Mind + Body < Self
If you acknowledge, as one ought to, that Body is a composition of material and Mind is a composition of thought, then you must also acknowledge that neither is genuinely accessible in full from any remote entity. You might assert that a crude sampling process can be leveraged so as to construct a genuine perception of another person.
However, upon closer inspection it seems clear that it is not a perception but more accurately a perceived impression. Just as your impression in the mirror is not genuinely you but a mere reflected image of you, we are only able to see the light which is not absorbed and only able to hear the resonating vibrations & echoes that find paths to our ears.
As such, the person that I perceive as you may indeed be embodied & endowed with mind, but I have scant verifiable evidence to affirm this as fact. Instead, the person with whom I feel acquainted or most familiar is the idea construed from the senses perceived and the effects observed.
If we are to acquiesce that we are able to share genuine experiences with other persons, as nearly everyone would surely accept, and that these experiences run deeper than complex dependent processes of crude sampling & causal relationships, then we must question more deeply the entity with which we aim to connect when we engage with another person. For interactions more profound than transactional exchanges or recreational activities, the intention seems to be a connection between Selves, not wholly dependent on the physical collocation of Bodies or the mutual engagement of Minds.
For example, recollect a cherished memory with a close friend and you will likely experience your interconnected Selves more deeply perhaps than during mundane discussion with each other about a recent happening. Of course, this begs the question of whether or not such reminiscent experiences are unilateral or perhaps somehow more transcendent. In an effort to address this, let’s return to the constructs of Body & Mind.
In addition to our arguably inadequate sampling methods, we must also acknowledge that Body & Mind are both highly dynamic and interrelated systems. If the Self were merely the sum of the Body & Mind then we’d either have to accept the Self as a dynamic interrelated system on level with the Body & Mind or even conceivably an illusory construct, a byproduct.
The struggle I have with believing the Self to be illusory is that it is both nonsensical and lacking in supportive evidence. How could I be an agent capable of pondering my own existence yet not actually exist at all? I can imagine my Body being an illusion, like a ghost perceived by my Mind, especially since I can’t definitively prove the independent existence of material. I can also imagine my Mind being an illusion, since my thoughts are transitory & influenced by my surroundings, like a leaf blown about by the wind. But I am not capable of imagining that I myself am an illusion because to do so would require me to divorce myself from my Self. I can imagine that the Self of another person is illusory, and I can imagine another person imagining my Self to be illusory. But, you see, I cannot both be myself and genuinely imagine myself to be an illusion. It seems that a prerequisite for such activity is to first lose that which is personally associated as Self.
To elucidate, when I was five years old I was still me — the very same Self. I was not a different person, although my Body & Mind along with its associated actions & knowledge were all very different than at present. Despite lacking incontrovertible direct evidence, I believe that I existed as truly & genuinely then as I do now. Much the same way, I believe quite strongly that I shall exist truly tomorrow if I wake in the morning.
So that which I call my Self is neither a snapshot in time nor an accumulation of past activity. Since I definitely exist now, at present, it also cannot be that my Self is summed up only after my life has ended. Also, since I exist too in the Minds of other people with whom I interact & connect, that which I call Self appears to be blurred widely across time & space. I know that my Mind will perish when my Bodily functions cease, but that tells me nothing of the fate of my Self.
It seems to me that just as my five year old Self undoubtedly existed on a particular day of which I can recall no information and that all of the occurrences on that particular arbitrary and forgotten day have contributed in some minuscule or profound ways to shaping my present life (even if only to have survived the day!), that which we call the Self is a space-time traveler in the Mind-Body vessel. So when that vessel reaches its final destination, what does that mean for the traveler inside? Well, clearly, this is for the traveler to decide.
