p According to Kant, the continuity and unity of experience are conditioned by the transcendental unity of apperception, that is, the unity of the Transcendental Subject himself. Kant believes that the proposition "I think" is the supreme foundation of knowledge. In critically analysing the German philosopher’s conception, we have pointed out that the actual dependence is of a different kind. It is true that the knowledge of external objects assumes self-consciousness,but the latter in its turn assumes the former. Both knowledge and self-consciousness are ultimately conditioned by the subject’s practical object-related activity in the world of real objects, an activity that is social in its very nature, including as it does the relation of the given subject to others.

p Thus Kant erroneously interpreted the actual facts of cognition. Still, we have to admit that self-consciousness indeed plays a special role in the acquisition of knowledge. This fact merits a more careful analysis.

p Let us note, first of all, that self-consciousness is always knowledge of a special kind.

p True, Kant draws a basic distinction between knowledge and self-consciousness, emphasising that the Transcendental Subject can only be consciously realised but it cannot be the object of knowledge. It is the attempt to think of this Subject as an object of experience that leads to one of the antinomies of pure reason, Kant believes. Sartre also separates consciousness and knowledge as a matter of principle, pointing out that consciousness does not necessarily deal with the world of objects, whereas knowledge obligatorily implies an object to which it refers. The world that is external with regard to consciousness, different and independent from it (the world in itself) does not initially appear as a world of objects, according to Sartre, and is not therefore an object of knowledge. Consciousness is 215 not reflective in its very nature and therefore does not initially know itself, let alone the world of external objects. However, it immediately realises itself as different from the world in itself (therefore Sartre names consciousness "Being For-Itself"). In this way the philosopher separates self-consciousness and knowledge of self (reflexion).

p Let us note that both Kant and Sartre believe that under ordinary conditions there exists a relation of the subject to himself which appears as knowledge of himself. It is a different matter that, according to these philosophers, the individual empirical subject’s exponentially given knowledge of self is not the same as grasping the true deep nature of this subject (the latter appears as the Transcendental Subject, according to Kant, and as "pure" consciousness, Being For-Itself, according to Sartre).

p Inasmuch as we begin our analysis with the study of individual empirical subjects and their mutual relations, the statement that a certain kind of knowledge is given in ordinary self-consciousness can hardly raise any objections. Later we shall also try to explain the facts interpreted by Kant and Sartre as a fundamental difference between consciousness (self-consciousness) and knowledge. We have noted the very important circumstance, recorded in modern psychology, that the objective amodal scheme of the world underlying all types and kinds of perception also assumes the incorporation of a scheme of the subject’s body in it. The knowledge of the position of one’s body in the objective network of spatio-temporal connections, the knowledge of the difference between the objective changes in the real world and the succession of the subjective states of consciousness, the knowledge of the connection between the perspectives of experience and the objective position of the subject’s body—all of these varied kinds of knowledge are included in a compressed form in an elementary act of consciousness, the act which is indeed assumed by any cognitive process.^^86^^ Without self- consciousness, the subject cannot determine the objective state of affairs in the world. In the specific and supreme form of reflection termed cognition, the subject does not simply know something—he also realises that he knows it, that is, he always stands in a certain relation to knowledge and himself. If that were not so, cognition could not exist. As Marx stated: "The animal is immediately one with its life activity. It does not distinguish itself from it. It is its life activity. Man makes his life activity itself the object of his will and of his consciousness. He has conscious life activity. It is not a determination with which he directly merges. Conscious life activity distinguishes man 216 immediately from animal life activity."^^87^^

p Since all this is quite true, a situation emerges which appears quite paradoxical and even impossible. Indeed, if I cognize some object, can I simultaneously also cognize my cognizing self and the act of my cognition? Does not accepting the thesis that knowledge of an object also assumes knowledge of the cognizing subject and the act of his cognition lead to an insoluble logical paradox? Is not the latter similar to the paradoxes which arise when an utterance has itself for a referent? (These paradoxes, along with some others, were discovered early in this century in set theory and stimulated intense studies in the foundations of mathematics.) Consider these facts. My eyes can see everything that surrounds me. They also see certain parts of my own body. They see other subjects looking at certain objects. But my eyes cannot in principle see themselves and the process of their vision. (It can be objected that the eyes see themselves in the mirror. But what we see in the mirror is not the eyes themselves but only their reflection. Of course, the reflection in the mirror has a likeness to my eyes, and I can imagine with the aid of the mirror the way I myself, my face and my eyes look to an external observer. However, when I look in the mirror, it is not my eyes that are the object of my experience but only their physical reflection on the surface of a certain body. The fact that this reflection resembles the picture my eyes present to a stranger is not at all evident and not known at the early stages of the development of the psyche.)

