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Towards a Universal Principle of Emergence (UPE)

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Hierarchical Emergent Ontology and the Universal Principle of Emergence

Abstract

This chapter clarifies the essential theoretical background. In opposition to the prevailing diversification of the meaning of the concept of emergence, it advocates universalizing it as a generally valid principle in the creation of complex wholes. Achieving unification and universalization in the creation of new perspectives is one of the primary intentions of science and philosophy; thus, we should not reject it as an option but should seek to establish why it is necessary to limit the search for a universal principle of emergence to ontological emergence and its role in the emergence of complex wholes in different domains of reality. Thus, the starting point is a critical analysis of traditional conceptions of ontological emergence, tracing the fundamental ideas underlying each approach, including the distinction between emergence1 and emergence2 (Searle ), the supervenient (Kim , Van Cleve, O’Connor, McLaughlin, Crane) and non-supervenient conceptions of emergence (Humphreys ), and the influential concept of “weak” and “strong” emergence (Bedau , Chalmers, Gillett).

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Notes

  1. 1.

    This list does not attempt to be complete, or to do justice to the specificities of the individual disciplines. On the contrary, although many of these have established a specialised branch of mathematics (e.g. fractal geometry), the processes to which they are applicable are often the subjects of other disciplines. Chaos theory pertains to dynamic systems, which often contain mathematical structures called attractors and fractals.

  2. 2.

    It is correlation if the control system includes feedback, which then correlates the motion of the drone e.g. through its pilot.

  3. 3.

    Compositional laws of the additivity of weight are only valid in Newtonian physics. In relativist physics, relativistic effects must be taken into account; yet it remains a difficult question whether or not these effects should be viewed as emergent.

  4. 4.

    Cf. Mill’s heteropathic and homopathic composition of causes.

  5. 5.

    The best-known realization of a cellular automaton is Conway’s “Game of Life”, demonstrating the formation of various emergent forms, structures and properties based on simple recurrent algorithms. The Game of Life cellular automaton is a 2D grid of cells where cells can have two values. They are full (alive) or empty (dead). A distribution of live and dead cells provides the initial configuration of the grid, following which Conway’s “genetic laws” for birth, death and survival (i.e. rules for changing the values of cells) are applied step by step, allowing one to see the dynamic evolution of changes in the distribution of live and dead cells in the grid. It is remarkable how simple rules lead to the complex behaviour of wholes. “Conway’s genetic laws are delightfully simple. First, each cell of the grid (assumed to be an infinite plane) has eight neighboring cells, four adjacent orthogonally, four adjacent diagonally. The rules are: (1) Survivals. Every live cell with two or three neighboring live cells survives for the next generation. (2) Deaths. Each live cell with four or more live neighbors dies. Every cell with one live neighbor or none dies from isolation. (3) Births. Each empty cell adjacent to exactly three live neighbors—no more, no fewer—is a birth cell at the next move. It is important to understand that all births and deaths occur simultaneously in one step. Together they constitute a single generation in one ‘step’ in the complete ‘life history’ of the initial configuration.” (modified from Gardner 1970)

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  1. Institute of Philosophy of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Praha, Czech Republic

    Vladimír Havlík

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Havlík, V. (2022). Towards a Universal Principle of Emergence (UPE). In: Hierarchical Emergent Ontology and the Universal Principle of Emergence. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98148-8_2

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