[mannykannot]

With regard to your question about who or what is being insulted, Perhaps the first thing to note is that we are to others what they have observed of us, modified by what their theory of mind intuits from those observations. The former, and even more so the latter, are not all that reliable, though they are all we have to go on.

[passion__desire]

The way I think is it is like a pattern trying to maintain itself. Pattern is the ghost in the machine. But the pattern isn't significant in itself in that apart from continuing its existence there is no other requirement. It's just that intelligence either individual or collective helps in continuing the pattern further. Self in that sense is like a soliton on a water surface.

[enugu]

Yes, we misrepresent others constantly. A more basic point is that we are misrepresenting ourselves - Without a clear, detailed vision of thought/emotion flow, statements like 'I did this' are reifying this flow into an agent(not as a convenient abstraction to stand for a group of thoughts, but a felt sense that there is an 'I' actually doing something).