Robert, It's supposed to be *my* job to ask embarrassing practical questions.
The answer, of course, is to provide a vehicle around which to hold at-length discussions on whether, or not, the term "emergence" applies to said phenomenon. Silly. You should have known that. --Doug On Sat, Oct 10, 2009 at 7:58 AM, Robert Holmes <rob...@holmesacosta.com>wrote: > What's the point of determining whether a phenomenon is emergent or not? > What useful stuff can I actually do with that knowledge? > In other areas of my life, classification can have actionable consequences. > For example, I can use the sophisticated pattern-matching algorithms and > heuristics embedded in my brain to work out that the three animals wandering > through my house can be categorized as "cats" and not "dogs". And that is > useful, because it tells me that I should buy cat food and not dog food when > I go to PetCo. > > So what is an equivalent example with emergence? Once I've attached the > "emergent" label to a phenomenon, then what? > > -- Robert > > ============================================================ > 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 >
============================================================ 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
