Self-consciousness implies a state of mind that makes the individual aware of how others perceive him, and thus influences how he sees himself. In a sub-section of the Phenomenology of Spirit entitled ‘Independence and Dependence of Self-Consciousness: Lordship and Bondage’, Hegel describes the development of self-consciousness, and that while he agrees with the notion put forth by earlier philosophers that an individual is aware of himself as a conscious being and a subject, he also advances the argument that other beings (and fellow subjects) are objects from the point of view of the primary subject (self). In addition, within the realm of the social arena the individual is often locked into a struggle for the affirmation of his existence by arousing another’s interest in him as a person and attaining such an affirmation. “Thus the relation of the two self-conscious individuals is such that they prove themselves and each other through a life-and-death struggle. They must engage in this struggle, for they must raise their certainty of being for themselves to truth, both in the case of the other and in their own case” (Hegel 94). Most of the time, the striving of two self-conscious individuals does not end in literal physical death, but the opposing ego (or multiple opposing egos) would be able to kill certain aspects of the primary ego by showing him that certain things he may have believed about himself are false from the perspective of the ‘other.’
In deciding victory in the life or death struggle, for those who have fully separated from the biological drives, the self-concept is more important than the continuation of the physical being. Though Hegel does, eventually, concede the point that self-consciousness is im...
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...e the bondsman as he becomes much more vulnerable to the thoughts and opinions of others as he seeks to fulfill the expectations of those he determines to be his ‘betters’ (in a social sense). Ultimately, like the bondsman, he may eventually emancipate himself from mental slavery by becoming aware of how others would judge him and use the information to chart his own destiny, especially since his success (and the eventual acquisition of power) is dependent upon the creation of an image geared to please the others. In other words, he would need to please more people in order to become more successful. There is no way to hold both states of consciousness simultaneously because they are unequal and opposite. While one path may bring power, the powerful are more constrained by social rules than the bondsman who only has to obey the lord and then live his own life.
Although it may seem that the lord is at an advantage of using the bondsman for his own gain through the deterrence of power, Hegel shows how the more to gain. Hegel writes, “what desire failed to achieved, he succeeds in doing, viz to have done with the thing altogether, and to achieve satisfaction in the enjoyment of it. Desire failed to do this because of the thing’s [bondsman] independence” (Hegel 116). This passage shows why the lord has much more to lose because the bondsman acts as an independent consciousness of intentionally not wanting to submit to his lord. How...
Take a minute to relax. Enjoy the lightness, or surprising heaviness, of the paper, the crispness of the ink, and the regularity of the type. There are over four pages in this stack, brimming with the answer to some question, proposed about subjects that are necessarily personal in nature. All of philosophy is personal, but some philosophers may deny this. Discussed here are philosophers that would not be that silly. Two proto-existentialists, Søren Kierkegaard and Friedrich Nietzsche, were keen observers of humanity, and yet their conclusions were different enough to seem contradictory. Discussed here will be Nietzsche’s “preparatory human being” and Kierkegaard’s “knight of faith”. Both are archetypal human beings that exist in accordance to their respective philosopher’s values, and as such, each serve different functions and have different qualities. Both serve the same purpose, though. The free spirit and the knight of faith are both human beings that brace themselves against the implosion of the god concept in western society.
An important precondition for Hegel's examination of the sensual is his caveat that sense-certainty must not use complex concepts of any kind to express that which it knows. In this sense, Hegel treats sense-certainty as the realm whose truth is expressed as pure being or ISNESS, as opposed to mediated forms that understand ISNESS in a wider context of meaning (Hegel, 91). By insisting on this limitation, Hegel treats sense-certainty as stripped down to bare assertions of sensual experience, allowing the phenomenologist to examine the sensual based solely on what it is capable of showing us on its own. Indeed, it is this litmus test of self-sufficient communication that sets the stage for Hegel to return sensuality to the universal conceptual framework that supports it once it has been seen to fail in its own right.
the reader must understand the term “the self.” Self in this context means the humanity of the
...onscious self is obsessed with an evil, the conscious must overcome it or a paradox will result in which both selves parish.
We created our ego self in our attempt to protect ourselves from the losses we fear loss of self, loss of other, loss of security, loss of face. As children, when we didn’t get the love we needed, we decided that our true Self must be unlovable. In our attempt to feel safe, we buried our true Self and created the false self the ego, our wounded self. The ego self then went about learning how to feel safe through trying to control others and outcomes. The ego believes that having control over how people see us and feel about us, as well as over the outcome of things, will give us the safety we
In his book The View From Nowhere (1986), Thomas Nagel discusses the various problems that arise when we consider the contrast between the objective world we inhabit, and are part of, and the inherently subjective way we view that world. Nagel writes that understanding the relationship between these external and internal standpoints is central to solving these problems: 'It is the most fundamental issue about morality, knowledge, freedom, the self, and the relation of mind to the physical world' (p.3). In this essay I will survey the problems that Nagel is referring to, and will echo Nagel's view that this issue is of central importance within philosophy. However, I will also suggest that Nagel is wrong in his emphasis in dealing with the issue.
