Self-Awareness and The Elusive Subject PDF Download

Are you looking for read ebook online? Search for your book and save it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Download Self-Awareness and The Elusive Subject PDF full book. Access full book title Self-Awareness and The Elusive Subject by Robert J. Howell. Download full books in PDF and EPUB format.

Self-Awareness and The Elusive Subject

Self-Awareness and The Elusive Subject PDF Author: Robert J. Howell
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192665871
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 188

Book Description
Self-Awareness and The Elusive Subject explores the puzzling fact that we are certain of the existence of a subject of experience despite its being objectively and subjectively elusive. It is objectively elusive in that, like phenomenal states, it cannot be found from the third-person perspective. It is subjectively elusive because it also cannot be found in introspection. On the one hand, then, the author agrees with the Buddhists and philosophers like Hume and Sartre that the self cannot be found in experience. He sides with Descartes', on the other hand, arguing the subject of experience exists and that we have certainty of the cogito. Along the way the book considers the claim that phenomenal states have “subjective character” or “mineness” and argues instead that they are phenomenally anonymous. Howell concludes with a deflationary account of pre-reflective self-consciousness and provides an account of basic self-awareness according to which we are most fundamentally aware of ourselves indirectly as the subject of our conscious states.

Self-Awareness and The Elusive Subject

Self-Awareness and The Elusive Subject PDF Author: Robert J. Howell
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192665871
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 188

Book Description
Self-Awareness and The Elusive Subject explores the puzzling fact that we are certain of the existence of a subject of experience despite its being objectively and subjectively elusive. It is objectively elusive in that, like phenomenal states, it cannot be found from the third-person perspective. It is subjectively elusive because it also cannot be found in introspection. On the one hand, then, the author agrees with the Buddhists and philosophers like Hume and Sartre that the self cannot be found in experience. He sides with Descartes', on the other hand, arguing the subject of experience exists and that we have certainty of the cogito. Along the way the book considers the claim that phenomenal states have “subjective character” or “mineness” and argues instead that they are phenomenally anonymous. Howell concludes with a deflationary account of pre-reflective self-consciousness and provides an account of basic self-awareness according to which we are most fundamentally aware of ourselves indirectly as the subject of our conscious states.

Consciousness and the Limits of Objectivity

Consciousness and the Limits of Objectivity PDF Author: Robert J. Howell
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0199654662
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 201

Book Description
Robert J. Howell offers a new account of the relationship between conscious experience and the physical world, based on a neo-Cartesian notion of the physical and careful consideration of three anti-materialist arguments. His theory of subjective physicalism reconciles the data of consciousness with the advantages of a monistic, physical ontology.

Self and World

Self and World PDF Author: Quassim Cassam
Publisher: Clarendon Press
ISBN: 0191518921
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 217

Book Description
Self and World is an exploration of the nature of self-awareness. Quassim Cassam challenges the widespread and influential view that we cannot be introspectively aware of ourselves as objects in the world. In opposition to the views of many empiricist and idealist philosophers, including Hume, Kant, and Wittgenstein, he argues that the self is not systematically elusive from the perspective of self-consciousness, and that consciousness of our thoughts and experiences requires a sense of our thinking, experiencing selves as shaped, located, and solid physical objects in a world of such objects. Awareness of oneself as a physical object involves forms of bodily self-awareness whose importance has seldom been properly acknowledged in philosophical accounts of the self and self-awareness. The conception of self-awareness defended in this book helps to undermine the idealist thesis that the self does not belong to the world, and also the claim that the existence of subjects or persons is only a derivative feature of reality. In the final part of the book, Cassam argues that the existence of persons is a substantial fact about the world, and that it is not possible to give a complete description of reality without claiming that persons exist. This clear, original, and challenging treatment of one of the deepest of intellectual problems will demand the attention of all philosophers and cognitive scientists who are concerned with the self.

Elusive Subjects

Elusive Subjects PDF Author: Susanna Scarparo
Publisher: Troubador Publishing Ltd
ISBN: 1904744192
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 209

Book Description
This book uses a cross-cultural and interdisciplinary approach to examine the role of biographies and autobiographies in the construction of historical narratives.

