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Philosophy of Consciousness :: Aspects of Consciousness

1.6a Self-Consciousness

See also: 1.4a. Higher-Order Thought Approaches, 1.4b. Self-Representational Approaches, 1.6b. The Unity of Consciousness, 1.6g. Consciousness of Agency, 1.6h. Bodily Experience, 4.8. Personal Identity, 8.3h. Self-Consciousness, 8.8c. Animal Self-Consciousness, 8.9a. Introspection.

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Abstract: In this paper we provide an account of the structural underpinnings of self-awareness. We offer both an abstract, logical account—by way of suggestions for how to build a genuinely self- referring artificial agent—and a biological account, via a discussion of the role of somatoception in supporting and structuring self-awareness more generally. Central to the account is a discussion of the necessary motivational properties of self-representing mental tokens, in light of which we offer a novel definition of self-representation. We also discuss the role of such tokens in organizing self-specifying information, which leads to a naturalized restatement of the guarantee that introspective awareness is immune to error due to mis-identification of the subject
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Baker, Lynne Rudder (2003). The difference that self-consciousness makes. In Klaus Petrus (ed.), On Human Persons: Metaphysical Research, Volume 1. Heusenstamm Nr Frankfurt: Ontos Verlag. (Cited by 2 | Google)
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Bayne, Tim & Pacherie, Elisabeth (forthcoming). Narrators and comparators: The architecture of agentive self-awareness. Synthese. (Google)
Abstract: This paper contrasts two approaches to agentive self-awareness: a high-level, narrative-based account, and a low-level comparator-based account. We argue that an agent’s narrative self-conception has a role to play in explaining their agentive judgments, but that agentive experiences are explained by low-level comparator mechanisms that are grounded in the very machinery responsible for action-production
Bealer, George (1997). Self-consciousness. Philosophical Review 106 (1):69-117. (Cited by 11 | Google | More links)
Beckermann, Ansgar (2003). Self-consciousness in cognitive systems. Schriftenreihe-Wittgenstein Gesellschaft 31:174-188. (Google | More links)
Abstract: Dualism, but he seems at least to have acknowledged the possibility that Descartes might be right on this issue, i.e., that the real self is a _res cogitans_. Maybe this is why talk of ‘selves’ is
Bermudez, Jose Luis (2001). Nonconceptual self-consciousness and cognitive science. Synthese 129 (1):129-149. (Cited by 4 | Google | More links)
Bermudez, Jose Luis (forthcoming). Nonconceptual self-awareness and the paradox of self-consciousness. In N. von Albert & Kai Vogeley (eds.), Das Selbst Und Seine Neurobiologischen Grundlagen. Mentis. (Google)
Bermudez, Jose Luis (1999). Precis of The Paradox of Self-Consciousness. Psycoloquy 10 (35). (Cited by 13 | Google)
Bermudez, Jose Luis (1997). Reduction and the self. Journal of Consciousness Studies 4 (4-5):458-66. (Cited by 3 | Google)
Bermudez, Jose Luis (2002). Sources of self-consciousness: Epistemic and genetic. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 102:87-107. (Cited by 2 | Google | More links)
Bermudez, Jose Luis (1998). The Paradox of Self-Consciousness. MIT Press. (Cited by 215 | Google | More links)
Bermudez, Jose Luis (2001). The sources of self-consciousness. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 102:87-107. (Cited by 2 | Google | More links)
Bermúdez, José Luis (2003). 'I'- and explanation: Reply to Garrett. Philosophical Quarterly 53 (212):432-436. (Google)
Bermúdez, José Luis (2007). Self-consciousness. In Max Velmans & Susan Schneider (eds.), The Blackwell Companion to Consciousness. Blackwell. (Google)
Bickle, John (2003). Empirical evidence for a narrative concept of self. In Gary D. Fireman, T. E. McVay & Owen J. Flanagan (eds.), Narrative and Consciousness. Oxford University Press. (Cited by 3 | Google | More links)
Breeur, Roland (2003). Consciousness and the self. International Journal of Philosophical Studies 11 (4):415-436. (Google | More links)
Abstract: With his notion of absolute consciousness, Sartre tries to rethink the relation between consciousness and the self. What is the origin of subjectivity in relation to a consciousness that is characterized as impersonal and as a radical lucidity? In this article, I attempt to question that origin and the nature as such of the subject in its relation to a consciousness that in its essence is not yet subjective. On the contrary, it is characterized by a selfpresence that is so radical that it threatens every form of self-knowledge
Brewer, Bill (1992). Self-location and agency. Mind 101 (401):17-34. (Cited by 13 | Google | More links)
