Are we sovereign in our own minds?

How do you know anything about anything? How do you know your own self? These questions cut right down to the core of who we are as individuals.

The one means of consciously knowing anything are your thoughts – the almost constant stream of awareness that shapes your self-identity and determines your conduct. Note here that all of your conscious thinking is wrapped in language (try to think a thought – any thought – without it being expressed in words; it’s almost inconceivable).

Your internal monologue also gives you the experience of what being you feels like. It feels like a totally individual, sovereign experience: in your own mind, you perceive your own truths, think your own thoughts, freely craft your free will and choose your conduct. That, anyway is what the experience feels like.

But that feeling is an illusion… in part, at any rate. As it turns out, we are not alone in our minds; our thoughts and actions are easily influenced from without. I’m not talking about good advice a piece of information here: thoughts and desires can quite literally be planted in your mind from the outside without your consent or even awareness.

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The Werther Effect, social uprisings and market trends

We all like to think of ourselves as rational individuals, independent in our thinking and sovereign in our judgment and decision making. Well, partly we all are like that. But in part – and this is an important and very mysterious part – we’re not.