Is There A Real You?

[Chas]

In this short talk, philosopher Julian Baggini, author of The Ego Trick, enlightens the audience about one of the most fundamental of philosophical questions: What is the self? Is it something stable and unitary as we think it is? Is it even real?

Julian believes that the sense of self emerges in us without any essential or permanent self actually existing. So the sense of the self is just an idea, an idea which is created in us by the summation of our countless thoughts, emotions, desires, intentions, memories, etc. Although I don't agree with this view (since I believe in the existence of "souls" which are thought to be something permanent), I've been pondering on this. Where does my sense of self come from exactly?

The sense of self comes from the evolved simulation software of our brains. We don't experience the present directly, we experience a constructed model of it.

And this is not a philosophical question, but a scientific one.