In his work, Who is Man, Abraham J. Heschel embarks on a philosophical and theological inquiry into the nature and role of man. Through analysis of the meaning of being human, Heschel determines eight essential traits of man. Heschel believes that the eight qualities of preciousness, uniqueness, nonfinality, process and events, solitude and solidarity, reciprocity, and sanctity constitute the image of man that defines a human being. Yet Heschel’s eight qualities do not reflect the essential human quality of the realization of mortality. The modes of uniqueness and opportunity, with the additional singular human quality of the realization of mortality, are the most constitutive of human life as uniqueness reflects the fundamental nature of humanity,
In today’s society, the mind is a set of cognitive elements which enables an individual’s consciousness, perception, thinking, judgement, and memory. In addition, without our minds and/or conscious experiences, a person would not be able to understand what makes them who they are. Similarly, in Thomas Nagel’s essay “What Is It Like to Be a Bat,” Nagel claims that even though there is something it is like to be an organism, humans are not capable of fully knowing what it is like to be a bat. In addition, Nagel supports his claims through the importance of an organism’s conscious experiences, memories, and knowledge which allow an individual to identify themselves. Therefore, in this paper I will discuss Nagel’s argument which I believe
Ego identity is said to be one of the many things Erickson has focused on. He believed that through social interaction we gain mindful sense of ourselves, which can be commonly referred to as Ego identity. Although, Freud referred to the ego as the match over the necessities of the identity and superego, Erickson saw the ego as our way of our self-esteem. The way Erickson describes ego is the way we commonly use it in conversation. The main i...
As presented in the Phenomenology of Spirit, the aim of Life is to free itself from confinement "in-itself" and to become "for-itself." Not only does Hegel place this unfolding of Life at the very beginning of the dialectical development of self-consciousness, but he characterizes self-consciousness itself as a form of Life and points to the advancement of self-consciousness in the Master/Slave dialectic as the development of Life becoming "for-itself." This paper seeks to delineate this often overlooked thread of dialectical insight as it unfolds in the Master/Slave dialectic. Hegel articulates a vision of the place of human self-consciousness in the process of Life as a whole and throws light on the role of death as an essential ingredient in the epic drama of life's struggle and Spirit's birth.
In The Concept of Anxiety, S�ren Kierkegaard deals with human anxiety about the possibility posed by freedom as it relates to sinfulness and spiritual progress. This paper will show that Kierkegaard?s concept of the moment and his prescription for inwardness, both in the context of spirituality, are connected. Importantly, inwardness depends on the moment and the possibility of transition that does not take place in time, transition that seems sudden if spotted from a temporal perspective. First, this paper will make sense of Kierkegaard?s concepts of time, eternity, and the moment, which will be an interpretation taken from his discussion at the first part of chapter three. Second, it will explain what his concept of inwardness is and what it means for human life, which will be based on text from chapter four, section two, subsection two (?Freedom Lost Pneumatically?). Finally, it will use those points to explain the connection between the moment and inwardness and then point out the importance of that connection.
Hegel's claim that self-consciousness realizes itself in ethical life is set up with the understanding that un-reactive immersion in the social community is no longer possible for modern human beings in his own time. In Hegel's view, ethical life is created within the culture and practices of the social community of an individual. “Ethical life is a system of norms and mores belonging to a social body, made up of spheres of social interaction and interdependence in which all individuals are embedded.” (Philosophy of Right, III: Ethical Life.) More importantly, the individual must follow that ethical life, and therefore contribute to the society himself. Ethical life is a stage of self consciousness towards which the individual of Hegel’s time is seen by Hegel to be living within, and to be constructing throughout his life. Hegel would claim that the moral individual would not try to dissociate from this, for his own benefit. He argues that reason is manifested in the benefit of the individual rather than of the social.
But, “human persons have an ‘inner’ dimension that is just as important as the ‘outer’ embodiment” (Cortez, 71). The “inner” element cannot be wholly explained by the “outer” embodiment, but it does give rise to inimitable facets of the human life, such as human dignity and personal identity. The mind-body problem entails two theories, dualism and physicalism. Dualism contends that distinct mental and physical realms exist, and they both must be taken into account. Its counterpart (weak) physicalism views the human as being completely bodily and physical, encompassing no non-physical, or spiritual, substances.
Truth of oneself makes it visible when faced with absurd events in life where all ethical issues fade away. One cannot always pinpoint to a specific trait or what the core essence they discover, but it is often described as “finding one’s self”. In religious context, the essential self would be regarded as soul. Whereas, for some there is no such concept as self that exists since they believe that humans are just animals caught in the mechanistic world. However, modern philosophy sheds a positive light and tries to prove the existence of a self. Modern philosophers, Descartes and Hume in particular, draw upon the notion of the transcendental self, thinking self, and the empirical self, self of public life. Hume’s bundle theory serves as a distinction between these two notions here and even when both of these conception in their distinction make valid points, neither of them is more accurate.