Who Am I? - A Thought Experiment That Changes How You Think About Yourself

It is a prevailing goal in life to be yourself. We want to be authentic and self-honest -- and we should. But when we think about this, we inevitably encounter the problem: who even are we? In this video, we explore the illusory notion of the 'self', how 'you' technically don't have one, and the ways in which you can still be your true self in spite of its mysterious, illusive nature.

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[PursuitofWonder]

As always, thank you so much for watching.

[TheArtofGuitar]

Strangely the people with extreme long-term memory loss are probably closer to who we really are than anyone with great memory recall capability.

[grainisobtained]

This reminds me of my favorite quote from Dune: "Life is not a mystery to solve, but a reality to experience."

[prognozprognoz]

The quote by Emerson hits hard for me. I've made a lot of mistakes in my life, and my own past behaviour puzzled me which later stemmed from undiagnosed complex-PTSD from events I lived through when I was much younger. Thinking back on who I was 20, 10, or even 3 years ago feels like reflecting upon a totally different person who I have to accept was me.

[TheDoomerGoGetter]

I don't know who I am or what that question means at this point, I'm just living an experience and try to make this experience as good as possible not through hedonism but through self development, through exercise, eating healthy, making YouTube videos as my creative outlet, etc...

[marcosminlletes]

But this begs the question: should you be held accountable of past actions? If who you were 10 years ago is completely different than who you are now, and you have a complete contrast of mindset. People only know who you are as a memory. No one will ever understand who you are now, as you will have evolved mentally, ever so slightly. This was a great concept and will have me thinking for months :)

[Jorge]

Wake up babe, new existential crisis just dropped.

[jamesstaggs]

I used to be afraid of dying, and that led to a massive fear of his going to sleep, since you're pretty much dying very time you lose consciousness. I got over both once I realized the thing I thought was dying didn't exist to begin with, so there's no loss in either process, since the self is just a process as well.

Oh and it's impossible to not be yourself. Even if you're emulating certain characteristics of someone else that's just a desire that you have encouraging you to do so.

[wal]

The narrator's voice gives me anxiety

[tathagatachatterjee]

I am just the witness of all that's around me and within me.

[pikaprisma]

In the last two years of my life, I've lost all sense of purpose and emotion. I've become numb to external factors that affect my life. Lost my family, friends and all ties to the outside world. I wish those who read this to reach out to those they love, as one day you might lose it all

[NatNat-uucs]

I feel like the only way we can really find true peace is by uncovering who we are, because, in essence, that's exactly what we are. Just a thought.

[akshatgusain]

The urge to just comment cause noone has commented

[lasseherberg]

Maybe it would be great to mention what Sam Harris is also saying: That the Illusion of the self can be cut through and on the otherside is a boundless centerless consciousness. Freedom from psychological suffering. That’s the real practice of meditation.

[duttaoindril]

I think who we are is the spacetime we occupy. The continuous physical space at a specific times that nobody else can occupy. The time and space we take up in other minds as we exist. The time and space of all the results of everything we’ve ever interacted with. That’s what death really is. We stop occupying anything as a singular concept.

[ReynaSingh]

The eternal question. Likely at the core of philosophy itself

[tjmarx]

I've heard this argument parroted frequently by philosophy, yet it holds little in truth with what we really see.

This is not merely a supposition, many of the assertions are indeed testable hypothesise.

For example, the assertion about the removal of limbs can be tested in amputees and to a lesser extent quadra/paraplegic. Both cohorts report feelings of being less themselves with the loss of a limb. Here the phenomenon of phantom limb syndrome gives us a clue into how much self is placed in our bodies.

Another cohort equally worthy of consideration in such a hypothesis are organ transplantees. Here individuals post transplant regularly report feelings of living with someONE else.

To the argument of atomic change, this is hardly isolated to humanity. It is equally present in all things living, dead and inanimate across the entirety of the universe. This includes your house, car and the device you're reading this comment on now. Does precession make them no longer yours after a period of time?

Moreover if we want to talk in those terms, we leave tiny pieces of ourselves everywhere we go. Similarly we incorporate small parts of everything we ingest. By your argument vegans are better described as plants and unbeknownst to you your cat is really a fish in disguise. That's not even getting into the realities of quarks and electromagnetism. The argument appears illogical.

An argument based on cellular regeneration is even less so as cells do not pop into existence from nothing. They are born through division. Cells indeed die, but not before recreating themselves. If I make two identical clones of you, which one is you and how can it be distinguished? Now as a thought experiment imagine that instead of me creating clones of you, before you died as a last act you organically self replicated a younger adult version of yourself before discarding the remaining lifeless husk. Which would be you? Could they be distinguished in any meaningful way? That is how cells do.

Ultimately the this entire argument from philosophy can be surmised as an attempt to point to a single indivisible you. But the argument never considers the possibility that self is divisible without degradation.

Consider, if we're in a plane crash stranded somewhere remote awaiting rescue. During it's course your friend dies. If I cut off their leg and offer it to you as food would you not shy away as result of your identification of the limb as being a part of your friend?

Or to put it in a perhaps less vulgar way, the fresh broccoli you buy in the store has been separated from the plant. Is it still broccoli? How about if I remove the stem, are we still having broccoli for dinner or something else?

It would seem to me that we are a transitory sum of our parts, with no part more we than any other. So too with division the parts remain equally us. So to the question "who am I", one might say I am change.

[The_Arcadian]

I see myself more as just a story. A tale of events that stretches beyond and before my current existence. I am not my body or mind but my actions and only those actions that are remembered.

[Puuuurrrr]

I went into a deep depression 4 years ago because I went down a tangent from this thought alone. I ruminated in solitude which probably fuelled it even more. I’m still struggling and it’s taken so much of whatever it is I am. Too scared to actually end it all too. I am not living or existing. Wouldn’t wish this on anyone, it’s a hellish purgatory.

[sonnygL]

When I was 7 My brother once told me that if I ask myself who am I over and over you will start feeling weird & will get to this weird point where you won't recognize your own thoughts or voice or self. I can't explain it but it's one of the most scariest and almost like your conscious and sense of self detaches from your body and well it's almost like you enter this realm of absolute awareness. I keep searching for those exact words, repeating who am I, who am I and see if anyone else has experienced/described something similar. I really can't explain this sense of being self aware yet being completely detached from that moment exactly at the same time. Where everything hits you, every thought, realization of the life you have lived, it's to difficult to put into words.