Does our «I» really exist? A strange question, because we are aware of ourselves. We are ready to talk for hours about our views and habits, about what we like and dislike, what are our strengths and weaknesses. But experimental psychologist Bruce Hood makes a compelling case that the wholeness of our personality is an illusion created by the brain. We are confident that we have the freedom of choice, but at the same time it is difficult for us to go against the will of the team. We consider ourselves honest and law-abiding — but we break the rules from time to time. We constantly copy the behavior of other people because we are programmed to learn and adapt to new conditions through imitation. We cannot rely entirely on our memories either. The director in our head so diligently erases any cuts that we do not notice the changes and believe that we, in our today’s version, are the same person that we were five and ten years ago. But this state of affairs, from Hood’s point of view, does not look tragic at all.
On the contrary, the illusion of «I» seems to be needed by the brain. Without it, we would go crazy with the complexity of the world around us and would not be able to make the most basic decisions: for example, what to wear in the morning or how to answer the phone.
Eksmo, 384 p., 2015.