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Are You an Illusion?
In Are You an Illusion? today’s scientific orthodoxy, which treats the self as nothing more than an elaborate illusion, comes under spirited attack. In an impassioned defence of the importance of our own thoughts, feelings and experiences, Mary Midgley shows that there’s much more to our selves than a jumble of brain cells.
Exploring the remarkable gap that has opened up between our understanding of our own sense of self and today’s science, she exposes some very odd claims and muddled thinking on the part of cognitive scientists and psychologists when they talk about the self and shows that many well-known philosophical problems in causality and free have been glossed over.
Midgley argues powerfully and persuasively that the rich variety of our imaginative life cannot be contained in the narrow bounds of a highly puritanical materialism that simply equates brain and self. Engaging with the work of prominent thinkers, Midgley investigates the source of our current attitudes to the self and reveals how ideas, traditions and myths have been twisted to fit in, seemingly naturally, with science’s current preoccupation with the physical and, in doing so, have made many other valuable activities and ideas appear as anti-scientific. Midgley shows that the subjective sources of thought – our own experiences – are every bit as necessary in helping to explain the world as the objective ones such as brain cells.
Are You an Illusion? offers a salutary analysis of science’s claim to have done away with the self and a characteristic injection of common sense from one of our most respected philosophers into a debate increasingly in need of it.
Exploring the remarkable gap that has opened up between our understanding of our own sense of self and today’s science, she exposes some very odd claims and muddled thinking on the part of cognitive scientists and psychologists when they talk about the self and shows that many well-known philosophical problems in causality and free have been glossed over.
Midgley argues powerfully and persuasively that the rich variety of our imaginative life cannot be contained in the narrow bounds of a highly puritanical materialism that simply equates brain and self. Engaging with the work of prominent thinkers, Midgley investigates the source of our current attitudes to the self and reveals how ideas, traditions and myths have been twisted to fit in, seemingly naturally, with science’s current preoccupation with the physical and, in doing so, have made many other valuable activities and ideas appear as anti-scientific. Midgley shows that the subjective sources of thought – our own experiences – are every bit as necessary in helping to explain the world as the objective ones such as brain cells.
Are You an Illusion? offers a salutary analysis of science’s claim to have done away with the self and a characteristic injection of common sense from one of our most respected philosophers into a debate increasingly in need of it.
176 pages, Hardcover
First published April 24, 2014
17 people are currently reading
347 people want to read
About the author
Mary Midgley
50 books160 followersMary Beatrice Midgley (née Scrutton; 13 September 1919 – 10 October 2018[1]) was a British philosopher. She was a Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at Newcastle University and was known for her work on science, ethics and animal rights. She wrote her first book, Beast And Man (1978), when she was in her fifties. She has since written over 15 other books, including Animals and Why They Matter (1983), Wickedness (1984), The Ethical Primate (1994), Evolution as a Religion (1985), and Science as Salvation (1992). She has been awarded honorary doctorates by Durham and Newcastle universities. Her autobiography, The Owl of Minerva, was published in 2005.
Midgley strongly opposed reductionism and scientism, and any attempts to make science a substitute for the humanities—a role for which it is, she argued, wholly inadequate. She wrote extensively about what philosophers can learn from nature, particularly from animals. A number of her books and articles discussed philosophical ideas appearing in popular science, including those of Richard Dawkins. She also wrote in favour of a moral interpretation of the Gaia hypothesis. The Guardian described her as a fiercely combative philosopher and the UK's "foremost scourge of 'scientific pretension.'"
Midgley strongly opposed reductionism and scientism, and any attempts to make science a substitute for the humanities—a role for which it is, she argued, wholly inadequate. She wrote extensively about what philosophers can learn from nature, particularly from animals. A number of her books and articles discussed philosophical ideas appearing in popular science, including those of Richard Dawkins. She also wrote in favour of a moral interpretation of the Gaia hypothesis. The Guardian described her as a fiercely combative philosopher and the UK's "foremost scourge of 'scientific pretension.'"
