Strengthening Weak Emergence.
I offer an improved version of Bedau's influential (Philos Perspect 11:375–99, 1997) account of weak emergence in light of insights from information theory. Bedau analyzes weak emergence in terms of the non-derivability of a system's macrostates from its microstates except by simulation. However, no...
| Publicado en: | Erkenntnis Vol. 87; no. 5; pp. 2457 - 2475 |
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| Autor principal: | |
| Formato: | Artículo |
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Springer Nature
Oct2022
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| Sumario: | I offer an improved version of Bedau's influential (Philos Perspect 11:375–99, 1997) account of weak emergence in light of insights from information theory. Bedau analyzes weak emergence in terms of the non-derivability of a system's macrostates from its microstates except by simulation. However, non-derivability alone does not guarantee that a system's macrostates are weakly emergent. Rather, it is non-derivability plus the algorithmic compressibility of the system's macrostates that makes them weakly emergent. I argue that the resulting information-theoretic picture provides a metaphysical account of weak emergence rather than a merely epistemic one. |
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