Brinck, Ingar (1998). Self-identification and self-reference. Electronic Journal of Analytic Philosophy 6. (Google)
Abstract: [1] To know who one is, and also know whether one's experiences really belong to oneself, do not normally present any problem. It nevertheless happens that people do not recognise themselves as they walk by a mirror or do not understand that they fit some particular description. But there are situations in which it really seems impossible to be wrong about oneself. Of that, Ludwig Wittgenstein once wrote:
It is possible that, say in an accident, I should feel pain in my arm, see a broken arm at
my side, and think it is mine, when really it is my neighbour's. And I could, looking into
a mirror, mistake a bump on his forehead for one on mine. On the other hand there is
no question of recognising a person when I say I have toothache.... it is as impossible
that in making the statement "I have toothache" I should have mistaken another
person for myself, as it is to moan with pain by mistake, having mistaken someone
else for me. (1958: 67)
In the passage in which this remark is found, Wittgenstein distinguishes between two kinds of use of "I". The first use, as object, as in "I have broken my arm" or "The wind is blowing in my hair", he holds, involves the recognition of a particular person, and there is the possibility of error as concerns the identity of the person. In the other use, as subject, as in "I think it will rain" or "I am trying to lift my arm", no person is recognised. No mistake can be made about who the subject is
Brinkmann, Klaus (2005). Consciousness, self-consciousness, and the modern self. History of the Human Sciences 18 (4):27-48. (Google)
Brook, Andrew (manuscript). Externalism and the varieties of self-awareness. (Google)
Abstract: Externalism is the view that some crucial element in the content of our representational states is outside of not just the states whose content they are but even the person who has those states. If so, the contents of such states (and, many hold, the states themselves) do not supervene on anything local to the person whose has them. There are a number of different candidates for what that element is: function (Dretske), causal connection (Putnam, Kripke, Fodor), and social context (Davidson). (Burge has foot in both the causal connection and the social context camps and Dennett fits in here somewhere, too.) This diversity will turn out to be important. The paper starts with Dretske but gets to other varieties of
Brook, Andrew (2001). Kant, self-awareness, and self-reference. In Andrew Brook & R. DeVidi (eds.), Self-Reference and Self-Awareness. John Benjamins. (Cited by 2 | Google)
Brook, Andrew & DeVidi, R. (eds.) (2001). Self-Reference and Self-Awareness. John Benjamins. (Cited by 5 | Google | More links)
Bryant, Sophie (1897). Variety of extent, degree and unity in self-consciousness. Mind 6 (21):71-89. (Google | More links)
Campbell, J. (1994). Past, Space, and Self. MIT Press. (Cited by 129 | Google | More links)
Campbell, J. (1995). The body image and self-consciousness. In Jose Luis Bermudez, Anthony J. Marcel & Naomi M. Eilan (eds.), The Body and the Self. MIT Press. (Cited by 12 | Google)
Canfield, John V. (1990). The Looking-Glass Self: An Examination of Self-Awareness. Praeger. (Cited by 1 | Google)
Cassam, Quassim (1997). Self and World. Oxford University Press. (Cited by 34 | Google | More links)
Cassam, Quassim (1995). Transcendental Self-Consciousness. In P. Kumar (ed.), The Philosophy of P. F. Strawson. Indian Council for Philosophical Research. (Google)
Castaneda, Hector-Neri (1966). 'He': A study in the logic of self-consciousness. Ratio 8 (December):130-57. (Cited by 113 | Google)
Castaneda, Hector-Neri (1979). Philosophical method and direct awareness of the self. Grazer Philosophische Studien 8:1-58. (Google)
Castaneda, Hector-Neri (1989). The reflexivity of self-consciousness: Sameness/identity, data for artificial intelligence. Philosophical Topics 17 (1):27-58. (Cited by 6 | Google)
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Chisholm, Roderick M. (1969). On the observability of the self. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 30 (September):7-21. (Cited by 14 | Google | More links)
Christofidou, Andrea (2000). Self-consciousness and the double immunity. Philosophy 75 (294):539-570. (Cited by 1 | Google | More links)
Church, Jennifer (1990). Judgment, self-consciousness, and object-independence. American Philosophical Quarterly 27 (1):51-60. (Cited by 2 | Google)
Clark, Romane L. (1988). Self knowledge and self consciousness: Thoughts about oneself. Topoi 7 (March):47-55. (Google)
Cunningham, G. Watts (1911). Self-consciousness and consciousness of self. Mind 20 (80):530-537. (Google | More links)
Delius, Harald (1981). Self-Awareness: A Semantical Inquiry. Beck. (Cited by 2 | Google)
Dennett, Daniel C. (1992). The self as the center of narrative gravity. In Frank S. Kessel, P. M. Cole & D. L. Johnson (eds.), Self and Consciousness: Multiple Perspectives. Lawrence Erlbaum. (Cited by 41 | Google | More links)