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
March 10, 2021
A fabulous book about the crucial part of our reality as human beings - our thoughts, feelings and memories. We may be able to study the activity of neurones in our brain but this does not mean that a reduction to brain cells necessarily should or can get rid of our sense of self. Illusion or not, we think, feel and remember who we are as individuals and there is little doubt that our belief in personal identity and free will deserves a more holistic explanation. The author emphasizes that the current neuroscientifc examination loses that unique aspect at the expense of our unique capacity for subjective thought. Much food for thought!
July 19, 2014
Twelve short chapters and a conclusion are presented without excessive academic baggage and in a style that is informal and enthusiastic. I found sections that I wished to argue against, specific points I wished to correct, but also insights that were unexpected and pleasurable and summaries of complex arguments that are fluent and competent. In short, Midgley comes over in this book as a kind and yet challenging educator. She has been retired from education for 34 years at the time of publishing this book and it seems to me a travesty - what younger philosopher could possibly have been considered an improvement?
I very much like the conclusion towards which this book is tunnelling from the outset: ...all that we know about human behaviour shows that it can be understood only by reference to people's own thoughts, dreams, hopes, fears and other feelings. This is not something invented by a particular culture, it is universal. And when we try to understand the immediate behaviour of those around us we absolutely need our familiar map of the possible moods and motives that might shape their actions. Above all, we need an understanding of the possible conflicts among them." This could be a fertile starting point for any of a range of important discussions about humanity, society, politics, culture and for that reason one can see why it is so desirable that Midgley is successful in the arguments that lead her to make this proposition. If the conclusion of her book is the basis for many more, then that is surely a good test of its merits.
Along the way, many specific topics are delighfully handled. She remarks for instance that Descartes' dualism sets up a conflict between the material body and the spiritual soul which was inevitably going to cause problems when the religious basis for these concepts was itself undermined. However, it is no solution to declare a "materialist" victory in which the spiritual side of this false dichotomy is abandoned, because the way Descartes defined that side incorporates a huge range of experience that is not strictly 'material' but also does not have to be thought of as 'spiritual.' Strangely enough, the strict 'materialist' relies on a dualist model of existence to define what is included and what is excluded - otherwise it makes no sense and yet dualism is something they claim to have rejected. When scientists dismiss philosphy as irrelevant to their far more important projects, it is fun to watch a good philosopher swipe away their pretensions and demonstrate their weak grasp of reasoning.
In discussing evolutionary theory, Midgley makes a number of interesting observations based on the possibility that she has actually read what Darwin wrote, unlike so many of his critics, and what he wrote is not always what people assume. For example, she points out quite rightly that Darwin did not rely exclusively on natural selection to account for the paths taken by evolution. In particular, sexual selection also plays a significant role and accounts for many curious adaptations which must otherwise be considered likely to make survival more difficult. This does introduce further fascinating observations about animal psychology which she follows up very sharply. On the other hand, she holds onto at least one erroneous idea about natural section, which is that it proceeds randomly. There is no validity to the notion of random selection - as Creationists like to argue, this could equate to a strong wind picking up the contents of a scrap heap and throwing down a fully operational aeroplane by random chance. However, natural selection is the opposite of a random process. The theory recognises a banal and non contentious observation, which is that there is random variation in many features of any organism, such as taller / shorter, bigger / smaller... Within that range, aspects of the environment are likely to be more favourable to one than another (it may favour short necks or long necks) and that can result in better or worse chances of reproduction. Over countless generations, such selective pressures are sufficient to account for the emergence of separate species. The climate and other aspects of the environment can change over time, and demonstrably have done, so the relative advantages of one creature over another will also change, not randomly, but in strict accordance with the nature of the environment in which it must survive. Thus each creature becomes ideally suited to its very specific environmental niche. That is just not random at all. It is very powerfully determined. I think some of Midgley's arguments would have to be adjusted if she accepted this alternative description of this process.
