Combining Texts

Ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Being You' and 'Causal Connections'

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3 ideas

15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 7. Animal Minds
Dogs show reason in decisions made by elimination [Chrysippus, by Sext.Empiricus]
     Full Idea: A dog makes use of the fifth complex indemonstrable syllogism when, arriving at a spot where three ways meet, after smelling at two roads by which the quarry did not pass, he rushes off at once by the third without pausing to smell.
     From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Sextus Empiricus - Outlines of Pyrrhonism I.69
     A reaction: As we might say: either A or B or C; not A; not B; therefore C. I wouldn't want to trust this observation without a lot of analysis of slow-motion photography of dogs as crossroads. Even so, it is a nice challenge to Descartes' view of animals.
15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 8. Brain
Single neurons can carry out complex functions [Seth]
     Full Idea: It is increasingly apparent that even single neurons are capable of carrying out highly complex functions all by themselves.
     From: Anil Seth (Being You [2021], I.1 n)
     A reaction: Bang goes the simple connectionist account of consciousness.
The cerbellum has a huge number of neurons, but little involvement in consciousness [Seth]
     Full Idea: The cerebellum [at the back] has about four times as many neurons as the rest of the brain put together, but seems barely involved in consciousness.
     From: Anil Seth (Being You [2021], I.2)
     A reaction: I wonder if it also has four times as many connections?