yego.me
💡 Stop wasting time. Read Youtube instead of watch. Download Chrome Extension

Supervenience


2m read
·Nov 8, 2024

One of the questions was, "Um, how is it that logic supervenes on our brains?"

And I think it's a good question.

Um, I think it's a question that we're not currently in a position to give a full answer to.

Um, for that, our understanding of how the brain and the mind are interrelated needs to be, uh, much more advanced than it currently is.

Um, but I think by way of analogy, I can give you an idea of how, uh, a materialist conception of the mind—how it, how it can, how it approaches this question.

Anyway, so to take the example of a computer, um, we know exactly, uh, the parts that make up a computer, and we know exactly what happens in those parts in order for the computer to do the things it's expected to do.

Ultimately, what happens inside a computer is electrons move around.

That's all it is at a basic level, and yet we're happy to say things like the computer calculates, uh, a sum, an equation, or the computer displays a web page.

And yet we don't feel the need to posit some kind of immaterial entity or immaterial knowledge or symbol or something from another realm that somehow is injected into the computer that enables it to do these things.

We know exactly what's in a computer, what happens in a computer, and we also know that in a manner of speaking, the result is greater than the sum of its parts.

The ability to calculate or to display a web page supervenes on the fundamental activity of electrons in a computer.

And what the materialist worldview says, or at least the version that I'm familiar with, is that in a similar way, the electrical and chemical activity inside the brain gives rise to Consciousness, thought, abstract Concepts, etc.

So logic, as in our internal representation of the most general features of the reality in which we find ourselves, logic in that sense supervenes on the physical.

I hope that makes it a bit clearer.

More Articles

View All
Genetics 101 | National Geographic
[Narrator] Genetics helps us understand the biological programming behind all life forms. But what exactly is the science of genetics? And what does its future hold? Genetics is the study of heredity. The expression of traits and how they are passed fro…
Short run and long run equilibrium and the business cycle | AP Macroeconomics | Khan Academy
What we’re going to do in this video is talk about the notion of equilibrium in a macroeconomics context. So let’s review a little bit of what we’ve already studied about aggregate demand and aggregate supply. So this vertical axis here, that is the pri…
Naval Ravikant - 11 Rules For Life (Genius Rules)
If you find a mountain and you start climbing, you spend your whole life climbing it, and you get, say, two-thirds of the way; and then you see the peak is like way up there. But you’re two-thirds of the way up. You’re still really high up, but to go the …
Essential Startup Advice During a Pandemic
[Music] Hello everyone, my name is Alex. I’m here from TechCrunch to talk a little bit about the startup world, the pandemic, what has changed, and what is the same. I’m very lucky to have Jeff Ralston from Y Combinator here with me today. Jeff, uh, befor…
Building a Sled | Alaska: The Next Generation
It’s a very harsh weather out here, very unpredictable. Takes a lot of time and effort to have everything ready for the winter. Ready? Yeah. Well pull up maybe, uh, pull the side out first, this way. Go on this side, and I’ll go on this side. This is the…
my Asian skincare routine for glass skin 🌈 ✨
Hi guys, it’s me Ruri! Today, I’m back with another video. Today, I’m going to show you guys my updated skincare routine. You guys really enjoyed the previous one, so I decided to create another one. So, let’s get started! Even though I’m not wearing mak…