UNDS Prelims

• Socrates' approach to self-understanding is to be inquisitive and seek answers
• Knowing oneself involves internal questioning or introspection
• Socrates created the "Socratic Method," where you repeatedly question yourself about your beliefs and thoughts
• Socratic Method - This strategy helps recognize your own strengths and weaknesses and devise strategies to deal with them
• Constantly inquiring and reflecting on yourself can help gain more knowledge about how to act and live your life with satisfaction
• Plato believes a person is separated into body and soul
• Plato thinks our soul is our true self, but it is stuck within our body, which links to the physical world
• Our bodies' physical demands have become a barrier to comprehending ourselves
• Plato believes that only when the soul ascends to the ideal world will we truly know who we are
• St. Augustine believes knowing God is knowing oneself
• St. Augustine holds the same views as Socrates and Plato on the existence of a soul and a body
• Our soul is good because its Creator, God, is good
• "To truly find ourselves, we need to have a relationship with God, who created us" - St. Augustine
• Descartes believes in contemporary dualism, the existence of the mind and body
• The body experiences the senses, and the mind interprets or thinks over what the body has seen
• Descartes suggests not putting complete reliance on the body as it can be easily tricked
• Being a rational human being means naturally thinking and doubting things to understand ourselves better
• Locke's concept of "Tabula Rasa" or "blank slate" states that humans are naive at birth
• As time passes and we encounter more scenarios and events, we gain more knowledge and insight that adds to our understanding of the world and ourselves
• Locke believes experience is key to knowing oneself as these experiences shape and define who we are
• Hume believes there is no permanent self
• Hume thinks everything around us impacts us, constantly altering our perception of who we are
• Our identities are dynamic and subject to change based on events in our lives according to Hume
• Kant believes we construct our own self
• Kant argues that our rational nature, along with our environment, defines who we are
• The self is a synthesis of our internal world containing ideas and feelings and the external world with circumstances beyond our control
• Our reasoning in understanding sensory experiences allows our self to construct itself according to Kant
• Freud introduced levels of consciousness and various aspects of personalities
• Freud believed every person has an id, superego, and ego that interact with one another
• Our sense of self is formed through the interactions of these personalities according to Freud
• Ryle believes our choices, behaviors, and emotional expressions shape how we perceive ourselves
• Ryle asserts that our actions and ideas define who we are
• Our identity is constructed through interactions with the world and other people, rather than being inherently individual or isolated according to Ryle
• Churchland defined the "self" based on brain movements
• Our brains and bodies work together to help us understand our surroundings according to Churchland
• To fully understand your "self," you must first understand how your brain functions neurologically according to Churchland
• Merleau-Ponty focuses on experiencing the world through your body
• Interaction with the world shapes the self according to Merleau-Ponty
• Our body and senses influence how we understand things and who we are according to Merleau-Ponty
• study of how human society is established, its structure and how it works, the people's interaction with each other and the effects they have to one another is an aspect to consider with regards to the development of a person

  Sociological