Abstract: What is a self? I will try to answer this question by developing an analogy with something much simpler, something which is nowhere near as puzzling as a self, but has some properties in common with selves. What I have in mind is the center of gravity of an object. This is a well-behaved concept in Newtonian physics. But a center of gravity is not an atom or a subatomic particle or any other physical item in the world. It has no mass; it has no color; it has no physical properties at all, except for spatio-temporal location. It is a fine example of what Hans Reichenbach would call an abstractum. It is a purely abstract object. It is, if you like , a theorist's fiction. It is not one of the real things in the universe in addition to the atoms. But it is a fiction that has nicely defined, well delineated and well behaved role within physics
Dodd, James (2001). On Dan Zahavi's self-awareness and alterity. Graduate Faculty Philosophy Journal 23 (1):191-198. (Google)
Eilan, Naomi M. (1995). Consciousness and the self. In Jose Luis Bermudez, Anthony J. Marcel & Naomi M. Eilan (eds.), The Body and the Self. MIT Press. (Cited by 10 | Google)
Eilan, Naomi M. & Marcel, Anthony J. (1995). Self-consciousness and the body: An interdisciplinary introduction. In Jose Luis Bermudez, Anthony J. Marcel & Naomi M. Eilan (eds.), The Body and the Self. MIT Press. (Cited by 12 | Google)
Eilan, Naomi M. (manuscript). Self-location, consciousness, and attention. (Google)
Ezcurdia, Maite (2001). Thinking about myself. In Andrew Brook & R. DeVidi (eds.), Self-Reference and Self-Awareness. John Benjamins. (Cited by 1 | Google)
Falk, Arthur E. (1995). Consciousness and self-reference. Erkenntnis 43 (2):151-80. (Cited by 2 | Google)
Frank, Manfred (2002). Self-consciousness and self-knowledge: On some difficulties with the reduction of subjectivity. Constellations 9 (3):390-408. (Google | More links)
Frith, U. & Happe, F. (1999). Theory of mind and self-consciousness: What is it like to be autistic? Mind and Language 14 (1):1-22. (Cited by 59 | Google | More links)
Gallagher, Shaun (2000). Self-reference and schizophrenia: A cognitive model of immunity to error through misidentification. In Dan Zahavi (ed.), Exploring the Self: Philosophical and Psychopathological Perspectives on Self-Experience. John Benjamins. (Cited by 35 | Google)
Gallagher, Shaun & Meltzoff, Andrew N. (1996). The earliest sense of self and others: Merleau-ponty and recent developmental studies. Philosophical Psychology 9 (2):211-33. (Cited by 99 | Google)
Abstract: Recent studies in developmental psychology have found evidence to suggest that there exists an innate system that accounts for the possibilities of early infant imitation and the existence of phantom limbs in cases of congenital absence of limbs. These results challenge traditional assumptions about the status and development of the body schema and body image, and about the nature of the translation process between perceptual experience and motor ability
Gallagher, Shaun (1996). The moral significance of primitive self-consciousness: A response to Bermudez. Ethics 107 (1):129-40. (Cited by 12 | Google | More links)
Gallagher, Shaun (2000). Ways of knowing the self and the other. Theoria Et Historia Scientiarum 7 (1). (Cited by 2 | Google)
Abstract: Gallagher, S. 2000. Ways of Knowing the Self and the Other. An Introduction to Ipseity and Alterity, a special issue of the online journal _Arobase: Journal des lettres et sciences humaines,_ 4 (1-2). Hardcopy publication: S. Gallagher and S. Watson. (in press). _Ipseity and Alterity: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Intersubjectivity_ . Rouen: Presses Universitaires de
Garrett, Brian J. (2003). Bermudez on self-consciousness. Philosophical Quarterly 53 (210):96-101. (Cited by 1 | Google | More links)
Gennaro, Rocco J. (1996). Consciousness and Self-Consciousness: A Defense of the Higher-Order Thought Theory of Consciousness. John Benjamins. (Cited by 51 | Google | More links)
Gennaro, Rocco J. (1992). Consciousness, self-consciousness, and episodic memory. Philosophical Psychology 5 (4):333-47. (Cited by 4 | Google | Annotation)
Gennaro, Rocco J. (1999). Leibniz on consciousness and self-consciousness. In Chalres Huenemann & Rocco J. Gennaro (eds.), New Essays on the Rationalists. Oxford University Press. (Google | More links)
Gomes, Gilberto (1995). Self-awareness and the mind-brain problem. Philosophical Psychology 8 (2):155-65. (Cited by 10 | Google)
Graham, George (online). Self-consciousness, psychopathology, and realism about self. (Cited by 3 | Google | More links)
Gruenbaum, Thor & Zahavi, Dan (2004). The ambiguity of self-consciousness: A preface. In Thor Gruenbaum, Dan Zahavi & Josef Parnas (eds.), The Structure and Development of Self-Consciousness: Interdisciplinary Perspectives. Amsterdam: J Benjamins. (Google)
