Personal horizon is a concept developed by J. J. Valberg in his book ''Dream, Death and the Self.'' He attempts to bring out his subject-matter by considering the dream hypothesis – what if ''this'' were a dream? In Valberg's view, an undetermined horizon would necessarily be internalised (a.k.a. subconscious) if ''this'' were all a dream. This leads to "horizonal" conceptions of

consciousness Consciousness, at its simplest, is awareness of a state or object, either internal to oneself or in one's external environment. However, its nature has led to millennia of analyses, explanations, and debate among philosophers, scientists, an ...

mind The mind is that which thinks, feels, perceives, imagines, remembers, and wills. It covers the totality of mental phenomena, including both conscious processes, through which an individual is aware of external and internal circumstances ...

experience Experience refers to Consciousness, conscious events in general, more specifically to perceptions, or to the practical knowledge and familiarity that is produced by these processes. Understood as a conscious event in the widest sense, experience i ...

life Life, also known as biota, refers to matter that has biological processes, such as Cell signaling, signaling and self-sustaining processes. It is defined descriptively by the capacity for homeostasis, Structure#Biological, organisation, met ...

, the

self In philosophy, the self is an individual's own being, knowledge, and values, and the relationship between these attributes. The first-person perspective distinguishes selfhood from personal identity. Whereas "identity" is (literally) same ...

, etc. Valberg subsequently considers death, and argues that when the meaning of death strikes us in the right way, it presents us with the prospect of nothingness – not there being nothing ''for me'', but nothing ''period''. This corresponds to one's personal horizon being the ''pre-eminent'' one, corresponding to a weak version of

solipsism Solipsism ( ; ) is the philosophical idea that only one's mind is sure to exist. As an epistemological position, solipsism holds that knowledge of anything outside one's own mind is unsure; the external world and other minds cannot be known ...

(arguably closely related to Hare's

egocentric presentism Egocentric presentism is a form of solipsism introduced by Caspar Hare in which other persons can be conscious, but their experiences are simply not . Similarly, in related work, Hare argues for a theory of perspectival realism in which other pe ...

). Valberg points out the difficulty of reconciling this with his commitment to the view that he shares the world with

metaphysical Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that examines the basic structure of reality. It is traditionally seen as the study of mind-independent features of the world, but some theorists view it as an inquiry into the conceptual framework of h ...

equals; he continues by re-evaluating many well-studied problems in philosophy in light of this notion of the personal horizon. Mark Johnston compares this notion to his related but distinct notion of an "arena of presence and action", which contains the stream of consciousness, and argues for the latter.

References

{{Reflist Conceptions of self Concepts in the philosophy of mind Epistemological theories Identity (philosophy) Metaphysics of mind Theory of mind Solipsism Metaphysics stubs Philosophy stubs

See also

References