23 found
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  1. A new look at emergence. Or when after is different.Alexandre Guay & Olivier Sartenaer - 2016 - European Journal for Philosophy of Science 6 (2):297-322.
    In this paper, we put forward a new account of emergence called “transformational emergence”. Such an account captures a variety of emergence that can be considered as being diachronic and weakly ontological. The fact that transformational emergence actually constitutes a genuine form of emergence is motivated. Besides, the account is free of traditional problems surrounding more usual, synchronic versions of emergence, and it can find a strong empirical support in a specific physical phenomenon, the fractional quantum Hall effect, which has (...)
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  2. Flat Emergence.Olivier Sartenaer - 2018 - Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 99 (S1):225-250.
    The main contention of this article is that current approaches to ontological emergence are not comprehensive, in that they share a common bias that make them blind to some conceptual space available to emergence. In this article, I devise an alternative perspective on ontological emergence called ‘flat emergence’, which is free of such a bias. The motivation is twofold: not only does flat emergence constitute another viable way to fulfill the initial emergentist promise, but it also allows for making sense (...)
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  3.  85
    What Price Changing Laws of Nature?Olivier Sartenaer, Alexandre Guay & Paul Humphreys - 2020 - European Journal for Philosophy of Science 11 (1):1-19.
    In this paper, we show that it is not a conceptual truth about laws of nature that they are immutable (though we are happy to leave it as an open empirical question whether they do actually change once in a while). In order to do so, we survey three popular accounts of lawhood—(Armstrong-style) necessitarianism, (Bird-style) dispositionalism and (Lewis-style) ‘best system analysis’—and expose the extent, as well as the philosophical cost, of the amendments that should be enforced in order to leave (...)
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  4. Sixteen Years Later: Making Sense of Emergence (Again).Olivier Sartenaer - 2016 - Journal for General Philosophy of Science / Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 47 (1):79-103.
    Sixteen years after Kim’s seminal paper offering a welcomed analysis of the emergence concept, I propose in this paper a needed extension of Kim’s work that does more justice to the actual diversity of emergentism. Rather than defining emergence as a monolithic third way between reductive physicalism and substance pluralism, and this through a conjunction of supervenience and irreducibility, I develop a comprehensive taxonomy of the possible varieties of emergence in which each taxon—theoretical, explanatory and causal emergence—is properly identified and (...)
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  5. Emergent Quasiparticles. Or How to Get a Rich Physics from a Sober Metaphysics.Alexandre Guay & Olivier Sartenaer - 2018 - In Melinda Fagan, Otávio Bueno & Ruey-Lin Chen (eds.), Individuation, Process, and Scientific Practices. New York, USA: Oxford University Press. pp. 214-235.
    Among the very architects of the recent re-emergence of emergentism in the physical sciences, Robert B. Laughlin certainly occupies a prominent place. Through a series of works beginning as early as his Nobel lecture in 1998, a lecture given after having been awarded, together with Störmer and Tsui, the Nobel prize in physics for its contribution in the elucidation of the fractional quantum Hall effect, Laughlin openly and relentlessly advocated a strongly anti-reductionistic view of physics – and, more particularly, of (...)
     
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  6. Synchronic vs. diachronic emergence: a reappraisal.Olivier Sartenaer - 2015 - European Journal for Philosophy of Science 5 (1):31-54.
    In this paper, I put forward a benchmark account of emergence in terms of non-explainability and explicate the relationship that exists between its synchronic and diachronic declinations. I develop an argument whose conclusion is that emergence is essentially a “two-faceted” notion, i.e. it always encapsulates both synchronic and diachronic dimensions. I then compare this account with alternative recent accounts of emergence that define the concept through the notion of unpredictability or topological non-equivalence.
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  7.  88
    Neither metaphysical dichotomy nor pure identity: Clarifying the emergentist creed.Olivier Sartenaer - 2013 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 44 (3):365-373.
    Emergentism is often misleadingly described as a monolithic “third way” between radical monism and pluralism. In the particular case of biology, for example, emergentism is perceived as a middle course between mechanicism and vitalism. In the present paper I propose to show that the conceptual landscape between monism and pluralism is more complex than this classical picture suggests. On the basis of two successive analyses—distinguishing three forms of tension between monism and pluralism and a distinction between derivational and functional reduction—I (...)
