Talk:Emergence/Archive 3

Archiving the Dispute

Now that some new parties have expressed an interest and are contributing, I think the time has arrived to archive the dispute that began over tagging for citations and led to the article being protected (frozen) December 3. I have archived it and then copied three specific remarks on subject matter (edited for concision) to a section following, to refresh their currency to help guide the development of the article content, since they seemed especially noteworthy and cogent. If this is premature, we can work the material back in (not a revert, please, as I am adding some original remarks of my own below), but I'm confident the timing is right. Hu 17:54, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I apologize, but in the process I inadvertently clobbered [1] an edit by Fourdee. I have placed it in the Archive 2 since it seems to be appropriate there. [2] — Hu 18:12, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Some Prior Remarks on Subject Matter

Hofstadter and Gell-Mann

Hofstadter supports only "weak emergence" in explaining consciousness, from GEB:

"This should not be taken as an antireductionist position. It just implies that a reductionist explanation of a mind, in order to be comprehensible, must bring in "soft" concepts such as levels, mappings, and meanings. In particular, I have no doubt that a totally reductionist but incomprehensible explanation of the brain exists; the problem is how to translate it into a language we ourselves can fathom."

Gell-Mann on the subject of consciousness rejects the mystical, new-cause and pseudo-Heisenberg-based explanations - from the summary of "Consciousness, Reduction, and Emergence":

"Consciousness is often seen as requiring a special kind of explanation. But the various aspects of self-awareness can presumably emerge when certain levels of complexity are reached in an organism: it is not necessary to assume additional mechanisms or hidden causes. Looking at the most fundamental level, that of elementary particle physics, three principles appear—the conformability of nature to herself, the applicability of the criterion of simplicity, and the utility of certain parts of mathematics in describing physical reality—which are in themselves emergent properties of the fundamental laws of physics. [...] All the other sciences emerge in principle from fundamental physics plus historical accidents, even though "reduction" is obviously inadequate as a strategy. [...] Finally, it is argued that appeals to the alleged weirdness of quantum mechanics are based on a misunderstanding and are unlikely to have any place in a discussion of consciousness."

(Quoted by Fourdee 21:05, 4 December 2006 (UTC))

Intro and General Thoughts

First, I have a suggestion on an approach that I think is more likely to resolve the dispute. Why not focus, at least in the introduction, on describing how the concept of emergence has developed and been applied in a number of different disciplines, instead of trying to definitively say what *emergence* *is*.

Second, some more general thoughts: While I agree with many of his points, I believe that Fourdee has conflated the imposition of a model on a system with the determination of the causal relationships amongst the whole and its components. Clearly, it is incorrect to say that the complete dynamics of a (deterministic) system are not implied by the dynamics of its individual interactions. However, by embracing the broadest possible definition of emergence, and failing to explain the process by which the concept has been extended, the current article makes it seem like this is the claim.

No one makes the argument that the mathematical operators that compose a nonlinear dynamical system such as, say, the Logistic map do not "explain" or "predict" the function's resultant behavior. The only reason for this I can think of is that in the context it's abundantly clear that the behavior under consideration is the result of systemic properties: the whole is more than the sum of its parts.

Also, it's interesting to note that the article on Complex Systems doesn't even mention emergence. It does, however, link to Synergetics, which deals with emergence in the more limited sense of self-organization. It would seem to me that this is the narrowest, most mathematical definition of emergence, and an important historical motivator for the concept. This article should definitely have more than a couple of sentences to say on the role of entropy in the matter (pun intended!).

Finally, here is a quote from a paper called "Perpetuating Evolutionary Emergence" by Alastair Channon, which I think is a nice introduction to the way that the same core concept has been approached from a number of different perspectives:

Cariani identified the three current tracts of thought on emergence, calling them “computational”, “thermodynamic” and “relative to a model”. Computational emergence is related to the manifestation of new global forms, such as flocking behavior and chaos, from local interactions. Thermodynamic emergence is concerned with issues such as the origins of life, where order emerges from noise. The emergence relative to a model concept deals with situations where observers need to change their model in order to keep up with a system’s behavior. This is close to Steels’ concept of emergence, which refers to ongoing processes which produce results invoking vocabulary not previously involved in the description of the system’s inner components – "new descriptive categories".

The paper is available online if anyone would like to look up the references to Cariani and Steels.

Kyle Cronan 11:20, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Paper on weak vs. strong emergence

Here's a paper that would seem to be relevant to our discussion: [3]

There's a lot of philosophical language that just makes no sense to me, but this section in particular seems helpful:

Since [strongly] emergent phenomena supervene on underlying processes, in this sense the underlying processes constitute and generate the emergent phenomena. And emergent phenomena are autonomous from the underlying processes since they exert an irreducible form of downward causal influence. Nevertheless, strong emergence has a number of failings, all of which can be traced to strong downward causation.

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.

It would seem that this distinction between "strong emergence" and "weak emergence" is primarily of concern to Philosophy. The author's characterization of weak emergence, later in the paper, captures the more CS/physics oriented view of emergence as new "global forms" arising out of local behavior, as well as the more evolutionary view of emergence as requiring increasingly sophisticated models of the system's dynamics (ie, open-ended evolution--see Universal Constructor).

I believe what we must certainly avoid is giving the impression that these views of emergence, inasmuch as they represent current scientific theory, somehow support strong emergence, a philosophical position about irreducibility. Kyle Cronan 07:16, 8 December 2006 (UTC

Some of what I'm replying to has been archived, so I'm going to summarize a bit.

Fourdee, you want to know how systems methodology is not like the scientific method. To put it in one word, "laboratory". Science presumes that things can be taken apart, isolated independently, then the way they work without countless other things acting on them (that is, the way they work in a controlled and artificial environment) is the way the work in the real world. While that can be useful, its a statement of faith. Systems methodology doesn't make that assumption. It realizes that the countless other things are possibly acting on what is being studied in ways that are unknown and, therefore, to isolate what is being studied in order to see what it does is very likely to study it when it isn't behaving the same as it does in the real world environment. Kyle, why are you presuming that philosophy and science are two seperate things, especially given that I have already pointed out that science cannot be seperated from its philosophical underpinnings? Is it because I didn't explain that clearly enough or is it that you didn't read what I wrote?-Psychohistorian 01:06, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't believe that the "laboratory" is part of the scientific method. My recollection is that you have repeatedly insisted systems theory doesn't use the scientific method, which is generally held to be constituted of the following:

Characterizations (Quantifications, observations, and measurements)

Hypotheses (theoretical, hypothetical explanations of observations and measurements)

Predictions (reasoning including logical deduction from hypothesis and theory)

Experiments (tests of all of the above)

If systems thinking doesn't involve the above, precisely how are its ideas formulated and tested? Isn't the scientific method just a description of how theories arise? After all, isn't this field usually called "systems science"? Fourdee 02:16, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Okay, so you are using the term as it is used by the uninformed masses and as it is taught in freshman level science classes. I was going a bit deeper than that. After all, astrology would be a science based on your description above, so would alchemy.-Psychohistorian 13:04, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

That is the "scientific method". I believe that's the term you have been using, have you not? If you are aware of some other meaning for "the scientific method" feel free to provide it. Science is commonly used to describe "the social sciences" and "systems science" - just what is the department of a university where systems theory is taught usually called? I've always heard it called the Department of Systems Science or something to that effect. Apparently all these other people are ignorant of what science means too. Astrology and alchemy would definitely be science if experiments validated their claims and predictions - big difference. Fourdee 21:14, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Interesting little conundrum you've presented me, Fourdee. I can either side with you, an anonymous editor on Wikipedia who seems to know very little about science (given that you are belittling the role of philosophy in science, have had to have it pointed out to you that you were using the term 'accuracy' when you meant 'precision', etc.), or I can side with Eberhardt Rechtin - a distinguished and highly respected researcher in the field (who received the Medal for Exceptional Scientific Achievement, the Alexander Graham Bell Award, the Pioneer Award, and many others). I think I'll side with Rechtin as I've been doing.-Psychohistorian 14:51, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Eberhardt Rechtin was an engineer, not a scientist, and is hardly the sort of expert one would cite for defining what the "scientific method" is. The scientific method is defined as I gave it above. Fourdee 20:01, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

A Medium Revamp

I have made a number of edits based on the start made by Kyle to Talk:Emergence/NewVersion, comprising of the following changes (which are in the context of some suggestions for next steps, below):

• Retained Kyle's work on the introduction mostly as is, for the time being.
• Systematized the References and Bibliography according the Wikipedia implementation of Harvard referencing (reasoning and discussion below).
• Moved a paragraph about the three orders of emergent structures up into sub-intro of the "Emergent structures in nature" because I thought it was sufficiently high level to belong there, and also I think it is a fascinating analysis.
• Trimmed the "Non-Living Physical Systems" sub-section because it was long and verbose, particularly on Temperature. I removed a sentence or phrase here and there.
• Moved a paragraph from the "Biological systems" sub-section up into the "Physical sub-section and reversed the order of the sentences so that they go in order of Physics, Chemistry and Biology, which is a nice progression and seque to the next section.
• Moved a couple of the "Biological systems" paragraphs around for more orderly presentation.
• Highlighted the terms "weak" and "strong", which is not strictly Wikipedia style, but I think they are important enough.
• Split out the stock market example into an Economics sub-section.
• Added a statement about pathways in landscape architecture. I spent over an hour looking for an online reference without success. They exist and I am depending on our architecture expert to provide one!
• Restored the three-column organization of the See Also section so that it takes less vertical space.

Hu 17:54, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Citations and References

After a couple of years of experience here (during which references were revamped right across the encyclopedia) and some recent experimentation, I have concluded that I heartily recommend the Wikipedia implementation of the Harvard citation schema, particularly for scholarly articles, for the following reasons (no other Wikipedia scheme offers all of these advantages):

• As it appears in the text to a reader, it provides a meaningful reference (Name, year), especially for one familiar with the literature of the field, more meaningful than a footnote number, and not bulky.
• The reference links in the text edit phase are simple, compact, and easy to use and reuse. They are of the form {{Harv|Name|year}} (Template talk:Harvard citation).
• The Bibliography entries (Template talk:Harvard reference) can (with no alteration) double as citations for the text. Thus the Reference and Bibliography can be seamlessly melded.
• The Wikipedia footnoting system (<ref></ref>) can be used for footnotes without interference with the Harv citations. However, the footnote system is not the best for citations because it puts the reference entry into the text and it can be a bother finding duplicate entries and keeping the naming scheme consistent.
• The References can be alphabetically sorted, not possible with the footnoting system.
• The {{cite}} schema leads to even bulkier disruption of the text in the edit phase.

In the reference/bibliography section, sort on primary order alphabetical on surname, secondary on year. Use unspaced Harvard Citations in the text for compactness, and fully spaced (for readability and clarity during editing) Harvard References in the Reference/Bibliography section.

Hu 17:54, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Next Steps

For the next steps onward I have the following suggestions:

• More citations to the references (of course).
• Delay any further work on the introduction until the body of the article is in good shape. Then doing the introduction becomes an easier task of distillation and summary.
• Sections on Strong Emergence, Weak Emergence, and Criticisms of the emergence paradigm. There could potentially be separate articles on Strong and Weak, if the sections get large enough. There could even potentially be some discussion of mysticism, not as the primary focus (since I agree with others that this is strongly and primarily a scientific/technical topic), but as a counterpoint.
• No excision or neglect of discussion of emergence as it relates to Intelligence, Consciousness, Societies, Governance, Economics, Architecture, Software, Memes and other fields.
• Remember that you can put very radical changes into this "New Version" sandbox without prior discussion, but if they really are radical, it might be best to put them in and then immediately revert one's self. This gets them into the record for diffing and comparing and discussion without interrupting the regular flow of edits. I trust that the medium revamp I have just made will not be seen as severe or radical, but will be seen as evolutionary.

