This introductory chapter outlines the main themes of the book. The first section places the self-reflective mind within a larger classification of kinds of minds, animal as well as human. The second section provides a working analytic profile of self-reflection, focused on the main executive, cognitive and sense-of-selfhood tasks involved in self-reflection, which guide the present inquiry into the mental architecture and its component abilities that run self-reflections. The third section previews the general direction and spirit of this inquiry.