[MURG] Defining the sense of self and personal identity

[Thomas Weber]

> Hi Randall,
  I have just corrected my paper for a few minor
spelling errors. I think it is ready to be sent to
reviewers as is. As I intend to write more is it OK to
send the drafts this way or do you recommend a
different format? Thank you for you attention.
Kind Regards,
Thomas Weber 
> 
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> Defining the sense of self and personal identity
> 
> Written by Thomas Weber
> 
> The sense of self is an awareness of being a unique
> individual entity separate from other humans and
> from
> our surroundings. It is probably the most important
> to
> us component contributing to the experience of being
> alive. The self exists in the environment and
> without
> it the self would lose it's meaning. This indicates
> that the self is a sense of relationship with the
> world around us. Awareness can be divided in two
> parts: the part which we can call the self and that
> something which the self is aware of. Therefore it
> can
> be said that awareness is a binary process. In most
> general terms the part that we are aware of is our
> environment which we all share. It is relatively
> easy
> to define. From our stand point the environment is
> eternal. It may change over time for better or
> worse,
> but it will not cease to exist. The self however is
> temporary and fragile. Trying to better understand
> what makes the self so unique we may analyse it from
> the very beginning. A child is born. Most of us will
> agree that the child's awareness is less developed
> than ours. The child is born with very little memory
> stored in her brain and she will not remember her
> own
> birth. She will express some sense of self reacting
> to
> the pain of the first vaccination, crying for
> comfort,
> care, etc. As she developes day by day she
> accumulates
> new memories. Her brain already partially grown is
> like a blank tape being recorded. It is believed by
> some psychologists that infants perceive themselves
> and their surroundings as one whole reality. That
> reality gradually records itself in their brains
> until
> at about the age of four some "critical memory mass"
> is
> reached. When we now adults try to recall when our
> lives begun it is about the age of four as we
> remember
> it ourselves. Before that we probably lived for the
> day only vaguely aware of the past or future. Our
> sense of self must have been limited to a relatively
> narrow location in space and time. Our awareness was
> probably mostly physical. Accumulating memories was
> kind of fun, playful activity. When at the age of
> four
> the "critical memory mass" is reached the small
> human
> starts living her life in time. She starts to
> understand time as a dimention in which processes
> take
> place. Grasping the continuity of time and realizing
> there is going to be future the child starts
> projecting memories forward and says: "there is
> always
> going to be mom and dad and the sun will shine
> forever".The child just started using her
> imagination.
> To make imagination effective events of the past
> must
> be arranged in proper sequential order. It is
particularly
> important for cyclic pattern recognition and
> application. As the self is born it can be described
> as a system made of past memories, the sense of
> present location and situation which at any given
> point in life is the final outcome of all
> experienced
> past, and the sense of outlook to the future. The
> last
> one are our intentions, our dreams, our plans. As we
> grow older these three elements are so uniquely ours
> that we have a good reason to call it self. The self
> is the experience of one's past, present and future.
> It is the dynamic relationship between one's
> personal
> history - the current strategic location and his
> ambitions. It is the inner conversation going on as
> the
> present moves thru time, as the events planned in
> the
> future move to the past and the accuracy of our
> planning undergoes a reality check. These three
> entities - past, present and future engage in team
> work toward our unique purpose. As the game goes on
> we
> are cheered by arrays of emotions. In the deeper
> sense
> our emotions are so strictly ours that every person
> is
> the only person who can possibly feel them. The past
> -
> present - future in the background of our emotions
> is
> our most uniquely self. But most of all we live in
> the
> present. In this now and here we directly interact
> with the environment and that includes other humans.
> We are not alone. We as individuals live in our self
> -
> relationships and life becomes more complex as we
> enter relationships with other humans. Each and
> every
> one of them is engaged in their own self - 
> relationships so the whole system becomes a
> relationship of relationships and so on. If each of
> us
> were only one person in our very own environments
our past -
> present - future selves would be just fine and the
> personal identity would not be an issue. But as
> there
> are more other selves around we must be able to
> identify ourselves among other humans.
> The sense of personal identity seems to be taking
> care
> of proper harmony with others. It helps us in our
> existence as persons in the context of other
> persons.
> At the current evolutionary stage as the human
> species
> we are designed for progress and creation. Some mega
> projects that we undertake require highly organised
> cooperation. Humans organise in families, friends,
> cities, countries, etc. At the functional level we
> are
> specialised for our unique professional or
> vocational
> capacities. These particular work capacities were
> the
> basis for personal identities within the progressing
> social organisation. We can observe today reading
> any
> telephone book that many names are derived from
> occupational titles. Personal identity has 
> a
> name attached to it. That name is to be used by
others
> relating
> to us. As we try to live useful lives we accomplish
> things to our name. We start connecting our personal
> identities to bigger concepts and this way some of
> us
> become famous. The concepts continue beyond our
> lives
> and perhaps make the history. Humans like Socrates,
> Gallileo or Albert Einstein have all gone home and
> so
> gone is their sense of self, but their personal
> identities will continue still far into the future.
> 
>
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