Weeks 3 and 4

Physics is the study of matter and its motion through space and time , along with related concepts such as energy and force. Philosophy, according to the video "History of Western Philosophy", is the study of the general and fundamental nature of reality, existence, knowledge, value, mathematics, reason, mind and language. Having taking a physics class in my undergraduate educational career, I can make elementary connections between the two disciplines and can draw understanding behind the importance of physics to philosophy. Without understanding physics and general rules of the universe, it can be difficult to understand how "matter" exist and interact within the universe and calculate the different approaches to life from a philosophical viewpoint. For example, quantum mechanics deals with the motion and interaction of subatomic particles with an integration of the uncertainty principle. The video Quantum Superposition: The Newton-Einstein Correspondence Paradox the cat experiment exemplified the ability of a particle to be in or (move towards) two different places at once, hence why the cat was considered to be dead and alive simultaneously.

Eliminative materialism is the radical claim that our ordinary, common-sense understanding of the mind is deeply wrong and that some or all of the mental states posited by common-sense do not actually exist (Ramsey, 2013). In the eliminative videos (parts 1-3), the details of this ideology are explained. In part one, the video provides the example "then God did it"; this claim says that if parts of life cannot be explained by factual disciplines such as mathematics, chemistry, physics, biology, psychology, or sociology (in that order) then the only other explanation/reasoning behind that part of life is the work of God. In part two, "The Death of Thor" explains the part of eliminative materialism that moves from more mythological interpretations to more scientific interpretations. For example, instead of the talk of spirits being the cause of diseases, the talk of viruses and bacteria became the subject of discussion. In the third part, "Intelligent Reductionism", relies more on human psychology. For example we use certain words to describe what we believe is happening with our anatomies, deriving from ancient terminology.