The physics of emergence /

---

"Version: 20190601"--Title page verso."A Morgan & Claypool publication as part of IOP Concise Physics"--Title page verso.Includes bibliographical references.1. Brief history of the debate -- 1.1. The modern emergentists -- 1.2. Einstein, Pauli, and Schr?odinger -- 1.3. The return of emergence -- 1.4. Questioning the hierarchy -- 1.5. Weinberg and the response to P.W. Anderson -- 1.6. Universality and independence2. Some physics objections to emergence -- 2.1. Physics is fundamentally causally closed -- 2.2. Fundamental principles/laws govern everything -- 2.3. Symmetry is reduction -- 2.4. Coherence of physics and the sciences -- 2.5. Ontological emergence violates fundamental laws -- 2.6. Atomism, context and reductionism -- 2.7. Bare versus dressed states3. Contextual emergence -- 3.1. A framework of conditions -- 3.2. Stability conditions -- 3.3. Contextual topologies and abstraction -- 3.4. Contextual topologies and contexts -- 3.5. Possibility spaces -- 3.6. Ontic/epistemic states and observables4. Case studies from physics -- 4.1. Convection as a contextually-emergent state -- 4.2. Temperature as a contextually-emergent property -- 4.3. Molecular structure as a contextually-emergent property -- 4.4. Brief examples5. Responding to objections -- 5.1. Physics is fundamentally causally closed -- 5.2. Fundamental principles/laws govern everything -- 5.3. Symmetry is reduction -- 5.4. Coherence of physics and the sciences -- 5.5. Ontological emergence violates fundamental laws -- 5.6. Atomism, context and reductionism -- 5.7. Is it all just boundary conditions? -- 5.8. Everything is in the fundamental domain6. Broader implications -- 6.1. Redefining fundamentality -- 6.2. Contextual emergence of the macroscopic -- 6.3. Implications for the universal wave function -- 6.4. Laws of nature -- 6.5. Determinism -- 6.6. Contextual emergence beyond physics.This book explores whether physics points to a reductive or an emergent structure of the world and proposes a physics-motivated conception of emergence that leaves behind many of the problematic intuitions shaping the philosophical conceptions. Examining several detailed case studies reveals results that point to stability conditions playing a crucial though underappreciated role in the physics of emergence. This contextual emergence has thought-provoking consequences for physics and beyond.Physics students, researchers, as well as those interested in physics.Also available in print.Mode of access: World Wide Web.System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader, EPUB reader, or Kindle reader.Robert C. Bishop studied physics at the University of Texas at Austin under John Wheeler, and philosophy under Fred Kronz and Robert Kane. He has held research postdocs in Freiburg and Konstanz, Germany, and taught philosophy of science and philosophy of physics at the London School of Economics, Oxford University and Rice University. He is currently Associate Professor of Physics and Philosophy and the John and Madeleine McIntyre Professor of History and Philosophy of Science at Wheaton College.Title from PDF title page (viewed on July 2, 2019).

---

Availability

No copy data

Detail Information

Series Title

-

Call Number

-

Publisher

: .,

Collation

1 online resource (various pagings).

Language

English

ISBN/ISSN

9781643271569

Classification

530.11

Content Type

-

Media Type

-

Carrier Type

-

Edition

-

Subject(s)

SCIENCE / Physics / Nuclear.
Particle & high-energy physics.
Physics
Emergence (Philosophy)

Specific Detail Info

-

Statement of Responsibility

Robert C. Bishop.

Other version/related

File Attachment

Comments

---

You must be logged in to post a comment