The Thinker and the Self

There is much said about the search for self.  The harder you look, the more elusive the self becomes.

My affinity with Zen is based on its ability to adhere to scientific evidence.  The duality of a “me”, separate from the rest of everything else, is not based on anything tangible.  It is all based on perception.  “I think, therefore I am”.  Descartes’ notion is that even if all we experience is illusion, then there must be a “me” who is being deluded.  Thoughts infer a thinker.  But do they?

What we really are, just like any other organism, is a series of stimuli and responses.  We possess a complex brain to monitor and respond to stimuli and as Max Tegmark says in Closer to Truth, consciousness is what we feel when the brain considers complex functions.  True to Zen philosophy, the brain deals with the now. It’s controlling our breathing and regulating the heart beat.  The brain works to recall past experiences and detects patterns such as the cyclical nature of the day or the seasons.  We can use this to help predict what might happen.  But while all the whirring and churning of the brain is going on, the brain’s primary function is to focus on the here and now.  For, it is the here and now that embodies the past and anticipates the future.  The now, is forever.