Why conversational equations and emergence (General)

by romansh , Saturday, March 29, 2014, 16:19 (3893 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained

That would be because your question/point is a non-sequiter. Just because there is a cause and effect, or even if we can explain the cause and effect in hindsight, it does not preclude something being an emergent property. An emergent property is simply something that can ONLY exist because of a particular configuration of relatively elementary (in relation to the property being examined) elements in a system. -For me this is an unusual use of the term non sequitur Tony, when trying to clarify what David means by emergent.-David makes this statement here I don't think we can curently explain properties we call emergent. That is why we use that term. To me it is perfectly logical to ask him to clarify this statement by asking If we can explain a supposed emergent phenomenon is it still emergent?-If you think it does not follow I would love to understand your reasoning Tony.-> Emergent properties do not require nor preclude prior planning. They exist regardless of intent as a combined function of their elementary components. 
Before we go too far here, Tony in the spirit of the topic would you care define emergence ... One common one seems to be systems (complex or simple) can behave in complex ways. DHW seems (to me) to have defined it in terms of breaking the first law of thermodynamics. Equations don't have to balance and may not even be relevant to emergence. 
> The problem with human designs is that we most often lack the foresight to see all of the possibilities inherent in a system, and thus can only examine emergent properties in hindsight, and so are surprised by them. If you had perfect knowledge of a system, the emergent properties would still exist, but would not be a surprise.-Again what is emergence?