KING’S COLLEGE OF THE PHILIPPINES

UNDERSTANDING THE SELF

FIRST SEMESTER 2019-2020
Instructor: Russele Ann A. Kechawen
Handout

CHAPTER I. THE SELF FROM VARIOUS PERSPECTIVES

INTRODUCTION
SELF
Something that a person perennially molds, shapes, and develops
not a static thing that one is simply born with
everyone is tasked to discover one’s self.

PHILOSOPHICAL PERSPECTIVE
- Inquiry into the fundamental nature of the self
- The inquiry has preoccupied the earliest thinkers in the history of
philosophy.
- Views on the self can be best understood by revisiting its prime
movers and identify the most important conjectures made by
philosophers
- Ancient times to the contemporary period.
SOCRATES
- "The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing"
- KNOW THYSELF
- Question everything
- "Only the pursuit of goodness bring happiness"
- Socratic Method: Question and Answer; Leads students to think for
themselves.
- “The unexamined life is not worth living”.
PLATO
- "Human behavior flows from three main sources: desire, emotion, and
knowledge."
- Dualism - man is a dual nature, composed of BODY AND SOUL
- Tripartite Soul - REASON, SPIRIT, APPETITE
 Reason (ruling class) - desires to exert reason and attain
rational decisions
 Spirit (military class) - desires supreme honor
 Appetite (commoner) - desires body pleasures such as food, drink,
sex, etc.
ARISTOTLE
- "All human actions have one or more of these seven causes: chance,
nature, compulsions, habit, reason, passion, desire."
- Contributed the foundation of both symbolic logic and scientific
thinking.
- The best way to gain knowledge was through "natural philosophy",
which is what we would now call science.
- Happiness, which is dependent in an individual's virtues, is the
central purpose of human life and a goal in itself.
- HIERARCHY SOUL – NUTRITIVE, SENSITIVE, RATIONAL
 Nutritive soul (plants) – power of growth, nutrition and
reproduction.
 Sensitive soul (animal) – they have at least one sense-faculty,
touch being the most universal. Also have desire and can feel
pleasure.
 Rational soul (human) – the power of reason and thought.
ST. AUGUSTINE OF HIPPO
- "The truth is like a lion. You don't have to defend it. Let it
loose. It will defend itself."
- An important figure in the development of Western Christianity.
- His philosophy of man brings together wisdom of the Greek
philosophy and the divine truths contained in the scripture.
- The absolute and immutable is the living God, the creator of the
entire universe.
- To love God means to love one's fellowmen, and to love one's
fellowmen means never to do any harm to another.
- He believes that man dwells in the world and is imperfect and
continuously yearns to be with the Devine and the other reaching
immortality.
RENE DESCARTES
- Father of modern philosophy "Dubito ergo cogito, cogito ergo sum"
(I doubt therefore I think, I think therefore I am)
- The Self is defined as a subject that thinks.
- The self that has full competence in the powers of human reason.
- Having distanced the self from all sources of truth from authority
and tradition, the self can only find its truth and authenticity
within its own capacity to think.
- "The fact that I am doubting, cannot be any more open to doubt."
JOHN LOCKE
- Personal identity is a matter of psychological continuity
- Personal identity (or the self) is founded on consciousness
- Identity over time is fixed by awareness of the past
- 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.
- "Our concept of personal identity must derive from inner
experience."

DAVID HUME
- "A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence"
- Empiricism. A school of thought that espouses the idea that
knowledge can only be possible if it is sensed and experienced.
- Rejects the notion of identity over time
- There are no "persons" that continue to exist over time, there are
merely impressions.
- "The self is bundle of impression"

IMMANUEL KANT
- "To be is to do."
- Consciousness is the central figure of the self.
- Two kinds of consciousness: Internal and External Self.
 Internal self - composed of psychological states and informed
decisions; remembering our own state, how can we combine the new
and old ideas with our mind
 External self - made up of ourselves and the physical world where
the representation of objects
GILBERT RYLE
- "I made it, and so I am."
- Rejects the theory that mental states are separable from physical
states.
- Concluded that adequate descriptions of human behavior need never
refer to anything but the operations of human bodies.
 - His form of Philosophical Behaviorism (the belief that all mental
phenomena can be explained by reference to publicly observable
behavior) became a standard view for several decades.
PSYCHOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES

"I AM WHO I AM"

"If you are who you are, then who are you that makes you who you are?"

PSYCHOLOGY OF SELF
- The study of either the cognitive, conative, or affective
representation of one's identity or the subject of experience.
- The earliest formulation of the self in modern psychology derived
from the distinction between the self as I, the subjective knower,
and the self as Me, the object that is known.

