Posted by
Kim Sorvig on
URL: http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/mystery-and-emergence-tp3599553.html
Nick and all --
I would have to say that many mysterious
phenomena are not emergent.
It takes one missing piece of information in an otherwise
linear deductive process to create "a mystery." The cat jumps into the
window and knocks over a kachina that strands there, while I am away. At
least for a while, it is a mystery how that happened. It is even more
likely to be mysterious if the cat's behavior is atypical, or if I don't see a
path for it to get from the floor to the window.
Secondly, there are mysteries that I doubt we will ever be
able to reduce, with certainty, either to a linear explanation
or to one involving emergence. Esamples "What preceded the Big
Bang?" or a religious version thereof; "What is outside the Universe
and how can it have a boundary?"; or "Where did quarks get the
ruleset under which it can be shown that they operate?" There
are a small number of baseline existential questions in which mystery is both
inherent and irreducible. I know that assertion will get some of the true
Rationalists going, and I am not looking for a big fight. Such questions
are very few in number, but I believe there are a half-dozen or so that we
are obliged to 'fudge' (that is, give operational definitions to them) in order
to proceed with rational analysis of the remaining 99.99% of
inquiry.
Thus, from either a simple or sublime perspective,
there can be mystery without emergence.
Last but perhaps not least -- and a reason for not making
mystery an essential part of a definition of emergence -- mystery is an
experiential quality more than an "objective" phenomenon. We can
retain the sense of wonder and of mystery even after we have analytically
understood how some phenomenon happens. Mystery is a willingness to remain
astonished, and as such is not discrete enough to define other
terms.
My two-cents worth -- which are bound to mystify some
folks!
Kim Sorvig
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