Hu 17:54, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Introduction

Thanks for your work Hu. However, I find this new introduction completely objectionable, still uncited, and completely counter to the balanced view which is the only resolution to our dispute.

"Emergence is the appearance of systemic behavior that can not be explained as the mere aggregate effect of the system's constituent interactions, or be analyzed at the level of the constituent parts. The concept is related to the old observation that, often, "the whole is more than the sum of its parts" (synergy). The term is also generally employed in scientific contexts to describe the inability to readily explain macroscale phenomena in terms of understood microscale dynamics."

"Cannot be explained", "the whole is more than the sum of its parts", and "inability". Those are not facts. It seems to be you ignored all of my objections and came back with an even stronger phrasing of your view. I also think the introduction is the first part we need to address, so that a consistent definition for or explanation of emergence can be used throughout the article, as well defining the tone to be used. Were I to edit this new version at the moment I would delete a lot of it. Fourdee 18:14, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I suggest we leave the introduction as-is for the time-being, since by working the article into good shape, all issues will get straightened out, and a good introduction will emerge at that time. Hu 18:18, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I do not believe you left the introduction as it was, this is an entirely new one. The article builds on the introduction. If we don't get the phrasing right up front, the whole thing will have to be redone. I would prefer something like:

Emergence is a term used in Philosophy, Systems Theory and the Sciences to describe the appearance of complex organized systems. It is generally divided into two perspectives, that of "weak emergence" and "strong emergence". Weak emergence describes new properties arising in systems as a result of the interactions at an elemental level. Strong emergence, which is a view not widely held in the sciences but proposed as a philosophical theory of etiology, epistemology and ontology, describes complex systems as not being explained by their constituent interactions, in other words that the whole is more than the sum of its parts.

-- Fourdee 18:26, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

In other words, if you are building on the "cannot be explained", "inability to explain" and "more than the sum of parts" points of view and using them as facts, your edits will be to no end and will have be reverted, as these are not accepted facts, even if cited. Assuming good citations, these concepts will still need to be phrased as opinion because they are hotly contested. Fourdee 18:28, 9 December 2006 (UTC).

No, as I explained above, I left the introduction basically the way Kyle had changed it (it was Kyle who made "an entirely new one"), and no, please don't put words in my mouth (again) (I am not building on what you suppose) and please don't threaten "your edits will be to no end". Please be more cooperative. Please recognize that I had just done a substantial amount of work on the new version and a substantial amount of explanation free of rancor in the spirit of cooperation (8 minutes before you attacked me (again) with "It does not seem that Hu or Psychohistorian are willing to accept the offer of collaborating on a new version before unprotection". It was essentially a simultaneous edit, but the edits do show that a) At least Kyle and I are collaborating cooperatively, and b) 14 minutes further on you continue to bicker. If you must bicker, please at least get your facts straight, but I do suggest that we others are cooperating and you are increasingly becoming the odd man out of that realm. Now, let's hope that this last little bit was an accident and, now that work on the new version has begun in earnest, that cooperation will prevail. Hu 18:50, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

You still don't know what a personal attack is. A personal attack would be saying something about your person, character, qualifications, abilities, etc., not what you do or think (even incorrectly attributed, which would be a mistake). By your own definition of ad hominem, you are guilty of it in the very paragraph where you complain about it. Fourdee 19:04, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

In the spirit of my remarks of 18:50 UTC just above, I will not respond at this time beyond this sentence. Hu 19:13, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Good, please do live by your own rules and requests. Anyway, let's further look at what I said, since you continued to "bicker" while requesting that the bickering stop:

"I do not believe you left the introduction as it was, this is an entirely new one."

This is correct, you did not leave the introduction as it was (even after Kyle's changes) and it is an entirely new one. This is phrased as "i do not believe". I do not say that you are solely responsible for the current version, I make no claims of fact other than I didn't believe you left the introduction as it was (which is true, you did not) and that it is a new version. You are saying "let's leave this alone" right after you edited it yourself.

"In other words, if you are building on the..."

Note the "if". Subtle I guess, but significant.

"It does not seem that Hu or Psychohistorian are willing to accept the offer of collaborating on a new version before unprotection."

It was a simultaneous edit and correctly reflects the fact that you ignored the offer for almost 4 days. Also note again my phrasing - "it does not seem".

It's also curious that I offered what I thought the introduction should read and immediately afterward you accuse me of not cooperating. Bickerbickerbicker... and please stop bickering. Editeditedit... and please don't edit. Attackattackattack... and please don't attack. First time I've had the chance to use it on Wikipedia, but - LOL. Fourdee 19:21, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Again, In the spirit of my remarks of 18:50 UTC just above, I will not respond at this time beyond this sentence. Hu 19:26, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

In the spirit of not not responding, this is all the response I will make. I reserve the right to further expound on not not responding at a future date, and to not not respond further. Fourdee 20:29, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Ok. Hu 20:59, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Sorry for being negative and making assumptions, Hu. Thanks for working on the collaboration. Fourdee 21:34, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

If you don't mind, we could just delete this section except for my proposed introduction, this bickering is indeed not productive. Fourdee 21:37, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Emergence is also a concept within the social sciences

With the article recently added to WikiProject Physics (which I support), and the article under heavy dispute at present, I think it is worth keeping in the very front of our minds that emergence and emergent behavior are concepts that are developed in many disciplines across the academic community.

For example, in the social sciences alone, there is a long and complex history. Writings on emergent outcomes of human social behavior go back at least to the 6th century BC, in both ancient Chinese and ancient Greek thought. In the second millenium, there was a thread of such thought, primarily but not exclusively in economics, from late medieval through the mid-nineteenth centuries, followed by an explosion of such thought, across the social sciences, after about 1860 with PJ Proudhon, Carl Menger, Emile Durkheim, Michael Polanyi, Friedrich Hayek and Thomas Kuhn. In the late twentieth century there was substantial work in a variety of fields including group cooperation, social justice, coordination theory, 'governance' (Political Science), the progress of 'science' within academic communities, and of course many areas within economics. A quick search of any of the social science research databases will produce a slew of articles and books.

I do not have time to get heavily involved in writing this article (at least, not for a few weeks), and would choose to stay out of the current contentious debate in any case, but I do think it is worthwhile to keep this perspective in mind when a number of you are proposing to substantially reshape the article right now. I hope this was a constructive thought and helpful to your work in improving the article. I believe it is important that the article remain consciously and explicitly cross-disciplinary, from the physical or hard sciences (Physics, Chemistry, Engineering, Computer Science, etc.) to the natural sciences (Neuro-biology, Geology, Meteorology, Hydrology), to the social sciences (Sociology, Political Science, Economics, etc.). (N2e 21:14, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Thank you. You raise interesting points to explore. Hu 21:24, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Thank you. I had mentioned before that emergence is not the exclusive domain of the hard science, but think I was ignored. Hopefully, another person saying the same thing will catch some people's attention.-Psychohistorian 01:05, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

No one is saying philosophy and systems thinking should not be included the article. In fact it wouldn't be much of an article without mentioning those views. Fourdee 02:08, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

And, once more, you are making the mistake of thinking that we'd need to -add- philosophy if we restricted ourselves to science.-Psychohistorian 13:04, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Psychohistorian's right on this one, Fourdee (Science is a branch of Philosophy). However I agree with your sentiment that non-scientific views should not intermingle heavily with the scientific views (at least not to the point where it is confusing to the average reader). - JustinWick 18:12, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Scientific statements are not a kind of philosophy in the usual sense. Philosophy has proclaimed the theory of science (i.e. the scientific method) under its purview, scientists have not proclaimed themselves philosophers. You are not using the term "philosophy" in the most common way, so it's hardly reasonable for you to claim that your different use of the term than mine invalidates what I am saying. This seems like an intentional semantic quibble when you know quite well what I mean. Here is how I am using the term philosophy from m-w.com:

"1 a (1) : all learning exclusive of technical precepts and practical arts"

"2 a : pursuit of wisdom b : a search for a general understanding of values and reality by chiefly speculative rather than observational means c : an analysis of the grounds of and concepts expressing fundamental beliefs"

It is not useful to introduce a semantic niggle with someone who is using a term, in conversation, in its customary sense. Fourdee 21:08, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Science was called "Natural philosophy" for many years. As a practical matter, it doesn't matter whether scientists are philosophers or not. What does matter is that philosophers have had some useful and interesting things to say about Emergence, and thus are included in the article. Hu 22:45, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

If you would read the article you linked yourself, you would find that "natural philosophy" did not employ the scientific method (specifically validation through experiment) and was therefore not science. Fourdee 22:58, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

""natural philosophy" did not employ the scientific method (specifically validation through experiment) and was therefore not science". More to the point, it is experiment in a controlled environment - a laboratory. Seems I mentioned the role of the laboratory in an earlier message of mine.-Psychohistorian 19:10, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

You may "mention" the laboratory as often as you like, however that will not make it any more intrinsically part of the scientific method, which it is not. There are sciences which cannot readily use a laboratory - astronomy and the social sciences come to mind, no doubt there are many more; I'm curious how geology can conduct laboratory validations of plate tectonics or mountain building or the like. Computer simulations are a recent development and don't really constitute an experiment; they are a mere model, a hypothesis and prediction. Fourdee 20:17, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

You don't need to make assumptions about my reading or my state of knowledge. Of course "natural philosophy" was only the foundation of science and not "science as we know it now". However, what practical consequence to the editing of the article are you suggesting by focusing on the word "philosophy"? I don't think you've made one. Hu 23:19, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

You said that science was called something which it was not; you made a factual error and an incorrect statement which could've been resolved by reading the link, assuming a standard degree of comprehension. "Natural philosophy" was not science since it did not employ the scientific method. You appear to have meant to say "the study of nature was once called 'natural philsophy' instead of 'science'" which I agree with and is pertinent to Psychohistorian's quibble. Strange that you accuse me of being "focused" on the term "philosophy" when I am not the one who insists on starting (incorrect) semantic arguments about it. Of course I am going to respond to false statements and any challenges against what I have said, I cannot resist - perhaps it is a flaw of mine. Also, please indent your responses properly; it makes things much easier to follow. Further, it behooves a man to admit his mistakes rather than niggle his way out of them. It certainly saves some typing and energy. Fourdee 00:17, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

I made a simple statement that you quibbled over. It behooves a person (and a man too) to not niggle or bicker their way into quibbles. So, the question remains, what practical consequence to the editing of the article are you suggesting by focusing on the word "philosophy"? I don't think you've made one. Hu 00:30, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

You are still (and persistently) not indenting your responses. I hope you don't mind that I do it for you as I find it difficult to read this without indents. There is no practical consequence to the semantics of "philosophy" at all; perhaps you should focus on the source of the niggle, Psychohistorian. I am merely responding to the both of you. The logical chain of events in this is readily clear above. Fourdee 00:47, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

No, you are the one who started to focus on philosophy vs. science. I just pointed out how scientifically illiterate that is. In addition to the book I recommended earlier, I also recommend this book. It really would help this article if the editors working on it were educated on the subject of the article and related fields -Psychohistorian 19:21, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, I just used the term philosophy correctly above, and you tried to correct me with an improper usage. Insofar as philosophy is usually considered to be about abstract rather than concrete knowledge, as I quoted from the dictionary above (perhaps the dictionary is wrong too), while the scientific method may be an example of philosophy, scientific statements per se are not. You may use continue the term philosophy to mean all knowledge, but that is a peculiar, even absurd usage. We might as well do away with all these labels for fields of study and call everyone philosophers - I think most will prefer to continue to use philosophy to mean "a search for a general understanding of values and reality by chiefly speculative rather than observational means" or "an analysis of the grounds of and concepts expressing fundamental beliefs" or perhaps definition 1a(1) from the dictionary: "all learning exclusive of technical precepts and practical arts" (if you need the definition for "technical", I'd suggest the dictionary). QED. Fourdee 20:30, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Let's start with the first sentence

What do you all think of this as a starting point? Can we all agree that this is an appropriate way to define the overall concept, before the article gets into all the nuance and controversy, that is?

