Why Bother Considering Whether Government is Necessary?

 

Before my most recent trip to India I had to choose which of two recently purchased books I should take with me: Aeon Skoble’s Deleting the State, or Salvatore Babones’ Dharma Democracy. I chose Dharma Democracy (which I have since written about here) because I didn’t like the idea of trying to explain to an airport official that Deleting the State is a philosophical treatise rather than a manual for the violent overthrow of governments.

At that time, I would not have been able to point to pages 107-8 where Skoble argues explicitly against violent action to remove a government in any “nominally liberal democracy”. In the Afterword of the recently published second edition of his book, the author takes the opportunity to emphasize his opposition to violence by giving reasons for eschewing it and reiterating that deleting the state means “deleting the idea of the necessity of the state”.

The subtitle of the book is Requiem for an Illusion. The illusion Skoble refers to is the Hobbesian Fear that in the absence of a government “to keep them all in awe” people would find themselves at each others’ throats - in a war “of every man against every other man”.  I will discuss later the author’s reasons for considering the Hobbesian Fear an illusion.

Skoble regards the neo-Aristotelian conception of human flourishing provided by Douglas Rasmussen and Douglas Den Uyl as providing the best defense of a theory of individual liberty. He notes, however, that in Norms of Liberty the Dougs leave open the question of whether a political/legal order defending individual rights necessitates the existence of a state. Skoble points out that the difference between a state and a political/legal order is not trivial.

What is the point of philosophical anarchism? 

In the Afterword Skoble writes:

“If deleting the state means deleting the generally held notion that we need to have a state, and the only way to do it is to make philosophical arguments, we’re in a lot of trouble. Philosophers have a poor track record of being persuasive to large majorities. So what, one might ask, is the point of philosophical anarchism?”

The author goes on to answer that question cogently. However, before considering his response, I want to present a contrary argument.

Is the existence of government an issue that should occupy the minds of those who believe that liberty supports human flourishing? As far as I know, there is no country in the world in which citizens are currently faced with a choice between having a minimal state or no state at all. In liberal democracies – the countries that currently enjoy the greatest personal and economic freedom – liberty is being threatened by political movements with authoritarian tendencies. Authoritarianism is presented in the wrapping of different varieties of collectivist idealism which offer citizens the opportunity to attribute personal and social problems to immigration, foreign competition, the greed of the wealthy, systemic discrimination, environmental degradation or anything else that appears to justify a larger role for government. Shouldn’t libertarians be focusing their attention on supporting the political/legal order – democracy, or representative government - that has been most successful in promoting personal and economic freedom?

Readers who doubt that the countries with greatest economic and personal freedom are liberal democracies should take a look at the graphs shown in an essay I wrote last year. There may be serious errors in common measures of personal freedom for some countries - as noted in my recent essay on Indian politics – but the weight of evidence suggests that representative government has hitherto been more successful in defending individual rights than any other contemporary form of politico/legal order that currently exists in the real world.

So, how do I justify spending time thinking about utopian concepts such as philosophical anarchism instead of spending all my efforts opposing the advances of authoritarianism?

The first defence that comes to mind is that I find it interesting to think about the question of whether government is necessary. I think that is sufficient justification for a human to spend some time thinking about any topic.

However, I have reasons to be particularly interested in the potential for utopian thinking to play a useful role in considering public policy issues. I have claimed in the past:

“We are more likely to improve opportunities for human flourishing if we approach public policy issues with a view to both (a) upholding ideals that ought to apply and (b) the real-world constraints that should not be overlooked.”

I made that comment in a short essay considering Chris Sciabarra’s discussion of the anti-utopianism in the methodology of Marx and Hayek in Marx, Hayek and Utopia.

Skoble argues that anarchist arguments can help people to think about the limits of state power. He suggests that they can be used to clarify that getting a different group of office-holders into power will not resolve problems that are attributable to institutional structures. He cites mass incarceration and business regulation that stifles innovation as examples. He sums up:

“To make the case against the state is to undermine the idea that coercion is necessary for social order or that it is beneficial to human society. It is to point the way toward the continual need to scale back the scope of state power. It is to affirm the priorities of liberty and its necessary connection to human flourishing, and to keep us mindful of the ways in which the state, and our often-unthinking obedience to it, hinders that flourishing.”

Allaying the Hobbesian Fear

Those who argue that a government is necessary to maintain social cooperation often refer to the prisoner’s dilemma in game theory. Players can obtain a greater payoff if they both cooperate than if they both defect. However, each player has an incentive to defect in the hope of obtaining a greater payoff at the expense of the other player. On that basis, it is claimed that in the absence of a coercive intervention to enforce cooperation both players will end up defecting.

However, Skoble observes that defection is only the winning strategy in a one-shot game - social cooperation emerges spontaneously when the prisoner’s dilemma game is repeated over long periods. In support of this argument he refers to Robert Axelrod’s book The Evolution of Cooperation, which found that a tit-for-tat (reciprocation) strategy gave players higher payoffs than constant defection. The author notes that strategies that allow for the possibility that a defecting player may have made a mistake offer higher payoffs than tit-for-tat.

It may be worth adding that the utility maximizing assumptions of game theory tend to be less conducive to social cooperation than are real people engaged in trust games in a laboratory setting. As Vernon Smith and Bart Wilson noted in Humanomics, anonymously paired people are “predominantly caring other-regarding, independent actors in the personal social exchange context of trust games in the laboratory”.

Skoble makes the point that law ought to be construed as a natural consequence of attempts of people to live and work together rather than as something requiring a coercive monopoly power. Among other things, he notes that enforcement of property rights requires “a society that in fact recognizes the practicality of recognizing property rights” rather than a “monopolistic coercive authority”. In that context he discusses the history of spontaneous evolution of civil law conflict resolution drawing upon works by David Friedman and Murray Rothbard.

The author devotes a chapter to providing an extended example of the potential for disaster relief to be provided via voluntary cooperation rather than a centralized political authority.

In his final chapter, Skoble discusses the question of whether disagreements between libertarian anarchists and minimal-state libertarians are radically incommensurable, or capable of being resolved by dialogue. He argues that there are “no fundamental premises or values that separate anarchists from libertarian minimum-statists” that would prevent the differences between them being resolved by dialogue. There is even potential for dialogue between libertarians and welfarist liberals. Political philosophy can explore relevant questions such as the circumstances, if any, under which the will of the majority should override individual liberty.

Additional considerations

One argument that is sometimes advanced in opposition to philosophical anarchism is that a written constitution helps to protect liberty. Perhaps that is true of the United States, but it is not difficult to find examples of countries where constitutional provisions have failed to protect liberty. The former Soviet Union comes to mind. There are also notable examples of countries which have maintained a relatively high degree of liberty without written constitutional protections. Britain comes to mind.  

