Faber and Faber Limited, London 1957 The Self as Agent is the first part of The Form of the Personal being the written rendition of the Gifford Lectures given by John Macmurray in 1953 to 1954 at the University of Glasgow. John Macmurray asserts the primacy of the practical over the theoretical in The Self as Agent, demonstrating that philosophical analysis should begin with the Self as an agent of action in the world. In Persons in Relation, John Macmurray extends his work in The Self as Agent, showing the Self in proper existence within a community of relational beings and asserting that ‘there can be no man until there are at least two men in communication.’ Macmurray’s primary criticism of the Western philosophical tradition is that it begins from a theoretical, rather from than a practical, standpoint. In The Self as Agent, he critiques and corrects Descartes’ ‘I think’ with the ‘I do’, a construction of the Self existing first and foremost as an agent of action in the world. In chapter 1, ‘The Crisis of the Personal’, he expresses his concern that philosophy’s emphasis on objectivity necessarily results in an atheistic approach. Summary Macmurray’s primary criticism of the Western philosophical tradition is that it begins from a theoretical, rather from than a practical, standpoint. In The Self as Agent, he critiques and corrects Descartes’ ‘I think’ with the ‘I do’, a construction of the Self existing first and foremost as an agent of action in the world. In chapter 1, ‘The Crisis of the Personal’, he expresses his concern that philosophy’s emphasis on objectivity necessarily results in an atheistic approach. Being unable to accept the latter, he rejects the former in preference to the subjective or personal. In chapter 2, ‘Kant and the Romantics’, and chapter 3, ‘The Rejection of Dualism’, Macmurray considers the critical philosophy of Immanuel Kant, suggesting that we disregard Kant’s limitation of knowledge to the empirical and reject the resultant dualism between theory and practice. He distinguishes between the egocentric and disembodied Subject (as in Descartes and Kant) and his own notion of the active, embodied and, most importantly, social agent in chapter 4, ‘Agent and Subject’. Chapter 5, ‘The Perception of the Other’, seeks to give content to form by considering the personal nature of the Self in perceiving the Other-than-Self. Macmurray addresses the implications of his starting point of the active agent as opposed to the knowing thinker in chapter 6, ‘Implications of Action’, leading toward a theory of action that includes knowledge and concluding that the possibility of action ultimately depends on the agency of the Other. In chapter 7, ‘Causality and the Continuant’, he suggests that the idea of a cause is problematic because it implies an agent that does not function as an agent; Macmurray theorises instead a Continuant that exists outside of time as a non-agent responsible for natural laws. In chapter 8, ‘Reflective Activity’, he asserts that all theoretical activities, or modes of reflection, iii derive from practical action by an intentional limitation of attention. He extends this in chapter 9, ‘Modes of Reflection’, focusing on this aspect of theoretical activity (which he calls ‘negative intention’) to consider the relationship of the two reflective modes, one intellectual and the other emotional, to action. In the final chapter, ‘The World as One Action’, having clarified the limitations of his study in regard to purpose and method, he argues the necessity of thinking of the world as a unity of action or intention in which we act as personal, relational agents. Brannon Hancock, University of Glasgow iv Contents Introductory 1 Chapter One: The Crisis of the Personal 7 Chapter Two: Kant and the Romantics 31 Chapter Three: The Rejection of Dualism 57 Chapter Four: Agent and Subject 81 Chapter Five: The Perception of the Other 103 Chapter Six: Implications of Action 129 Chapter Seven: Causality and the Continuant 149 Chapter Eight: Reflective Activity 169 Chapter Nine: Modes of Reflection 189 Chapter Ten: The World as One Action 209 v Introductory This volume contains the substance of the Gifford Lectures delivered in the University of Glasgow during the Spring term of 1953. The second series of these lectures delivered the following Spring under the title Persons in Relation will be published in due course. The general subject of the lectures was dictated by a double criticism of our philosophical tradition. The traditional point of view is both theoretical and egocentric. It is theoretical in that it proceeds as though the Self were a pure subject for whom the world is object. This means that the point of view adopted by our philosophy is that of the Self in its moment of reflection when its activity is directed towards the acquirement of knowledge. Since the Self in reflection is withdrawn from action withdrawn into itself withdrawn from participation in the life of the world into contemplation this point of view is also egocentric. The Self in reflection is self- isolated from the world which it knows. This theoretical and egocentric character of our philosophy is not doctrinal. It is a presupposition generally unconscious implicit in philosophical procedures. It is quite compatible with voluntarism. Fichte for instance begins from the assertion ‘In the beginning was the Act’. But this ‘act’ turns out to be an act of consciousness and its objective the theoretical and egocentric one of complete self- consciousness. My purpose has been to challenge both these presuppositions. Against the assumption that the Self is at least primarily a ‘knowing subject’ I have maintained that its subjecthood is a derivative and negative aspect of its agency. This corresponds to the fact that most of our knowledge and all our primary knowledge arises as an aspect of activities which have practical not theoretical objectives; and that it is this knowledge itself an aspect of action to which all reflective theory must refer. Against 1 the assumption that the Self is an isolated individual I have set the view that the Self is a person and that personal existence is constituted by the relation of persons. The present volume is concerned with the former of the two issues and so with the Self as Agent. The question of the interrelation of selves—the proposal to substitute the ‘You and I’ for the solitary ‘I’ of the philosophical tradition—has been reserved in order to facilitate exposition for the second volume. This method has disadvantages and may even be misleading if the incompleteness of the first volume is forgotten. It may therefore be desirable to say at once that the agent-self which will be the subject of our present discussions is a logical abstraction and can exist only as a community of personal agents. The misunderstanding however against which it is most important to guard touches the purpose or the philosophical function of these lectures. Because they range in a systematic fashion over every general aspect of human experience they may suggest that what is offered is a new philosophical system. This is not the case. Unlike many of my contemporaries I have no objection to system-making; I consider it indeed in its proper place a necessary part of the philosophical enterprise. Most systems of philosophy indeed are the product not of the genius of the original thinkers to whom they are ascribed but of the industry of their commentators. But there are system-builders among the great philosophers. Aristotle Aquinas Hegel are examples. Their function is to give a definitive and systematic expression to a process of thought which has been unfolding itself over a period of history. At the beginning of such processes stand the pioneers thinkers like Pythagoras or Descartes whose function it is to reject current presuppositions and to establish a new point of view with new assumptions. The process itself which unites these two extremes consists in the gradual discovery of the implications and consequences of the new 2