The Questions  ·  the self · Controlism

Which part of you is actually in charge?

Knock out the body and something remains. Knock out the mind and something still remains. The question is what that something is — and whether it is the thing doing the steering.

A body, a mind, and the self that governs both.

A third element that is neither body nor mind.

Knock either vehicle out and something still remains.

What this settles

The whole of a life is the long answer to that single question. Everything the foundation builds after this point is built on the third element rather than on either vehicle.

What it leaves open

What is the self ultimately made of?

Raised in this footing and not answered anywhere in the work — and the foundation marks it open in its own words.

Not this question

Were you damaged, or did you just lose the wheel?

Also in this footing, and a different question. That one asks what happened to the driver. This one asks whether there is a driver at all.

Also asked as

Where this is worked out

book

Philosophy Goes First

foundation

Theories of the Self

strand read

The Soul Has Three Parts

session

Which Part of You Is Actually in Charge?

glossary

self

Items without a link are sessions, shorts, strand reads or frameworks that live as video or audio rather than as pages. Everything Philosophy Zero puts out is listed on the Shelf.

Nothing on this page is composed. Every sentence in the answer is drawn from the pieces listed above. Where a claim is compressed, it is compressed from one of them and adds nothing they do not say.

Where this question sits

The self as governor

The body, the mind, and the third thing that overrules both — what it does, what is still there when a vehicle fails, and what it is finally made of. 3 of the 5 here have been worked through; the rest are on the map and not yet walked.

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