Emergence is the appearance of systemic behavior that can not be explained as the mere aggregate effect of the system's constituent interactions.

Fourdee, I presume that you're opposed to "can not be explained," but I have tried to temper that with "mere aggregate effect." A decent compromise? What I'm trying to say here is not that the systemic behavior isn't an effect of the individual interactions, but that to arrive at the effect you must do more than simply "sum up" the constituent parts. In fact, we often just don't have the analytical tools to follow cause and effect all the way to the level of systemic behavior, so it becomes necessary to study the system from a different, higher-level perspective. Kyle Cronan 00:53, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

I disagree with that sentence; it is this "whole is more than the sum of its parts" theory which I dispute is an accepted fact. It should be phrased as a theory rather than fact, and should be distinguished from weak emergence which doesn't make that claim. Something which describes emergence as a whole would be more appropriate for the first sentence than a description of strong emergence alone. I like the following well enough, seems to be balanced:

Emergence is a term used in Philosophy, Systems Theory and the Sciences to describe the appearance of complex organized systems. It is generally divided into two perspectives, that of "weak emergence" and "strong emergence". Weak emergence describes new properties arising in systems as a result of the interactions at an elemental level. Strong emergence, which is a view not widely held in the physical sciences but proposed as a philosophical theory of etiology, epistemology and ontology, describes complex systems as not being explained by their constituent interactions, in other words that the whole is more than the sum of its parts.

-- Fourdee 01:03, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

We could remove the "not widely held in the physical sciences" bit I suppose, if that is objectionable for some reason. It is probably sufficient to describe strong emergence as a philosophical theory to make it clear that it is not a scientific finding. Otherwise I think the introduction needs to be phrased in a balanced manner which doesnt make claims of fact about irreducibility. Fourdee 01:07, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

I think you've got the right of it. Let's just focus on the article. It would take too long to bring some editors up to speed on the subject and the Wikipedia discussion page is not the right environment to teach anyone a subject they don't want to learn. Having said that, I think "systemic behavior" is too vague to be meaningful as it is in the sentence you've offered. Perhaps, "When some organization of parts creates qualities which are not directly traceable to those parts (such as when a string of letters produce words), those qualities are said to be emergent." Also, "to describe the appearance of complex organized systems" is redundant. Definitionally, complex systems are systems which have emergent properties, so that sentence is just noise. Further, saying that something is a philosophical theory does not exclude it from being scientific - that's another error that I thought we already covered.-Psychohistorian 01:11, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

Why don't we just cite the definition(s) given by an expert or experts. I'm not willing to accept the ones you are offering (manufacturing it seems), for "philosophy", "science" or "emergence". Fourdee 01:21, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

In the spirit of verifiability, I support the use of definitions given by expert/s from reliable sources. These definitions (admittedly, not word for word as I was writing earlier off the top of my head - quotes will be provided) are in the books I linked to earlier and I will provide proper citations for them.-Psychohistorian 13:46, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

It's been two weeks now. Also, as I am sure you aware, books are not necessarily reliable - publications from a peer-reviewed journal are the most reliable sources. However any quotation from a book by a purported expert would be a great place to start. A scholarly text (school textbook) would work well for this; perhaps you know some from the systems theory curriculum. If we could see a book listed as required reading for a university course on this subject, that would be a great start (although I have seem some questionable books used even in university classes). At any rate, please offer a quote we can work from rather than paraphrasing it. Thanks for the (repeated) offer of providing citations for this article. Fourdee 18:44, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

"It's been two weeks now." Your point? Wikipedia is a voluntary effort. Between working full time, going to school part time, preparing for a certification in IT, and a couple of dozen other things, Wikipedia is not a priority for me. Its something I do in the moments between doing other things. "Also, as I am sure you aware, books are not necessarily reliable - publications from a peer-reviewed journal are the most reliable sources." Fascinating, and where are your publications from a peer-reviewed journal? Texts written by noted and highly recognized experts in the field are many times more reliable than anything you've provided. Finally, this is the discussion page. Kyle did not offer a quote, so I was using the same level of verification. Having said that, its cool to use a quote (and, in fact, I already provided one a couple of weeks ago).-Psychohistorian 18:58, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't really want to add any content to the article, I would be happy to delete all the uncited portions and leave it at that. As soon as there is cited material which I disagree with, I will consider finding solid citations to support its removal or balancing. Which doesn't appear to be likely any time soon. Fourdee 21:21, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

So when you wrote "I have already found the citations for any new material I would wish to add to this article", you were bluffing? Hu 22:13, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

Is that a polite way of saying "lying"? I meant the quotes above from Hofstadter and Gell-Mann, and perhaps a favorite of mine from Feynman. Fourdee 23:47, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

Here's an article by Bela Banathy describing the difference between traditional science and systems methodology.-Psychohistorian 19:01, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

Funny that you are offering something from the "international society of systems sciences" to try to back up your claim that systems theory isn't science. I am considering not responding any further to you as I have difficulty following the sort of logic you employ; I'm sure it is a failure on my fault. Fourdee 21:21, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, Fourdee, I've generally agreed with your views on here, if not always the way you go about things, but... I think a cursory evaluation of the isss website makes out claims (which I'm not qualified to substantiate) that "Systems Science" is fundamentally different from (and seemingly "incompatable" with) "Classical Science". Both are philosophies of how to extract "truth" (which is defined differently in both cases, often very differently from the intuitive definition that non-scientists would use) from the universe via observations, but they have different goals and methods. Check out this page Conceptual Foundations of Systems Science at the site (look at the diagram which sums up most of the point of the page). I do not know how trustworthy the site is, or its standing in its field (it would seem to have a high standing, but my accademic training is not in this field). For right or wrong, people in our society are taught to blindly trust science (if you do not understand science, there can be no other kind of trust, and most people do not understand science). I think the reason that this works is because science has useful results - TVs, Cars, medical care, etc... If System Sciences starts producing, real, useful results that people can tanglibly appreciate, they too may learn to trust it in general (I'm slightly skeptical, but do not feel it is unreasable to think). I just hope that in this article, there's a clear distinction made between the methods of classical science (what you refer to simply as science) and "Systems Science". I would argue that most things that are named something like "X science" are, invariably, not science. Even my own Computer Science education taught me that most of it is mathematics and theory rather than empirical probing of the universe. I think that Systems Science is a noteworthy field, and its views should be represented in this article (and separated from more solidly established views), however that readers should remain (rightlyfully, IMHO) skeptical of its claims, as it is not yet mature in the same way something like Physics, which has been around for hundreds of years, is. I think these views, and other philosophical views (and yes, Science is just another philosophy, albeit one with especially good results - I mean, why in principle *should* someone think that the universe must be run by a set of static rules that can be observed and figured out... but so far that seems to work, so maybe it's "true") of note should be represented, but that people should not be allowed to believe, after reading this page, that those views are somehow scientific (no matter how intelligent and important the people who thought them up were). I'm really starting to become upset at the level of bickering that's currently being used by both "sides" of this argument, the level of knowledge indicated by Fourdee, Hu, and Psychohistorian would seem to indicate an age level that is not, however, indicated by the conduct, and I think that's very unfortunate. Lets just get this article figured out already. Oh, and have good references :) You're right about that, Fourdee, I dont' want to see a bunch of unreferenced BS in this article by a few months time... if I do I think I might swear off Wikipedia for good! After all, that policy is there for a reason (things like Emergence are complicated and we shouldn't trust the assertions of random editors, like myself, but rather published, verifiable experts). - JustinWick 00:25, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Justin, you're right. I've let my frustation take over in this article. Frankly, I am frustrated because there is an editor working on this article who has -not- received training in the field (am I right in assuming that I'm the only editor actively working on this article who has received graduate level training in systems methodology?), has consistently gotten very basic stuff in the field (such as not knowing that the definition of complex systems is systems with emergent properties) and outside of the field (such as not knowing the difference between "precision" and "accuracy") wrong, has made preposterous claims (such as insinuating that a very highly distinguished NASA engineer was ignorant about science), etc. etc. etc. AND has attempted to hijack the article. I am frustrated because he is not simply ignorant, but obstinate about remaining ignorant. I have let that frustration have too much free reign in the way I've posted in this discussion page because I've tried to put myself in a position of educating this editor through well over six years of training when that editor doesn't want to learn. I have made the mistake of focusing on discussing the subject in the discussion page when I should be focusing on discussing how to make a better article. I owe people like yourself and Hu an apology for having to witness me expressing my frustration. I'll try to restrain it in the future.-Psychohistorian 01:04, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

You appear get very frustrated with every article you edit; perhaps it is a problem on your part? There doesn't seem to be any reason for an intelligent and well-educated person to become so consistently frustrated to the point of anger in so many different articles. You are mistaken that imprecise measurements are accurate, of course, and appear to fundamentally misunderstand the link between precision and accuracy. And you can equivocate and backtrack all you like, but you have misspoken several times on this matter of the meaning of "science" and "the scientific method", are inconsistent in your usage of words, and have not been able to offer reasoned arguments in this dispute. Your (incomplete) (non-)credentials do not lend any logic or credibility to your arguments, nor does the time wasted on insults and bickering bring you any closer to providing the citations of texts which you must've had in your possession (if not still) for the coursework you are so fond of mentioning. Your idea of a citation appears to be dropping the name of a book rather than clearly showing what it says, so I don't have much hope for better citations from you in the future. Fourdee 01:29, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Okay, let me address each of the points you just made. 1.) I didn't say that imprecise measurements are accurate. However, they can be accurate. To understand the difference between accuracy and precision, an example that I've seen in freshman level science classes (and that you might see when you take a freshman level science class) is the example of a dart board. If a number of darts appear widely spread on the dart board, but, when taking their average location, you find that they center around the bullseye, that's high accuracy, but low precision. If darts are highly clustered but center around the edge of the board, that's high precision, but low accuracy. So, imprecise measurements can be (that's -can be-, not -are-) accurate and inaccurate measurements can be (again, -can be-, not -are) precise. Again, you'll learn this when you take a freshman level science class. 2.) Where you have claimed that I have "misspoke" about science and the scientific method is where I have supported my position with the article I linked to by the ISSS - which a third editor has confirmed does support what I wrote. 3.) You have at no time pointed out an example of me being inconsistent. That's a spurious claim. So is your claim that I've not provided reasoned argument where needed/appropriate. 4.) Yes, I have mentioned several books and will continue to do so because I desire that the editors working on a Wikipedia article are actually educated on the subject that they are editing - a desire which appears, in your case, will go unmet. Having said that, I intend for it to be the last time I will focus on anything other than how to write a better article. That means that you can take the last word if you want it.-Psychohistorian 02:01, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

