Self-Appropriation

The Pursuit of the Unknown

Seeking knowledge is seeking an unknown. Wanting a burger is not the same as wanting knowledge as in the latter you do not know what you want. When we seek knowledge, we tend towards it intelligently and critically. It is a deliberate seeking. It is a combination of knowledge and ignorance. Knowledge, as it is sought consciously, intelligently, rationally, deliberately, methodically; and ignorance because we wouldn’t bother seeking if we already knew it. Finally, the possibility of the pursuit is the existence of an ideal.

Development of the Ideal of Knowledge

In Science

In science, let us consider that the ideal of knowledge is the mathematization of nature that is that the whole of reality is in numbers. This was first proposed by the Pythagoreans who began developing laws. These laws were further improvised by Archimedes, Galileo and Euclid, to name a few, and they made systems out of it. One of the systems that emerged was that of the Newtonian system. However, this hasn’t been the end of it. Einstein went a step further and began developing states and probabilities which we see in the Theory of Relativity. Thus, states and probabilities become the fundamental ideal. And so we see that the ideal of knowledge not only develops but it also changes. One’s ideal of knowledge becomes known in the pursuit of knowledge.

Another example goes such. The scholastic definition of science is ‘certain knowledge of things through their causes.’ These causes are not the Aristotelian causes that we study in philosophy. The causes of things could be considered as the essentials. Science works in this way: we discover the causes by starting with the thing and then moving from the causes to construct things out of them. The scholastics called the first movement from things to the causes as analysis and the movement from causes back to things as synthesis.

In Philosophy

The ideal in philosophy is a deductive ideal proceeding from analytic propositions to universal and necessary conditions. However, this ideal has been criticized by Kant and the Hegelians. Kant in his Critique of Pure Reason says that in mathematics pure reason can construct concepts because it can represent the concept itself but the same cannot be said of philosophy.  The Hegelians also argue saying that every ideal will be an abstraction and will be found to be inadequate. Then, a new ideal will arise and this too would suffer from the same inadequacy.

The Problem

The problem is that in all one’s questions, there is a presupposing ideal of knowledge which is expressed unconsciously more or less. Lonergan offers self-appropriation as the solution to this problem.

Self-Appropriation 

There are no set of propositions that define the ideal of knowledge. This does not mean that it is non-existent even if it is conceptually implicit. The ideal of knowledge is myself as intelligent by asking questions and seeking intelligible answers. Self-Appropriation is moving in where this ideal is functionally operative before it is made explicit in judgment, concept and words.

Lonergan speaks of three types of presence: the material sense of presence, a person present to another and a person being present to himself. Self-appropriation is concerned with the third type of presence. This presence is a fundamental presence. But, presence also requires consciousness. Lonergan presents four types of consciousness:

·         Empirical consciousness - the presence of just being there. (at the sensory level)

·         Intellectual consciousness - a presence that involves the use of the intellect while being present. (at the level of understanding)

·         Rational consciousness – presence with the use of one’s power of rationality. (at the level of judgment)

·         Rational Self-Consciousness – a presence involving making judgments before action. (at the level of deliberation)

Self-Appropriation means being present to oneself while being absorbed in the object. To move into self-appropriation, according to Lonergan, is to notice when you have an insight and to refer to it.

The Existential Element

In the problem of self-appropriation, there also exists the existential element. We already have some pre-existent ideals of knowledge operative in us. Self-appropriation involves that we remove these already existent ideals. These ready-made ideals that explain what knowledge must be are the very ideals that block self-appropriation.

The Value of Self-Appropriation

Self-Appropriation is advertence to oneself as experiencing, understanding and judging. Secondly, it is understanding oneself as experiencing, understanding and judging. Lastly, it is affirming oneself as experiencing, understanding and judging. Thus the analysis of knowledge has three elements, namely, experience, understanding and judging.

To deal with philosophical questions, one needs to have a point of reference which has its basis in oneself. If this doesn’t happen, a person becomes a repetition of another man. For example, one could quote Hegel here and there but will remain silent in a critical discussion about him if the former does not have a basis within himself. Self-Appropriation helps the person form the ultimate basis of reference from which he/she can deal satisfactorily with other questions.