“It is what neurologists call the hard problem: how does physical matter give rise to subjective experience? How does meat – the goo of the brain – become mind?” says Gordon enthusiastically, talking at 100 miles an hour during a break in rehearsals. “It is an absolutely crucial question because at stake is our identity and what it means to be human. We live with the illusion that behind every face is a self. It is the essential quality that we impose upon each other. But science tells us that it is an illusion and nothing more. In reality, the self is a story we are told by our brains. We are a fiction.”