1.

Socrates- Every man is composed of body and soul; all individuals have an imperfect,
impertinent to him, and the body, while maintaining that there is also a soul that is perfect
and permanent.
-Beauty and intelligence are the main determinants of a good flesh for humans. There is
an imperfection when our traits don’t go in harmony with the standards of the society. While
looking what’s outside the box, majority of us disregard the modesty of our soul. We always
prefer to give hasty judgment based on what we literally see.
Socrates compared the body and soul, and he gave his favor to the soul by telling that it is
the perfect and permanent one. I agree with that. I always embrace my imperfections and sell my
good sides by showing who really am I. I always unveil the good and bad sides of me and try not
to keep secrets. I believe that being honest to ourselves compliments our soul.

2. Plato- He supported that man is a dual nature of body and soul. He added that there are
three components of the soul; the rational soul, the spirited soul, and the appetitive soul.
-Humans have rational soul that makes them a “thinking individual”. They know the do’s
and don’ts of life. They also have spirited soul which denotes their soft side. And lastly, humans
have cravings also which feed their appetitive soul. These three components of soul portray the
true nature of a human being.
-The “self” can be good or bad, that depends on how tolerable the soul is. Because if
we’re going to analyze the idea of Plato, humans have the constructive and destructive nature.

3. Augustine- He agreed that man is of a bifurcated nature; the body is bound to die on
earth and the soul is to anticipate living eternally in a realm of spiritual bliss in communion
with God.
-The idea of St. Augustine is more on religious side. He mentioned about the mortality of
body and immortality of soul. The gist of it is very vivid, that feeding the soul with good deeds is
far better than pleasing the body.
To me, our body is just a vessel or avatar that someday will perish. So, whatever we have
materially does not define ourselves. What matters more for me is the purity of our intentions.
Heaven is a condition of heart after all.

4. Descartes- The body is nothing else but a machine that is attached to the mind. The
human person has it but it is not what makes a man a man. If at all, that is the mind.
-I support this idea. In the first place, being rational distinguishes us from animals. It is
our innate nature to know the consequences of our deeds. This signifies that we, humans, have
the ability to calculate our own actions.
 My point here is that, our body is useless without our capacity to identify ourselves as
humans. It means that we should act as one, we should govern ourselves, we shouldn’t do things
that could hurt others, and etc.

5. Hume- Self, according to Hume, is simply “a bundle or collection of different

perceptions, which succeed each other with an inconceivable rapidity, and are in a
perpetual flux and movement.”
-Hume clearly illustrates how our perceptions are sustained with body movements. The
way how we see things and happenings around us is called a perception. This perception defines
us in way that it comes from our mind. Previous perceptions are reinforced or supported with
new perceptions until they form a single meaning. Afterwards, they will become actions.
To wrap it up, unless there is a showing of the contrary, all of our actions are
premeditated and intentional. This is because most of our actions do not come from a single
source or impulsivity but from different perceptions that support one another.

6. Kant- The self is not just what gives one his personality; it is also the seat of knowledge
acquisition for all human being.
-The “self” has something to do also with how people learn. This is simply because of its
passive and active characteristics. The former defines one’s personality while the latter
influences our ability to accumulate knowledge. This gives a manifestation that our personality
then becomes the foundation of our knowledge acquisition.
-For instance, I am sensitive with a certain topic while others don’t. This is due to the fact
that my affective and cognitive domains were influenced by my personality or “self”.

7. Ryle- “Self” is not an entity one can locate and analyze but simply the convenient name
that people use to refer to all the behaviors that people make.
-Understanding oneself is very hard and complicated. We even get confused of our own
self. But seeing how Ryle defined the word “self” gives me a glimpse of enlightenment about it.
Truly that “self” houses different aspects of our personality which makes it vague. What we can
only understand is the way we react to the stimuli. This includes our behavior, attitude,
characteristics, ethic, morale, and others. Eventually, knowing these will lead us to our
understanding about ourselves.
8. Merleau- Ponty- The mind and body are so intertwined that they cannot be separated
from one another.
-The mind is indeed an integral part of the human body. If it were not the mind, our
discretion will be restricted. Human beings know what is right and wrong otherwise they become
barbaric and irrational. Just like a servant that cannot be separated to his master, the body must
not act without the permission of the mind. There goes the saying “all action is reaction.”
This point of view is very interesting, especially in understanding the behavior of others.
Sometimes people condemn others just only because of what they see, but if we should try to
understand and answer the “whys” then we must start with understanding their motives.

9. Sigmund Freud- Freud’s view of self was multilayered, divided among the conscious,
preconscious, and unconscious.
- Freud mentioned the three psyches of a human being in his psychoanalytic theory. He
named these psyches as Id, Ego, and Superego. According to him, these are the main
components of the human mind; Id as the pleasure principle, Ego as the reality principle, and
superego as the moral principle or the conscience. Normally, the psyches are at war and
whatever we act is the result of it.
Human beings, according to Freud, have conscious, preconscious, and unconscious state.
This idea can be illustrated by drawing an iceberg. The part of an iceberg that we see above the
water level is the conscious state of a human being. The one that others can see and the “self” in
which we are very aware of. Thus, the conscious part of a human being is composed of the Ego
and Superego. The water level perse is the preconscious part of human beings. It is where a
human being is partly aware and not aware of himself. In other words, it is where our dreams are
and our unintended actions are consummated. The biggest part of the iceberg, the one that is
located below the water level, is called the unconscious state. The Id and Superego are the main
psyches in this state. It is the hidden part of us. It is where our greed, desire, lust, and the likes
are kept.
I am a fan of his ideology. I also believe that we have good and bad sides. The “self” that
we know is a mirror of our mental processes, that includes the one that we are aware and the one
that we are not.