Chapter 1

DEFINING THE SELF: PERSONAL AND DEVELOPMENTAL

PERSPECTIVES ON SELF AND IDENTITY

Our primary personal responsibility is to have that best self that we could ever have. Naturally,
we have that desire to be transformed into somebody that we envision to become. However, there
are challenges we can to meet along the way. These may include our enslaving habits, preferences,
attachments, values, worldviews, and goals. Also, these gravitational forces that may hold us down
are subtle impositions of society which became our desires and turned the course of our lives from
our ideal selves. Nonetheless, we can dare to stand and be our best selves, to be the best that we
can be and make a difference. That’s achieving greatness (Antonio, 2021).
This chapter deals with the fundamental concepts, theories and principles relative to the self
and identity. It will help you as a student to understand the construct of the self from various
disciplinal perspectives which are philosophy, sociology, anthropology, and psychology. Moreover,
knowledge on Western and Eastern thought will help you to further develop a better understanding of
yourself.
 GEC 1 (Understanding the Self)
Lesson 1
The Self from Various Philosophical Perspectives

I. Starting AccUrAtely (Introduction)

A. Intended Outcomes/Learning Objectives:
At the end of this lesson, you are expected to be able to:
1. explain the importance of understanding the self;
2. discuss the different notions of the self from the points of view of the
various philosophers across time and place;
3. compare and contrast the representations of the self in different philosophical
schools; and
4. manifest enthusiasm in knowing oneself by completing the tasks assigned.

B. Lesson Introduction:
Who are you? What is your name?
Before we even had to be in any formal institution of learning, among the many things
that we were first taught as kids is to articulate and write our names. As we grew up, we were
told to refer back to this name when talking about ourselves. Our parents may have
painstakingly thought about our names. Should we be named after a famous celebrity, a
respected politician or historical personality, or even a saint? Were you named after one of
them?
Our names represent who we are. Human beings attach names that are meaningful to
birthed progenies because names are supposed to designate us in the world. Likewise, when
our parents call our names, we were taught to respond to them because our names represent
who we are.
As a student, you are to always write your names on your answer sheets, projects, or
any output for that matter. Your name is a term assigned to label you as an individual and is
what you carry with you as your identity.
On the other hand, the self is not a static thing that one is simply born with like a mole on
one’s face or is just assigned by one’s parents just like a name. Everyone is tasked to
discover one’s self. Have you truly discovered yours?

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II. StimUlating LeArning (Motivation)
Imagine yourself in this scenario:
You are about to submit yourself to your dream job interview. There are only a few slots
available but there is a long queue of applicants waiting at the lobby. You are given a form to fill in
with these necessary data: personal information (name, age, address, birthday, hobbies, favorites,
etc.) and answers to questions such as “Why should we select you?” and “What could be your
contribution to the company?” and “Describe the company after a year of hiring you”.
Which part/parts of the form do you think is/are easy to answer? Which part/parts is/are
difficult? Kindly take your time to reflect on these.

Analysis:
It is easy to access factual information about us: name, age, date of birth, parents’
names, etc. But, it is actually difficult to pull out those that are truly important or essential:
What distinguishes you from others? What makes you unique?
You, as you, should know yourself better and deeper than anyone else. We lack the time
to examine ourselves – most of our days are filled with responding to the expectations of
others, doing norms that are dictated by the society, and establishing things that are set for us
by our biological and socio-economic conditions (These are normal, but could sometimes
detach us from the core of our identity).

III. IncUlcAting Concepts (Inputs/Lesson Proper)

Since the ancient until the postmodern times, philosophers and scholars grappled to understand
the meaning of life. They have attempted to answer the question “Who am I?” Let’s find out these
ideas that may have influenced the ways we look at our lives today.

1. SOCRATES (469-399 B.C.E.)

He is the first philosopher who ever engaged in a systematic
questioning about the self. Socrates was more concerned with the
problem of the self. According to him, the true task of the philosopher is
to “know oneself”.
Socrates affirmed, as claimed by Plato in his dialogues, that the
unexamined life is not worth living. Living a life without knowing your
“self”, your purpose, your nature of being, is “sleepwalking”. These
“sleepwalking” individuals exist, but there is no life or meaning in their existence. They are only going
through the motions of life but they lack happiness, significance and virtue. To live and die inside is
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the worst thing that could happen to a man.
So, check on yourself. Are you “sleepwalking”?
In terms of the components or divisions of self, Socrates believed that every man is composed of
a “body” and a “soul”. Every human person is dualistic—composed of two important aspects of his
personhood: an imperfect, impermanent aspect called the “body” and a perfect and permanent aspect
called the “soul” (Dualism).

