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Consciousness
Mind

What is the I who watches what the mind does?
Accepted:
August 31, 2016

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Good question! For what it is

Gordon Marino
September 1, 2016 (changed September 1, 2016) Permalink

Good question! For what it is worth, it feels to me like the I. Freud would call "it" the observing ego. Kierkegaard famously stated "the self is a relation that relates itself to itself". So Kierkegaard would say it is the self and the self is a process. Surely, the labcoats would contend that this executive function is a bit of brain circuitry. But whatever you want to call that internal voice/ perspective on the self, it is something that next to everyone struggles with. The desire for peace of mind is pandemic and by that we usually mean freedom from whatever it is that watches the mind and passes judgements on our thoughts and feelings.

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