Social Sciences in China (Chinese Edition)

No. 3, 2025

The Predicament and Shift of the First-Person Perspective—Reflections on Kant and Heidegger

(Abstract)

Zhang Zhiwei

In its inception, philosophy was indistinguishable from science, as both were grounded in the unity of thought and existence. The scientific revolution of the seventeenth century precipitated a crisis in philosophy, with Descartes’ “Cogito” bringing the predicament of the first-person perspective into sharp relief and giving rise to the problem of dualism. Kant sought to fully realize the principle of subjectivity by suspending the thing-in-itself and bridging the gap between the mind and the world through a priori forms of knowledge, reinforcing the objectivity of the first-person perspective. Heidegger, in contrast, shifted from the plural to the singular first-person perspective, moving from “knowing” to “acting,” anchoring existence not as an object of thought but within the lived engagement of the individual Dasein. While scientific progress relies on eliminating subjective factors to understand the world purely from a third-person perspective, we are continually confronted with the fundamental question of the starting point and foundation of knowledge and, indeed, all human endeavor.