The facets:
 self-awareness
 self-esteem
 self-knowledge
 self-perception
All parts of the self-enable people to alter, change, add, and
modify aspects of themselves in order to gain social acceptance in
society. "Probably the best account of the origins of selfhood is that
the self comes into being at the interface between the inner
biological processes of the human body and the sociocultural network
to which the person belongs.
WILLIAM JAMES
- Defined a basic duality of the self: it is both the known, “Me” and
self-concept (our knowledge of who we are), and the knower, "I", or
self-awareness (the act of thinking about ourselves).
DONALD WINNICOTT
- Distinguished what he called the "true self" from the "false self"
in the human personality.
 True self - as one based on the individual's sense of being, not
doing, something which was rooted in the experiencing body.
 False self - regarding it in the fact as a necessary form of
defensive organization - a kind of caretaker, a survival suit
behind the protection of which the true self was able to continue
to exist.
CARL ROGERS
- believed that people must be fully honest with themselves
- The three sides of the triangle: Perceived self; Real self; Ideal
self
 Perceived self - how person sees self and others see them
 Real self - how the person really is
 Ideal self - how the person would like to be
 Self-concept - the mental image we have of ourselves.
- If you have a positive self-concept, you feel good about
yourself. You tend to focus on your strengths.
-If you have a negative self-concept, you feel bad about
yourself. You tend to focus on your weaknesses.
- The key to good mental health is having a good self-concept.
  Self-esteem - refers to the way we see and think about ourselves
it is the opinion of yourself. High self-esteem is a good opinion
of yourself. Low self-esteem is a bad opinion of yourself

SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE
-Sociologist believe that our concept of who we are is developed as we
interact with other people.-
CHARLES HORTON COOLEY – “Looking Glass Self”
- In 1902, he used the term looking glass self to stress the sense of
self emerged from our interaction with other people.
 3 Components
1. We think on how we present ourselves to others.
2. We think and react to what we feel their view of that
appearance must be.
3. We develop our self-base on what others see us.

GEORGE HERBERT MEAD

Stages of the Self
1. Preparatory Stage – children copy what people around them do,
particularly family members.
2. Play Stage – Children engage in play and begin to take the role of
others.
o Role Playing – The process of mentally assuming the
perspective of another and responding from that imagined
viewpoint (Shaefer, 2010).
3. Game Stage – the child is now eight or nine years old. He starts
to take into account different tasks and relationships all at the
same. By this time, the child will know not only his own role but also
the role others play in society and how each role is related to one
another.

STAGES SELF PRESENT DEFINITION EXAMPLE

Preparation No Child imitates When adults laugh
the actions of and smile, child
others. laughs and
smiles.
Play Developing Child takes the Child first takes
role of a single the role of
other, as if he doctor, then the
or she were the role of patient.
other.
Game Yes Child considers In game of hide –
the roles of two and – seek child
or more others takes into
simultaneously. account the roles
of both hider and
seeker.

 The significant Other (parents, friends, co – workers, teachers,

coaches) – they often play a major role in shaping an individual
self.
ERVING GOFFMAN
 - Made use of the dramaturgical approach with his expression, “all
the world is stage” (Panopio & Raymundo, 2004).
- Individuals perform and act for their audience in everyday life.
- Early in life, the individual learns to adjust his/ her
presentation of the self to form a unique appearances and satisfy
particular audiences.
 Impression Management – individuals manipulate landscapes,
communicative devices, external props and costumes to project
behavior to make new social situations and convey particular role
image to others.

ANTHROPOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE

- Anthropology is the study of humans, human behavior and societies,

past and present.
FOUR SUBFIELDS:
ARCHAEOLOGY
- Analyzes human culture by studying things what people have,
particularly from the past.
BIOLOGICAL ANTHROPPLOGY
- Studies how human adapt to various environments, the causes of
diseases and early death, and how humans evolved from animals.
CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY
- Study on how humans in various places live and make sense of the
world around them.
LINGUISTICS ANTHROPOLOGY
- Explore the varied methods of communication people use around the
globe.
 THE SELF IN WESTERN/ EASTERN THOUGHT

EASTERN/ ORIENTAL THOUGHTS

BUDDHISM
- Believes that the self is subject to the law of change (you are
born, grow and eventually die), there is no permanent.
- The goal is reach enlightenment by not being ignorant, because
ignorance causes suffering.
THE FOUR NOBLE TRUTHS
1. Life has inevitable suffering
2. There is a cause to our sufferings
3. There is an end to sufferings.
4. The end of suffering is contained in the eight – fold path.
THE EIGHT- FOLD PATH
1. Right View – have the right concepts and ideas
2. Right Intentions – eliminate the 3 poisons (greed, anger, and
ignorance) by keeping your thoughts in accord with the right Dharma.
3. Right Speech – wholesome verbal karma
a. Words of Truth
b. Words of compassion
c. Words of praise
d. Words of Altruism
4. Right Action – the behavior that is right and in accord of the
truth.
5. Right Livelihood – right occupation and right way to make a living
6. Right Effort – people should move in the direction of the truth
with courage and diligence.
7. Right Concentration – by using Samadhi to focus the mind and settle
the distracted body so we can better develop ourselves.
8. Right Mindfulness – have a mind that is pure, aware and does not
give rise to unwholesome thoughts.

HINDUISM
- It is an Indian religion, a way of life, a philosophy, as well as
social system (Morris, 1994).
- The self in Hinduism is the universal self (atman) identical with
the eternal core of the personality that after death it either
moves to a new life (reincarnation) or attains release from the
links of existence.
- Nirvana
- Maya
- Samsara

CONFUCIANISM
- Is described as a tradition, a philosophy, a religion and a way of
life.
5 basic virtues:
1. Ren – benevolence, humanness
2. Yi – Righteousness, justice
3. Li – Proper rite
4. Chic – knowledge
5. Xin – integrity