The main reason is that I have had similar but less well-formed and argued ideas, for quite a long time:
- When I was a kid, I used to wonder about why I couldn't see "blackness" at the back of my head, i. e. I was musing on the fact that there is no "border" nor a "beyond" to my visual field. I don't know where I got the idea, but I was an early and avid reader, and had read old popular books about the brain as early as age 10 (or less). If you think about this a while, it is quite striking, particularly in the context of Clark's paper. This is an 'angular' version of the 'finite block of experience'!
- Along the same lines, I also thought about 'Where was I before I was born?' at quite a young age. I may have thought about this as young as the age of seven or eight, maybe even sooner. I remember sitting in the yard and thinking about it, but I cannot recall the year.
- Later in life, when actively confronting the idea of 'hard materialism' and death, I have had the thought "Well, after I die, someone will go on experiencing anyway." This was definitely after learning about the idea of reincarnation and some Eastern ideas, though.
Also, this approach reminded me of two essays: The first is Harding's On Having No Head, a book I read many years ago (and still have somewhere). There is now a website for The Headless Way. Amazing. The second is "Enlightened Solipsism" in 5000 B. C. and Other Philosophical Fantasies by Raymond Smullyan. Alas, this seems to be out of print.
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