The Self As Agent [Paperback]

John MacMurray (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1991

At the heart of Macmurray's work is his attempt to reverse the proposition of philosophy of the modern period that posits the self as thinker withdrawn from action and essentially isolated from the world about which it reflects. Macmurray laboured to recast the role of philosophy in the service of a more fulfilling and basic personal communion with others, with the world, and ultimately with God. Indeed, it can be said that Macmurray's philosophy is really a philosophy of community - a philosophy that relates to many contemporary philosophical and religious concerns, as well as having a bearing on current historical/sociological, political, and feminist critiques of contemporary American society.

Product Details

• Paperback: 230 pages
• Publisher: Humanity Books (July 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1573923370
• ISBN-13: 978-1573923378
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,382,785 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Outstanding contribution to non-Cartesian philosophy, August 4, 2004

By 

Neil Hinrichsen (Knysna South Africa) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Self as Agent (Faber papered covered editions) (Paperback)

Macmurray is in my opinion one of the most neglected philosophers of the 20th century. His exceptionally lucid work lays the ground for a comprehensive non-Cartesian view of the world.

Macmurray firstly proposes action, and not thought, as the fundamental basis for understanding what it is to be human. When Descartes says "I think", he is then already divorced from the world. One can ONLY exist in interaction with others and other things, it is absurd to imagine a person as existing in a universe where there is nothing else whatsoever. Action is the full state of the human being, and thinking is a lesser, abstracted state. Action is a full concrete activity of the Self employing all our capacities whereas thought is constituted by the exclusion of some of our powers and a WITHDRAWAL into an activity which is less concrete and less complex... a theory of knowledge is derived from and included in a theory of action.

Secondly, Macmurray proposes another enormous paradigm shift for Western philosophy by saying that we cannot fully understand individuals in isolation, but only in relation to others. Relationship is constitutive of human living for Macmurray: 'We need one another to be ourselves. This complete and unlimited dependence of each of us upon the others is the central and crucial fact of personal existence.' The idea of an isolated agent is self-contradictory; any agent is necessarily in relationship with Others. Macmurray corresponded with Martin Buber, and his thought essentially extends Buber's vision.

These two central tenets are explicated respectively in Macmurray's two major works, "The Self as Agent" and "Persons in Relation" (also published together as "The Form of the Personal"). Macmurray's writing is crystal clear, and filled with other fascinating points, such as his distinction between intellectual and emotional representations, in chapter 9 of "The Self as Agent".

A great short introduction to Macmurray and his work can be found in David Creamer's book "Guides to the Journey".

5.0 out of 5 stars Actions for the sake of friendship, November 29, 2011

By 

Stephen Cowley (Edinburgh) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Self As Agent (Paperback)

This is a very ambitious book based on Macmurray's Gifford lectures of the 1950s which also gave rise to his Persons in Relation (1961). These are the culmination of Macmurray's work which he takes to embody a new philosophical form of the personal that will supplement the mechanical and organic forms that he thinks operate as assumptions in social theory to the detriment of modern society.

This first volume seeks to establish the standpoint of agency as prior to that of the observer in human experience. The observer, or thinker, represents a standpoint reached by abstracting from action and thus becomes egocentric. It also involves abstraction from the sense of touch and hence reliance on visual metaphors in understanding the mind which make room for scepticism about the external world. When the abstraction from action is removed on the other hand, we find ourselves again in the social world of 'persons in relation' (whose leading features are discussed in the sequel volume).

Macmurray draws ideas from Hegel and Bergson amongst others often without acknowledgement and this gives his work an aura of greater originality than it perhaps deserves. He compares his work in scope to Descartes' Discourse on Method (1637) and thus makes large claims for it in this regard. That said, it is a wide-ranging synthesis of trends that have been neglected in much recent philosophy. Those who admire him think Macmurray simply ahead of his time. Those who wish a more popular and self-contained introduction might try the earlier Freedom in the Modern World (1932) based on UK radio talks. I would strongly recommend this book to anyone interested in the nature of personal relations at a philosophical level or in the reception of Continental philosophy in the English-speaking world. The book was originally published by Faber in 1957 and the new edition reproduces this with a new introduction by Stanley Harrison.