САМОСОЗНАНИЕ

Self-Consciousness

The process of man singling himself out from the objective world, awareness of his relation to the world, awareness of himself as a personality, his behaviour, actions, thoughts, sentiments, desires, and interests. An animal is identical with its activity, it changes nature only by virtue of its presence, i.e., is related to it directly. Man, however, mediates his relation to nature by his social practical activity and above all by the use of tools. Thanks to labour he is singled out from the natural connections: in the process of labour he correlates his aims and tasks with the natural material and takes into account his own possibilities. By changing nature, he changes himself. By creating products in the process of labour, man, as it were, doubles himself, and in the object of his activity contemplates his handiwork. He differentiates himself as producer from the objects of his activity.

But since labour is always of a social character, man begins to be aware of himself as a particle, a cell of the given historical system, regarding another man as similar to himself and seeing in him a man. Language plays an important part in the shaping of self-consciousness because language is the direct reality of thought and discharges its function for man only because it exists for others.

Self-consciousness (as an earnest, as an inclination) arises simultaneously with consciousness as a derivative from it, but is displayed at a considerably higher stage in the development of mankind. At first man differentiates himself from the object, becomes aware of the object of his activity and of himself as a subject only in the process of acting on things. Then self-consciousness is manifested as a generic, collective element: man is still fully absorbed by the genus which carries human essence. As the gentile system declines, civilisation appears and the individual emerges, the self-consciousness of the personality as such arises.

In the history of philosophy, self-consciousness was an active principle and it frequently exhausted the understanding of the practical activity of man (see Fichte, Hegel, Young Hegelians). Moreover, self-consciousness was frequently regarded as a creative element in relation to the objective world. In reality self-consciousness, being an active principle, can be understood only as a result of man's productive activity in society and as its aspect; it depends on the reflection of the objective world and is determined by it.

Самосознание

Осознание, оценка человеком своего знания, нравственного облика и интересов, идеалов и мотивов поведения, целостная оценка самого себя как деятеля, как чувствующего и мыслящего существа. С. свойственно не только индивиду, но и обществу, классу, социальной группе, когда они поднимаются до понимания своего положения в системе производственных отношений, своих общих интересов и идеалов. В С. человек выделяет себя из всего окружающего мира, определяет своё место в круговороте природных и общественных событий. С. тесно связано с рефлексией, где оно поднимается на уровень теоретического мышления. С. формируется на определённой ступени развития личности под влиянием образа жизни, который требует от человека самоконтроля собственных поступков и действий, принятия полной ответственности за них.

Поскольку мерой и исходным пунктом отношения человека к себе выступают прежде всего другие люди, С. по самому существу носит глубоко общественный характер. См. ст. Сознание и литературу при ней.

А. Г. Спиркин.