosophy, Politic, and
Economics.
Title Lorem Ipsum His concept of the self is provided in his
philosophical statement, “I Act therefore I am.” Ryle
views the self as the way people behave, which is
GILBERT RYLE composed of a set of patterned behavior.
(1900-1976) Basically, for Ryle, the self is the same as your behavior.
 Churchland became a professor at the
University of California where he later became
the department chair and member of the
Cognitive Science Faculty, a member of the
Institute for Neural Computation. His
membership to these organizations prompted
him to dwell on the brain as the self.
Churchland’s theory is anchored in the
statement, “the self is the brain.” The self is
inseparable from the brain and the
physiological body because the physical brain
gives the sense of self. In short, the brain and
PAUL CHURCHLAND the self are one. Once the brain is dead, the
(1942) self is dead too.
 When he won the school’s “Award for
Outstanding Achievement” in Philosophy it
traced his commitment to the vocation of
Philosophy.
His concept, “the self has embodied
subjectivity” explained that all your
knowledge about yourself and the world is
based on your subjective experiences and
everything that you are aware of is
contained in your consciousness.
MAURICE MERLEAU-
PONTY For him, your body is your general medium
(1908-1961)
https://youtu.be/B3cSTYan-3w for having a world.