The arrangement is indeed dependent on the arrangement, but that's a tautology,
and I dont think I am committed to tautologies because of my allegiance to
Wimsattian emergence. The MEANING of the words of this sentence is indeed
emergent since it is dependent on the arrangement of the letters. I am happy
with the implication that a great many properties become emergent under the
defintion. Contra Searle and a bunch of other people, I think emergence is as
common as dirt .... well perhaps not quite that common.
N
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([email protected])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa fe]
----- Original Message -----
From: Russ Abbott
To: [email protected];The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee
Group
Sent: 11/7/2009 5:54:45 PM
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Crutchfield 's "Is anything ever new?"
One problem with Nick's proposed definition is that it will label as emergent
all sorts of uninteresting properties -- such as the sequence of characters in
this message. I'm not talking about the semantics of the message or anything
at all interesting, just the sequence of characters. That satisfies both of
Nick's criteria.
So does the arrangement of molecules of air in your kitchen at exactly 3:00pm
tomorrow. That satisfies the criterion of depending on the arrangement of
elements.
-- Russ Abbott
_____________________________________________
Professor, Computer Science
California State University, Los Angeles
Cell phone: 310-621-3805
o Check out my blog at http://russabbott.blogspot.com/
On Sat, Nov 7, 2009 at 10:25 AM, Nicholas Thompson <[email protected]>
wrote:
I agree that defitions, like everything else in science, should be heuristic.
So, I suggest we define an emergent property as one that depends on the
arrangement or timing of the elements that make up the whole. In so defining
emergence, we are led to ask, in every case of putative emergence, what is the
particular arrangment or timing of presentation of the parts that makes this
property possible.
Now, the tricky bit comes when we SUSPECT that a property is emergent but have
not yet discovered (or think perhaps we may NEVER discover) the arrangments of
parts that makes it possible. I gather that some properties of CA's fall into
that category. Not sure what to do. We could, I suppose, define a loose
category of "putative emergence" using surprise as a criterion, but reserve the
term "emergent" itself for a property whose dependence on arrangment and/or
timeing has been demonstrated.
It's heuristic because it leads to research.
Nick
Nick
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([email protected])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa fe]
----- Original Message -----
From: Douglas Roberts
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Sent: 11/7/2009 10:02:05 AM
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Crutchfield 's "Is anything ever new?"
100%, complete, total unequivocal agreement w/Glen.
--Doug
--
Doug Roberts
[email protected]
[email protected]
505-455-7333 - Office
505-670-8195 - Cell
On Fri, Nov 6, 2009 at 11:15 AM, glen e. p. ropella
<[email protected]> wrote:
Thus spake Nicholas Thompson circa 11/05/2009 05:04 PM:
> I think your rejection of emergence applies only to (2) above.... and
> possibly (4), if we understand "no way" to mean "no way we have thought of
> yet". But I bet you disagree.
Naaa. I don't really disagree. I said I TEND to think that emergence
is fictitious. Until I see a definition or construction of it that I
can _use_ to get my work done, it's a useless concept, regardless of
whether it exists or not. I don't frankly care if it exists. What
matters is whether it can be used for some purpose (other than passing
the time arguing with bright people on e-mail lists ;-).
--
glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095, http://agent-based-modeling.com
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