Where I was dissatisfied with the book was that I fear she sometimes constructs something of a straw man against whom to make her arguments. I agree that the views and opinions she refutes are now or were in the past strongly held by influential people but they are not universally held and never were, even within the "scientific community," while many alternative voices have made similar arguments to those of Midgley without being sufficiently credited here. To take a single example, the Behaviourist thinking of B.F.Skinner (whom I have seen lecture!) has been pushed into a very tiny corner of Experimental Psychology and his general claims largely dismissed since at the least the 1970s and arguably a decade before. On the other hand, I am forced to concede that failed theories and paradigms have a tiresome habit of resurrecting their zombie forms in new apparel, so that for example today we get very simplistic forms of psychotherapy offered under the label CBT which are guilty of all the limitations of their Behaviourist origins and which need to be challenged with reference to alternative and sometimes more appropriate therapies. Being "scientific" is good but not a sufficient assurance of quality. Zombie theories live on because they suit special interests and it is always necessary to refute them again as they return under new labels. So I think her arguments are valid and relevant but I think all the same that they could be more carefully targeted.
I have not exhausted the topics of interest in this lively book. I will refer to it many times as I take part in future debates, because it is such a lovely and effective journey through so many topics that are very much alive and relevant.
I very much like the conclusion towards which this book is tunnelling from the outset: ...all that we know about human behaviour shows that it can be understood only by reference to people's own thoughts, dreams, hopes, fears and other feelings. This is not something invented by a particular culture, it is universal. And when we try to understand the immediate behaviour of those around us we absolutely need our familiar map of the possible moods and motives that might shape their actions. Above all, we need an understanding of the possible conflicts among them." This could be a fertile starting point for any of a range of important discussions about humanity, society, politics, culture and for that reason one can see why it is so desirable that Midgley is successful in the arguments that lead her to make this proposition. If the conclusion of her book is the basis for many more, then that is surely a good test of its merits.
Along the way, many specific topics are delighfully handled. She remarks for instance that Descartes' dualism sets up a conflict between the material body and the spiritual soul which was inevitably going to cause problems when the religious basis for these concepts was itself undermined. However, it is no solution to declare a "materialist" victory in which the spiritual side of this false dichotomy is abandoned, because the way Descartes defined that side incorporates a huge range of experience that is not strictly 'material' but also does not have to be thought of as 'spiritual.' Strangely enough, the strict 'materialist' relies on a dualist model of existence to define what is included and what is excluded - otherwise it makes no sense and yet dualism is something they claim to have rejected. When scientists dismiss philosphy as irrelevant to their far more important projects, it is fun to watch a good philosopher swipe away their pretensions and demonstrate their weak grasp of reasoning.
In discussing evolutionary theory, Midgley makes a number of interesting observations based on the possibility that she has actually read what Darwin wrote, unlike so many of his critics, and what he wrote is not always what people assume. For example, she points out quite rightly that Darwin did not rely exclusively on natural selection to account for the paths taken by evolution. In particular, sexual selection also plays a significant role and accounts for many curious adaptations which must otherwise be considered likely to make survival more difficult. This does introduce further fascinating observations about animal psychology which she follows up very sharply. On the other hand, she holds onto at least one erroneous idea about natural section, which is that it proceeds randomly. There is no validity to the notion of random selection - as Creationists like to argue, this could equate to a strong wind picking up the contents of a scrap heap and throwing down a fully operational aeroplane by random chance. However, natural selection is the opposite of a random process. The theory recognises a banal and non contentious observation, which is that there is random variation in many features of any organism, such as taller / shorter, bigger / smaller... Within that range, aspects of the environment are likely to be more favourable to one than another (it may favour short necks or long necks) and that can result in better or worse chances of reproduction. Over countless generations, such selective pressures are sufficient to account for the emergence of separate species. The climate and other aspects of the environment can change over time, and demonstrably have done, so the relative advantages of one creature over another will also change, not randomly, but in strict accordance with the nature of the environment in which it must survive. Thus each creature becomes ideally suited to its very specific environmental niche. That is just not random at all. It is very powerfully determined. I think some of Midgley's arguments would have to be adjusted if she accepted this alternative description of this process.