Philosophy of Mind

Philosophy of Mind PDF Author: Torin Alter
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1003818331
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 299

Book Description
Imaginative cases, or what might be called puzzles and other thought experiments, play a central role in philosophy of mind. The real world also furnishes philosophers with an ample supply of such puzzles. This volume collects 50 of the most important historical and contemporary cases in philosophy of mind and describes their significance. The authors divide them into five sections: consciousness and dualism; physicalist theories and the metaphysics of mind; content, intentionality, and representation; perception, imagination, and attention; and persons, personal identity, and the self. Each chapter provides background, describes a central case or cases, discusses the relevant literature, and suggests further readings. Philosophy of Mind: 50 Puzzles, Paradoxes, and Thought Experiments promises to be a useful teaching tool as well as a handy resource for anyone interested in the area. Key Features: Offers stand-alone chapters, each presented in an identical format: - Background - The Case - Discussion - Recommended Reading Each chapter is self-contained, allowing students to quickly understand an issue and giving instructors flexibility in assigning readings to match the themes of the course. Additional pedagogical features include a general volume introduction as well as smaller introductions to each of the five sections and a glossary at the end of the book.

Self-traps

Self-traps PDF Author: William B. Swann
Publisher: Westview Press
ISBN: 9780716728986
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 236

Book Description
Not a self-help book, Self-Traps is a fascinating, multidimensional exploration of how self-esteem conflicts develop and are played out in all our relationships, and how the authentic achievement of self-esteem is often undermined by American social norms that tell us how to approach our love relationships and work. Swann shows how these societal influences may compound the inner conflicts that people with low self-esteem have, making their thought patterns and behavior that much more difficult to change. Yet raising self-esteem, he insists, is an achievable goal. Swann proposes solutions that take into account the multifaceted nature of self-esteem and allow us to perform a delicate balancing act, changing our notions of who we are without irreparably losing our fundamental sense of identity.

An Inquiry Into the Philosophical Foundations of the Human Sciences

An Inquiry Into the Philosophical Foundations of the Human Sciences PDF Author: Alfred Claassen
Publisher: Peter Lang
ISBN: 9780820481791
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 284

Book Description
Textbook

Triumphs of Experience

Triumphs of Experience PDF Author: George E. Vaillant
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674071816
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 473

Book Description
At a time when many people around the world are living into their tenth decade, the longest longitudinal study of human development ever undertaken offers some welcome news for the new old age: our lives continue to evolve in our later years, and often become more fulfilling than before. Begun in 1938, the Grant Study of Adult Development charted the physical and emotional health of over 200 men, starting with their undergraduate days. The now-classic Adaptation to Life reported on the men’s lives up to age 55 and helped us understand adult maturation. Now George Vaillant follows the men into their nineties, documenting for the first time what it is like to flourish far beyond conventional retirement. Reporting on all aspects of male life, including relationships, politics and religion, coping strategies, and alcohol use (its abuse being by far the greatest disruptor of health and happiness for the study’s subjects), Triumphs of Experience shares a number of surprising findings. For example, the people who do well in old age did not necessarily do so well in midlife, and vice versa. While the study confirms that recovery from a lousy childhood is possible, memories of a happy childhood are a lifelong source of strength. Marriages bring much more contentment after age 70, and physical aging after 80 is determined less by heredity than by habits formed prior to age 50. The credit for growing old with grace and vitality, it seems, goes more to ourselves than to our stellar genetic makeup.

The Oxford Handbook of the Self

The Oxford Handbook of the Self PDF Author: Shaun Gallagher
Publisher: OUP UK
ISBN: 0199548013
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 759

Book Description
The Oxford Handbook of the Self explores a fascinating diversity of questions about our understanding of self from a variety of interdisciplinary perspectives, including philosophy, ethics, psychology, neuroscience, psychopathology, narrative, and postmodern theories.

Three Faces of Desire

Three Faces of Desire PDF Author: Timothy Schroeder
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190291508
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 224

Book Description
To desire something is a condition familiar to everyone. It is uncontroversial that desiring has something to do with motivation, something to do with pleasure, and something to do with reward. Call these "the three faces of desire." The standard philosophical theory at present holds that the motivational face of desire presents its unique essence--to desire a state of affairs is to be disposed to act so as to bring it about. A familiar but less standard account holds the hedonic face of desire to reveal to true nature of desire. In this view, to desire something is to tend to pleasure if it seems that the desired state of affairs has been achieved, or displeasure if it seems otherwise, thus tying desire to feelings instead of actions. In Three Faces of Desire, Schroeder goes beyond actions and feelings to advance a novel and controversial theory of desire that puts the focus on desire's neglected face, reward. Informed by contemporary science as much as by the philosophical tradition, Three Faces of Desire discusses recent scientific discoveries that tell us much about the way that actions and feelings are produced in the brain. In particular, recent experiments reveal that a distinctive system is responsible for promoting action, on the one hand, and causing feelings of pleasure and displeasure, on the other. This system, the brain's reward system, is the causal origin of both action and feeling, and is the key to understanding the nature of desire.