ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with some of Peter Unger's arguments against the idea of a Self. It shows that there is a logical distinction between the Self and mind. The argument for the direct experience of the Self is based on the experience of pure consciousness, which is usually obtained through meditative practice. Zeno Vendler uses title same insight to argue for a Transcendental Self. The Transcendental Self is the subject of experience that cannot be an object of experience. Vendler further argues that the Transcendental Self is an agent, in that it determines causal chains, but is not itself a cause. Regarded as conscious subject at least, Vendler's version of the Transcendental Self is very similar to the view of the Self in Neoplatonism, and in the Islamic and mediaeval philosophies that descended from Neoplatonism, and similar to the view of the Self in many Eastern traditions.
