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From: jim@se-sd.SanDiego.NCR.COM (Jim Ruehlin, Cognitologist domesticus)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: emergent properties
Message-ID: <4126@se-sd.SanDiego.NCR.COM>
Date: 2 Nov 90 23:57:07 GMT
References: <1990Sep29.213139.2876@watdragon.waterloo.edu> <3499@media-lab.MEDIA.MIT.EDU> <1990Oct26.220658.11281@ncsuvx.ncsu.edu> <3841@media-lab.MEDIA.MIT.EDU> <1990Oct30.220248.20784@ncsuvx.ncsu.edu> <4112@se-sd.SanDiego.NCR.COM> <1990Nov1.205907.7472@ncsuvx.ncsu.
Organization: NCR Corp., Systems Engineering - San Diego
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In <1990Nov1.205907.7472@ncsuvx.ncsu.edu> fostel@eos.ncsu.edu (Gary Fostel) writes:


>Jim Ruehlin at NCR, San Diego, wrote:
>>True, but the point may have been that the physicist spoke of gravity
>>"emerging" from a complex system of particles (much as some cognitive
>>scientists claim "intelligence" emerges from a complex system of
>>neurons).  Minsky pointed out that this property exists for just two
>>particles.  The assuption is that two particles, like two neruons,
>>are not a complex enough system to provide "emergence" (just what is
>>complex enough is never addressed by the emergites).  Hence whatever
>>the property is, it's not emergent.

>I don't think it matters that much whether we are dealling with one particle
>or two.  It could be scads of particles.  No one has ever observed gravity
>acting on anything less than jillions of particles.  We all beleive it acts
>on each particle but that is unfounded.  I don't think there is even any
>indirect evidence of gravity until you get to macroscopic sized objects.
>The gravitional force is many orders of magnitude weaker than even the
>weakest of the other forces.  I don't often find myself disagreeing with
>Minsky, but this time I think he's wrong.  

I'm no physicist, but I think you're begging the question.  If gravitional
theory applies to two individual particles, then I think my argument
holds.  Otherwise, we can't know if it holds or not because we can't
observe gravity operating on anything less than jillions of particles. So
it's unprovable whether gravity is emergent or not.

I don't know if anyones done it or not yet, but it would be interesting to
see what one could theorize from just two neurons acting together with
no other connections to other neurons (someone must have done this by now).
Can we see the same properties in minutae that we can see with a more
complex neuronal system?  Are our measurements accurate enought to detect
anything?  Is what were measuring defined enough to measure?  The proper
experimental design might start to lead to some evidence/disproof of
emergence.

- Jim Ruehlin