Self-disorders and first-person authority
Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences June 16, 2026 Rick Bellaar, Jasper Feyaerts
The article argues that the 'ipseity disturbance model' of self-disorders cannot explain why people's reports of disturbed mineness have first-person authority. It also contends that the phenomenological account of a 'loss of common sense', typically paired with that model, fails to account for first-person authority in reports of paradigmatic self-disorders. An alternative 'grammatical' account of first-person authority, drawn from Wittgenstein and Moran, is presented and applied to such reports, including pre-psychotic experiences. Recent revisions of the ipseity disturbance model in terms of hyperreflexivity are evaluated. The authors argue that a change in the grammar of intentional concepts allows understanding reports of the hyperreflexive phenomenology of self-disorders as both first-personal and authoritative.