Hywel Lewis’ primary thesis in The Elusive Self is that human beings are best understood as a complex integration of mental and physical states.  In the first chapter, Lewis begins by recognizing the problem that this dualism has for conceiving of a constant personal identity, noting that a dualistic emphasis on sentient experience inherently raises questions of worth and significance.  He further posits that dualism is largely self-evident, because it is based primarily on experience (p. 8).