I see Buddha as having addressed the question of the ego--the inherent human tendency to believe that we are a permanent self--but to have failed to address another equally strong inherent human tendency--to believe that there is justice over time for all actions done or not done. Christians and Jews and Moslems rely on heaven and hell, as did the Egyptians and others--good deeds not rewarded in this life, and bad deeds that go unpunished, will be dealt with by a divine judge in the afterlife. India developed the doctrine of karma--no need for the divine judge, the universe just keeps you being born again and again to equalize it all out. Buddha modified the doctrine from its form at the time of his life by saying that it was not the act that created the karma--the moral effect that manifested in the next life--but only the intention. (This is separate from the colloquial view of "karma" as the law of cause and effect--that, in fact, is a misuse of the term "karma.") So, a thorough job of addressing inherent human views that are anthropologically based, and not provably reality based, would do away with not only the permanent self, but also the idea of karma operating through rebirth. Now, nothing I have said addresses whether or not there might be some form of "rebirth", or a continuation of the energy that is me into another form after my death. Buddha was pretty vague on that point, as I understand it, saying only that there was some rebirth, yet denying that the "I" continued since it was insubatantial to start with.

Stephen Batchelor writes
A key source for Bennett’s and Costa’s view of the agnostic nature of Buddhism would doubtless have been this famous passage from the Culamalunkya Sutta in the Majjhima Nikaya:

Suppose, Malunkyaputta, a man were wounded by an arrow thickly smeared with poison, and his friends and companions brought a surgeon to treat him. The man would say: ‘I will not let the surgeon pull out the arrow until I know the name and clan of the man who wounded me; whether the bow that wounded me was a long bow or a crossbow; whether the arrow that wounded me was hoof-tipped or curved or barbed.’

All this would still not be known to that man and meanwhile he would die. So too, Malunkyaputta, if anyone should say: ‘I will not lead the noble life under the Buddha until the Buddha declares to me whether the world is eternal or not eternal, finite or infinite; whether the soul is the same as or different from the body; whether or not an awakened one continues or ceases to exist after death,’ that would still remain undeclared by the Buddha and meanwhile that person would die.

So what would be the features of an ‘agnostic Buddhist?’ Such a person would not regard the Dharma as a source of ‘answers’ to questions of where we came from, where we are going, what happens after death. He or she would seek such knowledge in the appropriate domains: astrophysics, evolutionary biology, neuro-science etc. An agnostic Buddhist would therefore not be a ‘believer’ with claims to revealed information about supernatural or paranormal phenomena, and in this sense would not be ‘religious.’ An agnostic Buddhist would look to the Dharma for metaphors of existential confrontation rather than metaphors of existential consolation. He or she would start by facing up to the primacy of anguish and uncertainty (dukkha), then proceed to apply a set of practices to understand the human dilemma and work towards a resolution. An agnostic Buddhist would eschew atheism as much as theism, and would be as reluctant to regard the universe as devoid of meaning as endowed with meaning. (For to deny either God or meaning is surely just the antithesis of affirming them.) Yet such an agnostic stance would not be based on disinterest. It would be founded on a passionate recognition that I do not know. It would confront the enormity of having been born instead of reaching for the consolation of a belief.

Completed on the last day of his life, Uchiyama Kosho's final poem:

Just Bow

Putting my right and left hands together as one, I just bow.
Just bow to become one with Buddha and God.
Just bow to become one with everything I encounter.
Just bow to become one with all the myriad things.
Just bow as life becomes life.

Yes, it would seem that the reptillian brain still has the "inside track". So the risk of something like embarassment might feel life threatening (depending on the conditioning of the individual). And then the brain is always trying to make sense of things and believing in the connections it makes.

I think that as much as we would like to change certain things about ourselves it can also be difficult to let our "negative traits" go because we see them as part of our identity. So, in some ways, the prospect of having to re-invent who we are without our problems is even more scary than just continuing on with them! All these psychological tools are great but I think the real inner sense of completeness that is found in zazen is necessary for allowing change to happen. Then whatever "new self" emerges must eventually be dropped over and over and over... And maybe in the end we discover that we don't so much let go of our "negative traits" as simply embracing and somehow integrating them.

Well, I think there are two levels to this... on the one hand there is probably some disowned emotional voice that is the root of the behavior ("negative trait"). On the other hand, I'm not certain that getting in touch with what has been disowned will necessarily change the behavior.