Response to Aaron

Aaron's second question is concerned with the face in the mirror. In some ways, I have to think that a large part of recognizing that face is the repetition we go through, but I think a great deal of how we look at ourselves is part of why we have only a vague image of ourselves in our minds. We look in the mirror and spot the obvious things--facial hair, piercings, birthmarks, whatever--and then we spot the flaws--scars, asymmetrical features, etc--and those are what we think of. That's how we recognize ourselves, without examining the whole of our faces; we identify the primary flaws, and immediately check off our failure to match what we think of as a good looking person, etc.