This is in the series of blogs about consciousness and my attempts to understand it. Julian Baggini in a recent TED talk asked: Is there a real you and is it permanent and unchanging?
The results of recent studies in neuroscience have shifted from thinking of yourself as a "thing" which has experiences of life .....

to thinking of yourself as simply that "collection" of all the experiences of life. You are the sum of your parts.

By comparison Julian gives the example of water. We don't normally think there is a thing called "water' and attached to it are hydrogen and oxygen atoms .... We know that water is simply an arrangement of hydrogen and oxygen.

Is all this depressing and deterministic? -- no, says Julian

"Your true self is something that in part you discover and in part you create -- and that is a liberating and exciting prospect" For more watch the video ....