I notice you don't address the fact that you have this persistent problem with getting frustrated and insulting people. 1) I assure you that were one to take a freshman level science class (geez maybe I can some day... not sure if they offer that at Hamburger University though. personal attack noted and added to your tab.) one might expect to actually learn a fundamental truth - no single measurement is ever accurate if it is imprecise. Groups of measurements can be considered accurate but imprecise. However in the example in question I used the term "accurate" once, and correctly, to mean adherence to the true value (by a single observation no less), and aside from that used the terms "more true" and "less true". A single more precise, accurate observation is "more true" than a less precise observation, and is in fact more accurate. 2) and 3) You claim that systems science is not science then cite a website which describes systems methodology in its very title as science. That's inconsistent and illogical on the face of it. Specifically you said "Fourdee, you want to know how systems methodology is not like the scientific method. To put it in one word, 'laboratory'. Science presumes that things can be taken apart[...]" It is not possible for you to rationally cite a source which describes systems methology as properly labeled "science" to support your claim that it is not "science" - hence your irrational argument and equivocation. 4) Mentioning a book is not a citation. You seem to be unwilling to provide a clear, specific citation of anything. Thank you for the last word, and I would very much appreciate it if you focused on citing the article henceforth, and I'm sure the editors of the other articles you abuse would appreciate it as well. Fourdee 02:42, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

I share your frustration, for the reasons you cite, Psychohistorian. The basic requirements for editing are intelligence, cooperation, and reasonableness. Education helps a great deal because it saves other editors having to educate an editor, but it is not essential compared to the three requirements. It is not necessary to have a Ph.D., or advanced degree or any degree, to edit intelligently, cooperatively and reasonably. If any of the three are missing, then there is trouble and if two or all three are missing, then trouble can be severe. I have tried from time to time to bring the discussion back to discussing practical consequences for the article. (Nobody fiddle with the indentation of this remark, it is intentionally set the way it is, since it is a reply to Ph., please) Hu 01:51, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

So, for the First Sentence, what are the practical consequences of this little debate on "systems science" versus "science"? Hu 00:38, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Depends whether it uses either term. Seems easier just to quote or very closely paraphrase an expert definition, rather than trying to manufacture one now which we will never agree over. Fourdee 00:43, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Indentation

Excessive indentation uses up valuable space on the left. When comments are placed in chronological order, it is not necessary to indent further. However, if an editor goes back to reply out of chronological order to a prior remark then incrementing the indentation is a good idea. Occasionally it makes sense to outdent to the margin to reset indentation. A conservative approach to indentation preserves the flow of the discussion. Hu 02:23, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Bickering archived

As everyone agrees that the nonsense before does nothing to get the article improved, I have moved it, as the page was back to over 50k in length. Fourdee 02:51, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Not strictly true, not all of what went before was nonsense.Talk:Emergence/Archive_3#A_Medium_Revamp Also, I note that you made a last remark and immediately archived the discussion. However, since Psychohistorian graciously agreed to not contest any last word you wanted to make on a thread there, it is perhaps just as well to archive it. Hu 02:58, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Eh, we can always put more remarks on here :) Seems like there's plenty of space now! - JustinWick 05:40, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Back to First Sentence

How about "There is no firm consensus on a precise definition of Emergence."? That seems to be the result of a lot of discussion here. I am still convinced that if the article is made whole and healthy, then the introduction will emerge naturally, and from that the first sentence will emerge. However, if I'm in the minority on that conviction, then it is reasonable to attempt the first sentence and I've given it my try. Hu 02:31, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

How have we even established this much? How can we improve the article by adding more uncited statements? This is still a waste of time, whether or not I agree with what you are saying, because we are not working from content that will improve the verifiability of the article. Fourdee 02:46, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

A sourced definition of "emergence" can be found here. It is, however, expressed mathematically and, if we use it, we'll need to translate it into language that common people can understand. It translates into what I already offered as a definition, but if someone wants to translate it in some other way, please present your alternative.-Psychohistorian 03:06, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

That looks more like a proof of the plausibility of emergence than a definition, but it should prove useful for you in forming an introduction, and given your familiarity with this subject I don't think it would be untoward to suggest that you are the best qualified to do it. The article refers the reader elsewhere for the definition: "We will here use emergence in the general sense defined by Baas (1994a)." Sounds like Baas has what we are looking for. Fourdee 03:16, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

The first sentence should give the shortest possible relevant characterization of the subject. If the subject is amenable to definition, the first sentence should give a concise one that puts the article in context. Rather than being typically technical, it should be a concise, conceptually sound, characterization driven, encyclopedic definition. It should be as clear to the nonspecialist as the subject matter allows. WP:GtWBA#TFS (Indented to same level as Ph's remark since it flows in chronological order.) Hu 03:13, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

So, now that you (Fourdee) can't even agree to disagree, and you call working on the first sentence a waste of time and for you working on the article instead of working on the introduction is not an option, I think you have boxed yourself into a corner and I suggest you withdraw from the article entirely. (Note: the indentation of this remark is at the left since all three remarks are in chronological sequence. Please leave as is.) Hu 03:05, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Fourdee: can you find a good, citable definition somewhere? Anyone else, can you? I think Fourdee has some perspectives on this that are correct, and I'm afraid the discussion would be a bit unbalanced was Fourdee to withdraw, but I think at some point, Fourdee, you are going to have to find some citations for this stuff as well. I think it is reasonable to cite the fact that Emergence has different meanings in different fields, but that doesn't mean it doesn't have any definition. Man, this would be so much easier if we were like Nobel laurates and world-renowed philosophers. Who the heck came up with an encyclopedia based on random grad students and amateurs, heh. (I guess I count myself with the random grad students, even though I recently graduated that) - JustinWick 05:44, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

I empathize with your desire, Justin, to understand things as well as a Nobel laureate, but I think it is actually a good thing that we aren't, because that level of understanding does not always correspond well with the ability or desire to communicate and teach. In other words, if we can communicate the subject well enough at our level, we can explain it to each other and to others who might be entering college or merely "well-read". Furthermore, the more experienced among us know how to work Wikipedia cooperatively to produce results that are greater than any one of us or any one expert could produce. We are well situated to be the bridge between the "experts" and the core demographic of Wikipedia readers. Hu 08:51, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Foundations of Articles and Implications for Introductions

One theory about writing good Wikipedia articles holds that statements in the introduction should not be given citations or be studded with Wiki links, if two things are true about them, two things that would be true about a well written article anyway. 1) Every statement in the introduction should be expanded upon in depth in the article. 2) Those expansions should be properly provided with references. The theory goes that by keeping the introduction relatively free of Wiki links and citations and footnotes, it will be more readable and therefore more people will actually read it and then read the article. The introduction is not the foundation of the article, it is the storefront window that quickly shows people an overview and entices them into the article. The foundation of the article or the framework (pick your metaphor) is the structure of the section headings and sub-section headings, and then the key concept of each individual paragraph, which can be thought of as headerless sub-sub-sections. Get the organization of the concepts right and then it becomes easier to fill it out. This is part of my reasoning why it is better to write the article and then the introduction. Similarly, the size of the introduction depends on the size of the article. Note to skeptics: Despite scurrilous statements to the contrary (by one editor in particular), I am thoroughly in favor of citations and references in the body of the article. I also advocate not disrupting the article (by extension of Wikipedia) to make a point. Hu 09:36, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Work in Progress

The current focus of work is Talk:Emergence/NewVersion. Hu 09:40, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Reasonable Citations

I have limited interest in doing the footwork for this article when my position is merely that the uncited statements should be removed. However a quick search yielded the following useful practical explanations of "emergence" from this paper [4] (which also has a lot of citations of its own):

These citations have been archived to /References to save space here. Fourdee 07:26, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

These quotes offer the sort of supportable, carefully phrased, factually accurate, logically correct explanations of Emergence we should be using. It's not difficult or time-consuming to find this kind of citation. Fourdee 10:02, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

These are excellent quotes - defining Emergence under the guises of "classical" science. Now we just need quotes for all of the other definitions of emergence. Ph, got any for Systems Science? Is there a philosopher in the house? - JustinWick 05:51, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

I should also mention that I especially like the second quote, it really hits the nail that is Weak Emergence on the head. The third quote is very cool, but should also be very, very obvious to anyone with training in physics. The first quote addresses only a small subset of Weak Emergence (in this case, it seems to be related to some branch of mechanics). - JustinWick 05:54, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Quotes subpage - /References

Perhaps we should move all the quotes so far collected to a subpage of Talk:Emergence so they can survive this page being archived - we could put a link to it at the top. I'll give it a shot and you can undo it if you don't agree. Fourdee 06:48, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Seems like a reasonable thing to do. Hu 07:00, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Ok I have put all the quotes I could find in the article and talk pages in /References and added a link to it in the archive box up top. Also added another quote to the strong vs. weak emergence section. The "not widely held in the physical sciences" bit could probably be removed from the section if it's unwelcome, it would be hard to find a citation for that. Fourdee 07:22, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

I have also removed them from this page, if anyone objects (not sure if it was the right thing to do or not), feel free to revert. Fourdee 07:28, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Good job all!

Looks like all the major problems were fixed, and people are in agreement about the outcome. Wish I had been able to help more, but I know little about this subject. Thanks to everyone for helping, questioning, and figuring out the truth of the matter. - JustinWick 05:48, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Controversy

What is controversial about emergence? It's briefly mentioned in the opening of the article and not thoroughly addressed anywhere. 132.170.228.170 18:15, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

If you read the various archives of the talk page, you'll see that "emergence" means different things to different people. There are strict scientific meanings, as well as mystical/philosphical meanings, and even things in between. Most of these are noteworthy and it is difficult for people to agree on the meaning and potential consequences of this term. This probably should be explained in the article, but since the big fight over it cooled off here, I think everyone is reluctant to add *more* contraversial material to the article. - JustinWick 18:38, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

quote of a passage that quotes?

Can somebody rewrite the beginning? The quotes are unneccessarily confusing. Dreamer.redeemer 08:07, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

See Also section

The large number of links in this section is rather silly & not helpful for someone wanting to find genuinely related articles. For example, the link to Free will, which has little to do with emergence, and Rampancy, which is a ridiculous article. Perhaps someone else with more time & expertise than I could cut most of these. 84.70.195.69 19:10, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

New para

I have removed the following pending discussion.

A simple way to unify all kinds of emergent phenomena is to understand them as having a common process of emerging, rather than similar features or consequences. The emergence of all recognized emergent properties appears to take place by processes that begin and end, displaying the growth (and decay) of the internalized networks of self-organizing processes that bring them about. Identifying the autonomous growth of systems is also a rich source for finding new new forms of emergence. The developing methods for doing this are efficient and seemingly testable and reliable. The hypothesis that growth and emergence are actually the same thing has not yet been fully discussed, but has potential.

