(March 25, 2018 at 7:38 pm)polymath257 Wrote: yes, but like all sensory information, it can be wrong. For example, we have a sense of the 'continuity of the self'. In actuality, the continuity is an illusion of after-writing in the brain. In reality, many different 'selves' from different areas of the brain combine to give the 'sense of self' and they are not always working, or working in tandem.
I don't think experiences have to be representative of truth on any other level in order to be valid. The experience is its own validation, unless you are trying to draw inferences from it. If I'm in the Matrix, and the feeling of warmth from the sun in the morning is really just a digital signature, no matter: the sensation of warmness is what it is.
The same goes for the sense of self-awareness. I'm not talking about self-identity, just the vague understanding that there is sensation rather than a lack of it. I don't really have to be factually right about it in order to say that experience is going on, in some form. The terms "I" and "self" are just labels added post-production for the purpose of communicating about that more subtle reality.
