UNDERSTANDING THE SELF proves that there is a doubting self, a thing that things and
therefore, that cannot be doubted.
LESSON 1: THE SELF VARIOUS PHILOSOPHICAL
PERSPECTIVES
The history of philosophy is replete with men and women who
inquired into the fundamental nature of the self. The Greeks were
the ones who seriously questioned myths and moved away from
them in attempting to understand reality and respond to
perennial questions of curiosity including the question of the self.
• SOCRATES AND PLATO
After a series of thinkers from all across the ancient Greek world
who were disturbed by the same issue, a man came out to question
something else. This man was Socrates. Socrates was concerned
about the problem of the self. He was the first philosopher to ever
engage in systematic questioning about the self. To Socrates, and
this has become his life-long mission, the true task of a philosopher
is to know oneself. Plato claimed in his dialogs that Socrates
affirmed that the unexamined life is not worth living. For Socrates,
every man is composed of body and soul. This means that every
human person is dualistic, that he is composed of two important
aspects of his personhood. For Socrates, this means that all
individuals have an imperfect, impermanent aspect to him, and the
body, while maintaining that there is also a soul that is perfect and
permanent. Plato, Socrates’ student, basically took off from his
master and supported the idea that man is a dual nature of body and
soul. Justice in the human person can only be attained if the three
parts of the soul are working harmoniously with one another. Plato
added that there are three components of the soul: the rational,
spirited soul, and the appetitive soul. The rational soul: forged by
reason and intellect has to govern the affairs of the human person.
Spirited soul: in charge of emotions
Appetitive soul: in charge of the base, desires are controlled as
well.
• AUGUSTINE
Following the ancient view of Plato and infusing it with the
newfound doctrine of Christianity, Augustine agreed that man is a
bifurcated nature. An aspect of man that dwells in the world and is
imperfect and continuously yearns to be with the Divine and others
is capable of reaching immorality. The body is bound to die on
Earth and the soul is to anticipate living eternally in a realm of
spiritual bliss and in communion with God.
• THOMAS AQUINAS
Adapting some ideas from Aristotle, Aquinas said that indeed, man
is composed of two parts; matter and form. Matter or hyle, in
Greek, refers to the common stuff that makes everything in the
universe. Form, on the other hand, or morphe in Greek refers to the
“essence of a substance or a thing”. It is what makes it what it is.
• RENE DESCARTES: Cogito, ergo sum/I
think, therefore I am
Descartes conceived the human person as having a body and mind.
He claims that there is so much that we should doubt since much of
what we think and think is fallible, and may turn out to be false.
He thought that the only thing that one cannot doubt is the
existence of the self, for even if one doubts oneself, that only
• DAVID HUME
As an empiricist who believes that one can only know what comes
from the senses and experiences, Hume argues that the self is
nothing like what his predecessors thought of it. Empiricism is the
school of thought that espouses the idea that knowledge can only
be possible if it is sensed and experienced. For example, Elsa
knows that Ana is another human person not because she has seen
her soul. He knows she is just like her because she sees her, hears
her, and touches her. > using the 5 senses
For Hume, the self is nothing else but a bundle of impressions.
Experiences can be categorized into two: impressions and ideas.
Impressions are the basic objects of our experience or sensation.
Ideas, on the other hand, are just copies of impressions.
> Impressions include sensations as well as desires, passions, and
emotions. > Ideas are “the faint images of these in thinking and reasoning”
• IMMANUEL KANT
> Human autonomy - leading one's life according to reasons, values, or
desires that are authentically one's own.
To Kant, there is necessarily a mind that organizes the impressions
that men get from their external world. Without the self, one cannot
organize the different impressions that one gets in relation to his
own existence. Kant therefore suggests that it is an actively
engaged intelligence in man that synthesizes all knowledge and
experience.
• GILBERT RYLE
> Bodies and minds are not separate
> mental acts are not at all distinct from bodily actions.
Gilbert-Ryle solves the mind-body dichotomy that has been
running for a long time in the history of thought by blatantly
denying the concept of internal, non-physical self. For Ryle, what
truly matters is the behavior that a person manifests in his day-to-
day life. Ryle suggests that the “self” is not the entity one can
locate and analyze but simply the convenient name that people use
to refer to all behaviors that people make.
• MAURICE MERLEAU-PONTY
> believed the physical body to be an important part of what makes
up the subjective self.
Merleau-Ponty says that the mind and body are so intertwined that
they cannot be separated from one another. One cannot find any
experience that is not an embodied experience. All experience is
embodied. One’s body is his opening toward his existence to the
world. Because of these bodies, men are in the world.
LESSON 2: THE SELF SOCIETY AND
CULTURE
INTRODUCTION
Across time and history, the self has been debated, discussed and
fruitfully or otherwise conceptualized by different thinkers in
philosophy. One of the loci, if not the most important axis of
analysis is the relationship between the self and the external world.
We may be gifted with intellect and capacity to rationalize things
but at the end of the day, our growth and development and
consequentially, our selves are truly products of our interaction
with external reality.
WHAT IS THE SELF?
The self, in contemporary literature and even common sense, is
commonly defined by the following characteristics: "separate, self-
contained, independent, consistent, unitary, and private".
Separate- means that the self is distinct from other-selves. The self
is always unique and has its own identity.
Self-contained and independent- in itself it can exist. Its
distinctness allows it to be self-contained with its own thoughts,