2. PLATO (428-347 B.C.E.)

Plato is Socrates’ student who supported Dualism, an idea that man is
of dualistic nature composed of body and soul. For Plato, however, the soul
(psyche in Greek) has three elements: the rational soul, the spirited soul, and
the appetitive soul.
Rational Self—composed of reason and intellect that governs the
affairs of humans; enables humans to think, make wise choices and
understand eternal truths.
Spirited Self –also called Passion, is in charge of our emotions (love, aggressiveness,
empathy, etc.).
Appetitive Soul—in charge of base desires like eating, drinking, sleeping and even
sexual activities.

The focus of Plato is on the harmony of these three components of the soul. When the ideal
state is attained (meaning when the three components are working in harmony with each other), the
person’s soul becomes just and virtuous. Imagine that you plan to travel by using a chariot being
pulled by two horses. How can you arrive at your intended destination? Of course, your chariot must
have wheels and the two horses must gallop harmoniously with each other. Take these three
elements (the chariot and the two horses) as the three components of the soul, working in harmony to
achieve the ideal state. Plato called this giving JUSTICE to your human person.

3. ST. AUGUSTINE OF HIPPO, Northern Africa (354-430)

Following Plato’s ideas and infusing these with Christian doctrines,
Augustine agreed that man has a bifurcated nature or the self is divided
into two:
Body:
 Can only thrive in the imperfect, physical reality (the world)
 Bound to die on Earth

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 Soul:
 Anticipated to live eternally in a realm of spiritual bliss in communion with God.

He believed that happiness exists only in God’s love. Therefore, according to him, the goal of
every human person is to attain communion and bliss with God by living his life on earth in virtue. He
created, in his book “The Confessions”, a theology of self—a total, complete view of the self in
relation to God.
Do you also consider your relationship with your God a basis in examining yourself?

4. ST. THOMAS AQUINAS (1225-1274)

Aquinas is another Christian priest who introduced Christian
doctrines with philosophical ideas in understanding the self. He supported
Aristotle’s ideas of rejecting the dualistic belief that self is a dualistic entity
composed of body and soul. He maintained instead the idea of Aristotle
that there are two basic categories of things:
Matter (hyle) which represents all matter; and
Form (morphe) which represents the essence of a
thing, what makes the thing what it is.

This view is called Hylomorphism. It asserts that individual organisms are composed of matter
(body) and form (soul) which only exist in relation to one another. Humans are composed of a united,
inseparable union of components of self rather than divided, dualistic self. It also asserts that the soul
(anima) is what separates living thing (e.g. humans) from non-living ones.
The soul is what enlivens the body. For living things, to live is to exist. So the soul is
that by which the human body actually exists. Now a form is this sort of thing. So the
human soul is the form of the body. (Aquinas, De anima, 1, 369)

5. RENÉ DESCARTES (1596-1650)

Descartes is the “father of modern philosophy”. His philosophical ideas
were encapsulated in his major philosophical work, Meditations on First
Philosophy. His philosophy is focused on understanding the nature of
reasoning process and its relation to the human self. He questioned the
integrity of beliefs accepted on “faith”.
He emphasized that the only thing that we should not doubt or question
is the existence of self. For even if we doubt our self, it only proves the existence of a thinking self,
and a thinking self should not be doubted. His famous line is cogito, ergo sum which literally means “I

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think, therefore I am”. This simply means that because you are thinking, there is no doubt that you
exist. No rational person will doubt his/her own existence as a conscious, thinking entity (even if we
are dreaming, hallucinating or being manipulated by some external entity). However, the physical
body is just secondary to your personal identity.
According to Descartes, here are some of the manifestations that you are “thinking”:
You understand situations in which you find yourself.
You doubt the accuracy of ideas presented to you.
You affirm the truth of a statement made about you.
You deny an accusation that someone has made.
You will yourself to complete a task you have begun.
You refuse to follow a command that you consider to be unethical.
You imagine a fulfilling career for yourself.
You feel passionate emotions toward another person.