Roderick Long has suggested that those who believe government is necessary are being misled by a metaphysically illusive picture of what constitutional restraints are and how they work:

“The metaphysical illusion I referred to is the habit of thinking of constitutional restraints (checks and balances, separation of powers, etc.) as though these structures existed in their own right, as external limitations on society as a whole. But in fact those structures exist only insofar as they are continually maintained in existence by human agents acting in certain systematic ways. A constitution is not some impersonal, miraculously self-enforcing robot. It’s an ongoing pattern of behavior, and it persists only so long as human agents continue to conform to that pattern in their actions.” (Long, 2008)

I have previously discussed similar views of the nature of constitutions by Sheldon Richman (here) and Douglass North (here).

A more difficult argument to contend with is that the free rider problem would prevent adequate provision of national defense. I think John Hasnas has advanced an appropriate response to that argument. He suggests that an inability to raise sufficient capital to engage in foreign military adventures or pre-emptive warfare without resort to coercion proves nothing about the potential for defense against outside aggression to be funded voluntarily.

Hasnas acknowledges that he doesn’t know whether sufficient funds could be raised by voluntary means to fund protection against outside aggression. He suggests:

“No one believes that we can transition from a world of states to anarchy instantaneously. No reasonable anarchist advocates the total dissolution of government tomorrow. Once we turn our attention to the question of how to move incrementally from government to anarchy, it becomes apparent that national defense would be one of the last governmental functions to be de-politicized.”

That seems to me to be a sensible position to adopt. It does not preclude the possibility that a society that moves incrementally to reduce coercion of some by others will one day end up not requiring coercion to ensure appropriate provision of any goods currently provided by governments.

Conclusion

This essay has been prompted by my reading of the Second edition of Aeon Skoble’s book, Deleting the State.

Early in the essay, I posed the question of whether the existence of government is an issue that should currently occupy the minds of libertarians in the light of current threats to liberty by political movements with authoritarian tendencies. Skoble provides an appropriate response in his defense of philosophical consideration of the possibility of anarchy. In particular, he suggests that such philosophical endeavours help libertarians to make the point that getting a different group of office holders into power will not resolve problems that are attributable to the existence and scope of state power.

A central concern of the book is to allay the Hobbesian Fear that people will be unable to obtain the benefits of social cooperation in the absence of a government to maintain order. In my view, Skoble provides strong arguments to allay that fear.

I endorse Skoble’s view that law ought to be construed as a natural consequence of attempts of people to live and work together, rather than as something requiring a coercive monopoly power. Constitutional restraints are not self-enforcing. It cannot be assumed that they would continue to offer protection of the rights of citizens if enforcement of them did not have broad community support.

The question of how national defense could be provided without coercive taxation is probably the most challenging obstacle to attempts by philosophical anarchists to persuade minarchists that anarchy is a viable option. In my view, it makes sense to acknowledge the difficulties that would be encountered at present in ensuring adequate voluntary provision of defense resources. That doesn’t mean, however, that it makes sense to assume that coercive taxation will always be required to fund defense. Libertarians who have the objective of reducing coercion “as much as possible in society”, should leave open the possibility that at some stage elimination of the state could become a viable option.  

References

Axelrod, Robert, The Evolution of Cooperation (Basic Books, 1984).

Babones, Salvatore, Dharma Democracy: How India Built the Third World’s First Democracy (Connor Court Publishing, 2025).

Hasnas, John, Common Law Liberalism: A New Theory of the Libertarian Society (Oxford University Press, 2024).

Hayek, F. A. The Constitution of Liberty (University of Chicago Press, 1960).

Rasmussen, Douglas B. and Douglas J. Den Uyl Norms of Liberty: A Perfectionist Basis for Non-Perfectionist Politics (Pennsylvania State University Press, 2005). 

Long, R. T. “Market anarchism as constitutionalism”, in R. T. Long & T. R. Machan (Eds.), Anarchism/Minarchism: Is a government part of a free country? (Ashgate Publishing, 2008). pp. 133–154.

Sciabarra, Chris Matthew, Marx, Hayek and Utopia (State University of New York Press, 1995).

Skoble, Aeon J. Deleting the State: Requiem for an Illusion, Second edition (Independent Institute, 2026).

Smith, Vernon L., and Bart J. Wilson, Humanomics: Moral Sentiments and the Wealth of Nations for the Twenty-First Century (Cambridge University Press, 2019).

Is Indian Democracy an Extraordinary Success Story?

Salvatore Babones puts the view that Indian democracy is an extraordinary success story in his book, Dharma Democracy: How India Built the Third World’s First Democracy, which was published last year.

Babones describes himself as “a skeptical quantitative and comparative sociologist who came to the subject with an interest in democracy not (initially at least) with any particular interest in India itself”

I read the book during my most recent visit to India. I came to it with a particular interest in India and a desire to understand whether that country is more appropriately viewed as the world's largest democracy, or as an elective autocracy in which personal freedom is severely restricted. Babones has persuaded me that the first view is closer to being correct.

The structure of this essay is as follows. In the next section I discuss the graph presented above. I then draw upon Dharma Democracy to explain why Babones implies that the freedom data depicted in the graph understates personal freedom in India. The following sections outline why Babones views Indian democracy as a success story, his explanation for that success, and the reception his book has received in India. I present some personal views before concluding.

A Visual Starting Point: Emancipative Values and Personal Freedom

To frame the discussion, I use the chart above showing data from the World Values Survey and the Human Freedom Index. The horizontal axis presents Christian Welzel’s emancipative values index, a measure of cultural support for autonomy and expressive freedoms. The vertical axis shows personal freedom as assessed by the Fraser/Cato Human Freedom Index. I have previously explained the chart more fully on this blog, when using it to explore global patterns of authoritarianism associated with political entrepreneurship.

I am using the chart here to highlight how India appears to be situated within the broader global landscape. India appears in the middle of the distribution: less free than Western democracies but significantly freer than many culturally comparable societies. The chart suggests that the degree of personal freedom in India is much as might be expected for a country with India’s level of economic development and cultural values.

However, historical data suggests that personal freedom was much higher in India during the first decade of this century. It declined to its current level (around 6/10) from a rating substantially higher than might be expected based on emancipative (around 7/10). 

Possible errors in the measurement of personal freedom

Babones implies that the Fraser/Cato index understates the personal freedom that Indians experience. He argues that there is bias in all democracy and freedom indexes that use of subjective data from the Varieties of Democracy Institute (V-Dem). Apparently, nearly all of V-Dem’s survey indicators are coded by country experts, most of whom are academics residing in the country being studied. In the case of India, that methodology may introduce bias in recent freedom indicators because Narendra Modi and his BJP party are “widely reviled among social scientists both within India and in the West”.