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Harre, Rom (1981). On the problem of self-consciousness. In U.J. Jensen & Harre. R. (eds.), The Philosophy Of Evolution. St Martin's Press. (Google)
Hart, James G. & Kapitan, Tomis (eds.) (1999). The Phenomeno-Logic of the I: Essays on Self-Consciousness. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. (Cited by 2 | Google)
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Hobson, Allan (2005). Finally some one: Reflections on Thomas Metzinger's Being No One. Psyche 11 (5). (Google | More links)
Abstract: I praise Metzinger's book _On Being No One_ by calling my essay "Finally Some One" meaning that I am pleased to see a first rate philosopher so carefully reading the neurobiological literature. Especially as it pertains to sleep and dreaming. Metzinger is comprehensive and comprehending. By studying the neurobiological substrates of normal dreaming, lucid dreaming and related altered states of consciousness (such as out of body experiences, hypnosis, and deja' vu), we may gain insight into the general rules governing brain activity in relation to subjective experience
Hogan, Melinda & Martin, R. (2001). Introspective misidentification: An I for an I. In Andrew Brook & R. DeVidi (eds.), Self-Reference and Self-Awareness. John Benjamins. (Google)
Hurley, Susan L. (1998). Nonconceptual self-consciousness and agency: Perspective and access. Communication and Cognition 30 (3-4):207-247. (Cited by 3 | Google | More links)
Hurley, Susan L. (1998). Self-consciousness, spontaneity, and the myth of the giving. In Consciousness in Action. Cambridge. (Google)
Abstract: From my Consciousness in Action, ch. 2; see Consciousness in Action for bibligraphy. This chapter revises material from "Kant on Spontaneity and the Myth of the Giving", Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 1993-94, pp. 137-164, and "Myth Upon Myth", Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 1996, vol. 96, pp. 253-260
James, William (1890). The consciousness of self. In William James (ed.), The Principles of Psychology. Harvard University Press. (Cited by 9 | Google)
Janzen, Greg (2005). Self-consciousness and phenomenal character. Dialogue 44 (4):707-733. (Cited by 2 | Google)
Kapitan, Tomis (2006). Indexicality and self-awareness. In Uriah Kriegel & Kenneth Williford (eds.), Self-Representational Approaches to Consciousness. MIT Press. (Google)
Abstract: Self-awareness is commonly expressed by means of indexical expressions, primarily, first- person pronouns like ‘I’, ‘me’, ‘we’, ‘my’, ‘myself’, ‘mine’ and so forth. While not all indexical contents are first-personal, indexical usage suggests a kind of reflexive awareness since its terms always convey information about the speaker. For example, hearing someone say: ‘you’d better be prepared; it’s hot here today’, I conclude that the referent of ‘you’ is being addressed by the speaker, hence, believed by the speaker to be subject to influence through communication. Moreover, for normal usage, I assume that the day in question is the very day during which the speaker made that utterance. Again, positional expressions like ‘next to’, ‘left of’, ‘beyond’, ‘later’ and so forth, typically convey the orientation of objects and events vis-à-vis the speaker’s position in time and space. Indexicals are always biographical, and therefore, from the speaker’s standpoint, autobiographical. If so, self- awareness is manifested or realized by the producer of any indexical utterance or any indexical thought. If indexicality graces every conscious state, in turn, then self-awareness is ubiquitous.1 Does self-awareness accompany all indexically mediated states of consciousness? Answering this question—the main concern of this paper—requires close attention to the pragmatics of indexical usage and to distinctions among various notions of “awareness” and “self.” Among the important contrasts to be observed is between a _direct_ awareness of, say, a
Kapitan, Tomis (1999). The ubiquity of self-awareness. Grazer Philosophische Studien 57:17-44. (Cited by 6 | Google | More links)
Kitcher, Patricia S. (2005). Two normative roles for self-consciousness. In Herbert S. Terrace & Janet Metcalfe (eds.), The Missing Link in Cognition: Origins of Self-Reflective Consciousness. Oxford University Press. (Google)
Kriegel, Uriah (2003). Consciousness as sensory quality and as implicit self-awareness. Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences 2 (1):1-26. (Cited by 12 | Google | More links)
Kriegel, Uriah (2004). Consciousness and self-consciousness. The Monist 87 (2):182-205. (Cited by 9 | Google)
Abstract: Abstract. In recent philosophy of mind, it is often assumed that consciousness and self-consciousness are two separate phenomena. In this paper, I argue that this is not quite right. The argument proceeds in two phases. First, I draw a distinction between