Hi Platt, I haven't read the Wiki explanation. From the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, I take that emergentism (at least one school) purports that a new level is formed that is more than the aggregate. That something new arrises at that level. If we take the organic to the biological (human) level, we can speculate that human consciousness is more than just the aggregate of human cells. Each level has its form of consciousness (if you will) which is somehow different. Thus a new separate level arrises. The controlling force can be Quality, but one cannot dismiss the nuts and bolts of level creation.
I haven't got to the level of understanding yet where Quality explains anything. It still appears to me to be explanation in hindsight. The state of affairs of the universe is used to deduce the presence of Quality. Also I still have difficulty getting away from the subjectivism of Quality, but this may just be a semantic barrier for me. Mark On Nov 17, 2009, at 9:52:13 AM, [email protected] wrote: From: [email protected] Subject: Re: [MD] British Emergentism Date: November 17, 2009 9:52:13 AM PST To: [email protected] Hi Steve. Right. But doesn't emergentism purport to be a scientific discipline? >From Wikipedia: "In philosophy, systems theory and science, emergence is the way complex systems and patterns arise out of a multiplicity of relatively simple interactions. Emergence is central to the theories of integrative levels and of complex systems." Sounds like good old SOM to me. So, I think to associate it with the MOQ is misleading. And, as I pointed out before, unlike the MOQ it doesn't explain anything. Best, Platt On 17 Nov 2009 at 10:40, Steven Peterson wrote: > Hi Platt, > > > > Emergentism, whether British or Hungarian, suffers from a fatal flaw. It > > is entirely bereft of scientific explanation because it fails to identify > > deterministic causes or "mechanisms" for the phenomenon in question. > > To say that this or that property "emerges" is to say nothing more than > > from A comes B. It is a description, not an explanation. Or, if posited as > > an explanation it amounts to "Oops." > > I agree that "emergence" does not explain evolution with mechanisms or > deterministic causes, but neither does the MOQ. The idea of emergence > is basically anti-reductionism. It says, stop insisting that a > deterministic mechanism on a lower level must explain everything worth > knowing on a higher level. It says advances in physics will never make > biological science obsolete. The MOQ agrees. > > Best, > Steve > Moq_Discuss mailing list > Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. > http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org > Archives: > http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ > http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/ Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
