The Self is just a ghost in the hive mind of society until it appears out of the fog of history in a cloak of righteousness, defying a world that's become evil. — frank

Perhaps the idea of a ‘collective psyche’ or ‘hive mind’ needs to be shelved along with that of an autonomous, identical self. In their place we can substitute the perspectival consistency of a point of view. Point of view is itself a multiplicity of selves that are produced within the collective called a person. The collective selves forming the changing person participate in the social group via the vantage of an ongoing perspective.

To the extent that these images become naturalized in the collective psyche, the Self endures, and will endure any assault on it. — frank

:up:

"In every act of rebellion, the rebel simultaneously experiences a feeling of revulsion at the infringement of his rights and a complete and spontaneous loyalty to certain aspects of himself. Thus he implicitly brings into play a standard of values so far from being false that he is willing to preserve them at all costs.

Up to this point he has at least remained silent and has abandoned himself to the form of despair in which a condition is accepted even though it is considered unjust. To remain silent is to give the impression that one has no opinions, that one wants nothing, and in certain cases it really amounts to wanting nothing. Despair, like the absurd, has opinions and desires about everything in general and nothing in particular. Silence expresses this attitude very well.

But from the moment that the rebel finds his voice—even though he says nothing but "no"—he begins to desire and to judge. The rebel, in the etymological sense, does a complete turnabout. He acted under the lash of his master's whip. Suddenly he turns and faces him. He opposes what is preferable to what is not. Not every value entails rebellion, but every act of rebellion tacitly invokes a value. Or is it really a question of values?

Camus "The Rebel".

I think it really is a question of values. Values form the self and if the values of the self just are the values of the self's environment, the self is effaced.

Wow! That quote says it all!

Perhaps the idea of a ‘collective psyche’ or ‘hive mind’ needs to be shelved along with that of an autonomous, identical self. In their place we can substitute the perspectival consistency of a point of view. Point of view is itself a multiplicity of selves that are produced within the collective called a person. The collective selves forming the changing person participate in the social group via the vantage of an ongoing perspective. — Joshs

I'm not sure what this means. A point of view without a viewer makes no sense.

The Self is just a ghost in the hive mind of society until it appears out of the fog of history in a cloak of righteousness, defying a world that's become evil. — frank

:up:

The self only is to the degree that it opposes the Anyone. Some member of the chorus has to step forward and become the doomed hero.

She claims the right to ignore the rules of her society for the sake of a higher law. Nothing creates a more stark outline around the individual as the role of the reformer, the abolitionist, the revolutionary. Society calls them criminals. History calls them heroes. — frank

:up:

I think (?) this is deeply Hegelian. Time 'is' this endless emergence of new norms through which old norms are evaluated, challenged, and modified.

And what of those who didn't get their higher law taken seriously ? They are like failed artist who could not forge a conscience for their people.

The Self is Moses, leading his people out of evil Egypt. It's Martin Luther, breaking away from the mother church. It's Marx: the social critic. To the extent that these images become naturalized in the collective psyche, the Self endures, and will endure any assault on it. — frank

We can also contemplate how conspicuous deviation offers a high potential payoff, balancing the risk. We can consider both the advantage for genes and memes. Increased conformity might increase this potential payoff. The balance of males and females comes to mind.

Then there is the mother, or indeed any close carer, of a baby: she recognises a something in the baby that is very particularly that new human being, a unique identity in the movements and eyes and responses and 'personality' that soon merges: if this were true, the self would be no myth, at least, not to others. 'Why is he acting that way?' 'He's just being himself.'

Perhaps the idea of a ‘collective psyche’ or ‘hive mind’ needs to be shelved along with that of an autonomous, identical self. — Joshs

This autonomous self is the essence of the humanism and enlightenment. The self is identical, singular, possesses a voice unified by consistency norms. To drop this is to drop rationality itself, to go mad.

The collective selves forming the changing person participate in the social group via the vantage of an ongoing perspective. — Joshs

I agree with complex internals, but the self is a singular avatar, the central social convention. Think of an organism in the real world that needs a coherent strategy which does not sabotage itself. It needs a plan that works, with pieces that work together.

The self only is to the degree that it opposes the Anyone. — plaque flag

I am what's left when you subtract out the Other, yes.

Some member of the chorus has to step forward and become the doomed hero. — plaque flag

Right. Antigone hangs herself. The point is that this devotion to the higher good (higher than society's understanding, anyway) is worth dying for.

The Self appears along with such fierce devotion to the Good that the Self can be sacrificed for it.

Then there is the mother, or indeed any close carer, of a baby: she recognises a something in the baby that is very particularly that new human being, a unique identity in the movements and eyes and responses and 'personality' that soon merges: if this were true, the self would be no myth, at least, not to others. 'Why is he acting that way?' 'He's just being himself.' — mcdoodle

That's a good mother who realizes the baby isn't part of her. She's willing to let it be free. That's healthy. :up:

Nothing makes sense without the self really.

