Blood Music by Greg Bear

Quite a special scifi novel that starts like this. Quite grounded at the beginning, but it then evolves into body horror and later becomes quite abstract.

> Selves are more technically defined by biologists and neuroscientists as “agents”

Someone shoot me please

Interesting stuff but it hurts so much that the writer has the common misconception of pavlov's dog doing a circus trick. Sure the dog also consciously understands the connection between bell and food. But the physiological reaction of the saliva flowing is not a conscious decision of the dog. Circus tricks with animals existed long before Pavlov. The key discovery is that there is a physiological reaction which cannot be suppressed anymore consciously. That's why PTSD is such a bitch to be treated: even with the stimulus gone, the physiological reaction remains.

That said, the article is still worth a read.