Ego, Pure
The self conceived as a non-empirical principle, ordinarily inaccessible to direct introspection, but inferred from introspective evidence. See Ego, empirical. The principal theories of the pure ego are(a) the soul theory which regards the pure ego as a permanent, spiritual substance underlying the fleeting succession of conscious experience, and (b) the transcendental theory of Kant which considers the self an inscrutable subject presupposed by the unity of empirical self-consciousness. — L.W.