Who is experiencing pain? Who is hearing a tune? Who is having a memory?

Even if you think the self is just the brain. The brain has the necessary unity for a self identity and receives input from one individuals sensory organs and perceptual mechanisms.

The self is the ground of experience, but it has no objective reality.

Buddhist philosophy is well known for denying the reality of self, which is the principle of anatta (literally, 'no-self'). But if you drill down on it, the Buddha doesn't deny that the self exists - when asked whether it exists, he declines to answer, later explaining that both the positive and negative responses to the question are misleading. Beyond that, wondering about the self - who am I, where did I come from, what will happen to me, and so on - are discouraged as forms of self-seeking or egocentrism.

I am what's left when you subtract out the Other, yes. — frank

:up:

You, sir, are the icing on the cake.

The self is the ground of experience, but it has no objective reality. — Wayfarer

There's a case to be made for that kind of self (pure witness, the thereness of what's there), but I don't think it's the revolutionary/heroic self discussed in the OP.

Beyond that, wondering about the self - who am I, where did I come from, what will happen to me, and so on - are discouraged as forms of self-seeking or egocentrism. — Wayfarer

To this I must object, for how did the clever blokes figure out they were illusions in the first place if they weren't so curious about themselves ?

Antigone hangs herself. The point is that this devotion to the higher good (higher than society's understanding, anyway) is worth dying for.

The Self appears along with such fierce devotion to the Good that the Self can be sacrificed for it. — frank

Yes. You are touching on 'the' issue maybe. As you probably know, Hegel obsessed over Antigone. His master/slave relationship foregrounds a willingness to die to prove one's transcendence of the given.


***
The presentation of itself, however, as pure abstraction of self-consciousness consists in showing itself as a pure negation of its objective form, or in showing that it is fettered to no determinate existence, that it is not bound at all by the particularity everywhere characteristic of existence as such, and is not tied up with life. ... And it is solely by risking life that freedom is obtained; only thus is it tried and proved that the essential nature of self-consciousness is not bare existence, is not the merely immediate form in which it at first makes its appearance, is not its mere absorption in the expanse of life. Rather it is thereby guaranteed that there is nothing present but what might be taken as a vanishing moment — that self-consciousness is merely pure self-existence, being-for-self. The individual, who has not staked his life, may, no doubt, be recognized as a Person; but he has not attained the truth of this recognition as an independent self-consciousness.

https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/ph/phba.htm

To this I must object, for how did the clever blokes figure out they were illusions in the first place if they weren't so curious about themselves ? — plaque flag

I read somewhere that the idea of the illusory self was designed as a coping strategy for societies where the individual had little control.

And that seems to still apply today because people who are in touch with themselves are skeptical of society and more likely to protest.

I distrust the motive for claiming the self is illusory.

I read somewhere that the idea of the illusory self was designed as a coping strategy for societies where the individual had little control. — Andrew4Handel

This is a deep issue. Kojeve talks about stoics and skeptics focusing on what they could control, digging little bunkers in themselves. The world could go to hell. They were fine. This maximizes interiority. It can also look escapist.

Then denying the self is removing the thing that can be harmed altogether. Personally I can very much relate to the self melting into 'spirit' or science or philosophy. I can forget myself in my work. I can put the best part of me in the symbolic realm. I can realize that 'my' best thoughts were just stuff I found in books --- and that they are the best thoughts of pretty much anyone.

So it's a messy issue, right ?

You seem to be painting a picture of an individual conscience that compels one to stand up against oppressors, even at great personal risk. This seems to consist in an overriding sense of personal sovereignty, and a refusal to accept transgressions against it. The self stands up for itself and in doing so sees itself as standing up for oppressed others as well.

The dynamic is the same regardless of whether the oppression is real or imagined. just or unjust. Is this the self as "myth", though or rather the self as sense, that is an expression of a sense of self, a sense, however distinct it might be of boundaries, of lines which shall not be crossed? The idea of a myth of self seems more apt in the context of belief in a soul. Animals too will, if they can rise up against their oppressors because they also have a sense of self and of self-preservation.

You speak of the myth of the self being perpetuated by the canonization of heroic rebels, but I think this is more thought of as the myth of the hero, because as I said such heroes (if they really are heroes as opposed to disaffected troublemakers) do not stand up just for themselves, but for others, and symbolically, for the whole of humanity.

I think the story of self (I'm using another term now because the term 'myth' may carry pejorative associations these days) begins with consciousness; consciousness makes things stand out and divides the world up into parts and wholes, entities and identities, all of which becomes all the more binary, self-reflexive and seemingly rigid with the advent of language.

On a very simple view the self of a person is just the character of that person, each one being unique, But again it is like the leaves of any particular species of tree, each one is different from all the others and yet the same. Pattern and individuation.

It seems you have to address someone's self in order to get them to reassess the issue of self otherwise who is being addressed? So we seem to be talking about degrees of self.

