Conatus: THIRD EDITION by Tom Wallace - HTML preview

C O N A T U S

Discussion of emergence seems very rare nowadays — rarer even than a few decades ago.

Perhaps the reason is that — lurking amongst all the wonder — there are some awkward questions. Arguably, the big three are: Why something rather than nothing? (Or, really, why form rather than formlessness?) What makes something alive? And, what makes something conscious? Do they not just seem like the obvious questions? But I’ve read whole books on science — even whole books on biology — where these questions are never addressed.

Maybe it’s that we get the feeling such questions are going to lead to metaphysical answers rather than practical, scientific ones. And maybe the metaphysics will lead into spirituality! Whilst it seems that emergence is very much at work in biology, in eco-systems and the bio-sphere, the manner and explanation of what exactly is emergent is by no means clear, let alone how the emergence happens! We could say though that a lot of communication is evident across species in eco-systems — communication that points towards mutual aid. And when we get to human societies we have an explosion of phenomena that are not evident from our biological roots.

But I think that’s where our idea of mind plus body plus way of being in the world can help. Remember, no need for the supernatural here! No top-down causality, if that’s what upsets you so much. No — just emergence, from the bottom up. As I’ve hinted at above, we could go on with our emergence into eco-systems, societies and cultures — all of which have their

90