On The Self-awareness Theory Of Phenomenology

The self-awareness theory is not simply a but rather the fundamental problem of phenomenology. Based on the argumentation of the phenomenologists of Edmund Husserl, Jean-Paul Sartre, Jacques Derrida and Michel Henry, this article attempts to analyze the meaning of self-awareness and its position in the self-awareness theory of phenomenology, clarify how consciousness is aware of itself, and then throw light on the relation between self-awareness and alterity.First, this article criticizes the refection theory of self-awareness by pointing out its difficulties through the position of the Heidelberg School. It finds that self-awareness is irrelational, non-objectifying, and immediate. Self-awareness implies an instantaneous happening with the proceeding of object-consciousness, or a self-given state. Michel Henry's viewpoint of purely immanent self-affection further supports the irrelational character of self-awareness. However, is original self-awareness really an immediate self-presence, which excludes any alterity, or is there any alterity contained in the nature of self-awareness? In Husserl's phenomenology, there is an affection of the hyle in self-awareness, and he describes hyle as a kind of alterity. Husserl also analyzes the interdependence of self-affection and hetero-affection. Sartre develops the intentionality theory of Husserl, and he explains consciousness in terms of transcendence and negation, by introducing a tiny separation or even duality into self-awareness. Derrida proceeds with self-awareness from the angle of retention and the"fissure"of unfolding. He attempts to dissolve presence with différance. At this point, Husserl, Sartre, and Derrida all oppose Henry. However, their claims are different, one moderate and one far more radical. In conclusion, self-awareness contains some kind of alterity, but we cannot exaggerate the role of alterity. Otherwise, self-awareness will be impossible, and the theory of self-awareness will also fail.