It does seem that too much or to little focus on the self could be harmful.

I don't mind my own company so I can be fine on my own in the middle of nowhere and not feel lonely. I don't see the chronic need for other people as desirable. But then I have had bad experiences with other people from childhood and am on the autism spectrum.

Dysfunctional relationships, neurodiversity and dysfunctional societies are all going to have some input into our self analysis I suppose.

I can't imagine being anyone else so we may all be fundamentally different.

I raised this issue in my last thread about how can we compare mental states and what are we referring to.

I distrust the motive for claiming the self is illusory. — Andrew4Handel

The idea that the self is illusory is itself illusory, or at least elusive, ambiguous. The claim that it is illusory seems to stem from the fact that precisely what the self is cannot be determined. This is as much so when it comes to the imagined identities of objects as it is with the imagined identity of the self.

Add to that the fact that the self cannot be imagined as any kind of object of the senses other than the body. And yet we don't think of ourselves as "being bodies" but rather as "having bodies". This is sometimes referred to as a "cartesian error" or the myth of the "ghost in the machine", but I would say it is deeper than that and is bound up with the ineradicable dualism of language itself. The machine is as much a myth as the ghost is. (Or perhaps I should have written "story" instead of "myth" since it is not so much that such perspectives are wrong as that they are limited).

The Self is Moses, leading his people out of evil Egypt. It's Martin Luther, breaking away from the mother church. It's Marx: the social critic. To the extent that these images become naturalized in the collective psyche, the Self endures, and will endure any assault on it. — frank

All this high sounding stuff is baloney. The self is regular old everyday reality. Real as a lug nut. We all have one. Health people feel at home with it. I recognize and sympathize with the idea that the self is an illusion, but only in the sense that everything is an illusion. Maybe the difference is that the self is the first illusion. The one that makes all the rest possible.

Then there is the mother, or indeed any close carer, of a baby: she recognises a something in the baby that is very particularly that new human being, a unique identity in the movements and eyes and responses and 'personality' that soon merges: if this were true, the self would be no myth, at least, not to others. 'Why is he acting that way?' 'He's just being himself.' — mcdoodle

I like the way you've put this.

I think the idea of "looking" for the self (Which is what Hume did) is a mistake.

Because we can't see everything. Life is not just a visual experience. The world does not seem to disappear when you close your eyes. You "feel" pain and "hear" music have ideas and "understand" the meaning of words.

The issue of qualia seems arise from the idea that everything has to be described as physical objects.Spatial dimensions seem inappropriate for things like thoughts, dreams, sounds, colours and word meaning.

It do not know to what extent we can liberate ourselves from how we experience the world or if new language and perspectives could change how we experience things.

It seems you have to address someone's self in order to get them to reassess the issue of self otherwise who is being addressed? — Andrew4Handel

Yes. This is the normative, discursive self. The one that is ashamed or gets a trophy. This self identifies with this or that virtue or hero myth. So one appeals to such a self in terms of its current investments. What is takes for sacred is also a handle on this self. So Stirner tries to have no identity, nothing for an opponent to grab onto (an outermost skepticism).

I can't imagine being anyone else so we may all be fundamentally different. — Andrew4Handel

Yes, but we can still talk. We are still 'in' the same language.

And I can talk to myself via my thoughts.

I don't think talking to people proves that they have minds like some kind of Turing test. But I find that my language relates to my experiences.

So pain refers to my experience of pain sensations and self refers to my unique personal identity and when other people use the same language I assume by analogy that they have experiences and minds that are similar.

I have never been in a situation where I have felt I have lost my sense of self and become more at one with others or just without self.
I have been in a few situations where verbal interactions with others have made me feel weakened because their language was tailored to control my self identity and self worth or projected something on me.

This is all a bit vague though. We have sophisticated interactions with others on which copious amounts has been written, to try and analyse them from psychoanalysis to social psychology. We may even be described as always working on our self and self perception. Running from our self, finding our self, losing our self and so on

But one thing I believe is we should be true to our self not led by others. Not to feel pushed and pulled but with some kind of self contained integrity.

We may even be described as always working on our self and self perception. Running from our self, finding our self, losing our self and so on

But one thing I believe is we should be true to our self not led by others. Not to feel pushed and pulled but with some kind of self contained integrity. — Andrew4Handel

:up:

We need stability. We cling to terror management strategies, orienting myths. To me we get this 'software' from the culture, picking and choosing what fits our life, sometimes even inventing stuff that others can copy and use.

.

The brain has the necessary unity for a self identity and receives input from one individuals sensory organs and perceptual mechanisms. — Andrew4Handel

I think the unity is software rather than hardware. We learn to take responsibility for our bodies. We learn to talk about what we see and what we think. Before long we think that nothing is more real than this convention. This isn't crazy, though, for it's the normative self that makes a case. So Descartes was right but not complete or careful. Perhaps thoughts have extension. 'Of course' thoughts have extension, are material in some sense.