Ourcellves? (Identity)

by David Turell , Sunday, April 06, 2014, 22:28 (3673 days ago) @ romansh


> Romansh:Yes I agree there are many of orders of magnitude difference in complexity.
> So what? ... A good number of them boil down to changes in electron density around a central nucleus.-OK, a good number but not all. 
> 
> Romansh: Reductionism does not make things simpler. It simply (tries to) isolate a system and then understand what is going on ... the various interactions within that system. If there is a behaviour that is identifiable that system it can be described as weak emergence.-Granted. But you are describing "simpler".
> 
> Romansh: For immensly complicated systems whilst we may not be able to isolate and describe all the interactions within that system we have no reason to believe (well at least I don't) that there is something magical going on.-Well, something like a kidney or a liver is so complex I don't see an arrival by chnce. I might say the same thing fo the brain. For liver and kidney reductionism can explain the functions, but at the level of the brain we cannot find the functions that produce consciousness. We can see the functions but cannot propose the result we experience. For me the brain gets to the magical level.