ABSTRACT
By far the most significant aspect of the self, and far more fundamental than the issue of its location, is the appearance of the object self as actor. “Whenever my introspective glance succeeds in turning round quickly enough”—to borrow this phrase once again from William James —I find myself doing something—perceiving, thinking, loving, moving to some destination, and so on, with respect to one or another object, treating myself to some experience such as relaxing or basking in the sun, or some other reflexive act like trying to perceive myself. It is not true, as James would have it, that all that my introspective glance “can ever feel distinctly is some bodily process.” What my introspective glance may reveal—if the body is experienced at all save when it is directly examined—is some blurred apprehension of the body or some bodily process or, often enough, nothing of the body at all.
