Conscious Silk

"Knowing" the self is an illusion, a creative reconstruction assumed from the presented evidence. Most of experience and decision functioning is non-conscious and not interpretable by the self.

Evolution Tells

The brain is not a lazy lump of vestigial flesh but the salience of consciousness and folk psychology conspire to popularize this organ as a great unused resource. The vast majority of nervous system activity never rises to consciousness and is not only sustaining for common "physical" environmental interactions but embodies the development of an interactive psycho-social self.

The Limits of Looking

Dip that ladle all you want, it's not just dark in there - it is the "no light zone!"

Introspection is wishful thinking at best. The workings of MIND are almost entirely nonconscious, and yet, we "think" we are HERE & NOW and as sentient beings, we reflect on ourselves the sense of "masters of our own domains."

In fact, 95%+ of our internal and environmental interactions are effected in the realm of auto-control via biological and learned route patterns.

What you see is what you are.

The non-conscious reaches of the mind are the focus of extensive scientific research. Except for the retrograde of Behaviorism, which treated intrinsic brain/mind systems as "non-discoverable", there has been a continuing improvement in the study of mechanisms making us what we are.

For the uninitiated, unscientific, or uninterested the mind is no more mysterious than their refection in the mirror. But science now tells us that we behave based on influences and mechanisms that can't be discerned through direct refection.

Shadows, Echoes, and the Smell of Memory

There are ways to see and come to know our mind's way. Disclosures abound but they are not salient because our conscious monitoring.

Suspended Animation

There is a saying: "The meaning of what you say is the response you get." To see yourself this way comes at a great cognitive cost. Our general behavior and specifically communication is a perception that defines and binds us in the moment. Our self perception projects a self, we "think" and "feel" that we are "meaning."

Being aware of this process in the Here & Now effects infinite regress in knowing the you that is, knowing the you that is, knowing the you that is,...

Even getting to the first level of this know has a cost of monk-like "presence" and may be no better than post expression analysis and evaluation.