Where I was dissatisfied with the book was that I fear she sometimes constructs something of a straw man against whom to make her arguments. I agree that the views and opinions she refutes are now or were in the past strongly held by influential people but they are not universally held and never were, even within the "scientific community," while many alternative voices have made similar arguments to those of Midgley without being sufficiently credited here. To take a single example, the Behaviourist thinking of B.F.Skinner (whom I have seen lecture!) has been pushed into a very tiny corner of Experimental Psychology and his general claims largely dismissed since at the least the 1970s and arguably a decade before. On the other hand, I am forced to concede that failed theories and paradigms have a tiresome habit of resurrecting their zombie forms in new apparel, so that for example today we get very simplistic forms of psychotherapy offered under the label CBT which are guilty of all the limitations of their Behaviourist origins and which need to be challenged with reference to alternative and sometimes more appropriate therapies. Being "scientific" is good but not a sufficient assurance of quality. Zombie theories live on because they suit special interests and it is always necessary to refute them again as they return under new labels. So I think her arguments are valid and relevant but I think all the same that they could be more carefully targeted.
I have not exhausted the topics of interest in this lively book. I will refer to it many times as I take part in future debates, because it is such a lovely and effective journey through so many topics that are very much alive and relevant.
April 17, 2014
Are You an Illusion? How does that question make you feel? Mary Midgley poses the question both whimsically and seriously. Given that a vast corpus of contemporary neuroscience and psychology today questions the existence of “free-will”, and asserts that consciousness is no more than a by-product of neurons firing off in the brain or other unspecified bio-chemical processes, the conclusion of such studies is that the sense of a self is an illusion. Mary Midgley not only argues that the conclusion is nonsensical but that the scientists themselves probably don’t believe it either. At least with regard to themselves.
Mary Midgley is no anti-science nut. A respected philosopher who has produced a large corpus of books on moral philosophy and the philosophy of science, she is grounded solidly in Darwinian Evolution. She deserves a serious hearing, even if her views challenge prevailing scientific views.
How did we come to accept as scientific facts concepts that in her view clearly don’t make sense: that we don’t have free will, that our self doesn’t exist, that animals have no emotions, that nature and evolution have no purpose. She concedes that many scientific findings are “counter-intuitive”. Example: the Earth moves at 30km/second through space but we are not aware of it. However, the findings of science have to make sense. Our subjective experience of a self, of free-will and of consciousness cannot be swept under the carpet because our materialistic prejudice makes them inconvenient. The conflict, she perceives, is between empirical science and scientism about which she says,
"Scientism exalts the idea of science on its own, causing people to become fixated on the assumptions that seemed scientific to them during their formative years. This prevents them from seeing contrary facts however glaring they may be…"
How did “scientism’s assumptions come to be accepted as dogma? Mary Midgley offers answers that while disturbing do need to be looked at seriously. The banishing of “the self”, at the start of the 20th century was the foundation of the behaviouristic psychology. Behaviour was seen as measurable, a scientific quantity, while the psyche was an unscientific construct. It might feel perfectly real but it was still viewed as an illusion. She suggests that this choice was made because scientists were uncomfortable with the psyche, in particular with the unconscious; a fundamentally non-rational entity whose exploration was seen as too threatening. What you found there could up-end your rational world view. Anyone who has undergone psychoanalysis will tell you that it is not for the fainthearted. Coming face to face with your demons takes a lot of guts.
