A note on self-consciousness

This is yet another layer or level of complexity within a conscious system, with some of the following characteristics:

• It is generated by, or is an aspect of, the learning of "language", or a token-based communication system, which is also the basis of so-called "cultural" systems of social organization – self-consciousness in the sense used here would simply not exist in non-language-using organisms.
• The "self" so generated – the "I" or the "me" – is thus an inherently social or cultural phenomenon, and might be considered to be the representative of the larger cultural group within the individual consciousness. (This is the answer, by the way, to the worry – see Sartre or Wittgenstein – over solipsism: the very idea of an "I" implies a "you".)
• With the formation of this "self" there arises a kind of meta-conscious level which is itself only loosely coupled to the whole of Consciouness as a control system – the control system is now extended out beyond the individual to the culture, operating within the individual through such mechanisms as guilt, praise, etc. (forming sub-systems such as "conscience", "ideals", the Freudian super-ego, etc.)
• And there also arises the potential for this sort of meta-conscious formation to be repeated, as the self can examine its self, forming another, meta-meta-conscious level – the limits of this process being simply the practical ones of diminishing returns and limited processing capabilities.