This raises several issues. First, the Fraser/Cato index’s reliance on V-Dem seems to be modest. As far as I can see, only one item tends to depress India’s freedom score: that is V-Dem’s score for Media and expression under the heading “Expression and information”. On that item, V-Dem’s score is not far below the scores of Freedom House, BTI and CLD, which are also used in the Fraser/Cato index. It is possible, however, that data from Freedom House, BTI and CLD are subject to similar methodological biases as the data from V-Dem.

Second, India’s academics have some good reasons to criticize Modi’s human rights record. Nevertheless, in my view Babones’ allegation of bias carries weight because V-Dem gives Indian democracy a lower rating at present than in 1976 - during Indira Gandhi’s “Emergency” rule - when civil rights were suspended.

Third, some other freedom indexes provide a rosier picture of civil liberties in India than Fraser/Cato. For example, the Civil liberties rating for India incorporated in the Democracy Index of the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) is higher than for Armenia and Georgia – a ranking which is inconsistent with that shown in the above chart.

On balance, it seems to me that Babones has made a plausible case that democracy and personal freedom are in better shape in India than is often claimed by critics of the Modi government.

 India as an Extraordinary Democratic Success

Babones argues that “India’s democracy is in better shape than that of just about any other developing country”. His central claim is that India’s democracy is historically exceptional.

He emphasizes that India is the only large, poor, post‑colonial society to maintain continuous electoral democracy for more than seven decades. Unlike Western democracies, which evolved gradually over centuries, India launched universal suffrage at independence despite widespread illiteracy and immense cultural diversity. For Babones, this makes India not a fragile democracy but an extraordinary one - a global outlier whose success cannot be understood through Western liberal frameworks.

He grounds this argument in several propositions:

·        India conducts elections involving hundreds of millions of voters with consistently high turnout. Babones sees this as evidence of a deeply internalized democratic ethos.

·        India’s democratic resilience is rooted in its dharmic heritage, which emphasizes pluralism, decentralisation, and negotiated social order.

·        Most post‑colonial states experienced military coups and/or authoritarian consolidation. India did not.

·        India has vast civil society networks which have tended to inculcate a sense of national unity.

·        India’s electoral system has enabled historically disadvantaged communities to gain political voice – it is helping these communities to overcome social disadvantages.

Babones has included a chapter discussing the status of Muslims in India. In that context he suggests that nationhood is a work in progress. One interesting statistic he cites is that 99% of Indian Muslims report being “proud” to be Indian. He also makes the point that in a country that is 80% Hindu, “Muslims will never experience full social inclusion unless Hindus actively invite them into the national mainstream.”

Reception of “Dharma Democracy”

I asked Grok and CoPilot to provide summaries of the reception that the book has received in India.

Grok notes that as a relatively recent book from a smaller publisher, it hasn’t yet garnered widespread mainstream academic or Western critical reviews. However, the book has been well-received in circles aligned with its thesis. Reviewers highlight its challenge to global democracy indices, defense of India’s success via “dharma” and Hindu civil society, and data-driven rebuttals to criticisms of Modi-era democracy. One highly critical reviewer argues the book is misguided because it fails to address the Indian Constitution’s alleged anti-Hindu biases.

CoPilot offered similar comments, noting specifically that some critics are concerned that support for the Hindu civilization thesis tends to downplay pluralism and legitimize majoritarian narratives. Extending its analysis beyond formal reviews, it notes that much Indian academic discourse pushes back against the core thesis of the book. Many Indian scholars continue to view recent developments in India’s democracy as problematic. CoPilot sums up: “The book has not been dismissed; it’s being taken seriously in India, but primarily as a provocative intervention in an ongoing debate rather than a settled or widely accepted interpretation.”

Personal Perspectives

I cannot claim to have spent much time discussing politics during my three visits to India. Readers who are interested in my motives for visiting India can find relevant information here, here, here, here and here.

However, when discussion has turned to politics, the people I met have tended to express views that either strongly oppose or strongly support prime minister Modi. There were exceptions, but the views seemed to be linked to education levels – those with a university degree tended to be critical of Modi’s human rights record, whereas those without a university education were highly supportive of his emphasis on nationalism and economic development.

One observation stands out: critics of Modi expressed their views to me openly and without hesitation. These were not whispered conversations but frank and confident exchanges, often in public settings. That willingness to criticise the government directly to a foreign visitor is not something one would expect in a society where personal freedom is severely restricted. This suggests that India’s public sphere retains a level of openness that complicates the more pessimistic narratives about democratic decline.

My own view of Modi has moderated over the years. When he was first elected, international reporting had me viewing him as a somewhat alarming Hindu nationalist, whose policies might cause disorder. Perhaps Modi has himself become more moderate as he has focused on achievement of Viksit Bharat, which translates as “Developed India”. The image he presents internationally is certainly that of an extraordinarily diplomatic leader who seeks mutually beneficial relations with nearly all other countries.

While reading Babones’ book I pondered whether a “dharma democracy” would differ substantially from one based on Western individualism. At a superficial level, a “dharma democracy” might be seen to place less emphasis on personal freedom because dharma is about “duty” or “right action” rather than individual rights. However, the Indian concept of dharma seems to me to be close to Aristotelian ideas of individual self-actualization in accordance with natural purpose (telos). Babones notes that the Indian philosopher, Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (1888-1975), suggested “every form of life, every group of men has its dharma, which is the law of its being”.

It seems to me that when Indians speak of duty to the nation what they have in mind might generally have more to do with doing the right thing - for example, adherence to societal norms that make democracy possible – because such behaviour is honorable and integral to self-realization, rather than an obligation that necessarily entails self-sacrifice.

 I am left wondering whether there is much difference in practice in the way Indian democracy is conducted by comparison with Western democracies. It seems possible that Indian democracy may be conducted with a little more regard to the norms of reciprocity, fair-dealing and mutual respect that restrain citizens from seeking to use the political process to exploit their compatriots.  

Conclusions

Salvatore Babones argues in Dharma Democracy that India is an extraordinary democratic outlier among post‑colonial societies. I think that line of argument holds up surprisingly well once one examines both the historical record and the limitations of the freedom indices that dominate international commentary. The evidence suggests that India’s personal freedoms, while imperfect, are not in the state of collapse that some critics claim.

The dharmic framing of democracy that Babones highlights offers a useful reminder that democratic resilience can emerge from cultural resources that differ from those of the West. India’s traditions of pluralism, decentralization, and negotiated social order have helped sustain a vast and diverse electorate through seven decades of elections. Whether or not one embraces the full “dharma democracy” thesis, it is clear that India’s democratic foundations run deeper than many external observers assume.

The reception of Dharma Democracy inside India reflects this complexity. Supporters see it as a welcome challenge to Western academic pessimism; critics worry that it risks legitimizing majoritarian narratives. Yet the very fact that the book has sparked open, vigorous debate is itself evidence of a public sphere that remains lively and accessible.

My own conversations in India reinforce that impression. Critics of the government spoke freely and confidently, even in public settings - something inconsistent with the idea of a society sliding into authoritarian silence. At the same time, the polarization of views, often along educational lines, reflects the tensions of a rapidly modernizing nation.

