Self-knowledge and “inner sense.” Lecture II: The broad perceptual model

AbstractThe paper argues that Kant'sdistinction between pure and empirical apperception cannot be interpreted as distinguishing two self-standing types of self-knowledge. For Kant, empirical and pure apperception need to co-operate to yield substantive self-knowledge. What makes Kant'saccount interesting is his acknowledgment that there is a deep tension between the way I become conscious of myself as subject through pure apperception and the way I am given to myself as an object of inner sense. This tension remains problematic in the realm of theoretical cognition but can be put to work and made productive in terms of practical self-knowledge.

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Inner Sense and Self-Knowledge in the Kantian Refutation of the Problematic Idealism

Kant und die Berliner Aufklärung ◽

10.1515/9783110874129.952 ◽

2001 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Claudia Jáuregui

Keyword(s):

Inner Sense ◽

Self Knowledge

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RADICAL ENACTIVISM AND SELF-KNOWLEDGE

Kriterion Revista de Filosofia ◽

10.1590/0100-512x2018n14105gr ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 59 (141) ◽

pp. 723-743

Author(s):

Giovanni Rolla

Keyword(s):

Causal Mechanism ◽

Self Awareness ◽

Other Minds ◽

Middle Ground ◽

Privileged Access ◽

Perceptual Knowledge ◽

Radical Enactivism ◽

Perceptual Model ◽

Self Knowledge

ABSTRACT I propose a middle-ground between a perceptual model of self-knowledge, according to which the objects of self-awareness (one's beliefs, desires, intentions and so on) are accessed through some kind of causal mechanism, and a rationalist model, according to which self-knowledge is constituted by one's rational agency. Through an analogy with the role of the exercises of sensorimotor abilities in rationally grounded perceptual knowledge, self-knowledge is construed as an exercise of action-oriented and action-orienting abilities. This view satisfies the privileged access condition usually associated with self-knowledge without entailing an insurmountable gap between self- knowledge and knowledge of other minds.

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Some Recent Approaches

10.1093/oso/9780198821618.003.0003 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Alex Byrne

Keyword(s):

Propositional Attitudes ◽

Linguistic Expression ◽

Inner Sense ◽

Self Knowledge

Chapter 2 argued that the failings of the inner-sense theory are often more apparent than real. In any event, recent approaches to self-knowledge are usually advertised as taking a radically different route. This chapter surveys and criticizes three prominent examples, due to Davidson, Moran, and Bar-On. They illustrate how radically different accounts of self-knowledge can be, despite having some overlapping themes. All three philosophers emphasize the linguistic expression of self-knowledge. Moran and Bar-On both think the main problems are in important respects not epistemological. Davidson and Moran concentrate on the propositional attitudes, belief in particular, and suggest that another approach entirely will be required for knowledge of one’s sensations.

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Cartography and Autobiography

Kant's Transcendental Deduction ◽

10.1093/oso/9780198748922.003.0006 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 263-288

Author(s):

Alison Laywine

Keyword(s):

Special Problem ◽

Pure Reason ◽

Critique Of Pure Reason ◽

Transcendental Deduction ◽

Inner Sense ◽

Empirical World ◽

The World ◽

Self Knowledge ◽

Special Case

This chapter completes the examination, started in Chapter Four, of the second half of the Transcendental Deduction, as found in the second edition of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. The focus of this chapter is §24 and §25. The special problem of these sections is empirical self-knowledge. The author argues that Kant treats self-knowledge as a special case of the cosmology of experience: the problem is how I situate myself in the empirical world. The solution to the problem is to build up in thought an understanding of the world by legislating universal laws to nature by means of the categories and to map my geographical and historical place in the world by means of the cartographic resources available to the productive imagination. The chapter has two parts. The first part is devoted to a paradox Kant claims to be associated with self-affection. It tries to understand his claim as a reflection on his own views in the mid-1770s about self-apprehension by inner sense and apperception. The second part of the chapter is devoted to the specialized cartography Kant takes to be involved in empirical self-knowledge and considers how Kant distinguishes between biography and autobiography.

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The ‘I think’. What it is all about

ProtoSociology ◽

10.5840/protosociology2019364 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 36 ◽

pp. 101-139

Author(s):

Gerhard Seel ◽

Keyword(s):

A Priori ◽

Analytical Philosophy ◽

Time Consciousness ◽

Inner Sense ◽

De Se ◽

The Subject ◽

Self Knowledge ◽

Transcendental Apperception

Kant distinguishes two kinds of knowledge of one-self: empirical self-knowledge due to inner sense and a priori self-knowledge achieved by transcendental apperception. This conception encounters a host of problems. I try to solve these problems from the perspective of today’s phenomenology and analytical philosophy. I first introduce a new conception of inner sense and time-consciousness and argue that empirical self-knowledge must be based on the category of person, a category Kant did not list in his table of categories. I explain how the schematism of this category works. Then I introduce the a priori notion of the subject which corresponds to Kant’s ‘I think’. However, unlike Kant I hold that the notion of the subject is the notion of a being which has certain a priori capacities. Kant did not see that the term ‘I’ must be conceived of as an indexical. I argue that this indexical refers to both, the subject who does the thinking and the person who is thought. On this basis I give an answer to the question how genuine de-se knowledge is possible. I further defend—against Wittgenstein and others—the use of a private thought language. Finally, I show that what I have developed is—notwithstanding the refutation of important elements of Kant’s theory—still essentially a Kantian approach.

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