This is one of the reasons why human beings are capable of the symbolic thought that language entails.
The metarepresentations are also "a prerequisite for our values, beliefs, and priorities," (Ramachandran 2011, p. 247). When a human being makes a moral judgment about something, that judgement is not necessarily based on direct sensory input but on a whole range of symbolic and abstract decisions related to socialization and individual differences.
Ramachandran explains the discrepancy or paradox in Jason's inability to transfer his ability to process the auditory information separately when his father is in the room to the tendency for human beings to favor visual information over audio. Regardless, Jason has what Ramachandran calls a "fragmented self," (p. 247). The phenomenon begs inquiry into the scientific definition of self, and whether self is merely a collection of fragments.
Rather, the self is a complex composite of many different neurological and cognitive functions. Some patients with damage to the anterior cingulate in the frontal lobes experience the types of fragmentation and paradoxical cognitions like telephone syndrome. Alien hand syndrome is yet another phenomenon associated with damage to the anterior cingulate. Concluding that psychoanalysis and other non-biological branches of psychology do not provide answers satisfying enough to those who need empirical evidence, Ramachandran claims that neuroscience and neurology can help illuminate the various functions of self with research.
Reference
Ramachandran, V.S. (2011). The Tell-Tale Brain. Harcourt, 2011.