p Keith Gunderson, a modern American philosopher, points out that the cognizing subject cannot be the object of his own experience, an object of his knowledge. Experience is directed at the world of external objects. I can know the states and relations of physical objects. I also know other individuals, both at the level of everyday knowledge and through special scientific inquiry (e.g., physiology, psychology, sociology, etc.). In his turn, another subject may study me, and in this case I shall be the object of this other subject. But I cannot know myself, the subject, as an object of my own experience. Otherwise, Gunderson believes, we would get lost in an insoluble paradox similar to the paradoxes of set theory. It has to be recognised, states the American philosopher, that the subject himself, the carrier and generator of knowledge, drops out of the domain to which his knowledge refers. There is nothing surprising about it, he continues, since this fact is characteristic not only of man but in general of all systems, including artificially constructed technical mechanisms, which have to do with receiving information 217 from the environment. Any such system gathers information about objects different from the system itself, but it cannot obtain information concerning the process itself of gathering information. Periscope lenses reflect everything that happens around, but they cannot reflect themselves.^^88^^

p We may agree with Gunderson that the situation where cognition of the world of objects also implies the subject’s cognition of himself and the process of such cognition indeed appears rather paradoxical.^^89^^ At the same time, we cannot discard the real and basic fact of human cognition really involving self-consciousness. The examples cited by the American philosopher do not contradict that fact. The point is that artificial mechanisms gathering information do not implement the process of cognition, they do not have self-consciousness or consciously realise the world of objects. The information gathered by these mechanisms only becomes a fact of cognition when it is assimilated by man. A submarine’s periscope by itself does not see anything: the man using it does. Man’s perception of the external world presupposes an elementary act of self-consciousness, otherwise it will not see anything even with the aid of a periscope (self-consciousness thus pertains to the man using the periscope rather than the periscope itself).

p What is the way out of this paradox? Let us describe the solution in the briefest outline, with the intention of later recurring to this problem. The point here is that although self-consciousness is knowledge, it is knowledge of a special kind. So far we have assumed that knowledge presents to the subject the world of objects that are realised as such. This is true both of perception, which is a kind of knowledge associated with the individual subject, and of scientific theories, which are objectified forms of knowledge. However, the object of self-consciousness is not given to it (self-consciousness should not be confused with reflexion). When I perceive a group of objects, I realise at the same time the difference between my consciousness and these objects, I realise the spatio-temporal position of my body, etc. But all these facts of consciousness are in the background or on the periphery and not in the focus of consciousness. Directly, my consciousness is aimed at external objects that are the object of knowledge. My body, my consciousness, my cognitive process do not in this case form part of the objects of experience and knowledge. Thus knowledge of self implied by any experience and expressed in the form of self-consciousness is knowledge of a special kind. It might be somewhat 218 tentatively called "implicit knowledge", as distinct from explicit knowledge with which we are usually concerned. The goal of the cognitive process is acquisition of explicit knowledge. Implicit knowledge acts as a tool or method of acquiring explicit knowledge.

When I touch a thing with my hand, I feel the object itself and not my hand. The tactile sense speaks of the external object and not of myself. Only in the background of my consciousness do I realise the act of touching, localising the action of the object on myself at my fingertips. If I touch the object with a stick, not with my hand, the tactile impression is again connected with the object itself, not with the tool I use (the stick). The latter is no longer in the focus of consciousness but on its periphery, and is experienced as a direct continuation of my body. In this case, the sensation of the action of the object (we have already pointed out that this is not the same as the tactile image of objects) is experienced as localised at the end of the stick and not at my fingertips.