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  8.  42
    Entre monisme et dualisme : Deux stratégies pour l'émergence.Olivier Sartenaer - 2011 - Philosophiques 38 (2):543-557.
    Dans cet article, nous nous proposons de mettre en évidence deux stratégies émergentistes possibles qui constituent une médiation intéressante entre les extrêmes classiques que sont le physicalisme réductionniste et le dualisme des substances. En distinguant trois niveaux de tension possibles entre monisme et dualisme — le niveau des substances, le niveau des propriétés causales et celui des prédicats — nous sommes amené à formuler deux positions philosophiques associées à deux concepts d’émergence distincts : l’émergence représentationnelle et l’émergence causale. Ces deux (...)
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  9. Disentangling the Vitalism–Emergentism Knot.Olivier Sartenaer - 2018 - Journal for General Philosophy of Science / Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 49 (1):73-88.
    Starting with the observation that there exist contradictory claims in the literature about the relationship between vitalism and emergentism—be it one of inclusion or, on the contrary, exclusion–, this paper aims at disentangling the vitalism–emergentism knot. To this purpose, after having described a particular form of emergentism, namely Lloyd Morgan’s emergent evolutionism, I develop a conceptual analysis on the basis of a distinction between varieties of monism and pluralism. This analysis allows me to identify and characterize several forms of vitalism (...)
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  10. Does Organicism Really Need Organization?Olivier Sartenaer - 2023 - In Matteo Mossio (ed.), Organization in Biology. Springer. pp. 103-125.
    The main purpose of the present chapter is to argue in favor of the claim that, contrary to what is usually and tacitly assumed, organization is not necessary for organicism. To this purpose, I first set up the stage by providing a working characterization of organicism that involves two free parameters, whose variations allow for covering the rich and diverse conceptual landscape of organicism, past and present. In particular, I contend that organization is usually construed as a “mean to an (...)
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  11. Humeanism, Best System Laws, and Emergence.Olivier Sartenaer - 2019 - Philosophy of Science 86 (4):719-738.
    In the current article and contrary to a widespread assumption, I argue that Humeanism and ontological emergence can peacefully coexist. Such a coexistence can be established by reviving elements of John Stuart Mill’s philosophy of science, in which an idiosyncratic account of diachronic emergence is associated with extensions of the Humean mosaic and the correlative coming into being of new best system laws, which have the peculiarity of being temporally indexed. Incidentally, this reconciliation of Humeanism and emergence allows for conceiving (...)
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  12. John Dewey, Lloyd Morgan et l’avènement d’un nouveau naturalisme pragmatico-émergentiste.David Doat & Olivier Sartenaer - 2014 - Philosophiques 41 (1):127-156.
    David Doat ,Olivier Sartenaer | : Peut-on raisonnablement penser qu’un même phénomène naturel, comme l’esprit par exemple, puisse en même temps être continu et discontinu avec les processus physico-chimiques qui conditionnent son advenue au monde ? Autrement dit, est-il possible de construire une philosophie de la nature qui rejette simultanément la dichotomie métaphysique et la pure identité, c’est-à-dire qui se situe sans contradiction sur la ligne de séparation entre le dualisme et le matérialisme ? En y répondant par l’affirmative, John (...)
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  13. Emergent Evolutionism, Determinism and Unpredictability.Olivier Sartenaer - 2015 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 51:62-68.
    The fact that there exist in nature thoroughly deterministic systems whose future behavior cannot be predicted, no matter how advanced or fined-tune our cognitive and technical abilities turn out to be, has been well established over the last decades or so, essentially in the light of two different theoretical frameworks, namely chaos theory and (some deterministic interpretation of) quantum mechanics. The prime objective of this paper is to show that there actually exists an alternative strategy to ground the divorce between (...)
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  14.  45
    Qu'est-ce que l'émergence?Olivier Sartenaer - 2017 - Paris, France: Vrin.
    Le concept d’émergence est récemment réapparu avec force sur le devant de la scène philosophique. La notion est séduisante, notamment en cela qu’elle permettrait de promouvoir une vision « non réductionniste » du monde naturel. À cet égard, elle se retrouve souvent mobilisée à tort et à travers à tous les niveaux du discours scientifique, de la physique aux sciences cognitives, en passant par la biologie. Mais qu’est-ce que l’émergence exactement ? Est-ce seulement un concept cohérent ? N’y gagnerait-on pas (...)
