 The connection between rationality and self-knowledge (and so self-consciousness), Shoemaker argues, is even more pronounced in the case of our awareness of our own beliefs. Rational subjects should abide by certain strictures on the contents of their beliefs, updating them in line with new evidence, removing inconsistencies, and so on. And this, Shoemaker argues, requires that they not be self-blind with respect to their beliefs. It requires that they are self-conscious. As Shoemaker writes, 