Consciousness

Consciousness, in Sartre’s account, is not a self-contained inner object but the transcending For-itself, whose being is at issue in its relation to what is other than itself. Its basic structure is intentional: consciousness is always consciousness of something. The distinction between unreflective and reflective consciousness shows how this outward-directedness can coexist with a non-objectifying awareness of itself.

Definition and Intentional Structure

Consciousness is defined as a being whose being is in question insofar as it implies a being other than itself. It therefore cannot be understood as a sealed mental container: it reaches beyond itself toward an object, while its own existence is implicated in that directedness. Sartre’s insistence that consciousness is always consciousness of something establishes this intentional relation as fundamental.

The account can distinguish forms of consciousness by the psychic objects with which they are associated, such as pain-consciousness and shame-consciousness. These examples identify different ways consciousness may be oriented, but Sartre’s more basic distinction concerns whether consciousness is unreflectively related to an object or reflectively takes consciousness itself as an object.

Unreflective Consciousness

Unreflective consciousness, also called non-thetic or non-positional self-consciousness, is the pre-reflective cogito. In this mode, consciousness is conscious of an object and implicitly conscious of being consciousness of that object. This self-awareness is not knowledge: consciousness does not first inspect itself or make itself into a thing in order to be present to itself.

Because it is implicit rather than an act of self-observation, this awareness provides the pre-cognitive basis for reflective thought. The pre-reflective cogito is thus not a second object alongside what consciousness perceives. It names the non-positional self-awareness already involved in consciousness’s engagement with its object.

Reflection and the Cogito

Reflective consciousness, also called thetic or positional self-consciousness, is the contrasting mode in which consciousness takes a position on consciousness itself. It is distinguished from the unreflective mode by this objectifying relation, not by the mere fact that consciousness is present to itself: even unreflective consciousness has implicit self-awareness, though it does not know itself as an object.

This distinction clarifies the relation between the pre-reflective cogito and the Cartesian cogito. The pre-reflective cogito is presented as the latter’s pre-cognitive basis, rather than as a reflective conclusion reached by turning inward. Consciousness can reflect on itself because self-awareness is already implicit in its ordinary, intentional relation to objects; reflection articulates that relation in a different mode rather than creating it from nothing.