In the end, distinctive characteristics of India’s society have shaped its experience of democracy. Distinctive cultural values help to explain why Indian democracy has been surprisingly resilient. If the norms of reciprocity, restraint, and mutual respect that underpin democratic life continue to hold, India’s democracy may remain not only durable but an extraordinary success story. 

Why were merchants attracted to Buddhism in ancient India?

 

My recent visit to India was motivated in part by a desire to visit some ancient Buddhist caves that were excavated with the help of donations from merchants at a time when India was at the centre of a globalized world. My interest was aroused by reading of William Dalrymple’s book, The Golden Road, during a previous visit to India.

My interest was heightened by further reading, including a book chapter by Osmund Bopearachchi entitled ‘Indian Ocean Trade through Buddhist Iconographies’. (Please see references at the end of this essay.)

Ajanta caves

One of the highlights of my trip was visiting the Ajanta caves, which were hewn out over the period from 200 BC to 650 AD. The Ajanta caves are shown in the photo at the top of this post.

Here is an extract from Dalrymple’s discussion of the murals in Ajanta caves:

“The murals indicate that, by the time of Ajanta, India was not some self-contained island of Indianness, but already a cosmopolitan and surprisingly urban society full of traders from all over the world; in many cases it was the traders themselves who actually paid for these murals, such as the rich merchant Ghanamadada who, according to an inscription, donated the funds for Cave 12. To some extent, the murals may also have reflected the merchants’ taste, which could explain the near absence of asceticism or even monasticism in the murals.”

Some of the photos I took of murals at Ajanta caves are shown below.

 

I invite readers who are interested in finding out more about other historical sites I visited in India and Sri Lanka to take a look at a series of posts on my Facebook timeline, beginning on 12 April 2026.

Why was Buddhism attractive to merchants?

Even after my visit to the Ajanta caves, I did not fully understand why merchants supported Buddhism in ancient India. I reasoned that the occupation of being a merchant would make a person disinclined to accept a religious doctrine which denies their own existence. Idle people may ponder their own existence, but merchants would be expected to be too busy pursuing their occupation. So, wouldn’t Buddhism’s “no self” doctrine be unpalatable to merchants?

My first step toward a better understanding of this question was to revisit the discussion of the “no self” doctrine in a book on Indian philosophy by Peter Adamson and Jonardon Ganeri. The authors note that in proposing the “no self” idea the Buddha was signalling his disagreement with the Brahmanical tradition which made the self a central pre-occupation. They explain the role of “no self” in the context of the Buddha’s teaching that craving is the source of human suffering. He argued that you can avoid being attached to the things that falsely seem to benefit you if you give up on the idea that you have a self that can be benefited.

The authors note that in rejecting the idea of a centre of identity that underlies all awareness, there is still a lot of room for Buddhists to accept less metaphysically ambitious notions of the self. However, they add:

“Yet it seems clear that the Buddhists did want to critique and revise our everyday assumptions about the reality of persons, and other things.” (p. 53)

Buddhists believe that it is only by convention that we refer to a person as an entity. There is nothing to a person over and above a conglomeration of momentary bodily states, feelings and perceptions. The authors sum up:

“So here we have arrived at what may be the most notorious philosophical doctrine of Buddhism, that we are nothing more than flowing streams with no firm identity from time to time.” (p. 54)

That statement reminds me that Richard Campbell used the metaphor of flowing streams to make the point that it is possible to distinguish between the contents of one’s consciousness and one’s identity:

“The same river can flow through different places, and I remain the same person through the many phases of my life.” (Campbell, p. 292).

However, that is a digression. (I have previously discussed Richard Campbell’s views here and here.)

Although they argue that it is only by convention that we refer to a person as an entity, Buddhists have no problem in acknowledging that acceptance of such “conventional truth” is necessary for people to function in everyday life.

The Buddha believed strongly that actions have consequences – the causes that you create are reflected in your subsequent experiences. That view - and the Noble Eightfold Path more generally - seems to me to presuppose that, in the world as we experience it, individuals exist and make choices. It would not be possible to choose the right view; right intention; right speech; right action; right livelihood; right effort; right mindfulness; and right concentration if you did not have individual agency.

I have just remembered that in writing about individualism some years ago, I noted that the Buddha did not oppose self-love when given an opportunity to do so. Despite his belief in “no self”, he suggested that self-love provides a strong reason for individuals to refrain from hurting others.

It seems likely that many merchants would have been attracted to the precepts of the Noble Eightfold Path as providing a basis for ethical conduct. They would certainly have been inclined to view themselves as engaged in “right livelihood”, because they were earning a living in a way that benefits others as well as themselves.

Andy Rotman has noted that early Buddhist literature accords high regard to merchants. In one story, a merchant, Supriya, converts all of India to Buddhism by satisfying everyone's material needs and then establishing them on the tenfold path of virtuous actions. As well as presenting a merchant as a virtuous hero, the story seems to imply the existence of something like Maslow’s hierarchy of needs – people may find it easier to be virtuous if cravings associated with their physiological needs are satisfied.

The attitude of Brahminical Hinduism toward merchants also helps to explain why merchants were attracted to Buddhism. Kathleen Morrison notes:

“Buddhism … overcame many of the problems Brahminical Hinduism presented to merchants, including strict rules of commensality, limited avenues for social advancement, and a prohibition against overseas travel.”

Conclusion

Visits to ancient Buddhist caves during my recent trip to India were motivated by my interest in links between Buddhism and merchants engaged in international trade. Many of the murals in the Ajanta caves depict an environment full of beauty and the pleasures of youth rather than ascetic monasticism.

It isn’t difficult to understand why merchants might fund the creation of such works of art, but that doesn’t explain why they would be attracted in the first place to a religion advocating a “no self” doctrine. It is central to Buddhism that giving up on the idea of self enables people to liberate themselves from the craving that is the cause of suffering.

The important point is that Buddhists have no problem accepting that the existence of selves as a convention necessary to function in everyday life. Ethical behaviour is predicated on the idea that actions have consequences, which presupposes the existence of individuals who make choices.

It seems likely that merchants would have been attracted to the Noble Eightfold Path as offering support for ethical conduct. They had good reasons to think of themselves as engaged in “right livelihood”.

The high regard for merchants in Buddhist society is reflected in early Buddhist literature. By contrast, at that time Hinduism seems to have been much less supportive of the activities of merchants.  

Would conscious AI also cling to its sense of self?

 I began thinking about the question posed above after reading Michael Pollan’s recently published book, A World Appears: A Journey into Consciousness.

We do not yet know whether AI will develop a sense of self. We can be confident, however, that if an AI system does develop a sense of self, it will be because it serves a useful purpose for that system. That suggests to me that any intelligent system that has evolved to have a sense of self is likely to have good reasons to cling to it. I refer to AI to invite readers to ponder the motivations that humans have to cling to their individual identity rather than seeking to dissolve it or escape from it.

