Self. Consciousness and awareness Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Self. Consciousness and aw arness - establish Example?a thinking intelligent Being, that has reason and reflection, and crapper consider it self as it self, the akin thinking thing in different quantifys and places (Locke, 9). Locke states that as far as the disposition can be extended to some past action or thought, so far can the individuality of the person reach therefore he correlates identity of a person with his consciousness.It is clear that John Locke makes a distinction between eubstance and consciousness (a man and a person). For him these two notions are not the same. Man accounts for body and spirit, and person accounts for reason and reflection. Locke says that if a person would remember some things from his past, he would not be the same person, but nevertheless can be the same man. A galactic role is played by memory in Lockes idea of personal identity.To explain his hypothesis about separation of man and person, Locke gives a few examples. He states, for exa mple, that if a prince and a cobbler would substitute bodies than a personal identity would be where the consciousness is. Another example is if Heliogabalus would turn into a pig, he would be the same person, but not a man. If a parrot holds rational, self-aware conversations, then he is a person, but not a man. These examples confirm Lockes theory on separation of body and self. (Locke, 8, 15)Locke believes that if the body dies, the self is transferred into a new body, but it remains the same self, and therefore the same identity, because identity, tally to Locke, is independent of body.Locke does not identify consciousness with substance. He gives an example of a hand, being cut forth the body. At that point, it becomes separate from the body, the substance of the body has changed (it does not have one hand anymore), but the consciousness did not change, and this is the same person (Locke, 11)John Locke states that consciousness unites actions into the same person. It is con sciousness that unites actions different in time into the