Information about Strong Emergence
Strong emergence is a type of emergence in which the emergent property is irreducible to its individual constituents. Some philosophers have proposed that qualia and consciousness demonstrate strong emergence. Strong emergence stands in contrast to weak emergence.
However, "the debate about whether or not the whole can be predicted from the properties of the parts misses the point. Wholes produce unique combined effects, but many of these effects may be co-determined by the context and the interactions between the whole and its environment(s)."[2] Along that same thought, Arthur Koestler stated, "it is the synergistic effects produced by wholes that are the very cause of the evolution of complexity in nature" and used the metaphor of Janus to illustrate how the two perspectives (strong or holistic vs. weak or reductionistic) should be treated as perspectives, not exclusives, and should work together to address the issues of emergence.[3] Further,
The plausibility of strong emergence is questioned by some as contravening our usual understanding of physics. Mark A. Bedau observes:
Overview
Strong emergence says that if systems can have qualities not directly traceable to the system's components, but rather to how those components interact, and one is willing to accept that a system supervenes on its components, then it is difficult to account for an emergent property's cause. These new qualities are irreducible to the system's constituent parts.[1] The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. This view of emergence is called strong emergence. Strong emergence is a view not widely held in the physical sciences but proposed as a philosophical theory of etiology, epistemology and ontology.However, "the debate about whether or not the whole can be predicted from the properties of the parts misses the point. Wholes produce unique combined effects, but many of these effects may be co-determined by the context and the interactions between the whole and its environment(s)."[2] Along that same thought, Arthur Koestler stated, "it is the synergistic effects produced by wholes that are the very cause of the evolution of complexity in nature" and used the metaphor of Janus to illustrate how the two perspectives (strong or holistic vs. weak or reductionistic) should be treated as perspectives, not exclusives, and should work together to address the issues of emergence.[3] Further,
- "The ability to reduce everything to simple fundamental laws does not imply the ability to start from those laws and reconstruct the universe..The constructionist hypothesis breaks down when confronted with the twin difficulties of scale and complexity..At each level of complexity entirely new properties appear..Psychology is not applied biology, nor is biology applied chemistry..We can now see that the whole becomes not merely more, but very different from the sum of its parts."[4]
The plausibility of strong emergence is questioned by some as contravening our usual understanding of physics. Mark A. Bedau observes:
- "Although strong emergence is logically possible, it is uncomfortably like magic. How does an irreducible but supervenient downward causal power arise, since by definition it cannot be due to the aggregation of the micro-level potentialities? Such causal powers would be quite unlike anything within our scientific ken. This not only indicates how they will discomfort reasonable forms of materialism. Their mysteriousness will only heighten the traditional worry that emergence entails illegitimately getting something from nothing." [5]
Bibliography
- Anderson, P.W. (1972), "More is Different: Broken Symmetry and the Nature of the Hierarchical Structure of Science", Science 177: 393-396
- Bedau, Mark A. (1997), Weak Emergence
- Koestler, Arthur (1969), in A. Koestler & J. R. Smythies, Beyond Reductionism: New Perspectives in the Life Sciences, London: Hutchinson
- Laughlin, Robert (2005), , Basic Books, ISBN 0-465-03828-X
References
1. ^ Laughlin, 2005.
2. ^ Chalmers, 2002.
3. ^ Koestler, 1969.
4. ^ Anderson, 1972.
5. ^ Bedau, 1997.
2. ^ Chalmers, 2002.
3. ^ Koestler, 1969.
4. ^ Anderson, 1972.
5. ^ Bedau, 1997.
See also
External links
- Emergence article, 1997.
emergence refers to the way complex systems and patterns arise out of a multiplicity of relatively simple interactions. Like intelligence in the field of AI, or agents in distributed artificial intelligence, emergence is central to the theory of complex systems and yet very
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Qualia" (IPA: [ˈkwɑːliə]) is "an unfamiliar term for something that could not be more familiar to each of us: the ways things seem to us"[1].
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Consciousness is a characteristic of the mind generally regarded to comprise qualities such as subjectivity, self-awareness, sentience, sapience, and the ability to perceive the relationship between oneself and one's environment.
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Weak Emergence is a type of emergence in which the emergent property is reducible to its individual constituents.
This is opposed to strong emergence, in which the emergent property is irreducible to its individual constituents.
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This is opposed to strong emergence, in which the emergent property is irreducible to its individual constituents.
External link
- Emergence
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System (from Latin systēma, in turn from Greek σύστημα systēma) is a set of entities, real or abstract, where each entity interacts with, or is related to, at least one other
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supervenience is a kind of dependency relationship, typically held to obtain between sets of properties. According to one standard definition, a set of properties A supervenes on a set of properties B, if and only if any two objects x and y which share all properties in B (are
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Irreducibility, in philosophy, has the sense that a complete account of an entity will not be possible at lower levels of explanation and which has novel properties beyond prediction and explanation.
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Etiology (alternately aetiology, aitiology) is the study of causation. Derived from the Greek αίτιολογία, "giving a reason for" (
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Epistemology or theory of knowledge is the branch of philosophy that studies the nature, methods, limitations, and validity of knowledge and belief.
The term "epistemology" is based on the Greek words "
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The term "epistemology" is based on the Greek words "
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Ontology is a study of conceptions of reality and the nature of being. In philosophy, ontology (from the Greek ὤν, genitive ὄντος: of being (part.
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Arthur Koestler CBE (September 5, 1905, Budapest – March 3, 1983, London) was a Hungarian polymath who became a naturalized British subject. He wrote journalism, novels, social philosophy, and books on scientific subjects.
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Science is the academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and is considered one of the world's most prestigious scientific journals. The journal is peer-reviewed, is published weekly, and has a print subscriber base of around 130,000.
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emergence refers to the way complex systems and patterns arise out of a multiplicity of relatively simple interactions. Like intelligence in the field of AI, or agents in distributed artificial intelligence, emergence is central to the theory of complex systems and yet very
..... Click the link for more information.
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Weak Emergence is a type of emergence in which the emergent property is reducible to its individual constituents.
This is opposed to strong emergence, in which the emergent property is irreducible to its individual constituents.
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This is opposed to strong emergence, in which the emergent property is irreducible to its individual constituents.
External link
- Emergence
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