characteristics, and volition. It does not require any other self for it
to exist.
Consistent- It has a personality that is enduring and therefore can
be expected to persist for quite some time. Consistency also means
that a particular self’s traits, characteristics, tendencies, and
potentialities are more or less the same.
Unitary- It is the center of all the experiences and thoughts that run
through a certain person; the chief command post where all
processes, emotions, and thoughts converge.
Private- each person sorts out information, feelings, emotions, and
thought processes within the self. This whole process is never
accessible to anyone but the self.
The concern of this lesson is in understanding the vital relationship
between the self and external * Social constructivism - learning
reality. occurs through social interaction and
the help of others, often in a group.
"Social constructionists argue for a merged view of ‘the person and
‘their social context’ where the boundaries of one cannot easily be
separated from the boundaries of the other" (Stevens 1996)
Social constructivists argue that the self should not be seen as a
static entity that stays constant through and through. Rather, the
self has to be seen as something that is in unceasing flux, in a
a constant struggle with external reality and is malleable in its
dealings with society. The self is always in participation with social
life and its identity subjected to influences here and there.
^ the self cannot stay the same due to
its experiences with other people that
SELF AND CULTURE may cause them to change later on
According to the French Anthropologist Marcel Mauss, every self
has two faces: personne and moi. Moi refers to a person’s sense of
who he is, his body and his basic identity, his biological givenness.
Moi is a person’s basic identity. Personne, on the other hand, is
composed of social concepts of what it means to be who he is.
Personne has much to do with what it means to live in a particular
institution, a particular family, a particular religion, a particular
nationality, and how to behave given expectations and influences
from others.
In the Philippines, Filipinos tend to consider their territory as a part
of who they are. Filipinos most probably do not consider national
roads as something external to who they are. However, in another
country, the Filipino recognizes that he is in a foreign territory
where nothing technically belongs to him. He has to follow the
rules or else he will be apprehended.
THE SELF AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE
SOCIAL WORLD
> The self in the social world is how a person perceives whom they are. The way
a person sees his or herself is not always the way the rest of the world sees him
Recent studies indicate that men and women in their growth and
development engage actively in the shaping of the self. The
unending terrain of the metamorphosis of the self is mediated by
language. "Language as a both publicly shared and privately
utilized symbol system is the site where the individual and the
social make and remake each other" (Schwartz, White, and Lutz
1993).
MEAD AND VYGOTSKY
For Mead and Vygotsky, the way that human persons develop is
with the use of language acquisition and interaction with others.
The way that we process information normally a form of an
internal dialogue in our head.
Both Vygotsky and Mead treat the human mind as something that
is made, constituted through language as experienced in the
external world and as encountered in dialogs with others. A young
child internalizes values, norms, practices, and social beliefs and
more through exposure to these
dialogs that will eventually become part of his individual world.
For Mead, this takes place as a child assumes the "other" through
language and role-play.
Vygotsky, for his part, a child internalizes real-life dialogs that he
has had with others, with his family, his primary caregiver, or his
playmates. They apply this to their mental and practical problems
along with the social and cultural infusions brought about by the
said dialogs.
SELF IN FAMILIES
While every child is born with certain givenness, disposition
coming from his parents’ genes and general condition of life, the
impact of one’s family is still deemed as a given in understanding
the self. The kind of family that we are born in, the resources
available to us (human, spiritual, economic), and the kind of
development that we will have will certainly affect us as we go
through life. As a matter of evolutionary fact, human persons are
one of those beings whose importance of family cannot be denied.
Human beings are born virtually helpless and the dependency
period of a human baby to its parents for nurturing is relatively
longer than most other animals. Human persons learn the ways of
living and therefore their selfhood by being in a family. It is what
family initiates a person to become that serves as the basis for this
person’s progress Babies internalize ways and styles that they
observe from their family. Without a family, biologically and
sociologically, a person may not even survive or become a human
person.
GENDER AND THE SELF
Another important aspect of the self is gender. Gender is one of
those loci of the self that is subject to alteration, change, and
development. We have seen in the past years how people fought
hard for the right to express, validate, and assert their gender
expression.
Nancy Chodorow, a feminist, argues that because mothers take the
role of taking care of children, there is a tendency for girls to
imitate the same and reproduce the same kind of mentality of
women as care providers in the family. Men, on the other hand, in
the periphery of their own family, are taught early on how to
behave like a man. This normally includes holding in one’s
emotion, being tough, fatalistic, not to worry about danger, and
admiration for hard physical labor. Masculinity is learned by
integrating a young boy in a society.
The sense of self that is being taught makes sure that an individual
fits in a particular environment. Gender has to be personally
discovered and asserted and not dictated by culture and the society.
LESSON 3: THE SELF AS COGNITIVE
CONSTRUCT
ABSTRACTION
In confidence or in an attempt to avoid further analytical
discussions, a lot of people say, "I am who I am". Yet, this
statement still begs the question "if you are who you are, then who
