Where is the self?

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@davep humour me

[wlach@mastodon.social]

@evan Nowhere to be found

[julesbl@mastodon.me.uk]

@evan combination of brain and body

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@julesbl the brain is part of the body

[davep@infosec.exchange]

@evan Done

[julesbl@mastodon.me.uk]

@evan
For a long time the rest of the body has been left out of this discussion despite the massive impact it has on who we are and how we think

[santi@gone.lema.org]

@evan Somewhere in the Objective-C runtime that runs the universe.

[sean@mastodon.me.uk]

@evan in the community

[maj@cosocial.ca]

@evan I really think guts! but I picked brain from the choices.

[brooke@bikeshed.vibber.net]

@evan Tough one! Brain is _very important_ but it doesn't exist in a vacuum, it's affected by the rest of the body with its hormone productions and its biofeedback loops to the outside world.

For poll purposes I feel like I have to pick "the brain" but with an asterisk for ", but..."

*voted*

[smallcircles@social.coop]

@evan the body brain continuum

Without the sensorium of the body would there be a self?

[astraleureka@social.treehouse.systems]

@evan missing the real answer: the stomach and intestines

[golemwire@social.golemwire.com]

I vote the spirit I don't believe in physics / logic-execution being enough for consciousness, so I have to think it my "self" is something else. Though I guess this reasoning doesn't necessarily exclude the idea of particles having some sort of transcendental quality which consciousness comes from....

[terryhancock@realsocial.life]

@smallcircles
Yeah, I can make a case for "all of the above", but without the central nervous system, at least for humans, there is no "self".
@evan

[mpjgregoire@cosocial.ca]

@evan Body and soul together.

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@maj you're the guts

[maj@cosocial.ca]

@evan I contain multitudes (of diverse gut bacteria that might be at least partly responsible for the illusion of a continuous self!)

[malte@radikal.social]

@evan I picked heart. It is the closest to what I actually believe, which is the center of the gut just a few centimeters below the navel, inside the body. Some theories believe the thinking part ("the brain") of the nervous system is mostly interpreting and telling a story about the behavior we decide on a more intutive level (gut feeling). Michael Gazzaniga's study of the interpreter function is famous for this.