Self and Self-Ownership in the Husserlian Phenomenological Tradition

Summary

Husserl's conception of the self is explored as both a consistent identity and a developing unity shaped by history. He argues that time is fundamental to the formation of the ego, which becomes aware of itself through its historical context. The paper also discusses the 'minimal self' concept by Dan Zahavi, emphasizing the importance of sensory experience and habitual development in understanding self-ownership.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Abstract In this paper, I examine Husserl’s conception of the self as both an identical I-pole ( Ichpol ) for-all experience and as a developing, unfolding unity whose self-explication is its history. As Husserl proclaims in the Cartesian Meditations § 37, “time is the universal form of all egological genesis.” He further states: “The ego constitutes itself for itself in, so to speak, the unity of a history,” (Husserl, Cartesian Meditations § 37, p. 75; Hua I 109). In this paper, I will explore how Husserl understands the temporalization of the ego, including the ego’s essential historicity in the life-world. The Danish philosopher Dan Zahavi has spoken about the “minimal self” as a requirement that all experience have the character of “for-me-ness,” i.e., an immediate, non-objectifying, self-acquaintance of the self with itself. I broaden out this account to analyze the nature of the sensory basis for our experience of the self and the need to understand the self in its habitual and developmental character as a form of “ownship”.

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