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Single Idea 6671
[filed under theme 16. Persons / C. Self-Awareness / 3. Limits of Introspection
]
Full Idea
It seems impossible for me to acquire perfectly general concepts of thought and feeling, applicable to other people as well as to myself, purely from some queer kind of mental self-observation, but this is what the observational model demands.
Clarification
The 'observational' model is learning of my thoughts and feelings by observing them
Gist of Idea
It seems impossible to get generally applicable mental concepts from self-observation
Source
E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch.10)
Book Ref
Lowe,E.J.: 'Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind' [CUP 2000], p.289
A Reaction
I don't understand the word 'queer' here, which seems part of an odd modern fashion for denigrating introspection. It is right, though, that the acquisition of general mental concepts from my mind seems to depend on analogy, which is a suspect method.
The
23 ideas
with the same theme
[what may be unknowable by introspection]:
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5886
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Like the eye, the soul has no power to see itself, but sees other things
[Cicero]
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1316
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Introspection always discovers perceptions, and never a Self without perceptions
[Hume]
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5551
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I have no cognition of myself as I am, but only as I appear to myself
[Kant]
|
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12115
|
Introspection is pure illusion; we can obviously observe everything except ourselves
[Comte]
|
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24144
|
A cognitive mechanism wanting to know itself is absurd!
[Nietzsche]
|
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2932
|
'Know thyself' is impossible and ridiculous
[Nietzsche]
|
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7157
|
We think each thought causes the next, unaware of the hidden struggle beneath
[Nietzsche]
|
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5689
|
Freud and others have shown that we don't know our own beliefs, feelings, motive and attitudes
[Freud, by Shoemaker]
|
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20429
|
Most of us are too close to our own motives to understand them
[Fry]
|
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5380
|
In perceiving the sun, I am aware of sun sense-data, and of the perceiver of the data
[Russell]
|
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7116
|
When we are unreflective (as when chasing a tram) there is no 'I'
[Sartre]
|
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7124
|
The Ego never appears except when we are not looking for it
[Sartre]
|
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1353
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Reporting on myself has the same problems as reporting on you
[Ryle]
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1354
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We cannot introspect states of anger or panic
[Ryle]
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5661
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We identify experiences by their owners, so we can't define owners by their experiences
[Ayer]
|
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15815
|
Sartre says the ego is 'opaque'; I prefer to say that it is 'transparent'
[Chisholm]
|
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3468
|
I cannot observe my own subjectivity
[Searle]
|
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3363
|
We often can't decide what emotion, or even sensation, we are experiencing
[Kim]
|
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3412
|
How do we distinguish our anger from embarrassment?
[Kim]
|
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3102
|
Why don't we experience or remember going to sleep at night?
[Magee]
|
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5674
|
We can't introspect ourselves as objects, because that would involve possible error
[Cassam]
|
|
6671
|
It seems impossible to get generally applicable mental concepts from self-observation
[Lowe]
|
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3518
|
I'm not the final authority on my understanding of maths
[Maslin]
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