Emergent properties

American Philosophical Quarterly 31 (2):91-104 (1994)
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Abstract

All organised bodies are composed of parts, similar to those composing inorganic nature, and which have even themselves existed in an inorganic state; but the phenomena of life, which result from the juxtaposition of those parts in a certain manner, bear no analogy to any of the effects which would be produced by the action of the component substances considered as mere physical agents. To whatever degree we might imagine our knowledge of the properties of the several ingredients of a living body to be extended and perfected, it is certain that no mere summing up of the separate actions of those elements will ever amount to the action of the living body itself

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Timothy O'Connor
Indiana University, Bloomington

Citations of this work

Construction area (no hard hat required).Karen Bennett - 2011 - Philosophical Studies 154 (1):79-104.
Metaphysical emergence: Weak and Strong.Jessica Wilson - 2015 - In Tomasz Bigaj & Christian Wüthrich (eds.), Metaphysics in Contemporary Physics. Poznan Studies in the Philosophy of the Sciences and the Humanities. pp. 251-306.
Rejecting epiphobia.Umut Baysan - 2021 - Synthese 199 (1-2):2773-2791.
The Metaphysics of Emergence.Hong Yu Wong - 2005 - Noûs 39 (4):658 - 678.

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References found in this work

A World of States of Affairs.D. Armstrong - 1993 - Philosophical Perspectives 7:429-440.
Real patterns.Daniel C. Dennett - 1991 - Journal of Philosophy 88 (1):27-51.
Persons and Causes: The Metaphysics of Free Will.Timothy O'Connor - 2000 - New York, US: Oxford University Press USA.

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