This is hard to understand and seems WP:OR-ish. (Is there a simple way to understand emergence? is emergence about complexity?) 1Z 14:15, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

Cites need additional work

The level of cites in this article is good, but there are still quite a few un-cited assertions.
Additionally, we should make the citation format uniform throughout the article. -- Writtenonsand 17:52, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

commond mode of causation comment

I inserted the following on 5/6/07 in the lead paragraph: "The probable common mode of causation is the self-organization of internal loop networks, or 'systems', growing from imperceptible beginnings in the regions of gradients". Someone appropriately inserted "[citation needed]" The citations available are mostly to unpublished work, though the research has been quite successful. No one has been willing to discuss the very substantial additions to the scientific method required. What's needed to study emergence as a process is a way of closely examining individual events, which I now have published on the web at some length in the "physics of happening". I did go into the matter sufficiently to point the way in a paper for the Society for General Systems Research in 1984 conference, "Directed Opportunity, Directed Impetus: New tools for investigating autonomous causation" now republished as http://www.synapse9.com/DirOpp.pdf. Well it's missing most of the details, and the specific wording of the claim above, but the main substance is there. The fact is that the 'perfect formula' is the one you *look through*, not the one you *look at*. The basic reorientation of methods needed was done as part of a study of daily climate evolution in solar homes in the late 70's and the math and software done in the 90's. My best work is a piece on a fantastic little example of punctuated equilibrium for a plankton. If anyone has any idea of some journal that would be knowledgeable enough about evolving systems to consider it, I'd be delighted to finish up my latest (10th) version of the paper and submit it again.

Phil Henshaw —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Pfhenshaw (talk • contribs) 11:43, 8 May 2007 (UTC).

None of that adds up to notability. Please read the guidelines. 1Z 15:54, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Emergence and Dialectical Materialism

This article appears to have a clear ideological bias; so it's not a mystery why the most important, fundamental framework of emergence -- marxist dialectical-materialism -- is wholly absent from it. However, since Wikipedia pretends to objectivity over the long-term, there's no way this issue can be avoided indefintely, simply because one party is generally always first off the mark with getting their POV "out there".

I mean, is there "thinktank" organizing behind this systematic Rightwing article-writing, or something..? Poor show, people. This is not true objectivity at work here.

Pazouzou 06:50, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

"Fads and Beliefs" section

Slimmed this section down some, and added an OR tag. It's mostly about "Emergent Concepts", which from a quick google is a term that seems to exist but not with the technical sense that the paragraph implies it has.

From what I can gather, this section posits an emergent concept as something like what Darwinism was in its first introduction, in the sense that at first Darwinism was greeted with widespread skepticism in the scientific community, but is now widely accepted in the same as one of the two pillars of Modern evolutionary synthesis.

Also, this section probably needs a new header, as it isn't really about fads or beliefs.--BlackAndy 01:11, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Can anyone think of examples of emergence in large distributed software systems ?

The main page provides an example of emergence in the WWW. Can anyone think/share examples of emergence in a large network of software systems? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.131.203.96 (talk) 01:30, 12 March 2007 (UTC).

Wikipedia is an example of the emergence of a global infrastructure which was unexpected. See history of Wikipedia --66.195.150.98 (talk) 14:36, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

The large-scale cooperation to be found in Wikipedia, on a global basis, far transcends any other project, based on Wikipedia:Five Pillars, to state the obvious. --66.195.150.98 (talk) 14:39, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Space/time and string theory?

Hi.

I noticed this:

"In some theories of particle physics, even such basic structures as mass, space, and time are viewed as emergent phenomena, arising from more fundamental concepts such as the Higgs boson or strings."

However, strings do not create space and time. Space and time do not emerge from them -- they move in space and time. The strings still have a spacetime that they inhabit. mike4ty4 01:32, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

See, for example, Lee Smolin's Three Roads to Quantum Gravity ; see chapter 10 for a theory of how spacetime emerges from loops and knots. --66.195.150.98 (talk) 14:42, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

string Theory

"In some theories of particle physics, even such basic structures as mass, space, and time are viewed as emergent phenomena, arising from more fundamental concepts such as the Higgs boson or strings." - Given that String Theory is pretty speculative, non-predictive, and as far as I know entirely unfounded in any sort of empirical data (no one's ever seen a string, or a Higgs boson - they're purely theoretical constructs), I don't think this is a great example of emergence. Mass Space and Time are the basic structures, and higgs bosons etc are derived by mathematical reverse engineering from them (and to a large extent in spite of them - mass space and time don't seem to have nine dimensions). It isn't really plausible to say they "emerge" from the interaction of Higgs Bosons. ElectricRay (talk) 16:43, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Refined definition of Emergence

This article defines emergence strictly as high-level complexity resulting from low-level simplicity. However, it is the inverse and somewhat counter-intuitive definition which really is the relevant concept to science (and philosophy). It is the emergence of comprehensible high-level simplicity from low-level complexity that defines emergence. We can comprehend some of the mechanisms of natural processes at a high level (for example, psychologic impulses which may underpin behavior) even though we could not possible derive such insights from a consideration of molecular processes which are the unimaginably complex fundamental building blocks of our brains. We can formulate fairly simple physical laws such as the gas laws which describe the behavior of gases without consideration of the quantum uncertainties which surround the individual sub-atomic particles which, after all, are the root structure of the gas molecules. This complexity leading to emergent simplicity is the key feature which allows us to comprehend the world at our scale, and the mechanism by which we can reach some understanding of physical processes when reductionism fails us. The whole can indeed be greater than the sum of its parts. The British physicist David Deutsch has a beautiful exposition of the subject in his book The Fabric of Reality. I think this article needs major revision to include these concepts.Cd195 (talk) 05:16, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

the two articles emergence and strong emergence should be merged

Problem with "References and bibliography"

• The References Section is gummed up with everyone and his brother adding his recently published (or simply arXiv'd) "magisterial" paper on the subject. Perhaps there should be a separate section for older, dare I say, canonical or classical works on emergence such as Kant, Mill, and Lewes (and Anderson, which is often referenced in the literature). In any event, the arXiv references need to be segregated or removed; they are not peer reviewed and, alas, form an inferior class. JKeck (talk) 00:25, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Aristotle really??!

"The concept have been used since Aristotle", says the text. Is this not just a typical confusion of general descriptions with terms? Terms require contexts and I would wager Aristotle had quite a different context than modern philosophy and systems theory. ... said: Rursus (bork²) 10:09, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Mathematics Section

I think using the mobius strip in the mathematics section is misleading; a sphere can be built up in the same way and any subset of the triangles will be isomorphic a square, but not the whole; a torus can be built up cylinders so that no subset is connected and of genus 1; same goes for a circle, a triangle, etc. with line segments. Additionally, every prime can be written as a sum of composites so that no subsum is prime. And so on. At any rate, since their are an arbitrary number of predicates that can be applied to objects and decompositions of them, it is inevitable that one can make almost any mathematical object into an example of emergence; thus, I feel that the mobius strip is misleading since the average reader will see the mobius strip as more exotic than spheres and primes, and that this will cause them to think that there is greater depth to this concept than is true(at least, in so far as mathematics is concerned.) Phoenix1177 (talk) 04:35, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Additionally, the fact that the world wide web obeys a power law doesn't seem remarkable since there is no such thing as randomness, it's bound to follow some form of laws. I think my problem here is that if the world wide web(or any of the other examples here) exhibited some other laws/structures, then this page would work just aswell by pointing out those different laws/structures. In other words, all your pointing out is that these complex objects obey laws of some form, and that these laws are sensible to humans; the later part is the only remarkable feature, but the page gives the impression asif it were otherwise. Phoenix1177 (talk) 04:42, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Sorry to keep blathering on, I realize that in my second comment, above, I left out the part about no substructure having that property; nonetheless, we can always point something out about it that will satisfy this, unless we limit ourselves in what we can point out(which does not seem to be going on here.) For example, if we limit ourselves to topology and structures built up out of triangles, then we will not be able to find a distinction between two triangles joined into a square and a single triangle; however, we will be able to find such distinctions if we are allowed to talk about the number of sides when the complex is a polygon. I guess I would like to see more criticism of the topic, or have it pointed out that this phenomenon is nontrivial, in the vast majority of cases, only if we limit what properties we are allowed to refer to. 66.202.66.78 (talk) 09:00, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Suspect?

Alex J. Ryan, 2006. How is something (to be submitted) to the arXiv? The paper looked interesting enough for me to dig around and see if anyone else in the actual field had looked at it. 128.171.31.11 (talk) 19:43, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

The link to this paper is broken. -- Brinticus 06:16, 31 October 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.12.247.12 (talk)

Ceramic self-assembly

The following assertion is made in the Ceramic Engineering article:

"Self-assembly" is the most common term in use in the modern scientific community to describe the spontaneous aggregation of particles (atoms, molecules, colloids, micelles, etc.) without the influence of any external forces. Large groups of such particles are known to assemble themselves into thermodynamically stable, structurally well-defined arrays, quite reminiscent of one of the 7 crystal systems found in metallurgy and mineralogy (e.g. face-centered cubic, body-centered cubic, etc.).

I think this is a good non-living example of emergence at the molecular level in inorganic structures. I'm not incorporating any of this in the Emergence article today however as the sourcing was a bit unclear. When it is better sourced in that article, it might make a useful example for this one as well. Cheers. N2e (talk) 04:41, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

"Bangkok can be seen as an example of spontaneous order"

Not by anyone familiar with bangkok traffic. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.176.55.202 (talk) 05:02, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

The definition of "emergence"

In May 2007, a multi-disciplinary conference on "Understanding Complex Systems" was held at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, with the participation of researchers from various academic disciplines and industry. Later, in 2009, an invited article resulting from the conference, appeared in the journal Complexity, a cross-disciplinary journal focusing on the science of complex adaptive systems. The article describes a general understanding of complex systems dynamics, without formal definitions, and provides a good background for understanding the accepted meaning of terms such as emergence and self-organization.

I believe we should be content for now with this level of understanding. Emergence is under intense scrutiny, and many researchers find the term useful and appropriate for their needs. Scientific terms are frequently defined by their use in science. Nobody knew what was Physics until somebody said "this is Physics". Researchers working on emergence are telling us what they mean by "emergence" as clearly as they can.

The other factor, is that the discipline itself is progressing very fast. There is a great deal of new understanding, which makes much of the preceding discussion look somewhat obsolete. The article has some structural problems, and it must be rebuilt and updated. But it also has some very useful material, which should be preserved. SergioPi (talk) 19:51, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

References

Concern about positive bias

Emergence is very fascinating yet not always beneficial - the point is omitted in the article, yet examples create only positive impression. Even with good or neutral individual intentions, emergence in human groups may produce stunningly good or bad organizations. Corporations' cultures are an example of emergence with potentially sustained priorities misalignment w/society's long term interests. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Didenko (talk • contribs) 00:34, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Does the Central Limit Theorem describe an emergent property?