The essence of existing as a human identity is the possibility of being aware of our selves: Being
self-conscious in this way is integral to having a personal identity. Having a self-identity and being
self-conscious are mutually dependent on one another.
Do you believe that your self is more than or even beyond your physical sense of yourself?

6. JOHN LOCKE (1632-1704)

John Locke, a British philosopher and physician, is famous in his tabula
rasa theory of the mind. Tabula rasa (literally means blank slate) concept of
the mind suggests that humans are born with an empty or clean mind. The
mind is only filled in through experiences as one grows and interacts with the
environment.
In the study of self, John Locke holds the idea that personal identity (the
self) is a matter of psychological continuity. For him, personal identity is
founded on consciousness, and not on the substance of either the soul or the
body. Consciousness is being aware that one is thinking. It always accompanies thinking and is an
important part of the thinking process. Consciousness makes possible our belief that we are the same
identity in different times and different places.
Do you agree that you are the same you last night before you go to bed and in the morning
when you wake up? How about last year when you were still in high school? How about during the
summer vacation? If you believe so, then it is because of your consciousness of being the same

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person in all those different contexts. Consciousness is very important in creating a coherent self-
identity.
Additionally, personal identity, according to him, is the concept about oneself that evolves over the
course of an individual’s life. It may include aspects of life that man has no control over, such as
where he grew up or the color of his skin, as well as the choices he makes, like how he spend his
time and what he believes.
Reflect on yourself. How influential are your experiences in the development of your concept
of identity or self?

7. DAVID HUME (1711-1776)

David Hume is a Scottish philosopher, an empiricist, who believes
that one can know only what comes from the sense and experiences.
(Empiricism is the school of thought that espouses the idea that
knowledge can only be possible if it is sensed and experienced.) Hume
argues that the self is not an entity over and beyond the physical body.
Men can only attain knowledge by experiencing. For example, Jack
knows that Jill is another human person not because he has seen her soul. He knows she is just like
him because he sees her, hears her and touches her.
To Hume, the self is nothing else but a bundle of impressions or a collection of different
perceptions, which succeed each other with an inconceivable rapidity, and are in a perpetual flux
and movement (Hume and Steinberg, 1992). For him, man has no “clear and intelligible” idea of the
self. He posits that no single impression of the self exists; rather, the self is just the thing to which all
perceptions of man are ascribed. Moreover, even if there was such an impression of the self, it
would have to remain constant over time to constitute identity.
He said further that experiences are categorized into two: impressions and ideas.
Impressions are basic objects of your experience or sensation. They, therefore, form the core
of your thoughts; and are vivid because they are products of your direct experience with the world
(e.g. pain, pleasure, heat, cold, happiness, grief, fear, exhilaration, etc.).
Ideas, on the other hand, are copies of impressions. Because of this, they are not as lively and
vivid as your impressions. When one imagines the feeling of being in love for the first time, that still
is an idea.
Simply, impressions are your direct experiences while ideas are acquired through indirect
means. For example, your impression of your trip to Paris, France is more vivid than your ideas

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 about it based on what you see in YouTube videos, magazines, or your friend’s stories of their
vacation trips.
It is believed that there is a unified, coherent self, a soul or mind just like what some of the
previous philosophers thought. But to Hume, what one thinks as a unified self is simply a
combination of all experiences with a particular person because to him, there is no self.

8. IMMANUEL KANT (1724-1804)

To Kant, the self is a regulating and organizing factor of the
apparatuses of the mind.
The idea of Hume that the self was a combination of impressions
was problematic for Kant. Although he recognizes the truth to Hume’s
account that everything starts with perception and sensation of
impressions, Kant believes that there is a mind that organizes these
impressions that men get from the external world.
For example, time and space are ideas that one cannot find in the world, but is built in our
minds. He calls these the apparatuses of the mind. Along with the different apparatuses of the mind
goes the “self”.
Without the self, one cannot organize the different impressions that one gets in relation to his
own existence.
Kant believes that the self is an actively engaged intelligence in man that synthesizes all
knowledge and experiences. The self is also the seat of knowledge acquisition for all human persons.

