Consciousness Explained

🛠️ … in progress … 🛠️

In the previous post, we explored how computers use electrical signals to create binary code—sequences of 0s and 1s that encode all the data and instructions we use. But binary alone isn’t enough to explain how computers perform operations, make decisions, or process information. For that, we need Boolean logic, a system that allows computers to manipulate binary data according to specific rules.

Boolean logic is the foundation of computation. It enables computers to perform everything from simple arithmetic to complex decision-making by combining binary values with logical operations. In this post, we’ll break down what Boolean logic is, how it works, and how it enables computers to represent and process the world.

What Is Boolean Logic?

Long before computers existed, philosophers like Aristotle laid the groundwork for what we now call logic. Aristotle’s system of syllogisms—rules for reasoning about propositions—was one of the first formal methods for evaluating whether statements were true or false.

For example, in Aristotle’s logic, a basic syllogism might look like this:

• Premise 1: All humans are mortal.
• Premise 2: Socrates is a human.
• Conclusion: Therefore, Socrates is mortal.

This method of reasoning uses propositions (statements that are either true or false) and rules to derive conclusions.

In the 19th century, George Boole extended these ideas into a mathematical system that could handle logical operations on binary values (true/false). Boolean logic formalized operations like AND, OR, and NOT, creating the foundation for modern computation. The system revolves around logical operators—functions that combine or modify binary values to produce new results.

The Three Core Logical Operators

1. AND

The AND operator outputs 1 (true) only when both inputs are 1. If either input is 0, the output is 0.

Input A	Input B	Output
0	0	0
0	1	0
1	0	0
1	1	1

Example:

• If you have two switches connected in series, electricity will only flow (output = 1) when both switches are closed (inputs = 1).

2. OR

The OR operator outputs 1 if either input is 1. The only time the output is 0 is when both inputs are 0.

Input A	Input B	Output
0	0	0
0	1	1
1	0	1
1	1	1

Example:

• If you have two switches connected in parallel, electricity will flow (output = 1) if either switch is closed (input = 1).

3. NOT

The NOT operator takes a single input and inverts it. If the input is 1, the output is 0; if the input is 0, the output is 1.

Input	Output
0	1
1	0

Example:

• Think of a NOT operator as a light switch that toggles the light’s state. If the light is off (input = 0), flipping the switch turns it on (output = 1), and vice versa.

Boolean Logic in Action: Representing the World

🛠️ … in progress … 🛠️

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Conclusion: The Power of Logical Rules

Boolean logic transforms binary code into a tool for computation. By combining simple logical rules, computers can make decisions, execute programs, and represent real-world scenarios in binary form.

In the next post, we’ll explore how memory works and how computers use these logical operations to store and retrieve data, enabling them to perform tasks and remember information.

Before we dive into the complexities of how machines process information, let’s start with the basics: binary code—the language of computers.

A computer operates using tiny switches, called transistors, that can either allow or block the flow of electricity. When electricity flows through a switch, we represent it as 1 (on). When it doesn’t, we represent it as 0 (off).

By combining these on/off states in sequences, we can create binary values:

• A single switch can represent two states: 0 or 1.
• Two switches together can represent four states: 00, 01, 10, 11.
• Adding more switches exponentially increases the number of states we can represent.

At its heart, binary code is a way to represent information using sequences of 0s and 1s. This might sound abstract, but it’s no different from other “codes” we are more familiar. For example:

• Morse Code: Represents letters and numbers with dots and dashes.
• Braille: Represents characters with raised dots in specific patterns.

Binary works in much the same way. It’s a system for encoding information, but instead of dots, dashes, or patterns, it uses just two states: 0 and 1. This simplicity makes it perfect for computers, which rely on electrical signals (on/off) to process and store data.

Representing Numbers

Numbers are one of the simplest things to represent in binary. Each binary digit (or bit) corresponds to a power of 2, starting from the rightmost position. For example:

• The binary number 101 represents the decimal number 5 because:
  (1 × 2²) + (0 × 2¹) + (1 × 2⁰) = 4 + 0 + 1 = 5

This positional system works just like the familiar decimal system, but with only two digits (0 and 1) instead of ten (0–9).

Representing Letters

To represent text, computers use standard codes like ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange). Each letter is assigned a unique binary value. For example:

• The letter A is represented by the decimal number 65, which translates to the binary value 01000001.
• Similarly, B is represented as 66 in decimal, or 01000010 in binary.

This mapping allows computers to store and process text by encoding each character as a binary sequence.

Representing Images

Images are made up of tiny dots called pixels, and each pixel has a color or shade. In the simplest case, such as a black-and-white image, each pixel can be represented by a single bit:

• 0 for black
• 1 for white

For more complex images, additional bits are used to represent shades of gray or colors. For example, a pixel in a color image might require 24 bits (8 bits each for red, green, and blue values).

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Conclusion

What makes binary code so powerful is its universality. With the right encoding rules, it can represent anything: numbers, letters, sounds, images, and even instructions for the computer itself. The key lies in the code—the predefined system that tells the computer how to interpret sequences of 0s and 1s.

But how do computers use these binary sequences to perform operations and make decisions? That’s where Boolean logic comes in—a system that allows computers to process binary data using logical rules.

In the next post, we’ll explore how Boolean logic gives binary code its power, enabling computers to calculate, compare, and make decisions. Stay tuned!

Before talking about consciousness, I think it’s important to understand simpler things first—like how information processing works in physical terms. In David J. Chalmers’ book The Conscious Mind, in the first chapter, he argues:

…Taking the objective view, we can tell a story about how fields, waves, and particles in the spatiotemporal manifold interact in subtle ways, leading to the development of complex systems such as brains. In principle, there is no deep philosophical mystery in the fact that these systems can process information in complex ways, react to stimuli with sophisticated behavior, and even exhibit such complex capacities as learning, memory, and language. All this is impressive, but it is not metaphysically baffling…

Even understanding his point, the first time I read his book, all this information processing—along with learning, memory, and language capacities—still felt a bit like magic to me. So my first step in this journey was to break it down and explore the building blocks that enable intelligent machines to express ideas or even acquire what we might call knowledge.

To accomplish our first goal—to understand the basics of how computers work—we’ll explore these topics in a series of posts. This series will take us from the electrical signals at the heart of computation all the way to how computers store and process information. The series will be divided into 3 posts:

1. From Electrical Signals to Binary Code – We’ll start by exploring how computers use electrical signals to represent data as binary code (0s and 1s) and why binary is so essential to computation.
2. Boolean Logic and Representing the World – Next, we’ll delve into Boolean logic and how computers use it to process binary data and represent real-world concepts.
3. Memory and Information Processing – Finally, we’ll see how computers combine binary code, Boolean logic, and memory to store, retrieve, and process information to perform tasks.

Each post will build a clear picture of how computers work at the most basic level. By the end of this series, we’ll have a foundation for diving deeper into more complex topics, like machine learning and artificial intelligence.

Let’s go!