Here the sentence is a complex of names, to which a complex of elements corresponds. The primary elements are the coloured squares. “But are these simple?” I wouldn’t know what I could more naturally call a ‘simple’ in this language-game. But under other circumstances, I’d call a monochrome square, consisting perhaps of two rectangles or of the elements colour and shape, “composite”. But the concept of compositeness might also be extended so that a smaller area was said to be ‘composed’ of a greater area and another one subtracted from it. Compare the ‘composition’ of forces, the ‘division’ of a line by a point outside it; these expressions show that we are sometimes even inclined to conceive the smaller as the result of a composition of greater parts, and the greater as the result of a division of the smaller.
But I do not know whether to say that the figure described by our sentence consists of four or of nine elements! Well, does the sentence consist of four letters or of nine? And which are its elements, the types of letter, or the letters? Does it matter which we say, so long as we avoid misunderstandings in any particular case? — LW, Philosophical Investigations, §48
The alternative to both is found most explicitly in that grandmother of philosophy, Mary Midgley, but can be seen in other Oxbridge philosophers from the middle of last century. It's simply that we use different types of explanation in different situations, that we need not, indeed ought not, commit to there being a single monolithic explanation of everything. — Banno
But can anyone set out clearly what emergence is? — Banno
It's simply that we use different types of explanation in different situations, that we need not, indeed ought not, commit to there being a single monolithic explanation of everything. — Banno
But can anyone set out clearly what emergence is? — Banno
As you implied, the key to your differences with ↪creativesoul is in divergent definitions of "To Be / To Exist". A typical dictionary definition says that "To Exist" means Objective Reality, which seems to exclude Subjective Ideality — Gnomon
For example, consider the mind-brain relationship. Emergence suggests that mental phenomena, like consciousness, arise from the complexity of neural networks in the brain, but you can't predict consciousness just by examining individual neurons. Supervenience, in this context, emphasizes that mental states depend on the underlying neural states.
However,there is also such a thing as top-down causation which mitigates against purely physicalist explanations of consciousness. This concept becomes evident in phenomena like the placebo effect and other instances of psychosomatic medicine. — Wayfarer
Then there's also the discovery of neuroplasticity. as highlighted in Norman Doidge's book "The Brain That Changes Itself," demonstrates the remarkable ability of the brain to change in response to various kinds of training and stimuli. Neuroplasticity refers to the brain's capacity to reorganize its structure, functions, and connections in response to experiences, learning, and environmental factors. — Wayfarer
Do you have incontrovertible empirical evidence of top-down causation? — wonderer1
I don’t believe the substance of this exchange can be explained in physical terms. — Wayfarer
If I say something that affects you it might increase your blood pressure. Yet nothing physical would have passed between us, unlike if I had administered a medicine. That’s an example. — Wayfarer
I'm awfully confident that you physically used a computer input to device to compose your post so that it was physically sent over the intenet to the TPF server. Then when I reopened the thread my Kindle was able to receive the data representing your post, as a result of that data having been physically transmitted from the TPF server to my Kindle. — wonderer1
Of course. IN each transition, the physical constituents of the information change and also the underlying media. It's translated between electrical pulses, pixels on the screen, then you might even write it down. But the substance of the information stays the same. So how could that be physical? — Wayfarer
It is clearly naive however to assume identical content for both of us associated with the digital data. If such verbatim content transfer occurred, I wouldn't be so frustrated about people here not understanding emergence and supervenience. — wonderer1
"How do you combine a bunch of building blocks and get something completely new that wasn't in the blocks to start with?" Intuitive answer is you simply don't. — Count Timothy von Icarus
No brain external information. — Mark Nyquist
I understand what you're saying, but I don't agree with it. The point is, however, that we speak the same language and can convey ideas through text. That is what I say is not meaningfully reducible to the physical. — Wayfarer
It's in framing what emergence is in a way that meshes with the overall ontology (which would generally be physicalism since the overwhelming amount of work on emergence is in that context). — Count Timothy von Icarus
I've decided that ontologies are a lot like impressionist paintings. They look better from far way. :rofl: — Count Timothy von Icarus
Chapter five here is worth a read. Thanks, @Ludwig V.Anyone else you'd append for someone to explore? — AmadeusD
On the contrary, physicalism is exactly true, if what you are doing is physics. That's the methodological point made way back in the second post here. Physics has no place for explanations that are not physical, but in turn it has to restrict itself to not presenting explanations of things from outside its purview.In other words, then, there are no good arguments for physicalism, insofar as it is presumed to be a monistic explanation — Wayfarer
As with causality, it doesn't seem to stand up to close inspection....it actually reduced my confidence in "emergence," — Count Timothy von Icarus
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