Scientism also allows us to exploit the Earth’s resources and to exploit animals without any regard to how those animals feel. Its philosophy makes it a perfect companion for free-market capitalism. The notion that nature is there to be subdued, and that man (the masculine gender) is made to exploit nature (generally regarded as feminine) is a dogma of our times. It has allowed us to build our technological world, to pillage the natural world and drive species to extinction without any pangs of conscience. It’s no coincidence that the rise of “The Selfish Gene” evolutionary theory ran parallel with rise of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, both champions of Ayn Rand’s Virtue of Selfishness.
At the age of 94 Mary Midgley has put forward a strong case for reviewing our materialistic assumptions about nature. Would that we all have the mental clarity and verve to write such a book when we’re in our nineties.
Mary Midgley is no anti-science nut. A respected philosopher who has produced a large corpus of books on moral philosophy and the philosophy of science, she is grounded solidly in Darwinian Evolution. She deserves a serious hearing, even if her views challenge prevailing scientific views.
How did we come to accept as scientific facts concepts that in her view clearly don’t make sense: that we don’t have free will, that our self doesn’t exist, that animals have no emotions, that nature and evolution have no purpose. She concedes that many scientific findings are “counter-intuitive”. Example: the Earth moves at 30km/second through space but we are not aware of it. However, the findings of science have to make sense. Our subjective experience of a self, of free-will and of consciousness cannot be swept under the carpet because our materialistic prejudice makes them inconvenient. The conflict, she perceives, is between empirical science and scientism about which she says,
"Scientism exalts the idea of science on its own, causing people to become fixated on the assumptions that seemed scientific to them during their formative years. This prevents them from seeing contrary facts however glaring they may be…"
How did “scientism’s assumptions come to be accepted as dogma? Mary Midgley offers answers that while disturbing do need to be looked at seriously. The banishing of “the self”, at the start of the 20th century was the foundation of the behaviouristic psychology. Behaviour was seen as measurable, a scientific quantity, while the psyche was an unscientific construct. It might feel perfectly real but it was still viewed as an illusion. She suggests that this choice was made because scientists were uncomfortable with the psyche, in particular with the unconscious; a fundamentally non-rational entity whose exploration was seen as too threatening. What you found there could up-end your rational world view. Anyone who has undergone psychoanalysis will tell you that it is not for the fainthearted. Coming face to face with your demons takes a lot of guts.
Scientism also allows us to exploit the Earth’s resources and to exploit animals without any regard to how those animals feel. Its philosophy makes it a perfect companion for free-market capitalism. The notion that nature is there to be subdued, and that man (the masculine gender) is made to exploit nature (generally regarded as feminine) is a dogma of our times. It has allowed us to build our technological world, to pillage the natural world and drive species to extinction without any pangs of conscience. It’s no coincidence that the rise of “The Selfish Gene” evolutionary theory ran parallel with rise of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, both champions of Ayn Rand’s Virtue of Selfishness.
At the age of 94 Mary Midgley has put forward a strong case for reviewing our materialistic assumptions about nature. Would that we all have the mental clarity and verve to write such a book when we’re in our nineties.
December 9, 2016
Petit traité philosophique très accessible où Mary Midgley prouve que la question concernant l’existence immatérielle de la conscience est loin d’être une affaire classée. Exaspérée par le discours dominant scientiste actuel popularisé par ceux et celles qui s’autoproclament défenseurs de la Raison, cette philosophe de 97 ans remet les pendules à l’heure. Elle démontre que ce discours s’appuie en fait sur un raisonnement philosophique puéril et dépassé. À lire pour ceux et celles qui se demandent encore si l’humain n’est qu’un simple robot de viande…
April 5, 2022
I'd give her more stars but she's mostly rebutting the most extreme reductionism. I was hoping for something more nuanced. This seems dated.
