Self, Subject

Once again, I’d like to dwell on the subtlety of the relation between empirical “me” and transcendental “I”. As usual, for philosophical purposes I want to advise that we hold off on identifying the two in the way that we commonly do when immersed in living our lives.

A contentful self exists on the empirical side. There are biographical and psychological facts about it. Each such “me” is unique. I take the primary referent of this “self” to be our developed emotional constitution, or Aristotelian hexis. When immersed in living our lives, we often say “I” in common-sense reference to this contentful, factual self, but this is very different from a transcendental “I”. Each person who says “I” for “me” in this common-sense way says it differently, because in each of these cases, “I” refers to a different “me”.

A transcendental “I” is a contentless symbolic index for a constellation of values and commitments, i.e., what we care about and what we believe, our Aristotelian ethos. Here, what is of interest is not the content of a contentful, factual self (“us”), but rather the content of what we care about and what we believe. Transcendental “I” refers to the identity of an ethos or unity of apperception. Thus anyone who in some context cares about the same things and believes the same things says “I” transcendentally in exactly the same way in that context, because in each of these cases, “I” refers to the same ethos.

(I’m using the common vocabulary of reference and identity here to keep things simple, but the usual caveats apply. Reference and identity are actually derivative notions, not primitive ones, but there is no philosophical harm in using them in a simple way anyway, provided we avoid tacitly assuming they are primitive.)

What identifies us as individuals is the empirical “me”, but what plays the role of an ethical subject or subject of knowledge is the paradoxically intimate but anonymous transcendental “I”. (See also Transcendental?; Empirical-Transcendental Doublet; and many articles under Subjectivity in the menu.)

Historically, tight theoretical identification of ethical subjects and subjects of knowledge with empirical individuals is associated with the rationalization of practices of blaming and punishment, especially when translated into a theological context.

Kant’s Groundwork

Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals (1784) was Kant’s first major ethical treatise, predating the Critique of Practical Reason (1788). Perhaps the most famous and commented upon of all Kant’s ethical works, Groundwork introduced the categorical imperative. Kant says that the true vocation of reason is not to give us the means to some end, but to produce a moral will that is good in itself. He goes on to sharply distinguish actions done from duty from actions done from inclination, as the only ones deserving of praise. He says that actions from duty get their moral worth from the worth of the maxim (i.e., rationale) that guides choice, rather than from the worth of the aim of the actions. Duty, he says, is the moral necessity of an action from respect for the law. The relevant kind of law must be universal, and the only thing fitting this requirement is the categorical imperative, which is defined in terms of a pure universality.

Kant goes on to argue that while we are constantly tempted to excuse ourselves from acting in accordance with universal moral duty, no utilitarian, prudential, or other excuses have any place in ethics. Everywhere, he says, “one runs into the dear self, which is always thrusting itself forward”. Any resolution of these issues requires common human reason to move into the field of practical philosophy. To be genuine, morality should hold with absolute necessity, binding for all rational beings. Of course, for Kant this does not mean that our subjective conclusions hold with such necessity. To believe that would be to fall for a trick of the “dear self”, and to claim it would be dogmatism.

For Kant, any genuine supreme principle of morality must depend on pure reason, independent of all experience. We should seek a “fully isolated” metaphysics of morals, “mixed with no anthropology, with no theology, with no physics or hyperphysics”, although its application to human beings also requires anthropology. All moral concepts originate in pure reason. The will, Kant says, is just pure practical reason. (See also The Autonomy of Reason.)

Self-Consciousness vs Identity

In the development being pursued here, reason, self-consciousness, agency, and responsibility all end up being trans-individual and social things. My emotions are basically mine, but my thoughts, commitments, and actions and their consequences involve more than just me. At the same time, though, as I put it once before, these things that involve more than just me actually say more about who “I” am than my inner state says about “me”. Who we are as ethical beings involves much more than personal identity and what is strictly ours. (See also Ethos, Hexis; Apperception, Identity; Expansive Agency; The Ambiguity of “Self”; Essentially Self-Conscious?; Ego.)

Soul, Self

At the risk of some repetition, and putting it very simply this time, my own view is that common-sense personal identity is centered in the emotions, and in what Brandom would call our sentience, and Aristotle and Averroes would have called our soul. Reason, on the other hand, while it does in one aspect get secondarily folded back into the individuality of our Aristotelian soul, is at root trans-individual and social. (See also Ethos, Hexis; Parts of the Soul; What Is “I”; Psyche, Subjectivity; Individuation; Subject; Mind Without Mentalism; Ego.)

The Ambiguity of “Self”

To put it mildly, “self” is said in many ways. To begin with, is it used as a noun, as an adjective, or as an adverb? As a noun, it may refer to an empirical “me”. As an adjective, it may name an abstract, pure reflexivity. It may also be used to adverbially describe something that has recursive structure that depends on details. I’ve always thought adverbs were the part of speech closest to reality.

The contrast between “self” in something like Hegelian self-consciousness and the “self” figuring in my recent Ego post could not be more extreme. Hegel’s use is definitely adverbial; as I have said several times, self-consciousness is anything but direct consciousness of a (noun) “self”. It has more to do with ethical awareness of limitations, and awareness of others. (See also Self, Infinity; Individuation.)

Ego

Literally since childhood, I’ve been concerned about ethical issues involving ego or egoism in a plain ordinary dictionary sense. This involves a number of related aspects. At the grossest level, there is selfishness and arrogance. Beyond that, there are many kinds and degrees of self-centeredness. At the subtle end of the spectrum, there are various kinds of self-involvement that impair our attention to the concerns of others. What these all have in common is that with varying degrees of seriousness, they result in failures of reciprocity in social relationships, failures to apply the golden rule. As a young person, this led me to investigate various spiritual teachings about ego and self and what to do with them. This still stands as a backdrop to my philosophical interest in questions related to subjectivity, and in related questions of historical interpretation.

Philosophically, ego in the ordinary sense is not at all the same thing as a Subject, but the two are commonly confounded. Both are problematic, and require careful handling. Modern common-sense views of such things most often implicitly reflect a very specific historical “mentalist” philosophical view shared by Descartes and Locke, which tends to simply identify the two. In my view, this identification of ego-self-subject-mind as one simple thing is utterly wrong, and makes it impossible to adequately address the serious issues with each separate concept.

Historically, the rise of Cartesian-Lockean mentalism was closely tied to the rise of possessive individualism, of which Locke, along with Hobbes, was one of the main theorists (see Rights). This gave egoism in the ordinary sense a new kind of respectability that it did not have in premodern society. On this theory, people could claim ethical justification for egoistic behavior, and claim additional support from theories like Adam Smith’s invisible hand. This created a further slippery slope, leading to all manner of extensions and abuses of these principles that Locke or Smith would not have condoned. (See also Desire of the Master; Freedom Without Sovereignty.)

In sound ethics, reciprocity comes before self. This does not imply any extreme self-denial, just appropriate consideration of others, who should give the same consideration to us. (See also The Ambiguity of “Self”; Individuation; What Is “I”?)