Rather, self-knowledge distinguishes itself specifically from our usual knowledge, and the enigmatic singularity of this knowledge is concealed when it is conceived of in analogy to the allegedly familiar knowledge of objects – and thus misunderstood from the ground up. At first glance, nothing appears to speak against grasping the ‘self’ in ‘self-knowledge’ as if it simply designated the object of this knowledge. Just as knowing can aim at a tree, a house or a stone, in the case of self-knowledge it could aim quite analogously at the self. The expression ‘self-knowledge’ would simply pick out a particular piece of knowledge from the multitude of all possible knowledge by specifying more precisely the object of knowledge.
Seen from this perspective, self-knowledge would be comparable (in accordance with its form) to all other kinds of human knowledge, all of which would differ from each other with respect to their different objects (in accordance with their content). Knowing would then be similar to a telescope, itself remaining unchanged and serving as a means, in always the same manner, to behold diverse objects and to bring them ‘closer’. Knowledge of a tree looks at the tree, knowledge of a house at the house, and self-knowledge, accordingly, at the self.
Yet the self at issue in self-knowledge is the self that puts itself in question. The self that makes self-knowledge into a unique and enigmatic kind of knowledge is not the object but rather the subject of knowledge. Herein lies precisely the radical difference between knowledge of something other and knowledge of oneself; when understood appropriately, this difference opens up in the first place the possibility of genuine self-knowledge by making us aware of its incompatibility with other kinds of knowledge. The tree that is the object of knowledge is obviously not the subject of this knowledge; by contrast, the self that is to know itself in self-knowledge is very much indeed the subject.
For this reason, the Delphic commandment aims at a quite peculiar form of knowledge that, as self-knowledge, distinguishes itself specifically from the usual knowledge of objects or knowledge of something other. In self-knowledge, the self ought to know itself precisely as itself, that is, as subject – a task that would be misguided from the start if the subject sought to know itself only as object, and thus precisely not to know itself. A knowledge that takes into account the self only as an object of knowledge can learn a lot, but none of what it learns may be regarded as genuine self-knowledge.
This difference between knowledge of something other and knowledge of oneself, which is far from self-evident, is what first makes clear why ‘Know thyself!’ is uttered as an imperative: the imminent and always present possibility of fundamentally misunderstanding oneself as a mere object of knowledge makes self-knowledge into a normative demand, which one can satisfy but also fall short of satisfying by misunderstanding oneself as an object among objects and forgetting oneself as subject. Self-knowledge is for this reason not primarily characterized by a certain ‘what’, but rather a certain ‘how’ of knowledge, from which the ‘what’ (the enigmatic reality of the self) results in the first place. One can violate the commandment of self-knowledge not merely by failing to follow it, but just as well by confusing the ‘how’ of knowledge of oneself with the ‘how’ of the knowledge of something other, without knowing to distinguish between the two.
This art of distinguishing, demanded by the Delphic commandment, becomes clear in the classical model in which the striving for self-knowledge in the history of human spirit takes shape. The exemplary pioneer in embarking on the adventure of a radical distinction between knowledge of oneself and knowledge of something other is Plato’s Socrates, speaking in Phaedo: ‘I am not yet able, as the Delphic inscription has it, to know myself; so it seems to me ridiculous (γελοῖον), when I do not yet know that, to investigate irrelevant things’ (1914, 229e–230a).
Obviously, Socrates distinguishes here very precisely between self-knowledge as it is demanded by the ‘Delphic inscription’, and knowledge of everything else that is not the subject but the object of knowledge. And this fundamental difference is understood as a radical difference in rank: self-knowledge is for Socrates so important and singular that it would be ‘ridiculous’ to be interested in any knowledge of objects as long as the commandment to know oneself has not been satisfied (which does not mean that only few people commit such a ‘ridiculous’ mistake, as Socrates does not tire of pointing out to his fellow citizens).
It is indeed remarkable and highly characteristic of Socrates’ thought that he understands self-knowledge as the highest form of knowing, but at the same time emphasizes that he does ‘not know’ himself. In Socratic not-knowing, maximum and minimum, positing and negating, interlace in a way that is not easy to understand: on the one hand, self-knowledge is the most important form of knowledge, and human beings have to seek it above all else; on the other hand, Socrates is distinguished from his fellow citizens precisely by his peculiar non-knowledge – that is, by the knowledge of not knowing what or who he is. Socratic non-knowledge is thus by no means non-knowledge with respect to any objects, but, rather, quite pointedly a non-knowledge with respect to the self. It is, then, a forerunner and ironic place-maker of the self-knowledge that is sought after.
The Intangibility of the I
The Socratic insight that self-knowledge is a quite peculiar form of knowledge, distinct from ordinary knowledge of objects while constituting its blind spot, has indeed never been developed into a lasting achievement in the further course of the history of human thought. This is because the basic orientation of everyday consciousness to ‘graspable’ things proved overpowering, pushing itself in front of the enigmatic exceptional nature of self-knowledge, which consequently fell again into obscurity.
Yet, precisely for this reason, the Delphic commandment of self-knowledge constitutes the secret source of unrest and irritation in human thought. Moreover, it is in the exceptional moments of our intellectual history that the enigmatic non-objectifiable nature of the I is rediscovered in always original ways and its intangibility brought into paradoxical or ironic concepts that seek to do justice to the ‘ungraspable’ character of the I in human self-knowledge.
Such a rediscovery finds expression with David Hume. ‘There are some philosophers’, Hume writes, ‘who imagine we are every moment intimately conscious of what we call our Self; that we feel its existence and its continuance in existence.’ Of all the possible objects of knowledge, the I, it appears, is a very special one. It is the one that is closest and most familiar to us, the one that is easiest to comprehend and is immediately present: there is nothing that we know better than our own self. Of all the possible kinds of knowledge, self-knowledge would be the one, then, that we need not demand of anyone since everyone has already achieved it. Hume’s critique sets a powerful Socratic question mark suitable for tearing the overly confident human self-consciousness out of its dogmatic slumber: ‘Unluckily all these positive assertions are contrary to that very experience, which is pleaded for them, nor have we any idea of self, after the manner it is here explain’d.’ It must ‘be some one impression, that gives rise to every real idea. But self or person is not any one impression.’ Consequently, ‘there is no such idea’ (2007, 164).
The I that underlies all grasping as the condition of possibility withdraws itself (precisely for that reason?) from our conceptual grip. As Hume observes, it does not allow for a real impression of an objective thing to which we could trace our conception of an I. In the case of the I, there is, then, precisely no reference given to an objectively ‘given’ object that ordinarily lends our everyday knowledge and language a solid foundation. From this it follows, however, that everything that the I grasps is the object of a knowledge, so that it itself as the subject of knowledge becomes a blank space of knowledge. The Delphic project of self-knowledge must, for this reason, highlight anew time and again this peculiar ‘blank space’ of the kind of knowledge sought here (Socratic non-knowledge).
The first ‘result’ that appears in the attempt