The notion of the ‘self’ has always been a hot topic among philosophers, who have long debated questions such as ‘what is the self?’, ‘does the self actually exist, or is it a mere illusion?’, ‘how do selves come to be?’, and ‘can selves survive any kind of change?’  Cognitive scientists are no less immune to the conundrums raised by this four letter word, and empirical research promising to shed light on its enigmas has recently increased both in output and popularity. Perhaps not unsurprisingly, though, the rifts between theorists of different persuasions continue unabated and confusion and misunderstanding, more than consensus, seems to be the order of the day. Dan Zahavi’s book is an attempt to mend this state of affairs, and the way forward — he argues — lies in the phenomenological tradition of engaging “the question of the self by focusing on its experiential givenness and by taking the first-person perspective seriously.'(p.3) In other words, Zahavi’s aim is to understand selfhood via an investigation of the self’s accessibility to itself in experience. Along the way, Zahavi also hopes to demonstrate the vitality and relevance of the phenomenological approach to the issues being debated in current philosophy of mind and cognitive science.

The book is divided into seven chapters, the first four of which seemingly united by Zahavi’s concern to establish the ‘homogeneity of the phenomenological tradition’ (p. 11) regarding the claim that all conscious experience involves a tacit element of self-awareness (i.e., an experience of x is always also an implicit awareness that we are experiencing x). Chapter one asks what the relation is between phenomenal consciousness and self-awareness and, after distinguishing between various kinds of self-awareness, homes in on Sartre’s ‘one-level’ view of consciousness, according to which all experience is inherently characterized by an immediate pre-reflexive self-awareness. The chapter also includes a rejection of higher-order approaches to consciousness on the basis that they leave the first-personal givenness of experience unexplained. Chapter two focuses on Husserl’s conception of the structure of experience in his Fifth Logical Investigation, and Zahavi’s chief concern lies in showing that Husserl had already anticipated the view Sartre would later come to elaborate. Chapter three moves on to an examination of Husserl’s analysis on inner time-consciousness, whilst chapter four discusses Heidegger’s views on whether deliberate reflection on experience can reveal pre-reflective subjectivity without distorting it. Chapter five sees Zahavi take on the relationship between selfhood and subjectivity head-on, and we find here the most explicit statement of his views. After considering some arguments in favor of a non-egological approach to consciousness, Zahavi declares the self to be the “very first-personal givenness of the experiential phenomena.” (p.106) In other words, the self is to be identified with the immediate, pre-reflexive self-awareness that distinguishes conscious experience from other mental states. Zahavi then contrasts this core, minimal self with the narrative approach, according to which the self is a socially constructed narrative. He concludes that the two approaches are in fact complementary, since the minimal self of conscious experience is also the owner of a personal (and social) history, and there can be no narrative personhood without the first-personal givenness of subjectivity. The final two chapters are about our experience of other minds. Chapter six reflects on intersubjectivity, the problem of how we know other minds. Zahavi rejects that such knowledge is gained by analogy with our own minds, and endorses instead the view that our understanding of others is based on a form of empathy that is rooted in our own bodily subjectivity. Chapter seven, the last chapter in the book, discusses the ‘theory-theory’ of the mind and argues that it is fundamentally mistaken in it’s claim that the knowledge we call upon to understand ourselves and others is essentially theoretic and inferential.

As the above should indicate, Subjectivity and Selfhood is an ambitious project that covers a vast range of material, rich in ideas and thought-provoking throughout. Unfortunately, and for all it’s clarity of exposition, the book also seems rather thin on argument particularly where one would have expected a more substantial case to be made. An example is the very central claim that the self can be identified with the first- personal givenness of experience. Zahavi’s principal defense for this claim rests exegesis of Husserl’s work, as well as discussions of Sartre, Heidegger and Meaurly-Ponty. Interesting as these may be on their own right, they however do very little to persuade ego-skeptics that a form of pre-reflexive self-awareness is in fact an intrinsic characteristic of all conscious experience. Zahavi’s contention that the narrative self is metaphysically and ontologically dependent on a core, minimal self is another example where more argument is needed than what he offers. Zahavi asserts that “only a being with a first person perspective could consider her own aims, ideals, and aspirations as her own and tell a story about them” (p. 129), but this, again, tells nothing against the view that that very same first person perspective is but a conceptual and linguistic product of social life. More generally, I found that not enough was said about the positive contribution phenomenology is alleged to make to contemporary debates in philosophy of mind and cognitive science. It is true that many of the careful phenomenological observations Zahavi makes about intersubjectivity, theory of mind, and autism are of relevance to those interested in developmental psychology and psychiatry, as well as analytical philosophy of mind. What is not so clear, however, is what phenomenology has more to offer in terms of explanatory and predictive power than can be gained from the empirical disciplines investigating self-consciousness.

This said, Subjectivity and Selfhood is well worth the reading and should not be ignored by anyone seriously interested in consciousness and the self.

© 2009 Isabel Gois

Isabel Gois is a lecturer in philosophy at the University of Nottingham (UK). Her research interests include Philosophy of Mind, Neuropsychology, and Mental Disorder.

Keywords: philosophy