The Devils in the Details: a Response to Kiverstein's 'Minimal Sense of Self, Temporality and the Brain'

Abstract

While remaining in broad agreement with the overall position developed and defended by Kiverstein, I identify and discuss what I take to be a number of problems with the details of the argument. These concern (a) the claim that a certain temporal structure to conscious experience is necessary for there to be a minimal sense of self, (b) the alleged ubiquitous presence in experience of a minimal sense of self, and (c) the claim that the distinction between the constitutive background conditions and the core realiser of a given experience is ultimately unsustainable.