In My Mind

Poul Anderson, World Without Stars, XI.

The telepathic Ai Chun address Argens and Rorn by using a blind dwarf like a ventriloquist's dummy:

"'Through this creature we address you...'" (p. 73)

Then the two men feel the Ai Chun in their minds:

"Unbidden images, impulses, bursts of terror and anger and bliss and lust..." (p. 75)

Where do mental images come from? Most concurrently operating cerebral processes are unconscious. Some such processes control bodily functions whereas others are associated with unconscious mental processes. The light of consciousness moves, apparently at random, between potentially conscious cerebral processes. Thus, an image or memory appears as if from nowhere. Zen meditation is attention to naturally occurring thoughts accompanied by temporary cessation of deliberate thought.

In CS Lewis' The Screwtape Letters, a demon can insert a thought into the mind of the man whom he is tempting. The man is unaware that this thought has come not from his own brain but from another being. Is this possible? In Lewis' Perelandra, the fictional Lewis, approaching Ransom's remote cottage alone at night, is tormented by thoughts of hauntings and madness. Ransom knew that his visitor would be subjected to some such barrage but expected him to get through it.

Are all our thoughts our own?