St Anselm's Senior Common Room, Early Afternoon
Sunlight had briefly appeared outside before apparently reconsidering its position and withdrawing behind clouds.
Professor Quillibrace sat beside the fire with a book resting unopened upon his lap.
Miss Elowen Stray was making notes.
Mr Blottisham entered carrying a teacup and the expression of a man enjoying unusual confidence.
He sat down heavily.
"I have been thinking."
Quillibrace looked up cautiously.
"Oh dear."
Blottisham ignored him.
"I have concluded that while our recent discussion concerning time was needlessly unsettling, there are certain matters upon which no confusion exists whatsoever."
"How fortunate," said Quillibrace.
"The self."
Blottisham nodded firmly.
"There I am."
He pointed at himself.
"Perfectly obvious."
Quillibrace regarded him quietly.
"One hesitates to interfere with certainty of that magnitude."
Miss Stray smiled faintly.
Blottisham continued.
"Experiences come and go. Opinions change. Circumstances alter. Yet beneath it all there remains..."
He struck his chest lightly.
"...me."
Quillibrace was silent.
Blottisham frowned.
"You appear unconvinced."
"I am merely waiting."
"For what?"
"For the complications to arrive under their own momentum."
Miss Stray leaned forward.
"We do normally speak that way."
"Of course we do," said Blottisham. "Thoughts belong to us. Feelings belong to us. Memories belong to us."
Quillibrace nodded slowly.
"Interesting language."
"What is?"
"'Belong.'"
Blottisham sighed.
"Not this again."
Quillibrace folded his hands.
"The familiar picture assumes something rather specific."
He spoke carefully.
"There exists a self. The self possesses experiences. Thoughts occur to it. Feelings happen within it. Identity persists beneath change."
Blottisham looked satisfied.
"Excellent."
"I am describing the picture, not endorsing it."
Blottisham's satisfaction diminished slightly.
Miss Stray looked thoughtful.
"So experience becomes something happening around an underlying object."
"Precisely."
"The self sits at the centre."
"Quite so."
Blottisham spread his hands.
"Again, I fail to detect any problem."
Quillibrace nodded.
"Then perhaps you would kindly indicate where this self resides."
Blottisham stared.
"In me."
"Yes."
A pause.
"...where precisely?"
Blottisham frowned.
"In my body."
Quillibrace nodded.
"The body changes continuously."
"Oh."
"Cells regenerate. Capabilities emerge and disappear. Appearance alters."
Blottisham waved this aside.
"Then memory."
"Memories fade."
"Oh."
"Distort."
"Oh dear."
"Occasionally disappear altogether."
Blottisham looked troubled.
"Personality then."
Quillibrace tilted his head.
"Do people behave identically across childhood, adulthood, friendship, grief, work, and old age?"
Blottisham stared into his tea.
"No..."
A small silence settled.
Miss Stray looked up from her notebook.
"So the problem isn't merely that these things change."
Quillibrace nodded.
"No."
"The problem is that the stable self seems to move elsewhere whenever we try to locate it."
"Exactly."
Blottisham looked alarmed.
"You make it sound as though the self is hiding."
Quillibrace considered this.
"It does display certain evasive tendencies."
Blottisham shifted uneasily.
Miss Stray spoke quietly.
"And if the self exists first as an independent thing..."
"Then relationships become secondary additions," said Quillibrace.
"One first becomes an individual and only afterwards enters social life."
Blottisham looked puzzled.
"Naturally."
Quillibrace raised an eyebrow.
"Language?"
Blottisham blinked.
"What about it?"
"You learned it through others."
"Oh."
"Meanings emerge through interaction."
"Oh."
"Values arise through social coordination."
Blottisham sank slightly lower.
"Oh no."
Miss Stray had begun writing rapidly.
"Even the categories through which we understand ourselves come from relations."
Quillibrace nodded.
"The supposedly independent self begins to look rather less like an origin."
"And rather more like something emerging through relations."
"Quite."
Blottisham looked genuinely distressed.
"You cannot simply remove the self."
"No one has removed anything."
Quillibrace reached calmly for his tea.
"Names remain."
Blottisham looked hopeful.
"Good."
"Memories remain."
"Excellent."
"Lives continue."
Blottisham relaxed.
"But perhaps the self was never a hidden object sitting behind experience."
The relaxation disappeared immediately.
Miss Stray looked thoughtful.
"So identity becomes something continually actualised rather than permanently possessed."
Quillibrace smiled faintly.
"Yes."
"And individuality changes too."
"Indeed."
"Individuals become distinguishable organisations emerging within relations."
Silence settled around the room.
Rain had returned and was tapping softly against the windows.
Blottisham stared into the fire for a long while.
Finally he spoke.
"I have had a troubling thought."
Quillibrace looked up.
"Again?"
Blottisham frowned.
"If there isn't some stable little fellow inside me running everything..."
He looked around cautiously.
"...who exactly has been eating all my biscuits?"
Quillibrace considered this for a moment.
"A highly persistent organisation of relations, Mr Blottisham."
A pause.
"With remarkably consistent dietary commitments."
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