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Full Idea
According to Fichte, spontaneity, self-relatedness, and unity are the basic traits of knowledge (which includes conscience). ...This principle of all knowledge is what he calls the 'I' or the Self.
Gist of Idea
The Self is the spontaneity, self-relatedness and unity needed for knowledge
Source
report of Johann Fichte (The Science of Knowing (Wissenschaftslehre) [1st ed] [1794]) by Ludwig Siep - Fichte p.58
Book Ref
'A Companion to Continental Philosophy', ed/tr. Critchley,S/Schroeder,W [Blackwell 1999], p.58
A Reaction
This is the idealist view. He gets 'spontaneity' from Kant, which is the mind's contribution to experience. Self-relatedness is the distinctive Fichte idea. Unity presumably means total coherence, which is typical of idealists.
Related Idea
Idea 22066 Novalis sought a much wider concept of the ego than Fichte's proposal [Novalis on Fichte]
| 22024 | Fichte's subjectivity struggles to then give any account of objectivity [Pinkard on Fichte] |
| 22017 | Normativity needs the possibility of negation, in affirmation and denial [Fichte, by Pinkard] |
| 22018 | Necessary truths derive from basic assertion and negation [Fichte, by Pinkard] |
| 22032 | Fichte's key claim was that the subjective-objective distinction must itself be subjective [Fichte, by Pinkard] |
| 22064 | Fichte's logic is much too narrow, and doesn't deduce ethics, art, society or life [Schlegel,F on Fichte] |
| 22060 | The Self is the spontaneity, self-relatedness and unity needed for knowledge [Fichte, by Siep] |
| 22066 | Novalis sought a much wider concept of the ego than Fichte's proposal [Novalis on Fichte] |
| 22016 | The self is not a 'thing', but what emerges from an assertion of normativity [Fichte, by Pinkard] |
| 22061 | Judgement is distinguishing concepts, and seeing their relations [Fichte, by Siep] |
| 22023 | Fichte's idea of spontaneity implied that nothing counts unless we give it status [Fichte, by Pinkard] |
| 22065 | Fichte reduces nature to a lifeless immobility [Schlegel,F on Fichte] |
| 22019 | Consciousness of an object always entails awareness of the self [Fichte] |
| 22020 | We only see ourselves as self-conscious and rational in relation to other rationalities [Fichte] |