On The Human Selfhood, Ego, Heart

Bold shows Dooyeweerd's ideas. Italics shows ideas of others that he is arguing against.

Click here for a more general discussion of the Human Being.

Dooyeweerd's Own Ideas

Ego as Concentration Point, Unity of Individual

• the human heart is the concentration, the radix of temporal existence, I:65
• it is I who am the central point of reference and the deeper unity above all modal diversity; I:5
• it is the concentration point of all its cosmic functions, a subjective totality lying at the basis of all the functions I:5
• the central sphere of human existence; I:31
• the concentration point of the root of our existence, I:31

Convergence and Coherence of Aspects

• Our ego expresses itself as a totality in the coherence of all its functions within the modal aspects of cosmic reality; I:5
• the modal diversity is the expression of a totality of signification; I:16
• the meaning totality is the transcendent centre where the aspects converge into the unity of direction towards the Origin, the Arche of all meaning; I:16
• intermodal synthesis and selfhood, II:554

Ego Transcends Aspects

• the ego or selfhood transcends this coherence; I:5
• the ego transcends the philosophical concept; I:5
• the ego is the inner concentration point of all the aspects, and does not coalesce with the mutual coherence of the aspects, but is transcendent over it; I:16 [ego distinct from multi-aspectual coherence]
• man in his full selfhood transcends the temporal earthly cosmos in all its aspects and partakes of transcendent root of this cosmos, II:593

Ego as Functioning Subject

• the ego as a totality operates in the conceptual determination of philosophical thought, but also in all my temporal functions; I:5
• the ego is subjected to a central law, which derives its full meaning from the Origin of all things and limits and determines the centre and root of our existence; I:11
• the selfhood, or ego, as the religious root of existence is the hidden performer on the instrument of philosphic thought I:21
• pre-functional; I:31
• our selfhood is under the law, II:552

Ego as Involved, not Isolated

• the ego must participate in the meaning totality if genuine thinking in terms of totality is to be possible; I:11 [action research; cannot know if not involved; on detached observer]
• the ego is rooted in the spiritual community of mankind, in the 'We' directed to the Divine 'Thou', I:60

The Limit of Ego

• the transsencent horizon of the selfhood, II:560

Religious Root of Ego

• the heart and faith II:299
• the ego seeks its origin in order to understand its own meaning and thereby the cosmos; I:11
• the religious sphere; I:31
• the ego and religion I:57
• religion is the ex-sistent condition in which the ego is bound to its true or pretended origin; I:58 [relationship of ego to origin]
• religion is self-surrender; I:58
• the religious root of human existence, II:549
• the individual ego has been integrated into the religious selfhood and self-consciousness, II:562
• [selfhood] is the individual religious centre of human existence and experience; III:6

Worldviews

• the original choice of a position is an act of the full self, which transcends the modal diversity; I:20 [perspectives, worldviews]
• it is a religious act for it contains a choice of position in the concentration point of our existence in the face of the Origin of meaning; I:20 [perspectives, worldviews]
• this central sphere is one of dynamic occurrence out of which the conflict between the civitas Dei and the civitas terrena takes its issue; I:32

Restlessness of Ego

• the restlessness of the ego is transmitted from the selfhood to all temporal functions in which the ego is actually operative; I:11
• the ego seeks its origin in order to understand its own meaning and thereby the cosmos; I:11
• the Arche trascends all meaning and our ego comes to rest in it; I:11

Sundry Other Matters

• but occurrence is not identical with the historical aspect of cosmic time, I:32
• religion is self-surrender; I:58
• this existence is a 'stare extra sė', III:6

Views of Others

• according to Peter Bayle, religion has a place in the heart and is in open conflict with human reason; he opposed the 'Vennunftreligion': I:260
• Rousseau holds that the principles of true virtue are inscribed in everybody's heart I:314
• the concrete and the thinking ego, in Theodor Litt, I:62
• Theodor Litt's view: the ego is a monad interweaving past and present experiences, III:250
• the ego is mathematical centre of thought in Descartes; I:
• in Hume it [the ego] is merely collective concept of the series of ideas ordered constantly in accordance with the laws of association, I:295
• the ego is an illusion and must be explained in terms of the laws of association, in Hume, I:296
• the absolute and the thinking ego in Fichte, I:142
• Fichte's absolute ego is the hypostatization of the concept 'ego' as the totality of reason, according the Lask, I:416
• in Kant the ego becomes an ego only if it obeys itself, I:373
• the 'Ego-Drama' is the formal expression of the art of the German 'Sturm und Drang' I:453

• Husserl's egology: I:91,213, II:560
• [Selfhood] is supposed to be reducible to an immanent subjective pole of thought I:6
• [Selfhood] as pure actuality in Scheler I:111
• Heidegger reproaches Kant for conceiving the Ego as a Subject in an ontological sense, thus considering the being of the ego as the reaity of the 'res cogitans', I:111
• In Heidegger [selfhood is] finite, its essehce is historical time, II:524,525
• only in theoretical abstraction Heidegger holds reality to be accessible to the selfhood, II:527
• his [Heidegger's] self is the origin and identical with time; II:531
• our self and time, II:531
• his [Heidegger's] 'existential' time is not 'cosmic time', II:531
• the transcendental phenomenological subject or ego, II:543
• the subjective a-priori of the intentional content of the acts, II:544
• intersubjectivity of egos as mental monads, II:545, cf. 549
• the absolute transcendental subject is an absolutization II:546

On the Thinking Ego:

• the supposed reduction of the selfhood to an immanent, subjective pole of thought; I:6
• in this attempt the thinker imagines that he is able to set the logical function of thought apart as a self-sufficient activity; I:6
• but such a reduction of the thinking ego to the would-be 'transcendental logical subject', executed in the process of thought, cannot be performed only by the selfhood, which cannot itself turn into the result of the abstraction formed by thought; I:7
• the transcendental logical ego is the subjective pole of thought to which the empirical world is related as Gegenstand, i.e. an immanence philosophy I:16
• the conception of the 'transcendental cogito' conceals a pitfall in its neglect of the problem of the relation between the ego and the logical function I:17

On Ego as Elevated Ideal Selfhood

• the idolatrous elevation of the ego to an 'ideal selfhood' opposed to our 'empirical' I-ness as the objectivation of our self in the past and subjected to causality; I:58 [I seen as thing]
• if this 'ideal selfhood' is related to the present and the future, a dialectical time problem results in the existential conception of the ego, due to the basic motive of nature and freedom; I:58
• but the 'authentic', the 'fundamental' I-ness is then dispersed in time and recedes from our view for ever; I:58
• a purely temporal ex-sistere may never be identified with the ex-sistent character of the religious centre of human nature, I:58

Ouweneel

And to all ThinkNetters, I highly recommend W.J. Ouweneel's article "Supratemporality In The Transcendental Anthropology Of Herman Dooyeweerd" in that same edition of Philosphia Reformata (58 #2 --1993). Ouweneel says in part:

"Those who reject the supratemporality of the heart "will sooner or later attempt to theoretically grasp the ego or soul in some kind of 'metaphysical concept,' which amounts to a mere substantialization of the later ['normative'] temporal functions... This complex of functions will then automatically call forth another abstract functional complex as its necessary counterpart...."

He notes that this article is based on chapters 5 & 6 of his work "De leer van de mens" (1986)... too bad this work is not available in English.

Created: 16 April 2003. Last updated: 21 November 2005 unets. 7 July 2006 Ouweneel.