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From: n025fc@tamuts.tamu.edu (Kevin Weller)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: Emergent properties (was: What AI is exactly)
Summary: Good point!  Here is a revision of my theory.
Message-ID: <8747@helios.TAMU.EDU>
Date: 3 Oct 90 05:24:49 GMT
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In article <1990Oct1.212639.24730@maytag.waterloo.edu> jfbuss@maytag.waterloo.edu (Jonathan Buss) writes:
>A Dickens novel is a collection of words.  A Dickens novel being read
>by someone, in a social context, with the possibility of discussing it
>later, is something else.  Why should a whole be explainable as a sum
>of some of its parts?  No one ever tries to explain computers in terms
>of only AND gates.
>
>Jonathan Buss

An excellent point, which really brings home the shortcomings of
English when trying to define "system" at relative levels of
abstraction.  In fact, you have forced me to reconsider my original
definition of emergence [ I bet you all thought I was perfect :-) ].

Perhaps we should be thinking of emergence as a practical approach to
solving certain problems rather than a metaphysical truth.  This
pragmatic definition is, I think, what the originators of the term
meant for it.  The whole purpose of the concept was to try and
demystify the collective behavior of highly organized systems in
pursuit of a non-dualistic explanation for mind.  It was NOT intended
to offer some kind of pseudo-scientific support for philosophical
dualism at all!  It can be used as a razzle-dazzle word, but it is
better used as a pragmatic term for collective behavior.

Your solution for my problem is a perfect example of the practical
value of the emergence idea.  You had to resort to a larger system
(higher on our scale of abstraction) of book, reader, and social
context to explain the book's power to generate interest and
discussion.  Some books simply don't have nearly as much of this power
(relative to some readers and contexts, but this point doesn't really
matter for our purpose, as we will see shortly), and some don't have
what they do for long while others seem to have it perennially.  This
power is by no means absolute and universal, but in context it is
manifested in some works more than in others.  It derives not just
from the component words, but also from the way they are assembled
into a consistent whole having a meaning to human readers.  The way I
define it, the sum of the parts is simply the parts unassembled, or
possibly assembled in a simple linear system.  The extra (more than
the sum) comes into the picture with the more complex *structure*, of
words, paragraphs, chapters and people for our current example.  You
may argue that the structure is ultimately the result of organizing
properties in the fundamental components, which I was unwilling to say
before (for some systems) but now concede as very likely (for *almost*
all systems).  Here is my change of mind.

As far as computers go, you may explain their operation fully in terms
of AND gates, OR gates, electromotive force, and so on.  This
explanation can be complete for its own level of abstraction, but it
hardly solves all the problems of computer science!  Programmers
rarely, if ever, try to describe high-level programs in terms of
electropotentials in the computer hardware or magnetic aberrations on
a hard disk either, if only because it is impractical to do so.  They
will usually talk about subroutines, loops, processes, etc.  The point
here is that a program transcends the means of its expression.  The
same program can exist as a magnetic pattern on a disk, a pattern of
electrical pulses in a computer memory, deposits of ink or graphite on
some paper, and patterns of electrochemical impulses in a human brain.
The (high level) program can be fully explained in a way completely
independent of the hardware it is run on by referring to its
functions, or sequence of symbolic operations.  The explanation is
complete for its own level of abstraction.  It can be explained more
reductionistically, too, but the more abstract way is usually better
(i.e., more useful) in this case.  It all depends on what you want to
describe.  My work routinely requires me to shift focus between lower
and higher levels because of the hierarchical relationships of these
models.  As I understand it, description-levels of the brain are even
more tightly bound than we originally thought.  The hierarchy is just
so vast that it is still useful to consider psychological events as
"real" in the same sense that programs are "real" (except on a MUCH
higher level of abstraction).  I doubt that we will feel the need to
dispose of such abstract ideas even if (or when) we fully "explain"
how neurons interact to produce sentience and intelligence, just as we
should not feel compelled to stop studying biology if (or when) a
Grand Unified Theory is put forth by physicists to "explain"
everything.

I wrote my (possibly) mistaken definition of emergence with good
reason, however.  Modern physics seems to make no sense unless we
consider every particle in the universe as multiple manifestations of
a single particle.  In other words, it suggests that there is really
only one particle in the whole universe!  Under this model, all
particles are in some way "contained" in all other particles, so that
reference to the fundamental parts (particles) of *everything* is
meaningless without reference to everything else.

The theory here is that total (absolute, not relative) reduction is
FUNDAMENTALLY impossible.  All explanations are made in relation to
their description-levels, including the so-called "explanations" of
reductionistic science.  So perhaps my original definition is correct
in one sense, but as long as we're stuck inside our framework of
hierarchies, incapable of explaining anything in an "absolute"
all-around way, my newer one might be more pragmatic.

The question now must be: are the current "new physics" models
correct?  Right now the facts DO point that way, but admittedly, this
could change (or we wouldn't call it science).  We have the
scientist's faith in the ultimate reducibility of everything based on
the history of science to date.  It's not an unfounded faith, yet it
is contingent on the direction the facts will take us.

-- Kev