Comment by bjk on The Futility of Emergence · 2007-08-27T05:17:42.000Z · LW · GW

If we take EY's example of a market crash, the non-emergent hypothesis is that of a random process. In other words, price action is like the action of gas molecules, or Brownian motion. To say that a market crash is an emergent phenomenon is to say that it displays more order than gas molecules bouncing off one another, which do not display emergent properties. That is not an empty distinction, as far as I can see.