Consciousness and Perspective

"For me" can connote either privacy or perspective, a distinction which, since Berkeley's reduction of Primary Qualities to Secondary Qualities, e. g. the assimilation of the perception of a coin as an ellipse, to color-blindness, is often obscured. Corresponding to, and perhaps underlying, the distinction is a Metaphysical one of the concept of the I as an Atom, and that of it as essentially in relation to a world. Likewise, Selfishness may be Atomist, while Egocentrism is implicitly relational, i. e. a Center entails the existence of points of which it is the center. Also, Perspective connotes Finitude, but not necessarily fixed, because a perspective can vary in scope. For example, Hegel's 'Phenomena' are actually Perspectives that, in the course of the Phenomenology, increase in scope Dialectically. Now, the essentially social character of Marx-Engels' concept of Consciousness indicates that it is perspectival. Furthermore, just as a Center can be the locus of both centripetal and centrifugal motions, Consciousness that is at the center of experience can be both the end point of perception, and the origin of action. In other words, the Perspectivist concept of Consciousness can ground both Theory and Practice.