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.
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.
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...
Following in the path of Kant and Fichte, Hegel has become one of the most influential philosophers in history. His philosophy has influenced important people, such as Karl Marx, and influential schools of thought, such as the Frankfurt School. This influence rides heavily on the chapter, Master and Slave in his book Phenomenology of Spirit. This chapter examines the relationship between two self-consciousnesses, and the process of self-creating. The relationship between the two self-consciousnesses and the eventual path to ‘acknowledgment’ or recognition of the self is outlined in the first line of the chapter: “Self-consciousness exists in itself and for itself, in that, and by the fact that it exists for another self-consciousness; that
To Hegel, the history of the developing self-conscious mind was the same as the history of philosophy. Through out time, conflicting theories have laid claim to their one exclusive form of truth. Hegel implies that we should not focus on these conflicted ideals but view each as “elements of an organic unity”. This places Hegel as part of a progression of philosophers (Plato, Aristotle, and Kant) who can generally by described as Idealists, whom regarded freedom or self-determination as real and being important for the soul or mind or divinity.
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
Hegel was influenced by developing biological fundamentals in that organisms were interdependent upon each other and their environment making them all part of a hierarchy in life. He related this to society and human reason by believing that nothing could function in isolation and that everything and everyone was part of a larger whole: the Nation-State. He asserted that an individual’s moral ideas would be identical to that of the Nation-State. Hegel believed in the assimilation of one’s moral ideas and social ethics to the government’s because it incorporated all political, economic, and social aspects of an individual’s culture. Hegel’s philosophy opposed rationalism in that instead of celebrating the independent, individual person, he believed that people had the need to become part of something larger beyond themselves.
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
At the height of Plainview's career, a character named Paul Sunday approaches the tycoon regarding his family's property in Little Boston, California and the oil that resides below it. When attempting to purchase the property, Plainview is halted by Eli, Paul's twin brother. Eli, the local pastor, demands $10,000 for the property, imputing the cost to the benefit of the church. A deal is begrudgingly made, and Plainview ends up purchasing all lots surrounding the oil well except for one. This is the first time that Eli posits himself as an equivalent master, and Eli continues to antagonize Plainview throughout the film. G. W. F. Hegel writes in his work, Phenomenology of Spirit, on the notions of self-recognition, master/slave relationships, and the cyclical nature of such. Hegel proposes that to understand the world, one must understand relation - that is relation of one's own consciousness through the recognition of a consciousness of equal value to one's own. Hegel writes, "[Self-consciousness'] recognize themselves as mutually recognizing one another". The author bolsters the idea of recognition by contending that rival self-consciousness' engage each other in a "fight to the death". That is, to be sure of one's own consciousness they must recognize a consciousness that is equal to their own; and then, once that recognition is done, the consciousness' must
With each of these forms of despair, one is the despair of not wanting (or eager) to be oneself and the other is the despair of wanting (or eager) to be oneself. The despair of wanting to be oneself is, in some sense, the craving to be one’s own self, that is, a self that does not owe its presence to God. It is a refusal of our possibility, an unwillingness to acknowledge that our character/identity is the consequence of our connection to God. In this, the despair of wanting to be oneself is the despair of a self that has been created by something else. The despair of not wanting to be oneself is, by distinction, the despair of a self that fe...
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 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,
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.
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
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.