Ego heads. Photograph: Tristram Kenton
Each week Maxie Szalwinska hits the streets to find out what visitors to a particular show or exhibition think it's about. This week she went to On Ego, the play written by Mick Gordon and neuropsychologist Paul Broks about the "astonishing hypothesis" that the ego doesn't exist. "Humans are simply machines driven by 'a bundle of neurons.'" What did you think?
Brian, 58, London I have no interest in science at all, but On Ego was a super play. Being a man, of course, I thought it was all about me.
Jenny Walker, 30, New York It made my mind race. I wasn't sure whether the scientist agreed to die because he believed in "bundle theory" or because he couldn't bear losing his wife. Even if we are nothing more than the connections between neurons, that doesn't make the feelings we experience less powerful. It's the connections between people and the stories we tell ourselves that make life bearable and fascinating.
Harry, 28, Essex You think about what's going on inside your brain and whether we are just walking robots. It made me want to read Paul Broks' book.
Ian, 63, Sussex Lots of ideas were being thrown around. The teleportation angle was interesting. But the hypothesis that's called "The Astonishing Hypothesis" lives up to its name because it's obviously false. You don't see visual images if you look inside someone's head so it's easy to assume there's nothing there; but they don't occupy space.
Claire, 37, London At the beginning I wondered whether I was going to understand it, but the narrative became clearer and the ideas connected with the story. I was thinking about who we are and why we're here.
Sarah, 37, London I struggled because it's not comfortable thinking about "bundle theory" and I wanted to hang onto the romanticised idea of the self. But in some respects On Ego was quite simple and straightforward: it was a love story.