To set the scene for subsequent discussion I will provide a brief description of the book before focusing on the author’s discussion of scientific research into building AI with conscious feelings and his personal experience of self-transcendence via meditation.

Michael Pollan’s book

Michael Pollan is a science writer with a background in the humanities. He is the author of several books on topics related to science, philosophy and culture. In the introductory chapter, he tells us that his main qualification for writing the book is that he is a conscious human being who has become intensely curious about that fact.

A World Appears explores four different dimensions of consciousness – sentience, feelings, thought, and self. The author’s discussion on sentience focuses on the question of whether plants are sentient, suggesting that the idea should be taken seriously. The chapter on feelings encompasses discussion of research into building AI that might develop feelings. The chapter on thought discusses the contents flowing through consciousness and leans heavily on the work of philosophers and novelists. The chapter on self acknowledges the emergence of a sense of self as “perhaps the apotheosis of consciousness in humans” before entertaining the idea that it is an illusion.

The author tells us the story of his visits to scientists and philosophers who have been thinking about consciousness. That makes the book an interesting and painless way to obtain knowledge of developments in this field.

Feeling machines

One of the most interesting topics covered in the book is the account of the efforts of Mark Solms and Karl Friston to build a machine that has feelings. They focus on feelings, because feelings are necessarily conscious – it is not possible to have a feeling that you cannot feel.

Solms was a protégé of Antonio Damasio, a renowned neurologist, but while Damasio treats homeostasis – the self-regulating process - as a purely biological phenomenon, Solms and Friston believe that it applies to all self-organizing systems. For Friston and Solms, minds are in the business of maintaining homeostasis by reducing uncertainty which jeopardizes their survival. They believe that uncertainty generates conscious feelings in self-organizing systems - consciousness is felt uncertainty. When uncertainty arises, the system relies on feelings to seize our conscious attention and then guide our decision-making.

Solms and his team have constructed an AI model which has homeostatic needs – hunger, thirst and a need to rest. The algorithm samples its simulated environment to construct a model of its world which it relies on to make predictions that help guide its survival choices. The researchers believe that they have forced the “agent” to deal with uncertainty and have thus laid the groundwork for feelings to emerge.

The researchers plan to confront the “agent” with increasingly complex situations which it will learn to navigate. At some stage it will be confronted with misleading hedonic rewards - the opportunity to experience positive feelings which are harmful to its survival. If the “agent” chooses those rewards, Solms will take that as a sign that it has feelings because its actions will be based on feelings rather than reason or self-interest (just like a human taking harmful drugs).

From other sources, I have the impression that the researchers believe that a breakthrough to artificial consciousness may be quite close. At that point, however, they will still have some difficulty in persuading sceptics that their computer model is actually conscious.

 As I was reading about these efforts to build a machine with feelings, I was thinking that the underlying theory has elements in common with Richard Campell’s philosophical contribution in The Metaphysics of Emergence. I have previously written about Campbell’s book here, and here.

I have been unable to find any evidence that Solms had drawn upon Campbell’s philosophy, so I decided to ask Grok:

Can the empirical work of Mark Solms on consciousness be viewed as a test of the systems view of emergence advocated by the philosopher, Richard Campbell?

Here is an abridged version of Grok’s response:

“Yes, Mark Solms’ empirical work on consciousness can reasonably be viewed as a test (or, more precisely, a concrete empirical case study that supports or challenges) the systems/process-oriented view of emergence developed by philosopher Richard Campbell. This interpretation arises from a natural alignment between Campbell’s metaphysical framework and the mechanistic, systems-level account Solms provides, even though the two thinkers do not appear to reference each other directly.  

In The Metaphysics of Emergence (2015), Campbell argues that traditional substance metaphysics (treating reality as fixed entities with intrinsic properties) makes emergence mysterious and irreducible in an inexplicable way. He replaces it with process metaphysics, in which the primary existents are generic processes organised into dynamic systems.  

Solms (neuropsychologist and psychoanalyst) has built an influential body of clinical and theoretical work which locates the “hidden spring” of consciousness not in the cerebral cortex (the usual assumption) but in upper-brainstem structures. Consciousness is fundamentally affective—raw feelings of pleasure/unpleasure that register homeostatic deviations (needs, prediction errors). The cortex adds sophisticated content but is not required for the existence of consciousness itself.

Solms’ account maps almost directly onto Campbell’s criteria for emergence in process-systems:

•  The brain (especially brainstem networks) is treated as an open, far-from-equilibrium process-system engaged in recursive self-maintenance via homeostasis.

•  Consciousness (affective subjectivity) is a novel, system-level property arising from non-linear organisation of lower-level neural processes; it is not reducible to the parts (individual neurons or circuits lack feelings) yet is mechanistically explained by their relational dynamics.

•  The free-energy principle supplies the physics-level grounding Campbell invokes (quantum-field/thermodynamic processes organised into living systems).

•  Empirical predictions are testable and have been tested: brainstem lesions eliminate consciousness (falsifying cortical-centric views), while the model explains clinical phenomena (dreaming, blindsight with preserved affect, etc.) without eliminating the “hard problem” (subjectivity remains real and emergent).

If Solms’ model is empirically robust (and it has gained significant traction in neuropsychology and consciousness studies), it provides positive evidence that emergence of the kind Campbell describes actually occurs in the most complex biological system we know—the human brain. It shows how a higher-level property (felt consciousness) can arise irreducibly yet intelligibly from process organisation, exactly as Campbell’s metaphysics predicts. Failures or inconsistencies in Solms’ data (e.g., if cortical mechanisms proved sufficient after all) would conversely pressure Campbell’s framework.

Thus, while not a direct “falsification test” in the Popperian sense (metaphysics is broader), Solms’ neuroscience functions as a real-world empirical probe of Campbell’s systems view: it demonstrates that treating consciousness as an emergent feature of biological process-systems is not only philosophically coherent but scientifically productive. This alignment makes the interpretation not only possible but illuminating for both fields.”

I am impressed by the ability of this (unconscious) LLM to respond to questions such as the one I asked. It would be understandable, however, if some readers think that I have a favourable view of Grok in this instance because its reasoning supports my own beliefs. If you want to explore these ideas more fully, please consult other sources which may offer differing opinions.  

Why attempt to transcend self?

Of the various theories of self that Michael Pollan discusses, the one by Anil Seth seems most compatible with the approach adopted by Marc Solms. Like Damasio and Solms, Seth grounds his thinking about consciousness firmly in homeostasis. Seth suggests that “the self is not the thing that is perceiving; it is itself a kind of perception” constructed in the brain. Under this theory a feeling is the brain’s interpretation of a change in the state of the body. Consciousness evolved to help keep us alive by monitoring changes in the body.