If you're going to talk about aggregate properties, I think the CLT would at least shed some light on the subject from a historical perspective. I'm not an expert in emergence, so if anyone could provide some feedback as to whether "the CLT qualifies as emergence" that would be quite helpful. DavidBrooksPokorny (talk) 21:32, 30 March 2013 (UTC)

Formal system

Biology emerges from chemistry which emerges from particle physics. Each of these is a Formal system with its own objects, actions, and rules. They are all just protons, electrons, and neutrons therefore they are all made of the same objects so they must differ in their actions or rules. See Deductive system and Axiomatic system. Just granpa (talk) 20:57, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Semantics - this can't be right

In Emergent properties and processes: " . . the fallacy of division is a fallacy" is ambiguous at best. s/b the theory of division is a fallacy? or the fallacy of division is correct? Jrdoubleyou (talk) 15:08, 19 December 2013 (UTC)

Emergence in political philosophy removed ?? and Economics

The following section is removed today:

Economist and philosopher Friedrich Hayek wrote about emergence in the context of law, politics, and markets. His theories are most fully developed in Law, Legislation and Liberty, which sets out the difference between cosmos or "grown order" (that is, emergence), and taxis or "made order". Hayek dismisses philosophies that do not adequately recognize the emergent nature of society, and which describe it as the conscious creation of a rational agent (be it God, the Sovereign, or any kind of personified body politic, such as Hegel's state or Hobbes's leviathan). The most important social structures, including the laws ("nomos") governing the relations between individual persons, are emergent, according to Hayek. While the idea of laws and markets as emergent phenomena comes fairly naturally to an economist, and was indeed present in the works of early economists such as Bernard Mandeville, David Hume, and Adam Smith, Hayek traces the development of ideas based on spontaneous-order throughout the history of Western thought, occasionally going as far back as the presocratics. In this, he follows Karl Popper, who blamed the idea of the state as a made order on Plato in The Open Society and its Enemies.

This section is removed with the argument:

sect - it's an unreferenced, OR essay

Now this seems a bit radical. The text seems ok. Why not just add a reference-needed tag? - Mdd 19:32, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I restored the text per your suggestion and added an OR tag. —Viriditas | Talk 10:46, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Isn't that the whole point of the invisible hand? A political philosophy of leaving everything alone and it'll spontaneously create joy and wealth for everyone.

-G — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.51.168.65 (talk) 02:48, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

@70.51.168.65 and Viriditas:I believe mention of Adam Smith's Invisible hand may be useful in the Economic section. There is a paper on "The Emergence of Economic Organization" by Peter Howitt and Robert Clower which looks in detail of how markets organize.Jonpatterns (talk) 19:17, 12 March 2014 (UTC)

That's fine, but the entire section is still unsourced. It would help if you would just rewrite it with good sources. Viriditas (talk) 19:35, 12 March 2014 (UTC)

Irreducible complexity

On rationalwiki is say Irreducible complexity (as proposed by some creationists) was taken from systems theory, can Irreducible complexity (emergence) redirects here. Maybe a mention of this theory could be added to the article? Jonpatterns (talk) 08:54, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

Emergence happens only in the mind

The concept of Emergence like chaos, exists only in our imaginations. Take for example the fact that iron has the property of hardness. The iron atom does not have this property. But the property hardness doesn't really exist, it is just how our primitive senses interpret the properties of the iron atom when they are combined together. So emergence really does happen but it happens only in our minds not in reality.

Cmatrix 10:58, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

"The concept of Emergence like chaos, exists only in our imaginations." Are you saying that emergence is emergent? If so, it might be written somewhere. 66.130.177.54 22:30, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Hardness is a mechanical property rated on a scale with diamond the hardest (if not the hardest) material(s) known. also, maths is a hard nut because it is "tough" to crack.Tkyoung (talk) 02:17, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

Emergence and Intelligent Design

On 21 Oct 2010, 148.134.37.3 added a bunch of Intelligent Design propaganda. I don't know (or care) enough about the topic of emergence to address all of the changes, but I thought someone might want to take a look. (And it appears that this wouldn't be this user's first run in with the authorities.) Steve in Appalachia (talk) 17:18, 24 October 2010 (UTC)

It would be great if also there was a simple explanation of 'how' the sum of parts are (made) greater than the whole. Tkyoung (talk) 02:26, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

There is more than one definition of "emergence"

My investigations of the subject have convinced me that there is more than one definition of "emergence". I visited the page with the vague intention of changing it accordingly. The new version is in fact pretty much what I was aiming at, so it only remains for me to lend my support to it. 1Z 02:54, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Thank you, I like it too; hopefully something along those lines will survive the debate. Right now we are trying to build a body of citations and quotes to work from, as the current new version of the introductory paragraph appears to be contested. Fourdee 03:31, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Yes there's more than one definition, this needs to be made very, very clear, and the separate definitions should be addressed separately - JustinWick 06:12, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Here are several perspectives and definitions from Aristotle to modern times - there are a couple of other related quotes in here as well

The extensive list of citations Psychohistorian provided has been archived to /References along with other quotes and removed from here to free space. Fourdee 07:24, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Thank you psychohistorian for the quotations. They mostly look solid, however I am concerned with the relevance of Aristotle aside from historical reference (is Plato's Idealism next?), and the Kauffman quote seems to be very sparse on context. It is the "whole is more than the sum of the parts" statements which are the most contentious and need clear context for what the expert means by that. But thank you again for the obviously thorough effort you've undertaken. It should be possible between all these references to develop a good introduction. Fourdee 15:10, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

I provided the Aristotle reference just for historical reference. As for Kauffman, I included it because, aesthetically, I like "spontaneous crystallization". I think we can use it strictly for its aesthetic appeal.-Psychohistorian 15:31, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Ok I have just now reviewed your edits to the New version of the article and I must say: excellent work! I have also added a section on the subjectivity of complexity with the quote I provided above. While we have a lot of quotes at the moment, if someone later wants to refine these into careful paraphrases, I think we can leave that to them (or ourselves when the inclination presents). This article is looking very good and as far as I'm concerned there is no NPOV, Verifiability, Original Research or other dispute with the new version. We could proceed to have the article unprotected replaced with the improved one. Any citations of the remainder of the article could proceed at a leisurely pace and I see no reason even to mark anything as needing citation, although I haven't carefully reviewed the entire article. Fourdee 22:01, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

Please review my section on subjectivity for accuracy. I wasn't sure how to phrase it properly, as I initially said that in both theories of emergence, complexity and organization are considered subjective, however after looking at it again, I'm not certain that is the case of all theories of strong emergence, so I reworded the section to say that strong emergence may claim something concrete has arisen at the higher level of organization. Fourdee 22:13, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

I believe I can dig up some quotes on that subject which might help with the NPOV and OR issues. I'll just need some time.-Psychohistorian 03:25, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Looks great. I'm going to ask that the article be unprotected and replaced with this version. Fourdee 06:28, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

I like the new version too, good work. And it's been a fascinating discussion. Kyle Cronan 06:45, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

--Greg Royston Molineux (talk) 00:35, 10 May 2010 (UTC)==Unprotection Requested==

I have requested unprotection at Wikipedia:Requests_for_page_protection#Current_requests_for_unprotection. This version looks pretty solid; it could use more work and someone will probably be interested in adding detail, more citations and subsections. You guys may also be interested in using some of these references for improving weak emergence and strong emergence which were pretty sparse (and probably somewhat incorrect) the last time I looked at them. This is an important article and I'm glad we managed to get past the arguing and put a quality overview together for it. Thanks guys. Fourdee 06:48, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

I have updated the strong emergence article with material from this one. Fourdee 07:38, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

I believe that the new strong vs. weak emergence section covers both perspectives better than the articles on the respective perspectives and, consequently, that the articles on the respective subjects should be replaced with redirects to the new emergence article.-Psychohistorian 12:06, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Sounds fine to me. I'm no longer going to be regularly monitoring the talk page here. Thanks for your work on this, the article looks great. Fourdee 20:42, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

--Greg Royston Molineux (talk) 00:35, 10 May 2010 (UTC)emergence and strong emergence are degrees of the same thing, strong emergence should be a sub heading of emergence as you could also have weak emergence and dysfunctional emergence —Preceding unsigned comment added by Greg Royston Molineux (talk • contribs) 00:31, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Consider putting the key definitions in "History" (including the corrected Aristotle citation), replace definition with description and use the arc + arc + arc = circle explanation. Just a simple one followed by a more complete description if required by philosophical argument. Consider this: If there are different definitions then either (a) one is wrong (the frog is green, the frog is orange), (b) they are similes (the frog croaked, the frog riddiped), (c) they are used in a different context (the frog is green, the frog is wet).Tkyoung (talk) 02:37, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

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Removed link

Since this paper is not published in English, it has no relevance in a Wikipedia article written in English

• Määttä, Urho (2000), "Mistä on pienet säännöt tehty?", Virittäjä, 2: 203–221

(Unsigned edit)

You're saying that if there were a subject which English readers are interested in, but the only source material is non-English, an article would not be permitted? Sorry, that doesn't make sense to me; that simply means it'll be harder for other editors to confirm. Internet users do have a number of language translators available. Scott McNay (talk) 22:14, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

Money

Money is discussed in this article as an emergent property of economic systems. Indeed, I do believe it is an emergent property of modern complex economic systems. However, as described an related to "Austrian economics" this cannot be true. There is nothing in the "Austrian economic approach" (what the approach actually says is difficult to pin down) that has emergence in it, it is just the opposite. I think if money is an emergent property of complex economic systems, we need to find some references and develop a section that really establishes this. If this cannot be done soon, I think the money section should be deleted because as it stands, it is not an example of emergence.--I am One of Many (talk) 18:46, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

Your reasoning is that since the Austrian School of Economics is not an example of an emergent property, but money is an example of an emergent property, you'd like to delete the section on money? I did not get the sense that the section was only talking about the Austrian School, but rather, money in general. So I do not understand your reasoning or your suggestion.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 21:11, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

I don't want to delete it. I want a better section on emergence. Money is an emergent property of complex economic systems, we just need to find the research if any that backs it up. The Austrian School just can't do it. There is no concept of emergence in that school of economics. On their view, economics is deducible from one or a few principles. I only think it should be deleted if we cannot ultimately create a better section. As with most things on Wikipedia, it is best to go slow. But if we can't figure out how to come up with a better section by say this summer, may be it should be deleted?--I am One of Many (talk) 21:46, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

Still trying to understand what you're saying. Your last paragraph begins "I don't want to delete it." Then it ends with "may be it should be deleted?" So, I'm trying hard to follow the logic here, or maybe what you're saying is that somebody please improve this section, and to motivate such an effort, we'll consider chopping the section. My sense is: each individual step we do should be to improve the encyclopedia, to take it forward, to make it better, inch by inch. Sometimes that means adding; sometimes tagging; sometimes deleting (if it makes it better -- that is, if the encyclopedia is better with the information removed). So, that's my issue here -- in this instance, I don't think the encyclopedia will be better with the Money section removed. So, how about improving it? Adding references? Making it better?--Tomwsulcer (talk) 22:28, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

As is, I don't think it demonstrates emergence. I think it can and I want to help work on it. But, if we ultimately cannot find sources to back it up, then and only then it should be deleted as an unverified case of emergence. I'm convinced we will succeed. --I am One of Many (talk) 22:58, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

Okay. Maybe I can help later but probably not for a few months. I still think that money, as a subject, is itself an example of emergence, if I understand the concept correctly.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 01:18, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

As I have said, I think money is an example of emergence and I think it is possibly one of the more interesting examples. Once upon a time, the value of money depended on the intrinsic valued of the tokens used for money. The value of money in large part depended on the supply of material (gold or silver) the tokens were made out of. Later paper notes appeared that in principle could be exchanged for gold and silver. Now the value of money does not depend on being tokenized with a valuable metal or a note promising such metal, instead the value of money is an emergent property of economic systems. This is just a very rough account of what I think is interesting about money as emergent. What we will have to find (and I'm looking and that is what got me interested in this) is sources that give emergent accounts of money. I don't know of any yet. Probably, it will take a long time to work this out. I just wanted to let people know that we ought to be thinking about issue.--I am One of Many (talk) 19:31, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

Yes. It would be nice if we received emergent amounts of money for our volunteer contributions emerged in our wallets, but maybe this kind of remuneration is yet to emerge.--Tomwsulcer (talk) 20:01, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

Section removed

@73.208.7.120, Tomwsulcer, and I am One of Many: Section on money removed in February 2015, [see diff]. 73.208.7.120 stated 'There is no consensus on the origin of money.' Jonpatterns (talk) 13:10, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

Determinism versus reductionism in emergent phenomena

Determinism and reductionism seem to be two sides of the same coin: determinism aims at a final result in a goal-oriented way, while reductionism follows that way backwards. Emergence and reductionism are by definition contradictory. But what about determinism?

