The Forethought and the Afterthought

As we try to look at ourselves and understand our actions and emotions, we do it in a perspective different from the perspective that we were at when we made that decision or when we had that emotion. We become 2 people: the original and the later one that's analyzing the original.

Well as we try to have thoughts or try to work out a problem this happens almost all the time as in the most minute of thoughts and actions, there are always 2 thoughts we think when we do something.

It is this that I call the forethought and the afterthought. These 2 thoughts create their own personalities, with their own opinions and knowledge that support their idea. and then they argue with each other, leading to another thought that is the new thought that comes out of it. This is where you exist as well. As, when you have these thoughts and a preceding thought it formed as the combination of the 2, there must be someone to judge over the 2 thoughts and decide what is correct to how much of a degree and why. That is also you.

So if we were to give these 2 thoughts over to physicalism and say that the thoughts came into being by the sheer coincidence of one ion jumping from one neuron to another, and also the decision is not also made by a sheer coincidence of one ion jumping from one neuron to another, then it means that there is a "I" who sits above this plane of simple computing and controls the whole mechanism. To explain it further, imagine a computer and a human typing things in, and then you see 2 ads pop up. This happened without their influence. Now it is up to the human to decide what to do. this is the "judge" but it is possible that the human is a simple machine as well.... In this example the computer and the human are both one entity (the brain).

So that's what the forethought and the afterthought are: two thoughts, one that came after the other, arguing over the other one to make the correct decision. since the person who makes the correct decision, or the "judge" is also you. and so are the thoughts. make sense?