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
Drawing particulate models of reaction mixtures | Chemical reactions | AP Chemistry | Khan Academy
In a previous video, we used a particulate model like this to understand a reaction—not just understand the reaction, but to balance the chemical reaction as well. When I hand drew these particles, the atoms in this particulate model here, I tried to draw…
It grows from the barrel of a gun
Chairman now said every communist must grasp the truth: political power grows out of the barrel of a gun. The power of the state is, of course, political, so Chairman Mao could have said that the power of the state grows out of the barrel of a gun. Is thi…
LearnStorm Growth Mindset: Dave Paunesku on student self-reflection
One important way that teachers can, uh, enhance a growth mindset is to really help students self-reflect on their own learning. So, in the LearnStorm activities, we try to be really intentional about, uh, creating a lot of room for students to engage in …
Groundhog Day Explained
February is home to one of the most important holidays of the year not to forget: Groundhog Day. If you live outside of Can-merica, then you might not know what a groundhog is, so… here you go: this is a groundhog. They’re basically giant grumpy squirrels…
How a bill becomes a law | US government and civics | US government and civics | Khan Academy
In other videos, we have first started talking about the legislative branch of the United States federal government. We talk about how it has two houses: the Senate, which has 100 members (two per state, two times fifty), and the House of Representatives,…
The First Wave - Trailer | National Geographic
I have to keep it together. I have kids who can’t see me fall apart. He has to come home; he has no choice. I just let my fear be my strength because I know one day I’m gonna be with my wife and my baby. It is because of you that we are gonna make it thr…