We are able to talk to other people reasonably successfully, develop relationships, identify friendliness or hostility, and empathise with others because we have a mental capacity for what has been called aTheory of Mind (or ToM). This means that we possess an assumption that the other person has a conscious mind just like ours. Fundamentally, other people are people: they have beliefs, goals, conscious thought, and emotions. It is our ToM that allows us to see them as people.