Emergence and Causality Mark H. Bickhard Lehigh University

Process and Emergence Parmenides –Empedocles, Democritus, Aristotle Hume Kim Process —> ubiquitous emergence –Downward causation External Internal Internal developmental Emergent “causation”

Hierarchy of Emergents Emergence is a phenomenon of process organization New organization yields new properties Some of these emergent properties can serve to help stabilize the new organization Thus yielding new stable entities Which can then participate in higher level organizations

Some Lower Levels in the Emergence Hierarchy Quantum field theory — Noether’s theorem: yields conserved quantities Fermion relationships yields “valence” –Atoms themselves can be electrically neutral and still have “valence” Inhomogeneities of neutral molecules yields van der Waals forces in solids –And similar forms of causality that hold solids together

Some Intermediate Levels in the Emergence Hierarchy Processes with independent energy sources influencing each other constitute control relationships –Servomechanisms, computers — note that stability of control organization is usually not due to the control relationships per se When control relationships do maintain the system ( and it can reproduce: a form of maintenance ) we have biological autonomous systems –This involves far from equilibrium systems, self maintenance, and recursive self maintenance

Some Higher Levels in the Emergence Hierarchy Modulations among autonomous systems constitutes a form of communication –Yields ecosystems Modulations among autonomous systems with regard to representations, goals, intentions, constitutes meaningful communication

More Higher Levels When presumptions of such communication constitute situation conventions –Yields relationships and communities –Productive conventional means for meaningful communication that interacts with situation conventions constitutes language

Higher Levels III Social reality emerges as situation conventions among agents For linguistic agents, these realities can be constituted in large part as potentialities for further “conversation” Stability of social realities inheres in conventions, both occurrent and institutionalized

Persons and Society Human agents develop as agents within social realities They become agents in and for those social realities — socio-culturally specialized agents They become emergent social persons

Emergent Culture Culture induces the developmental emergent “production” of persons who co-constitute that culture Culture creates its own emergence base by guiding the developmental emergence of its constituent persons Stabilities depend on communicative influences on processes of developmental emergence

Cultural Evolution Culture, then, becomes a realm of evolution with its own historicities, partially independent of the biological base –A unique realm of evolution

Conclusion “Cause” is a protean word; it has no consistent meaning beyond some kind of determination There are multifarious emergent forms of determination, of cause, beginning with quantum field theory And, therefore, multifarious emergent forms of stability of organizations, of emergent entities