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Full Idea
Whatever the causal process is, it remains true that if emergentism is true, the completeness of physics is false; there are some effects which would not have come about if mental things were absent from the world.
Clarification
'Emergent' properties are not a necessary consequence of their physical basis
Gist of Idea
If mental properties are emergent they add a new type of causation, and physics is not complete
Source
Tim Crane (Elements of Mind [2001], 2.18)
Book Ref
Crane,Tim: 'Elements of Mind' [OUP 2001], p.65
A Reaction
Emergentism looks to me like an incoherent concept, unless it is another word for dualism.
| 3471 | Some properties depend on components, others on their relations [Searle] |
| 3472 | Fully 'emergent' properties contradict our whole theory of causation [Searle] |
| 2320 | Properties can have causal powers lacked by their constituents [Kim] |
| 3291 | Emergent properties appear at high levels of complexity, but aren't explainable by the lower levels [Nagel] |
| 3432 | Is weight a 'resultant' property of water, but transparency an 'emergent' property? [Kim] |
| 3434 | Emergent properties are 'brute facts' (inexplicable), but still cause things [Kim] |
| 2469 | The world is full of messy small things producing stable large-scale properties (e.g. mountains) [Fodor] |
| 4083 | If mental properties are emergent they add a new type of causation, and physics is not complete [Crane] |
| 4082 | The distinction between 'resultant' properties (weight) and 'emergent' properties is a bit vague [Crane] |
| 4612 | Complex properties are just arrangements of simple properties; they do not "emerge" as separate [Heil] |
| 4615 | Complex properties are not new properties, they are merely new combinations of properties [Heil] |
| 18513 | Emergent properties will need emergent substances to bear them [Heil] |
| 14302 | A lead molecule is not leaden, and macroscopic properties need not be microscopically present [Mumford] |
| 14553 | Weak emergence is just unexpected, and strong emergence is beyond all deduction [Mumford/Anjum] |