“All our knowledge is ourselves to know” — Alexander Pope

“What are you thinking ?” , muses Nick as he stares quizzically at his wife Amy in ‘Gone Girl’ , a question which forms the quintessential focal point of our existence as rational beings , elevating us from being a mere amalgamation of atoms avoiding pain and seeking pleasure to Descartes’ ‘corgito ergo sum’. Answering Nick’s query, however, is far more complicated than emphasising its importance , for as rational beings, our thought processes or ‘mental state’s ( identified here as that peculiar combination of attitudes, interests, disposition, perceptions and beliefs that constitutes our psychological ‘selves’) are subject to great, often contradictory, variations : baffling both ourselves and those around us.

Any endeavour to identify and consequently define these mental states is not only impossible but also futile, even counter productive, for psychological ‘experiences’ cannot be confined by the boundaries of language. What can be attempted, however, is an analysis of our own myriad thought processes at a given point in time and space, elucidating them as far as possible so as to know ourselves and through ourselves, the world around us. In other words, an examination of that complex process of exchange between the “within” and the “without”, each moulding the other, is what is solicited. This examination would bring us as close as possible to our own ‘mental states’ , commencing a journey of self discovery and rediscovery, cognition and re-cognition.

Amogh Mannekote