Almost everything we perceive in our environment is emergent. All artefacts we see around us, but also all living beings are emergent phenomena, with properties that can not be found in their building blocks. We often cannot see the complex interactions that are responsible for the emergent phenomena because they occur on a microscopic (eg molecular) scale.

For example, a good cook has the talent to combine different ingredients in the right proportion to create a perfectly balanced dish. The taste of the dish is emergent because it gives you sensations that cannot be found in the individual ingredients that make it up. Is this a deterministic process? If you consider the recipe as an algorithm, then you will be able to achieve the same result as the cook who invented the recipe. However, if you only have the final result, it is difficult to analyze how this product came about. The secret of the cook is difficult to analyze reductionistically....

Another example: the score of a piece of music could be considered as the "recipe" to be able to perform the piece of music. A form of determinism indeed. But we all know that the quality of the performing artist determines whether we will ultimately find the music beautiful or ugly. Just as with a recipe, there are all kinds of nuances that are not described in the score, combined with the musician's skill, which do have a significant influence on the end result. In the same way you can distinguish between a real Rembrandt and a fake Rembrandt.

An invention can also be seen as an emergent phenomenon: by combining components (which themselves are often emergent), you can get something new with characteristics that you can not find in those components. Reductionistic analysis of the invention, however, often makes it possible to imitate that invention. The inventor protects himself against this by means of a patent. Whether you can copy something or not depends very much on the complexity of the product. But there is no principal reason why it could not. You can indeed create an emergent phenomenon by following a deterministic recipe and vice versa, by reductionist analysis, how such an emergent phenomenon can occur. The number of factors that you need to involve in your analysis therefore mainly limits whether reductionism is also practically possible. And then you quickly encounter limits .... Analysing a computer program f.i. is practically impossible if only the digital codes are available.

The emergent nature of an invention is, as a matter of fact, determined by the functionality of that invention, which indeed cannot determined deterministically from its building blocks (That is why it is an invention!). This functionality is context-dependent and that is dependent on the perspective of the observer. When you remove the context, or if you are an observer who does not understand the context, the functionality disappears and with it the emergent character. An invention (and therefore all artefacts) is therefore subjectively emergent.
Ypan1944 (talk) 09:40, 3 January 2019 (UTC)

Difference Between Strong and Weak Emergence Poorly Explained

In previous versions of this section, I thought the difference was well explained. The present article seems to do a poor job of detailing the philosophical differences between the two. Simply saying that one can be explained by computer simulations while the other cannot does nothing to provide the reader with a real understanding of the philosophical differences between the two. Obviously this is a big problem for uneducated readers who come here seeking to understand how the two relate to our understanding of awareness. The real difference remains obtuse to the casual reader.

It would be better if this section included a treatment of how the two relate to awareness. Strong emergence precludes matter containing elements of awareness, while weak emergence assumes matter must have elements of awareness to it. This key difference is not readily understandable from the article.

It's almost like weak emergence is simply being treated as if it's a microscopic version of strong emergence, rather than the separate philosophical structure that it is. Assuming matter contains elements of awareness is a big deal. It should be emphasized. Weak emergence treats awareness as a fundamental constituent of the universe, rather than being a product of a material system. This is not explained at all in the current article. 158.61.0.254 (talk) 23:10, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

Two further comments on this topic (may require elaboration / correction by relevant specialists): (1) A large part of this section reads like a cross between a review of Bedau's book, and self justification. (2) Perhaps liken it to a mechanical arm+hand (+strings attached). An arm can reach and an hand can grab. Together they can reach and grab (weak emergence), you can line it up to grab an apple (following the above paragraph, is it that awareness exists but is not applied?). Strong emergence: If the apple is moved, it needs that external 'awareness' (lets call it that) to be able to (a) 'sense' its position, and (b) realign with the apple. Of course there is the pulling of strings too but I believe that is transfer of energy besides the philosophical construct. I think the difficulty here starts with the definition "weak emergence is a type of emergence in which the emergent property is amenable to computer simulation", partly because what a computer can simulate is still in development, and partly because a computer is a sum of parts and its own capabilities depend on what those parts are (E.g. WE can simply just easily add a complete mathematical model of the universe along with full decision tree to a computer, then set parameters to simulate whatever we want).Tkyoung (talk) 02:02, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

Cannot be simulated?

In reference to "strong emergence, in which the emergent property cannot be simulated by a computer", anything can potentially be simulated, it's just that it really needs intelligence to realize that the "trees" work together to create a "forest". For example, if you're looking at quarks, you'll never see the WWW (much less this article), which have many emergent layers between the two. Scott McNay (talk) 15:26, 15 October 2017 (UTC)

This excerpt is indeed quite meaningless, any property that can be described can be simulated on a computer, at that level of description.134.160.214.17 (talk) 02:47, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

relate verses interact

Relate is more philosophical interact more physical; Ref: "Emergence, Function and Realization", Umut Baysan, In Sophie Gibb, Robin Hendry & Tom Lancaster (eds.), Routledge Handbook of Emergence. ...Abstract: “Realization” and “emergence” are two concepts that are sometimes used to describe same or similar phenomena in philosophy of mind and the special sciences, where such phenomena involve the synchronic dependence of some higher-level states of affairs on the lower-level ones. According to a popular line of thought, higher-level properties that are invoked in the special sciences are realized by, and/or emergent from, lower-level, broadly physical, properties. So, these two concepts are taken to refer to relations between properties from different levels where the lower-level ones somehow “bring about” the higher-level ones. However, for those who specialise in inter-level relations, there are important differences between these two concepts – especially if emergence is understood as strong emergence. The purpose of this chapter is to highlight these differences.Arnlodg (talk) 15:21, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

Emergence and 5.1.3 Architecture and cities may offer a great example of emergence and unintelligent design / Emergence in a negative sense: stampedes of animals and humans

When I scan read through the article I wonder if emergence is not too often connotated with positive things? I know emergence from the setting of the "Tree of knowledge" - first there was matter, then life like microorganisms, then organisms with a mind, then organisms with a conscious - who could have predicted that the sum of 2 single items could result into 3 iso 2. Great, hopeful, inspiring. But I'm also working on sustainability and when I read chapter 5.1.3 (Emergence in the context of) Architecture and cities, I wonder if we shouldn't put a reference to uninformed people running towards towns with completely wrong expectations, straight into slums, criminality and their demise and that of their family and kids? Or similarly economic refugees from Africa obsessed with a completely wrong image of Europe - delivering themselves to the dangers of the desert, then the Mediterranean Sea - and when arrived - some who are misguided to the next level - obsessively want to cross the North Sea to the Island that is the UK and if there would have been yet another island beyond that, I assume they would obsessively go there, because there finally would be the country of milk and honey? All that obsessive human "running like chicken without a head" no matter what - even if it costs their lives and that of their family and kids, or animals and humans in a stampede where many get killed by trampling/pressuring till suffocation and death follows - complete madness - aren't those also a form of emergence - but in a negative sense and aren't they worthwhile mentioning? Sincerely, SvenAERTS (talk) 03:28, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Citation style

Please pick a citation style and I'll harmonize it throughout the article. It seems that the article originally used footnotes, but has carried a hidden comment "Use unspaced Harvard Citations in the text: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template_talk:Harvard_citation" for at least a decade. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 21:40, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

I've harmonized this article to use footnotes. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 11:15, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

Bicycle is a terrible example

The initial example of a bike + rider = motion doesn't describe an emergent phenomenon of the type we're talking about. Equally you might say the parts of a TV set, put together to produce pictures and sound, is an emergent phenomenon, and it isn't. It's just a thing made of parts. Not quite the same.

It's a tricky thing and a bit ethereal and vapourous to grab hold of. But the best example is surely the classic one - an ant hill. A hill full of ants can find the shortest route to a food source. It's because the ants leave a scent trail behind them. The shortest route is the one that can be done quickest. The ants that take that route will be there and back, then off again, quicker, so will make more runs. So that trail will have more scent contributed to it, and therefore smell strongest.

If ants are wired to follow a scent trail, once it starts to smell strong enough, or otherwise wander randomly, then eventually the shortest route will be marked out, and most ants will start taking it, leaving the longer trails, or the ones that don't go anywhere, behind.

This, obviously, would not work with just one ant. But lots of ants, each one an identical unit with limited information-handling capacity, can do it. No ant holds a map of the area in his mind, or even part of one, nor any information about the trail at all. All he needs, is his nose and his scent gland. "Wander randomly. If you catch a scent, randomly decide whether to follow it, with a probability corresponding to how strong it is." is the simple rule from which accurate path-finding emerges, even though there's nothing about distance or creating a map in there. They just have to like smelling the smell, while having an urge to walk forwards. Easy enough for evolution to do, and there's another emergent phenomenon!

A group of ants does something that no single ant has the brain capacity to do. Similarly in cellular automata, "creatures" like gliders appear, even though there's nothing in Conway's simple rules about them. Or rather, there is, the whole zoo of a cellular automaton is stored in it's simple rules. They're just not obviously visible. And they only appear on a grid with enough cells working together, individually.

CA are a great example of emergence, and I think the inspiration for the phenomenon first being thought of. But they're a bit of a geek toy, and computery, and it's important to show that emergent phenomena occur in nature as well. Actually they occur in all systems that are complex, or big, enough.

Anyway... while a sprocket isn't a bicycle, it is an obvious part of one. Each part is different, and designed to work together according to the intention of the designer. Emergent phenomena occur in systems with identical parts, and no design or intention is there. They just occur. Like weather comes from air molecules. In the case of the ants, general evolutionary pressure is the driving force, but that itself has no designer or intention.

A bike + rider is not a valid example. Emergent phenomena are unexpected! Not obviously implicit from looking at the parts. They evolve into existence. Bikes don't.

Sorry for rambling a bit. I realise the ant thing is mentioned in the article already, though it's not explained fully. But whoever thought of the bike example doesn't understand emergent phenomena. It has to go. If somebody wants to use ants as a replacement example, there are explanations online that are better-written than mine. You could use weather, with gusts adding up to hurricanes. Weather is chaotic, too, chaotic systems and emergence are often deeply connected.

Some time in the future I might try replace the bike example with something bettter-written myself. I don't mind doing the work. But not if whoever wrote the bike thing is going to get territorial and just revert me, and the whole thing ends up in the hands of some ridiculous cabal of no-lives spouting WP:BLAHBLAHBLAH at me.

84.65.77.182 (talk) 20:55, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

Terrible example removed. Thanks for pointing it out! (FYI, in the eusocial hymenoptera I am familiar with, the workers are anatomically female.) Cheers! Just plain Bill (talk) 21:44, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

Water as strong emergence.

In the section on strong emergence and weak emergence, it says:

Strong emergence describes the direct causal action of a high-level system upon its components; qualities produced this way are irreducible to the system's constituent parts. The whole is other than the sum of its parts. An example from physics of such emergence is water, which appears unpredictable even after an exhaustive study of the properties of its constituent atoms of hydrogen and oxygen. It follows then that no simulation of the system can exist, for such a simulation would itself constitute a reduction of the system to its constituent parts.