9. GILBERT RYLE (1900-1976)

Gilbert Ryle is a British philosopher who solved the mind-body
dichotomy that has been running for a long time in the history of thought by
blatantly denying the concept of an internal, non-physical self. For Ryle,
what truly matters is the behavior that a person manifests in his day-to-day
life. He said that looking for and trying to understand a self as it really
exists is like visiting your friend’s university and looking for the “university”.
One can roam around the campus, visit the library and he football field,
and meet the administrators and faculty and still end up not finding the
“university”. This is because the campus, the people, the systems, and the territory all form the
university.

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 Ryle suggests that the “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. To him, the self is
how you behave.

10. MAURICE MERLEAU-PONTY (1908-1961)

Merleau-Ponty is a French phenomenological philosopher who

asserts that the mind-body bifurcation that has been going on for a long
time is a futile endeavor and an invalid problem.
Unlike Ryle who simply denies the “self”, Merleau-Ponty instead
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. This means that 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. The living body (or lived body), his thoughts, emotions and experiences are all
one.
So, how do you know that you are really in love? According to Merleau-Ponty, you need to have
a precise description of your immediate responses: physically, emotionally, and cognitively.
I am currently in love, and
 I feel ________________________________________________________.
 I think _______________________________________________________.
 My physical responses are ______________________________________.
 I spontaneously _______________________________________________.

By doing so, you can have a clearer understanding of what “being in love” is all about, by using
the concepts based on the reality of your lived experiences.
Try doing that in other phenomenon of your experiences such as:
 Being the eldest/youngest/only child
 Poverty
 Living with a broken family
 Being a teenager
 Being a member of LGBTQIA+ community, etc.

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11. PATRICIA CHURCHLAND

Through time, more ideas and views about self emerged.

There are those who believe that all aspects of the universe are
composed of matter and energy that can be fully explained by
physical laws (Materialism, or Physicalism as its more
contemporary counterpart). These philosophers (and even
psychologists) believe that mental states are identical to physical
brain states. They believe that there is no immaterial self that
exists independently from the brain or the body.
Patricia Churchland’s ideas on self are grounded on the
perspectives of materialism or physicalism. She argued that to fully understand the mind, one must
understand the brain, using concepts of neuroscience to explain mental concepts such as freewill.
She asserted that there is no mind or soul beyond the physical brain. Therefore, she proposed that
the brain is the self; the brain is each of us.

Conclusion:
Self has been philosophically defined in many ways. Though we were provided with these
fundamental concepts and principles about the self, finding the true meaning of our existence is a
personal endeavor. It is our personal task to find out and understand who we really are. Doing so can
help us define ourselves better. No one else can, not even our parents. In this time of digital
socialization, instead of knowing other people’s lives, take time to listen to yourself. Look inwardly and
search that “self” that waits for your attention. Be yourself. While doing so, reflect on this idea by
Friedrich Nietzsche: “We are unknown, we knowers, ourselves to ourselves; this has good reason.
We have never searched for ourselves—how should it then come to pass, that we should ever find
ourselves?”
Lastly, this search to understand the self is not entirely possible without “the knowledge of the
holy” (Proverbs 9:10) for this knowledge is supreme and it is where all wisdom is actually anchored.

IV. Using/Applying Knowledge (Application/Integration)

To summarize and to better compare and contrast the views of the different philosophers
that we have discussed, kindly complete the matrix below.

Philosopher View of Self Division of Self Other remarkable

ideas
Socrates

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 Philosopher View of Self Division of Self Other remarkable
ideas
Plato

St. Augustine

St. Aquinas

Rene Descartes

John Locke

David Hume

Immanuel Kant

Gilbert Ryle

10
 Philosopher View of Self Division of Self Other remarkable
ideas

Maurice Merleau-
Ponty

Patricia Churchland

V. EvalUAting Understanding (Assessment)

(Assessment which will serve as quiz will be uploaded soon in the LMS.)

IMPORTANT:
The complete version will be uploaded in the LMS. It already includes the Assessment
Activities.

References:
Alata, E., Caslib, B., Serafica, J. & Pawilen, R,A. (2018). Understanding the self (1st edition).
Rex Book Store, Inc.

Brawner, D., & Arcega, A. (2018). Understanding the self. Quezon City: C & E Publishing.

Chaffee, J. (2016). The philosopher's way: Thinking critically about profound ideas
(5th ed.). USA: Pearson Education.

Villafuerte, S., Quillope, A., Tunac, R., & Borja, E. (2018). Understanding the self. Quezon
City: Nieme Publishing House Co.

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