Unreality and strangeness in the understanding of the self

Abstract

Since modernity, philosophy has taken the "I exist" as its first principle due to its absolute certainty and has conceived the essence of the self as consciousness. The proposition "I exist" affirms the being of the I in the sense that it is or exists whereas the proposition "I am a consciousness" expresses its being in the sense of what it essentially is. These two predicates are affirmed of an individual conceived through the concept of the self, which is an ecceidative concept. This conference proposes a theory of ecceidative concepts, also called deictic or indexical concepts. The application of this theory to the concept of the self reveals, on the one hand, the grounds for both self-reference and its existence to be absolutely certain for every self and, on the other, that on the basis of these certainties alone it is not feasible to determine what the self is. The reduction of the self to a thinking thing—soul, self-consciousness, or mind—is uncertain. The origin of the concept of self is also addressed, starting from the premise that ecceidative concepts —including that of the self— are human constructs. Based on the conditions under which these concepts are constructed, it is argued that only an entity that exists alongside and among the other entities, rather than being radically separate and opposed to them as has been believed since modernity —without thereby implying that it is a mere body governed by mechanism— can construct a concept of the self and understand itself as such