are you that makes you who you are?"
Simply put, "self" is the "sense of personal identity and of who we
are as individuals (Jhangiani and Tarry 2014)."
William James (1890) was one of the earliest psychologists to
study the self and conceptualized the self as having two aspects—
the "I" and the "me". The "I" is the thinking, acting, and feeling
self (Gleitman, Gross, and Reisberg 2011; Hogg and Vaughan
2010). The "me”, on the other hand, is the physical characteristics
as well as psychological capabilities that make who you are.
Other concepts similar to the self are identity and self-concept.
Identity is composed of personal characteristics, social roles, and
responsibilities, as well as affiliations that define who one is
(Oyserman et al. 2012). Self-concept is what basically comes to
your mind when you are asked about who you are.
Carl Rogers captured this idea in his concept of self-schema or our
organized system or collection
of knowledge about who we are (Gleitman, et al). Imagine an
organized list or diagram similar to
one below.
The schema is not limited to the example above. It may also
include your interests, work, course, age, name, and physical
characteristics, among others. As you grow and adapt to the
changes around you, they also change. But they are not passive
receivers, they actively shape and affect how you see, think, and
feel about things. (Gleitman et al., 2011)
Theories generally see the self and identity as mental constructs,
created and recreated in memory. Current researches point to the
frontal lobe of the brain as the specific area in the brain associated
with the processes concerning the self. (Oyserman et al., 2012)
Basically, Sigmund Freud saw the self, its mental processes, and
one’s behavior as the results of the interaction between the Id, the
Ego, and the Superego.
However, as mentioned earlier, one cannot fully discount the
effects of society and culture on the formation of the self, identity,
and self-concept. Even as Freud and other theories and researchers
try to understand the person by digging deeper into the mind, they
cannot fully discount the huge and important effects of the
environment. As in the abovementioned definitions of the self,
social interaction always has a part to play in who we think we are.
This is not a nature vs. nurture but instead a nature-and-nurture
perspective. > partners in how developing
people interact with the
surrounding environment.
Under the theory of symbolic interactionism, G.H. Mead (1934)
argued that the self is created and developed through human
interaction. Basically, there are three reasons why self and identity
are social products (Oyserman et.al, 2012)
1. We do not create ourselves out of nothing. Society
helped in creating our self-concept in creating the
foundations of who we are and even if we make our
choices, we will still operate in our social and historical
contexts in one way or the other.
2. Whether we like to admit it or not, we actually need
others to affirm and reinforce who we think we are. We
also need them as reference points about our identity.
One interesting example is the social media interactions
we have.
3. What we think important to us also may have been
influenced by what is important in our social or historical
context.
Social interaction and group affiliation, therefore are vital
factors in creating our self-concept especially in the aspect of
providing us with our social identity or our perception of who we
are based on our membership to certain groups (Jhangiani and
Tarry 2014).
There are times, however, when we are aware of our self-concepts;
this is called self-awareness. Carver and Scheier (1981) identified
two types of self that we can be aware of (1) the private self
or your internal standards and private thoughts and feelings, and
(2) the public self or your public image commonly geared toward
having a good presentation of yourself to others (Hogg and
Vaughan 2010).
Self-awareness also presents us with at least three other self-
schema: the actual, ideal, and ought self. The "actual self" is who
you are at the moment, the "ideal self" is who you like to be, and
the "ought self" is who you think you should be.
Self-awareness may be positive or negative depending, depending
on the circumstances and our next course of action. In other
instances, self-awareness can be too much that we are concerned
about being observed and criticized by others, also known as self-
consciousness. At other times, especially with large crowds, we
may experience deindividuation or the "loss of individual self-
awareness and individual accountability in groups" (Festinger et al,
1952).
One of the ways in which our social relationship affects our self-
esteem is through social comparison. According to the social
comparison theory, we learn about ourselves, the appropriateness
of our behaviors, as well as our social status by comparing aspects
of ourselves with other people (Jhangiani and Tarry 2014).
Downward Social Comparison- we create a positive self-concept
by comparing ourselves with those who are worse off than us.
Upward Social Comparison- comparing ourselves with those who
are better off than us.
Social comparison also entails what is called self-evaluation
maintenance theory, which states that we can feel threatened
when someone our-performs us, especially when that person is
close to us (i.e., a friend or family).
In this case, we usually react in three ways. First, we distance
ourselves from that person or redefine our relationship with them.
Second, we may also reconsider the importance of the aspect or
skill in which you were outperformed. Lastly, we may also
strengthen our resolve to improve that certain aspect of ourselves.
In the attempt to increase or maintain self-esteem, some people
become narcissistic. Narcissism is a trait characterized by overly
high self-esteem, self-admiration, and self-centeredness.
Though self-esteem is a very important concept related to the self,
studies have shown that it only has a correlation, not causality, to
positive outputs and outlook.
People with high self-esteem are commonly described as outgoing,
adventurous, and adaptable in a lot of situations. They also initiate
activities and building relationship with other people. However,
they may also dismiss other activities that do not conform to their
self-concept or boost their self-esteem.