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  15.  35
    A Contextualist Solution to the Demarcation Problem.Olivier Sartenaer - forthcoming - Journal for General Philosophy of Science / Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie.
    In this paper, after presenting three challenges that any knowledge-based demarcation between science and non-science should meet, namely, the skeptical, triviality, and mimicry challenges, I show how a recent contender in epistemology, viz., presuppositional epistemic contextualism, allows these challenges to be met, hence pointing toward a novel solution to the perennial demarcation problem. Conceiving of scientific knowledge from the vantage point of contextualism forces us to consider science as being first and foremost a distinctive epistemological context, which has the peculiarity (...)
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  16.  73
    Non-standard approaches to emergence: introduction to the special issue.Olivier Sartenaer & Umut Baysan - 2021 - Synthese 199 (3):7773-7776.
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  17.  71
    Emergence.Olivier Sartenaer - 2017 - L'Encyclopédie Philosophique.
    En tout généralité, le concept d’émergence capture une relation entre deux entités, un « émergent » E et sa « base d’émergence » B, de telle manière que l’on puisse affirmer que E dépend de B et que, malgré cette dépendance, E s’avère irréductible à B. Une façon classique de concrétiser cette idée est de considérer E comme un « tout » et B comme les « parties » de ce tout. Dans l’esprit de la maxime classique selon laquelle « (...)
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  18.  21
    Emergenza piatta.Olivier Sartenaer - 2019 - Philosophy Kitchen 11:53-74.
    The main contention of the present paper is that current approaches to ontological emergence are not comprehensive, in that they share a common bias that make them blind to some conceptual space available to ontological emergence and, accordingly, to some clear-cut empirical cases of such an emergence. The bias in question is twofold. It consists in considering whatever emerges to be both systematically simultaneous with, as well as belonging to a higher level with respect to, what it emerges from. What (...)
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  19. Le « scientifiquement prouvé » et l’appel au complot : les deux facettes d’une même méprise épistémique.Olivier Sartenaer - 2024 - Philosophia Scientiae 28-3 (28-3):183-203.
    The aim of the present paper is to show that, when properly understood, both the ’scientifically proven’ and calls to conspiracy are grounded in the very same epistemic misunderstanding about the exact nature of what is commonly required to acquire knowledge. In other words, I will track and identify the common (illegitimate) basis for both these rhetorical manoeuvres which unfortunately occupy most of the space in public debates nowadays. On this basis, I will offer a modest philosophical recommendation for science (...)
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  20. Émergence et causalité descendante dans les sciences de l'esprit.Olivier Sartenaer - 2013 - Revue Philosophique De Louvain 111 (1):5-26.
  21.  50
    Pour mettre fin au mythe de Laplace.Olivier Sartenaer - 2017 - Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale 94 (2):179-200.
    We open this paper by explicating the content of « Laplace’s myth », which we construe as an inference resting on the conjunction of two premises, the hypothesis of an unlimited intelligence and the hypothesis of an ontologically deterministic universe, and leading to the thesis of epistemological determinism. We then aim at showing that such an inference is not valid. To this purpose, we seek for a particular metaphysical framework within which it is possible to hold the conjunction of the (...)
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  22. Free Will, Language, and the Causal Exclusion Problem.Olivier Sartenaer & Bernard Feltz - 2019 - In Bernard Feltz, Marcus Missal & Andrew Sims (eds.), Causality and Free Will. Brill. pp. 163-177.
     
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  23. Réductionnisme.Olivier Sartenaer - 2016 - L'Encyclopédie Philosophique.
    Le réductionnisme consiste en la thèse selon laquelle toute entité Y « se réduit », ou est en principe « réductible », à une entité unique de base (ou un ensemble unique d’entités de base) X(i). Ceci étant, la thèse du réductionnisme ne peut être rendue intelligible qu’au travers d’une explicitation première de ce en quoi consiste la « réduction » de Y à X(i). Une telle explicitation s’opère le long de deux dimensions, l’une associée à la nature des relata (...)
     
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