Individual Autonomy and Responsibility in Late Imperial China By ...

Chapter 3

Impermanent Unity and Fragility of Individual Boundaries

In the introduction and previous chapters, the term “self” was often mentioned, and it would be helpful next to recapitulate its meanings. The rationalization of self-related knowledge which accompanies the study of self-consciousness and the hypotheses on the existence of a more or less unified and coherent self has encouraged long debates on the question of the unity of personality or on the mythic construct of the autonomous self. This question has been variously discussed in the West, on a literary and philosophical level.¹ Scholars still have different opinions on the real entity of self. Some have even taken the extreme position that it is a mere illusion; for example, Thomas Metzinger states that “nobody ever was or had a self.” Ulric Neisser maintains there are multiple “selves” per person; others, like Tobias Schlicht, list as many as five (dimensions of) selves; namely, the ecological, interpersonal, conceptual, remembered, and private selves. Moreover, John Doris and Gilbert Harman deny the existence of personal traits and dispositions that manifest themselves