Individuation und Selbstbewusstsein

This article aims to address some fundamental questions of the individuation of things by means of a theory of the non-empirical aspects of the individual self-consciousness of bodily subjects. At the outset, the principle of the identity of indiscernibles, ( <italic>f</italic> )( <italic>fx↔fy</italic> ) → x=y, is introduced as a theorem of second-order predicate logic. However, regardless of its logical nature, this principle seems to be countered by the conceptual truth that the general does not individuate. In order to resolve the apparent contradiction, the values of the predicate variable ‘ <italic>f</italic> ’ in ‘( <italic>f</italic> )( <italic>fx↔fy</italic> ) → x=y’ are critically considered, first, as intrinsic and relational completely general properties, then as object-dependent properties and so-called haecceities, and finally as spatiotemporally positional and (last but not least) perspectival properties. It turns out that the logical character of the identity of indiscernibles can only be made intelligible and secured through recourse to perspectival properties, that is, those properties that are referenced to the self-consciousness of bodily subjects. In order to unpack and spell out this result, an impersonal self-consciousness of judgement is then contrasted with the personal self-consciousness of the judging subject, and it is finally shown that the epistemic-ontic self-individuation of subjects in space and time is the source not only of the epistemic but also the ontic individuation of things, and at the same time, of the logical validity of the identity of indiscernibles.