Pollan comments:

“Afterward, thinking back on all that Seth had told me, I decided that I could travel only so far with ideas of the brain’s “predictions” and “inferences” and “hallucinations.” It all made sense until I tried to translate those abstractions into felt experience. Who is the subject of these mental operations?”

He goes on to note:

“The way I see it, there is an unbridgeable gap between the brain’s operations as a prediction machine and my felt experience of the resulting hallucination. How can you have a hallucination without a hallucinator?”

That is a good question to ask, but one can also ask why one should view consciousness of self as an hallucination or illusion. Indeed, Pollan also mentions that Christof Koch, a neuroscientist, has pointed out that it makes no sense to call consciousness an illusion, for what is an illusion but a conscious experience.

More fundamentally, it seems to me that one of the few things that we can all be certain of is our own existence. Another thing that we can all be certain of is that we are thinking beings. I cannot claim those ideas are original. Indeed, it seems to me that it requires considerable (unnecessary) intellectual effort to contemplate the possibility that one’s awareness of one’s own existence could be an illusion. I have discussed why I am certain of my own existence in the preceding essay entitled, “Who are you?”

Pollan struggles to reconcile how it is possible for humans to be conscious observers of themselves if consciousness is a product of biological processes. Towards the end of the book, he writes:

“I’m abashed to say I know less now than I did when, naively, I set out to unravel the mystery of consciousness. But then, most of what I thought I knew or took for granted, like the assumption that consciousness is a product of our brains and materialism will eventually explain everything, turned out to be unproven or wrong.”

During his journey, the author asks interesting questions. Early in his chapter on the self, he asks:

“Why do we cling to the idea of a self, placing great value on self-confidence and self-esteem, while simultaneously spending so much effort on self-transcendence, whether through meditation or psychedelics or experiences of art, awe, and flow? Some of the most powerful experiences in life hinge on the dissolution of the self and the broad horizons of meaning that open only after it has been chased from the scene.”

That question remains unanswered in his book. The book ends with the author describing his efforts to transcend his sense of self by spending time meditating in a cave. He seems to end up viewing consciousness as an activity:

“My time in the cave had shown me another way to look at consciousness: less as a scientific or philosophical puzzle to be solved and more as a practice, a way to once again be altogether here, present to life and to this vault of stars.”

Personal reflections

 It seems to me that Michael Pollan’s book ends up in a good place, with him being absorbed in conscious awareness of his environment. I have previously recognised the value of that kind of experience in discussing Scott Barry Kaufman’s book, Transcend, 2020. The transcending experiences that Kaufman refers to incorporates a continuum of experiences ranging from becoming engrossed in a book, sports performance, or creative activity (what psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi refers to as the flow experience), to experiencing meditation, feeling gratitude for an act of kindness, experiencing awe at a beautiful sunset etc., all the way up to the great mystical illumination. He suggests that transcendence “allows for  the highest levels of unity and harmony within oneself and with the world” (See: Freedom, Progress, and Human Flourishing, p. 171).

The experience of unity and harmony within oneself seems to me to be the opposite of attempting to escape from uncomfortable feelings. When people develop a habit of attempting to escape from uncomfortable feelings by using alcohol, drugs, social media etc. they tend to become caught up in a “happiness trap”. I wrote about that here.

It is worth highlighting that the idea of experiencing unity and harmony within oneself still entails the existence of an observer. When I experience transcendence, I forget about the image I present to the world, but I am present as an observer of my own experience.

Pollan asked why we cling to the idea of a self. The obvious answer is that we cling to the idea because it serves useful purposes.

As Richard Campbell explains in The Metaphysics of Emergence, “our consciousness of both ourselves and the world we live in is now irrevocably shaped by cultural and institutional influences, and that influences how our brains function” (pp. 288-9). He suggests: “The first-person standpoint, which is inextricably linked to self-reflection, is an important aspect of human experience, not a theoretical construct” (p. 291). He goes on to note that the human capacity to understand the perceptions of others – to put oneself in their shoes – requires “the exercise of reflective consciousness, and involves more than expressions of our subjective attitudes, desires, and preferences” (p.113). That is what Campbell mean by “transcending subjectivity” in the passage quoted in the epigraph.

Cambell develops an argument along Aristotelian lines that eudaimonia, rather than mere survival, is the ultimate good of a human being. He links personal identity to the exercise of practical wisdom in the process of individual flourishing:

“We are recursively self-maintenant social beings with reflective consciousness, able to create and explore a vast repository of collective knowledge, and with capacities for empathy, practical wisdom, for whom the good life is one of maturity and flourishing” (p. 307).

Conclusion

I asked whether conscious AI would seek to cling to its sense of self to invite readers to ponder the motivations that individual humans have to cling to their sense of self. My answer is that intelligent systems tend to cling to a sense of self because a first-person perspective evolves to serve useful purposes.

The essay was prompted by my reading of Michael Pollan’s recently published book, A World Appears.

My focus has been on chapters in this book discussing research into building AI that might develop feelings and the chapter on the concept of self.

In my discussion of these topics, I have emphasized the relevance of the ideas of the philosopher, Richard Campell, in his book, The Metaphysics of Emergence.

Postscript

I recommend that readers who wish to follow up the question of whether it is possible to engineer consciousness watch the episode of Mind-Body solution in which Tevin Naidu interviews Mark Solms and Karl Friston. Please see:

https://youtu.be/Jtp426wQ-JI?si=9rhDt9jQFxFQzYve

Who are you?

 The following essay is an edited transcript of a podcast episode I released a few years ago. I have decided to publish the transcript in essay form because I want to refer to it in a subsequent essay. It is easier to find particular words and paragraphs in an essay than in a podcast. Besides, when I listened to that podcast episode again, I decided that the sound of my voice distracted from the ideas I was presenting. 

My main qualification for talking about personal identity is that I have been around for long enough to have thought quite a lot about my own identity. I hope that what I have to say will interest other people. In any case, writing this podcast script should also help me to remember what I have learned about myself.

Rather than meander through the circuitous history of my thinking, I will focus here on what I now consider to be a sensible approach to the topic. I will begin by discussing the most superficial aspects of personal identity and will end up considering whether your identity would be retained if your consciousness was uploaded into a machine. Along the way, I will touch upon a range of other issues that might be of interest:

·       Is your identity defined by personal information about you?

·       Does your life-story define who you are?

·       How can aspects of your identity change over time?

·       Is the essence of your identity located in your conscious mind?

·       Where did Descartes go wrong in asserting “I think, therefore I am”?

·       What kind of being are you?

·       How does self-direction fit in to your identity?

Let us begin.

Is your identity defined by personal information about you? 

Your passport has information about your name, nationality, date of birth and sex. It also shows a photo that looks something like you. Other government documents may include additional information such as your place of residence.

