Self : Ancient and Modern Insights about Individuality, Life, and Death.

Intro -- Contents -- List of abbreviations -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- Part I: Existence of Self and philosophical development of the idea -- 1 The Self: is there such a thing? -- 2 The varieties of self and philosophical development of the idea -- Part II: Personal identity over time -- 3 Same person in eternal recurrence, resurrection, and teletransportation -- 4 Stoic fusion and modern fission: Survival cannot depend on what happens to someone else -- 5 Memory: Locke's return to Epicureans and Stoics -- Part III: Platonism: impersonal selves, bundles, and differentiation -- 6 Is the true self individual in the Platonist tradition from Plato to Averroës? -- 7 Bundles and differentiation of individuals -- Part IV: Identity and persona in ethics -- 8 Individual persona vs. universalizability -- 9 Plutarch: narrative and a whole life -- 10 Self as practical reason: Epictetus' inviolable self and Aristotle's deliberate choice -- Part V: Self-awareness -- 11 Impossibility of self-knowledge -- 12 Infallibility of self-knowledge: Cogito and Flying Man -- 13 Knowing self through others versus direct and invariable self-knowledge -- 14 Unity of self-awareness -- Part VI: Ownerless streams of consciousness rejected -- 15 Why I am not a stream of consciousness -- 16 The debate between ancient Buddhism and the Nyaya school -- Part VII: Mortality and loss of self -- 17 How might we survive death? -- 18 Could we survive through time going in a circle? -- 19 If we do not survive death, is it irrational to feel dismay? -- Table of thinkers -- Select bibliography of secondary literature -- General index -- A -- B -- C -- D -- E -- F -- G -- H -- I -- J -- K -- L -- M -- N -- O -- P -- Q -- R -- S -- T -- U -- V -- W -- Z -- Index locorum -- A -- B -- C -- D -- E -- G -- H -- I -- J -- K -- L -- M -- N -- O -- P -- R -- S -- T -- V -- W.

Richard Sorabji presents a brilliant exploration of the history of our understanding of the self, which has remained elusive and mysterious throughout the spectacular development of human knowledge of the outside world. He ranges from ancient to contemporary thought, Western and Eastern, to reveal and assess the insights of a remarkable variety of thinkers. On this basis he rejects the common idea that the self is an illusion, and develops his own original conception of the self as essential to our ownership of our experience and our apprehension of the world.

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Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, Michigan : ProQuest Ebook Central, 2024. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ProQuest Ebook Central affiliated libraries.