The Demystification of Emergent Behavior

TL;DR

This paper clarifies the concept of emergent behavior, distinguishing it from chaos, and discusses its significance and contentious nature in biological sciences.

Contribution

It provides a clearer understanding of emergence, emphasizing its difference from chaos and exploring its role in biological systems.

Findings

Emergent behavior transcends simple complexity increase.

Emergence is distinct from chaotic systems.

The paper offers a clearer conceptual framework for emergence.

Abstract

Emergent behavior that appears at a given level of organization may be characterized as arising from an organizationally lower level in such a way that it transcends a mere increase in the behavioral degree of complexity. It is therefore to be distinguished from systems exhibiting chaotic behavior, for example, which are deterministic but unpredictable because of an exponential dependence on initial conditions. In emergent phenomena, higher-levels of organization are not determined by lower-levels of organization; or, more colloquially, emergent behavior is often said to be "greater than the sum of the parts". The concept plays an especially important but contentious role in the biological sciences. This essay is intended to demystify at least some aspects of the mystery of emergence.