If you wanted to tell me who you are, you might provide further information such as your occupation, marital status, whether you have had children and how many, ethnicity, religion, political views, education level, schools attended, employment history, the places you have lived in the past, your hobbies, books you have read, sports you have played or enjoy watching, movies you liked, and other entertainment preferences.

A person with all that information would know a lot about you. They might be well placed to predict how a person like you might spend money or vote, but they would have only a superficial view of who you are as an individual.

Does your life-story define who you are?

Your own understanding of who you are probably includes a narrative covering important events in your life, a view about important things you have learned from life, your personal values, and how you came to hold those values.

So, if you were to write an autobiography covering all those aspects, would that encapsulate a comprehensive understanding of your identity? I doubt it. If you are anything like me, a few days after you finished writing the book you would think of something important that you wanted to add.

What I am suggesting is that even though we know more about ourselves than anyone else can possibly know about us, our self-knowledge is never perfect. As you go through life, you may discover more about who you are, and some aspects of your identity may change.

How can aspects of your identity change over time?

Let us assume for the moment that the concept of identity implies the existence of an unchangeable essence at the core of who you are. I will consider the validity of that assumption later, but I first want to discuss how some aspects of your identity can change.

It is obvious that there are various ways in which the information in your passport and other identity documents can be changed. I will focus on how more fundamental aspects of identity, such as character traits, may change over time.

It may be possible for your character to change as a consequence of changes in the social and economic environment in which you live. People do tend to respond to incentives. For example, if the social and economic environment rewards cooperation for mutual benefit, that provides an incentive for people to develop habits of trustworthy behavior that will enable them to participate more fully in those benefits. The opposite happens if the social and economic environment rewards predatory activity.

However, that does not mean that your identity is “socially constructed”. The social and economic environment affects the incentives you face, but you can still choose how to respond to those incentives. People often think carefully before responding to incentives. And they sometimes choose to respond differently than they have in the past. The behavioralist assumption that people respond automatically to stimuli is a distorted view of human nature.

Individuals can also choose to change their behavior in ways that change their identity. You may discover that you have an aptitude to do something – for example, to assist other people to learn – and some aspects of your identity may change as you acquire skill in doing that.

It is even possible for people to discover that they have potential to change their personality to some extent. Traits such as extroversion, conscientiousness, agreeableness, and emotional stability tend to be fairly stable in adults, but some research suggests that people can even change such traits if they make active efforts to do so. We discover our potential as we actualize it. There is some discussion of that process in Chapter 8 of my book, Freedom, Progress, and Human Flourishing.

If fundamental aspects of your personality can change over time, that raises the question of where we should look if we want to find an unchangeable essence at the core of your being.

Is the essence of your identity located in your conscious mind?

In his book Thinking Fast and Slow Daniel Kahneman, a psychologist, suggests that the system in the mind that makes judgements and choices is “who we think we are” (Kahneman 2011, loc. 7547/9800). He is probably correct that most people tend to identify themselves with that system.

However, I argue in Freedom, Progress, and Human Flourishing, that people are making a cognitive error when they identify themselves in that way (Bates 2021, p.140).

In order to explain why, I need to explain the two systems in the mind that Kahneman employs in his discussion. System 1 engages in intuitive thinking (fast thinking) and tends to produce quick answers to complex questions. It operates with little effort and no sense of voluntary control. System 2 allocates attention to the effortful mental activities that demand it. Kahneman suggests that System 2 is who we think we are (Kahneman 2011, loc. 7547-7556/9800).

When I first read about Kahneman’s System 1 and System 2 several years ago, I saw parallels with the concept of Self 1 and Self 2 developed by Timothy Gallwey, a sports and business coach and author of popular ‘inner game’ books (Gallwey 1986, pp. 18-19). Gallwey observed that when he was playing tennis, he seemed to have two identities: Self 2 was playing tennis and Self 1 was constantly interfering by telling him how to play. It struck me that Gallwey’s Self 1 might correspond to Kahneman’s System 2 and that Gallwey’s Self 2 might correspond to Kahneman’s System 1.

The point I want to make is that it is not possible to judge whether it is more appropriate to identify with System 1 or System 2 without considering the nature of the activity that you are engaged in at a particular time. If you are playing sport, it often pays to identify as a fast thinker, responding intuitively and ignoring the unhelpful advice of the inner coach who is warning you to think carefully to avoid making an error.

If you are making a career choice, it makes sense to identify yourself as a person who thinks carefully about important decisions.

Should we view the system that makes judgements and choices as some kind of inner philosopher who thinks dispassionately? There was a time when I thought that. However, I had to ditch that idea after I read Antonio Damasio’s book Descartes Error. Damasio, a neurologist, pointed out that when people suffer brain damage that causes loss of most of their emotional lives, they are unable to make simple decisions even if their reasoning and logical abilities are intact (Damasio 1994, p.78).

In his book, The Happiness Hypothesis, Jonathan Haidt argues that “Reason and emotion must both work together to create intelligent behavior, but emotion ... does most of the work”. He presents a useful metaphor - an elephant and its rider - to explain the relationship between the controlled and automatic systems that determine human behavior. Haidt writes:

“The controlled system ... is better seen as an advisor. It’s a rider placed on the elephant’s back to help the elephant make better choices. The rider can see further into the future, and the rider can learn valuable information by talking to other riders or by reading maps, but the rider cannot order the elephant around against its will. ... The elephant and the rider each have their own intelligence, and when they work together well they enable the unique brilliance of human beings” (Haidt 2006, p 160).

Haidt is inviting us to identify ourselves as both rider and elephant.

That seems to me to make more sense than to identify myself only with the rider, or the system in my mind that makes effortful judgements and choices. When I exercise my cognitive abilities in non-judgmental observation of bodily sensations and ideas floating past, I identify with a natural self that embodies instinct and emotion as well as reason, and all the inherent potential that individual humans are born with. I invite you to engage in similar meditative practices to see if you come to the same conclusion.

That might be a good point to end on. However, many of you will be reluctant to trust your meditative insights unless you can be persuaded that there is a philosophically respectable basis for them.

We should not even view the meditative insights of prominent philosophers as being beyond question. The philosopher I have in mind is René Descartes, who claimed “I think, therefore I am” in the 17^th century, after he had engaged in a meditative process.

Where did Descartes go wrong?

Descartes reached his conclusion, “I think therefore I am”, after going through a process of considering what sources of knowledge could not be doubted, and discovering that he could not doubt that he was thinking.

I have already mentioned Antonio Damasio’s book, Descartes Error. What does Damasio see as the source of Descartes’ error? Damasio makes the point that beings existed before long before the evolution of humans who are aware that they are thinking (Damasio 1994, pp. 248-9).

In his book, The Metaphysics of Emergence, Richard Campbell suggests that Descartes was on the right track in observing that he was unable to doubt that he was thinking. Campbell suggest that the error arose when Descartes asked himself, “What then am I?” That question “presupposes that he takes himself to be some sort of thing” (Campbell 2015, pp.282-3). Campbell suggests that Descartes question immediately entrapped him in the traditional metaphysics of entities.

