But the brain is a biological organ with cells that die and are replaced by new cells each day. — magritte
It's a miracle we remember anything — magritte
Henry Gustav Molaison is one of the most important and studied human research subjects of all time. He revolutionized what we know about memory today because of the amnesia he developed after a lobotomy in 1953 to treat the severe epilepsy he developed after a head injury sustained earlier in life.
I don't know whether there are an infinite number of thoughts.
I don't know where to begin thinking about an infinite number of thoughts.
if materialism is true, there are only a finite number of possible thoughts — RogueAI
Well, our days are full of slop that isn't worth remembering anyway, so there's that. The upside of that is that since our brain neurons last a lifetime, the vast majority of them are on the job for life. — Bitter Crank
I'm OK with there being a finite number of possible thoughts, given that the finite number of possible thoughts is really very hugely huge. Unless you can actually count all the grains of sand in the world (a very hugely huge finite number) or all the variations possible for snow flakes (no two are alike, supposedly) then the world is not impoverished by a finite number of sand grains or snow flakes. Or possible thoughts.
And it isn't enriched by an infinite number of possible thoughts, sand grains, or snow flakes. Just one of my extremely finite opinions, of course.
For any brain-sized region of space, there are only a finite amount of configurations of matter possible. That means there is a finite amount of possible brain states, which would entail a finite amount of possible thoughts. However, math is infinite, and any number can be conceived, so there are an infinite number of possible thoughts. is this a problem for reductionism?
My point is it seems like there are an infinite number of possible thoughts to we can think of, and that's not possible, given materialism. — RogueAI
Though I do not think the mind is a brain, I do think “the infinite use of finite means” could provide a way to avoid your problem. Just as a finite number of letters could conceivably be used to create an infinite number of sentences, a finite number of “brain states” could produce an infinite number of thoughts.
Just as a finite number of letters could conceivably be used to create an infinite number of sentences — NOS4A2
That means there is a finite amount of possible brain states, which would entail a finite amount of possible thoughts. However, math is infinite, and any number can be conceived, so there are an infinite number of possible thoughts — RogueAI
That means there is a finite amount of possible brain states, which would entail a finite amount of possible thoughts. However, math is infinite, and any number can be conceived, so there are an infinite number of possible thoughts. is this a problem for reductionism? — RogueAI
For any brain-sized region of space, there are only a finite amount of configurations of matter possible. That means there is a finite amount of possible brain states, which would entail a finite amount of possible thoughts. However, math is infinite, and any number can be conceived, so there are an infinite number of possible thoughts. is this a problem for reductionism? — RogueAI
No, because we don't conceive of numbers in this way. We don't have a concept of 143,672ness. We can relate 143,672 to 143,671 by comparing six symbols each one of an ordered set (the decimal base) and noting that all are the same but the last, and that the last digit of the former is later in the set than that of the latter.
When we consider numbers like 9,479,284,479,946,424,742,057,043,748,258,831,164,859,380,423,470,964,125,667,852,865,110,732,989,169,568,826,863,358,101,582 we can't even do that. It's just "a very big number". We can break it down, but at no point are we considering 9,479,284,479,946,424,742,057,043,748,258,831,164,859,380,423,470,964,125,667,852,865,110,732,989,169,568,826,863,358,101,582ness.
I'm going to push back on this. I agree that for any absurdly long number, it's hard to imagine how we can hold it in our minds, and yet, for any number, I can add 1 to it and figure out what the answer is. How am I able to do that if the number is so large I can't properly think of it? — RogueAI
We don't have a concept of 143,672ness. We can relate 143,672 to 143,671 by comparing six symbols each one of an ordered set (the decimal base) and noting that all are the same but the last, and that the last digit of the former is later in the set than that of the latter. — Kenosha Kid
"Because manipulating the final symbol according to a small set of rules learned in childhood is trivial and does not require comprehension of the entire number."
That's true. But your position entails that for any number over 143,672, when we do math we're not really understanding anything, we're just playing a rules game. That doesn't seem right. Do you believe that? — RogueAI
That's a pretty cynical view, Kenosha. I'm not sure I buy it. I think I have a pretty good concept of, say, a million. — RogueAI
So I grant you that some numbers are "unthinkable" (and what does the existence of unthinkable numbers entail?) — RogueAI
But if math is just a rules game, how did we come up with innovations like imaginary numbers, which have real-world applications? Doesn't that require understanding of math on a conceptual level, rather than something that's just rules-based? — RogueAI
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