Related Terms • Gestalt • division

Definition:
An emergent property is a property which a collection or complex system has, but which the individual members do not have. In such a case, the whole system is sometimes said to have Gestalt. A failure to realize that a property is emergent, or supervenient, leads to the fallacy of division.

For example, the taste of saltiness is a property of salt, but that does not mean that it is also a property of sodium and chlorine, the two elements which make up salt. Thus, saltiness is an emergent or a supervenient property of salt. Claiming that chlorine must be salty because salt is salty would be an example of the fallacy of division.

Claiming that a property is supervenient is not always without controversy. For example, some philosophers argue that morality is a supervenient property of human actions or that mental states are supervenient properties of brain states. This allows for the fact that we cannot deduce morality or mental states from the individual pieces of human actions or brain functions, but not everyone agrees with those solutions.

Also Known As: supervenient property

Alternate Spellings: none

Common Misspellings: none

Related Resources:

What is Philosophy?
What is philosophy? Is there any point in studying philosophy, or is it a useless subject? What are the different branches of philosophy - what's the difference between aestheitcs and ethics? What's the difference between metaphysics and epistemology?