LESSON 4: THE SELF IN EASTERN AND

WESTERN THOUGHTS

In this lesson, we will look at religious beliefs and political

philosophies that greatly influenced the mindset of each nation or
culture. Since almost all the theories about the self, which were
discussed in the previous lessons, also came from Western
scientific research, we will highlight the Eastern thoughts in this
lesson.

First is Confucianism, Confucianism can be seen as a code of

ethical conduct, of how one should properly act according to their
relationship with other people; thus, it is also focused on having a
harmonious social life. Self-cultivation is seen as the ultimate
purpose of life but the characteristics of Chun-tzu, a man of virtue
or noble character, is still embedded in his social relationships.

The second philosophy is Taoism. Taoism is living in the way of

the Tao or the universe. However, Taoism rejects having one
definition of what the Tao is, and one can only state clues of what
it is they adopt a free-flowing, relative, unitary, as well as
paradoxical view of almost everything. It rejects the hierarchy and
strictness brought by Confucianism and would prefer a simple
lifestyle and its teachings thus aim to describe how to attain that
life.

The ideal self is selflessness but this is not forgetting about the self,
it is living a balanced life with society and nature, being open and
accepting to change, forgetting about prejudices and egocentric
ideas, and thinking about equality as well as complementarity
among humans as well as other beings.

Buddhism. The self is seen as an illusion, born out of ignorance, of

trying to hold or control things or human-centered needs; thus, the
self is also the source of all the suffering. It is our quest to forget
about the self, forget the cravings of the self, break the attachments
you have with the world, and to renounce the self which is the
cause of all the suffering and in doing so, attain the state of
Nirvana.

The Western Culture- individualistic culture since their focus is

on the person. Eastern Culture/Asian culture- collectivistic culture
as the group and social relations that are given more importance
than individual needs and wants. By valuing the individual,
Westerners may seem to have loose associations or even loyalty to
their groups. Eastern or oriental persons look after the welfare of
their groups and values cooperation.