On Thu, Jul 09, 2009 at 08:25:14AM -0400, James Steiner wrote:
> On Wed, Jul 8, 2009 at 8:33 PM, russell standish<r.stand...@unsw.edu.au>
> wrote:
> > On Wed, Jul 08, 2009 at 10:16:55AM -0700, glen e. p. ropella wrote:
> >> The question was: Is there any identifiable property of a system that is
> >> NOT an emergent property, regardless of how one defines "system"? If
> >> anyone knows of one, please name it!
> >
> > Absolutely! The positions of the particles in a Newtonian n-body system
> > are not emergent. Of course there are other properties of these
> > systems that are emergent, but position & momenta of the particles are
> > not amongst them, being part of the basic vocabulary of the model.
>
> OK, so aren't the positions and velocities of the particles a
> consequence of the forces affecting the particles? Is saying something
The forces are also part of the basic vocabulary of the system. The
positions and momenta of the particles are uniquely specified for all
time given a set of dynamical equations (\dot{x}=; \dot{p}=), and once
the initial conditions are given. No emergence is involved here.
Where emergence comes into play, is when additional descriptive
elements are added. The concept of orbit, for example, is emergent, as
the original dynamics has no notion of an orbit. The reason "orbit"
works well model with gravitating objects as a is a consequence of the
inverse square force law - with other force laws, the concept of orbit
is not such a good descriptor.
> is a consequence the same as saying it is an emergent property? Or is
> this concequence too well defined, which brings us back to "emergent"
> means "poorly understood"?
>
> I'm not sure why I'm even playing this game, since I don't think its
> helpful to say that everything is an emergent property of something...
> because of course it is... because everything in the universe is made
> of math.
>
> ~~James
>
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile)
Mathematics
UNSW SYDNEY 2052 hpco...@hpcoders.com.au
Australia http://www.hpcoders.com.au
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