At this point I must explain why Cambell considers it to be problematic to consider oneself as an entity rather than as a process.

What kind of being are you?

You observe that you are thinking, and conclude that you are a thinking being. You also observe that you are a being that has a body, and that you experience sensations and emotions.

It appears obvious that you are an entity that has all those qualities. But you are also the observer engaged in self-reflection. You can engage in radical reflexivity as you observe the thoughts passing through your own mind.

However, if you are an entity, how can you be both the observer and the being that you are observing? Could you be two entities? I don’t think so. The observer, who is you, does not exist independently of the being who is observed, who is also you.

Richard Campbell suggests a way out of this dilemma. Drop the assumption that you are a fixed, given entity. The alternative he suggests is to perceive yourself as a complex process system. That enables you to perceive of radical reflexivity as a process. He writes:

“If the assumption that there is a fixed, given entity called ‘the self’ …  is rejected, the way is open to understand consciousness as a flow: a complex, emergent and interactive process which is radically reflexive” (Campbell 2015, p.292).

Our observations of the world tell us that many other animals are also aware of their surroundings. We have no problem in understanding that their awareness emerged or evolved to help them to survive and reproduce. Our human consciousness is just another step in that evolutionary process. Radical reflexivity - awareness of our own awareness - has emerged to help us to flourish as individuals in the cultures in which we live.

Campbell suggests that the flow of consciousness is analogous to a river maintaining its identity as it flows though different places. Your understanding of who you are is informed by the flow of your consciousness through time. In other words, your sense of identity is informed by your autobiographical memories. Campbell explains that this sense of identity also involves an element of projection into the future:

“I am a complex process system continually projecting myself out of my past into my future, my sense of myself necessarily involves my ‘has been’ and my ‘not yet’ (Campbell 2015, p.292).

As you think about your “not yet”, you might imagine a future that is different than your past. Perhaps that is just wishful thinking. Or you might be considering options available to change your life in various ways, or how to achieve a vision that you have for your own future. That brings me to the concept of self-direction.

How does self-direction fit into your identity?

As explained in Freedom, Progress, and Human Flourishing, I subscribe to the view that wise and well-informed self-direction is integral to the process of individual flourishing. The nature of humans is such that as individuals mature, they normally have the potential to exercise the practical wisdom and integrity required to direct their own flourishing in accordance with goals they choose and values they endorse.

However, wise and well-informed self-direction is not an attribute that is manifested by all adult humans. It is to some extent a product of the incentives in the social environment in which people live. When the social environment requires individuals to accept responsibility for the outcomes of the choices they make, they have a strong incentive to become wise and well-informed.

Acquisition of skills in self-direction is also a product of personal attitudes. Unfortunately, some people perceive that nothing they do will make any difference to their lives. Others, who have similar history, perceive the potential to improve their lives and often make inspiring efforts to so by investing in personal development.

In my personal experience, it is easier to avoid behaving like a grumpy old man when I remind myself to be the person that I have potential to become.

That brings me close to the end of what I have to say. However, before I sum up, I will keep my promise to talk about the question I said I would end on.

Would your identity be retained if your mind was uploaded into a machine?

Some neuroscientists think this might be feasible within a few decades. They point to scientific advances that suggest it might be possible, and say they are not aware of any laws of physics that would prevent it.

I am not qualified to have an informed view on the technical feasibility of mind uploading, so I will think of it merely as a thought experiment.

Imagine that your mind has been uploaded and you wake up with your memories intact in an environment that looks like the real world as you know it. Is this emulated mind actually you? As I see it, that is something that your emulated mind would have to decide for itself.

However, that does not prevent me from speculating how an emulated mind might perceive its own identity if separated from the body which it remembers as an integral component of the complex processing system from which it was derived. Perhaps the emulated mind might feel as though it is having a dream and is unable to wake up. It might feel more like a ghost than the natural self – the mind-body system – that it remembers as its former self.

It might identify as “the ghost in the machine”.

Summing up

I began by suggesting that personal information about you gives only a superficial view of who you are as an individual. Your life story might encapsulate all the important things that you know about yourself, but self-knowledge is never perfect. As you go through life, you may discover more about who you are.

Aspects of your identity may change over time. Your character might be influenced by changing incentives of the social and economic environment. And you may even change aspects of your personality to some extent, by choosing to develop new habits.

So, where is the essence of your being located? I argue that it is a mistake to think it is located solely in your conscious mind.

Descartes correctly observed that he was thinking, but in concluding “I think, therefore I am” he overlooked the fact that he had already assumed that he was some kind of being.

You are the kind of being that can observe itself. It is difficult to comprehend how you can be both an observer and the object of your observation if you think of yourself as an entity. Thinking of yourself as both observer and object poses no problem if you think of yourself as a complex processing system.

You cannot doubt that you think. You are aware of both the flow of inner experiences – thoughts and feelings – and of your experience of the world in which you live. Thinking about your experience of the world enables you to contemplate the goals you seek, to make choices in pursuit of those goals, and to learn from experience. Your sense of identity is informed both by autobiographical memories and by future projections.

If you accept that wise and well-informed self-direction is integral to your flourishing, you are likely to think of yourself as seeking to become the kind of person who has the practical wisdom and integrity to flourish in accordance with goals you choose and values you endorse.

I have speculated that if your mind was uploaded into a machine, the emulated mind would not perceive itself to be a real person with a body as well as a mind. It might remember you as its former self, but would see itself as being something like a ghost.

You understand who you are from the ongoing experience of your whole self, living in the real world. Walt Whitman captured that well in his poetry. I will leave you to contemplate a fragment from his poem, “A song of myself”:

“My respiration and inspiration, the beating of my heart, the passing of blood and air through my lungs,
The sniff of green leaves and dry leaves, and of the shore and dark-color’d sea-rocks, and of hay in the barn,
The sound of the belch’d words of my voice loos’d to the eddies of the wind,
A few light kisses, a few embraces, a reaching around of arms,

The play of shine and shade on the trees as the supple boughs wag,
The delight alone or in the rush of the streets, or along the fields and hill-sides,
The feeling of health, the full-noon trill, the song of me rising from bed and meeting the sun.”

 
References

Bates, Winton, Freedom, Progress, and Human Flourishing (Hamilton Books, 2021).

Campbell, Richard, The Metaphysics of Emergence (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015).

Gallwey, Timothy, The Inner Game of Tennis (Pan Books,1975).

Haidt, Jonathan, The Happiness Hypothesis (Basic Books, 2006).

 Kahneman, Daniel, Thinking Fast and Slow (Penguin, 2011).

 Whitman, Walt, Complete Works of Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass, Book III ‘Song of Myself’. (The poem, ‘Song of Myself’, was first published in 1855 in the collection Leaves of Grass.)