(Emphasis by me.)

I understand that ab initio simulations of water have not always perfectly reproduced experimental properties, but they are actually quite good and getting better (e.g. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-20821-w , https://www.pnas.org/content/114/41/10846), and also, 2 things must be remembered about them:

1) Ab initio simulations that are actually done involve much smaller amounts of matter than is usually experimented on. A single milligram (~1 mm³) of water contains 3.343×10¹⁹ molecules of water, which is already much more than could feasibly be simulated in a highly quantum-mechanically complete model. Real simulations rarely simulate more than thousands. These simulations also simulate very small amounts of times. For an extremely large-scale example, a 2020 paper reports "that a machine learning-based simulation protocol (Deep Potential Molecular Dynamics), while retaining ab initio accuracy, can simulate more than 1 nanosecond-long trajectory of over 100 million atoms per day". For another comparison, 1 picogram (~1 μm³) of water contains 33.43 billion molecules, so such a microbe-sized droplet could be simulated at a rate of about 1 nanosecond per year using this new method. It is already well-known that a conglomeration of 10 atoms behaves significantly differently than a conglomeration of 100 atoms, which behaves differently than 1000 atoms and so forth, both in experiments and in simulations, so it's really not valid to expect such simulations of to exactly predict the behavior of the much larger amounts of matter that most experimental properties are measured for. A somewhat similar, though probably less important, note is the fact that simulations usually assume completely pure samples or simple, perfectly described, mixtures. Real samples used in experiments are invariably contaminated, not just by other types of atoms or other chemical compounds, but also by various types of radiation and electromagnetic fields that cannot feasibly be avoided (or at least are not completely avoided in practice.)

2) These ab initio simulations do not actually exactly simulate all of the laws of physics that are believed to exist. The processes going on inside atomic nuclei are rarely modeled and generally not in a fully quantum-chromodynamic way when they are, because a) the complexity of fully quantum chromodynamic simulations of even fairly small atomic nuclei stretch the limits of modern computation (and even these use numerical methods) and b) because these inner workings are expected to have only very tiny effects. It's mostly just the charge, mass, position, motion, and somewhat total angular momentum of nuclei that matters. Similar considerations explain why the weak force and gravitational forces are omitted (despite the fact that electrons do interact with the weak force), and the issue with gravity in particular is compounded by the fact there currently is no quantum theory of gravity (only conjectures without experimental support). In addition, and probably most importantly, not even quantum electrodynamics is used fully, but rather certain approximations/simplifying assumptions are made in order to make the computations feasible. In any case, such situations necessarily involve highly nonlinear differential equations that simulations must solve numerically rather than analytically, and even just solving equations numerically rather than analytically is itself an approximation.

My point is that I don't think it's justified to assert that the formation of water from hydrogen and oxygen is a case of strong emergence rather than weak emergence, even if some biology book (note the citation) did that. I think this claim should at least be qualified somehow rather than just stated as a fact. I haven't read the book, though, so I don't know what points it made.DubleH (talk) 12:36, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

References

Incorrect translation of Aristotle

I am no expert on emergence but the translation given for Aristotle is wrong. The text is :

περὶ δὲ τῆς ἀπορίας τῆς εἰρημένης περί τε τοὺς ὁρισμοὺς καὶ περὶ τοὺς ἀριθμούς, τί αἴτιον τοῦ ἓν εἶναι; πάντων γὰρ ὅσα πλείω μέρη ἔχει καὶ μὴ ἔστιν οἷον σωρὸς τὸ πᾶν [10] ἀλλ᾽ ἔστι τι τὸ ὅλον παρὰ τὰ μόρια, ἔστι τι αἴτιον, ἐπεὶ καὶ ἐν τοῖς σώμασι τοῖς μὲν ἁφὴ αἰτία τοῦ ἓν εἶναι τοῖς δὲ γλισχρότης ἤ τι πάθος ἕτερον τοιοῦτον. ὁ δ᾽ ὁρισμὸς λόγος ἐστὶν εἷς οὐ συνδέσμῳ καθάπερ ἡ Ἰλιὰς ἀλλὰ τῷ ἑνὸς εἶναι.

which is translated by Hugh Tredennick ( Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1933, 1989) as

With regard to the difficulty which we have described in connection with definitions and numbers, what is the cause of the unification? In all things which have a plurality of parts, and which are not a total aggregate but a whole of some sort distinct from the parts, there is some cause ; inasmuch as even in bodies sometimes contact is the cause of their unity, and sometimes viscosity or some other such quality.But a definition is one account, not by connection, like the Iliad , but because it is a definition of one thing.

This seems to be quite different to the translation given in the footnote which is unsourced: "Aristotle, Metaphysics, Book 8.6.1045a:8-10: "... the totality is not, as it were, a mere heap, but the whole is something besides the parts ...", i.e., the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.

Unless anyone objects I will change the translation in the footnote. But it seems to me that he is not explicitly saying the whole is greater than the sum of the parts but rather that there is a cause why the parts cohere into a whole.

Any comments?

Seneca_2007 (talk) 00:57, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

My only comment is that I would like the opinion of someone who can actually read Ancient Greek. Obviously, the professional translators should be most trusted, but I know a bit about linguistics, and I know that looking at a translation, no matter how good, does not always give the same insight as looking at the way something is said in the original language. Translators make choices, and someone who can read both the translation and the original better than just looking up each word and its inflection separately (though that's also a very valid option) can understand the nature of those choices, rather than just the nature of how the words of the English translation look like they mean to us with our understandings of English.DubleH (talk) 12:56, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

The emergence of memory in the brain

I want to prepare a sentence or paragraph about emergence related to the emergence of memory in the brain. It goes something like this. Draw your favorite animal and compare it to google images of it. Often quite a sobering and humblefying endeavour, right? Humans really have to train hard to be any good at it - we call these people "artists, painters, etc.". Computers with their 1 and zero storage system are very good at reproducing images; but they are terrible at giving meaning and flow. When you google your favorite animal, computers don't know what info you need about the animal, so they just "spew" a bunch of info and hope the relevant stuff is in there and you have to pick it out then: pictures of them, maybe you are interested in some faq. The computers have no clue of the "flow (of a conversation)" in which you are and what part of the info you need in your flow. Our brains however are very good at "meaning" and "flow" and "emergence". Our brains don't "store" memories as computers do. Just zoom in to the grey matter of the brain, there's no 1 and zero storage system. It's neural cells with an average 7000 connections to other neurons and they constantly update that wiring. Our brains make us re-live experiences - and can link us to and relive the relevant sub-experiences, schema's and sub-schema's, abstracts of experiences of you meeting that favorite animal: what shape did it have, typical colors, skin, movement, speed of movement and rotation, typical acceleration-deceleration patterns, size, smell, typical environment it is associated with, temperature, time of day, sounds, relevant context, lexemes, ontology, etc. All your senses have been involved and both pre-existing neural pathways have been used and reinforced, new ones have been made and fore sure new and shorter, more relevant links to other neural schema's have been induced to grow. And from all that emerges what we experience as "memory" and what we "know". You know what your favorite animal is, you can talk about it passionately, in a flow of a conversation without being overloaded by irrelevant information or overcome by irrelevant emotions for the flow you are in. But you cannot draw it. :), That's all I have time for. Looking forward collaborating on this. SvenAERTS (talk) 22:40, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

Definition problems

There is a lot of ambiguity about the interpretation of the definition of emergence.

The current definition of emergence contains the following elements:

• there is an interaction of constituent (not necessarily identical) entities.
• this interaction produces new properties which are characteristic for the collective but who's properties are not present in the constituent entities.

The definition is so broad that as a consequence almost everything in this world is emergent, because all objects or phenomena we encounter are composed of different parts who has different properties than the collective constituent . It is virtually impossible to find an elementary object/phenomenon that is not composed. Even at the smallest (Planck) scale emergent phenomena occur (such as space and time).

Other problems are:

• The occurrence of emergence is scale dependent and therefore necessarily subjective, which makes it difficult to find an objective and universally valid definition. For instance entropy in the sense of "disorder", acting on molecular scale is a purely subjective judgment.
• The "new" aspect of emergence is a vague formulation. It seems insufficient to define "new" as "different from all the previous". But if the phenomenon in question is a direct (deterministic) consequence of its constituent interactions, then the question is whether you can call that phenomenon "new". "Temperature" is just an other name for the mean value of kinetic energy of a lot of molecules and interference of waves is just the result of summing up different waves. You may call this "epistemological emergency".
• Conway's "Artificial Life" is a tricky one: this is a algorithmic process whose endproduct is difficult to predict, especially whether the result will be dynamic ("live"), but nevertheless a typical deterministic result.
• Another aspect that is often brought up in the discussion about "newness" is that emergence seems to arise spontaneously, sui generis (it happens "by itself"). That is a misconception: the interaction needs always a necessary exchange of energy and/or matter, while the conditions under which this takes place must be favorable. However, the moment an emergent phenomenon arises can be based on a coincidental concurrence of circumstances, e.g. a spark, a condensation core, the presence of a catalyst that triggers the process, etc.
• Another mystery that often raised is that an emergent phenomenon seems to ("want to") maintain itself and thus acquires an odium of "purposefulness", which seems to contradict the "purposelessness" in nature. This confusion arises because although the interactions are purposeless, the result of the interactions (i.e. the emergent phenomenon) can be (semi-)permanent, depending on the local and/or accidental circumstances. This apparent purposefulness is therefore more of a retrospective interpretation.
• Living beings (as emergent appearances) are goal-oriented for survival reasons. This is purely the result of natural selection taking place in the evolutionary process, whereby the best-equipped individuals survive.
• Artifacts fall just as well under the definition of emergence. Here the purposiveness is evident, but that is only apparent within an appropriate context, in which the intent of the artifact is understood. So subjectively strongly emergent. Bees, ants and termites are not aware of the purposefulness of there behavior, resulting - among other things - in emergent sophisticated artifacts.

At the moment I don't have a conclusive solution for solving this problem. Therefore, I think it makes sense to include these issues in a "Criticism" section. Ypan1944 (talk) 14:35, 23 November 2021 (UTC)

Hello Ypan,

If these criticisms have been raised by an author or authors you've read, it might be helpful to add proper citations for where they've been published. As it stands, this section of the article reads a bit like a personal essay, not a Wikipedia article. (See WP:NOR). I think it's a good section to have, however, so if you can find some references it would definitely improve the article. HansVonStuttgart (talk) 22:51, 9 March 2022 (UTC)

I suggest cutting the Criticism section

This section was created by Ypan1944 last month without citations [5]. I see that a "no citations" tag was added recently. That's a good start toward addressing the problem. But see also e.g. WP:CRITICISM. It's unclear to me that the article benefits from this section, which appears to be a laundry list of editor WP:OR. Am I off base here? Ypan1944, do you have citations to support each of these claims? I'm posting here rather than WP:BOLDly doing the deed on my own initiative because I know that this is a relatively high-traffic page. If anyone objects to cutting this section, let's discuss. Generalrelative (talk) 19:08, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

It resembles a rambling essay. Interesting, maybe, but not encyclopedic. Just plain Bill (talk) 20:30, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

Done. Generalrelative (talk) 00:24, 1 April 2022 (UTC)

I am working on it. Thanks.

Ypan1944 (talk) 12:09, 2 August 2022 (UTC)