March 2, 2016
Midgely tries very hard to get her head around the position that matter is the source of life. At times she seems to accept it in principle:
"It turns out, in fact, that Matter is not the inert, passive, standard, characterless stuff of tradition, the mass of standard, lifeless pebbles that seventeenth-century theorists envisaged when they wanted to provide a suitable opposite for spirit and to exile earthy stuff entirely from the business of creation. Instead, matter is something much more active and mysterious; something of which perhaps we actually now very little; something that must have had in it, from the start, the capacity and the tendency to generate all the complexities that have since arisen, and even to rebuild them again after repeated extinctions."
But she seems to have a hard time letting go the Master of Creation. To say that matter must have something in it from the start is to imbue matter with mystery. That complex structures may arise from physical principles of matter and energy, that these structures may eventually seek to reproduce, and that these structures may evolve consciousness is mind-blowing but does not require a Creator.
I was frustrated at the author's efforts to put the ghost back into the machine through wordplay rather than sound argument.
Am I an Illusion? Mary doesn't convince me that I am not.
"It turns out, in fact, that Matter is not the inert, passive, standard, characterless stuff of tradition, the mass of standard, lifeless pebbles that seventeenth-century theorists envisaged when they wanted to provide a suitable opposite for spirit and to exile earthy stuff entirely from the business of creation. Instead, matter is something much more active and mysterious; something of which perhaps we actually now very little; something that must have had in it, from the start, the capacity and the tendency to generate all the complexities that have since arisen, and even to rebuild them again after repeated extinctions."
But she seems to have a hard time letting go the Master of Creation. To say that matter must have something in it from the start is to imbue matter with mystery. That complex structures may arise from physical principles of matter and energy, that these structures may eventually seek to reproduce, and that these structures may evolve consciousness is mind-blowing but does not require a Creator.
I was frustrated at the author's efforts to put the ghost back into the machine through wordplay rather than sound argument.
Am I an Illusion? Mary doesn't convince me that I am not.
April 7, 2014
Brief book that covers a lot of ground, and does so eloquently and passionately. Midgley makes the case that much recent science-driven work makes a huge error in suggesting our selves are illusions, showing instead alternative ways of understanding the world have at least as much to offer. She questions Darwinism in explaining human (or even animal) behaviour, even if she appears to have some time for right/left brain work that provides us with insights into our behaviour, offering this as a counter to neuroscientific accounts that often attempt to show us as being wholly determined by our brain biology and chemistry. Well written and thoughtful.
April 12, 2019
The basic tenets of Midgley's argument are better expressed (and with greater implications) in Thomas Nagel's Mind and Cosmos (2012). I have a lot of respect for Midgley, whose previous work I admire, but it's hard to take this book seriously when it's just a smattering of out-of-context quotes. It's also rather embarrassing when a professional philosopher needs to block quote a historian to explain who the Pythagoreans were.
March 10, 2018
A world without Mary Midgley would be a world less interesting, intelligent and inspiring.
November 7, 2020
I hope I’m thinking and writing as well when I’m her age (95). This is a worthwhile challenge to some of the more tedious orthodoxies of the age. She’s very clear on animal consciousness, and instantly became my heroine for the following: ‘all earthly development is gradual and continuous’. Overall, though, this book didn’t advance my thinking very much, probably because of its brevity and its consequently superficial coverage of many issues.
October 16, 2019
Finished reading Are You An Illusion by Dr Mary Midgley. Her philosophy has too many assumptions and her rejection of what she calls Scientism seems to lead to a nebulous theology of the soul. Dr Midgley supports the free will argument, but fails to provide evidence for her assumption that truly spontaneous acts exist.
October 5, 2024
The world is indeed much stranger than we think. This book revives the sense of wonder that was the driving motive of philosophy for me. Midgley argues against scientism and reductionism; in favour of the Gaia hypothesis and points out the crudities of physicalism. An accessible read.
March 26, 2025
I read this for the sole (soul… haha) purpose of hearing from both sides. I am more prone to the scientific concept of consciousness, that we are nothing but electricity. I enjoy the way she describes souls, the emphasis she displays for her point.
March 26, 2017
Not as exciting as I hoped.
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews