Figure 1: An illusory square we experience that isn’t really there
These influences work from the very beginning. Proportionally, humans spend the greatest amount of time in childhood compared to any other animal. This is not only so that we can learn from others, but also so we can learn to become like others. Becoming like others and getting on with them involves creating a sense of who we are – a participating member of the human species.
This development of the self emerges across childhood as the interplay between the modelling brain, constructing stories from experience, and the influences of other people. This does not mean that we are blank slates at birth and that babies are not individuals. Anyone who has raised children or ever encountered identical twins knows they can think and behave differently right from the very beginning even though they are raised in the same environment. Our dispositions vary from one individual to the next, a legacy of our genetic inheritance, no doubt. However, we all share a common goal to become part of the human race through our social interactions and that can only take place when people construct a sense of self.
That process of constructing the self does not end with childhood. Even as adults we are continually developing and elaborating our self illusion. We learn to adapt to different situations. Sometimes we even describe our self illusion as multifaceted as if we have the work self, the home self, the parent self, the political self, the bigoted self, the emotional self, the sexual self, the creative self and even the violent self. They seem to be almost different individuals but clearly there is just one body. We seem to switch effortlessly between these different selves but we would be wrong to think that there is an individual doing the switching. That’s part of the illusion. There is not one self or multiple selves in the first place. Rather, it is the external world that switches us from one character to another. This idea that we are a reflection of the situations is sometimes called the looking-glass self 9 – we exist as the reflection of those around us.
Initially as infants, we are bundles of self-interested activity but evolution has pre-programmed our self to emerge and attend to others. Our greatest influence during childhood moves from the immediate family that looks after our needs to the competitive world of young children. We learn to interpret, predict, anticipate and negotiate in the playground. Gradually over late childhood and adolescence we increasingly elaborate the narrative of who we are and eventually strike out to become a character differentiated from those who shaped us. For many adults, adolescence marks the turning point at which we ‘discover’ our true self. We use groups, possessions, tastes, politics and preferences to create the self – an individual that is different. At least, that is the story of self-formation in the West; other cultures provide a different framework that shapes a different type of self. Even hermits and outcasts from society are defined by their rejection of the principles that the rest of us accept. But whether we are distancing our self from the herd, or ingratiating our self as part of the herd, it is the existence of others that defines who we are.
If the self is largely shaped by those around us, what does that mean for our everyday lives? For one thing, it could change our fundamental outlook. Consider a modern day miracle about the self. By the time she was 15 years old, Liz Murray’s mother had died of AIDS and her HIV-infected father had moved into care. Liz found herself homeless and looking after her younger sister. In spite of all these obstacles, she excelled at school and won a scholarship to Harvard University eventually graduating in 2009. Liz’s ‘Homeless to Harvard’ tale is an inspiring account of the triumph of the individual self over adversity. It is the epitome of the American dream, which is why so many love her story. But think again. What is the take-home message? Is it that if we try hard enough, we can all achieve our dreams? Clearly that cannot be true. Homeless to Harvard is more a tale about the inequalities that exist in life. Liz Murray is remarkable, but that means that she is also the exception because most never overcome the hurdles that keep them from success. Many of us consider Liz to be one of life’s ‘winners’ but the flipside is that we all too easily regard others who fall down as ‘losers’. When did this game of life become so unfair that we blame individuals rather than the circumstances that prevent them from achievement? This is known as the fundamental attribution error in human reason10. When other people screw up it’s because they are stupid or losers but when I screw up it’s because of my circumstances. The self illusion makes the fundamental attribution error an easy fallacy to accept. Also putting all the blame on the individual self is tantamount to excusing all the policies that create inequality in our society. Maybe it’s time to redress this imbalance by rethinking success or failure not so much as issues of the self alone, but more of society in general.
Knowing that the self is an illusion cannot stop you thinking that it exists and even if you succeed, as Buddha and Hume did, then maybe it is best not to try in the first place. But knowledge is power. Understanding that the self is an illusion will help to reconcile the daily inconsistencies that you may experience in the way you think and behave. We are all too quick to notice how others can be manipulated, but we rarely appreciate how our own self is equally under the influence and control of others. That is something worth knowing and watching out for.
1
The Most Wondrous Organ
One of the strangest experiences we can have is to hold a human brain in our hands for the first time. It surprises us for so many reasons, but for me, it was the realization that I could hold something that was once a person not so long ago. Our brain, and the mind it supports, is what makes us who we really are.
As a scientist, the brain has always fascinated me and yet it is not much to look at. When I first arrived at Bristol University, I used to organize a brain dissection class for my colleagues because, although we had all been taught that the brain plays the critical role in creating our mind, very few of us had ever had the opportunity to examine this wondrously mysterious organ. Some of us had measured the electrical activity of the brain as it goes about its business of thinking. Others had even worked with patients who had lost mental abilities through damaging their brains. But few had actually held another human’s brain.
So in December, just before we broke up for the Christmas holidays and after the medical students had finished their dissection classes, a group of about twenty fellow faculty members from the psychology department headed down to the medical school for a crash course in human brain anatomy. At the entrance to the dissection suite we giggled nervously like a bunch of first-year students as we tried on ill-fitting lab coats. White lab coats – now this was real science! However, that jovial mood suddenly changed when we entered the large, chilled dissection suite and were faced with the stark sight of human bodies in various stages of advanced deconstruction on the tables. This was not some fake alien autopsy, but involved real people who had lived real lives. The nervous mirth so boisterous outside the suite was stifled. The faces of our group turned ashen and pale with that tight expression that you often see at funerals as people try to appear dignified and composed when faced with death.
We split into groups and tentatively approached the lab benches, each of which had been furnished with a white plastic bucket. We put on rubber gloves and removed the lids. After the initial plume of formaldehyde fumes that stung our eyes and assaulted our nostrils had passed, we stared at the human brains inside each bucket.