An abstract concept, considered to be a property of non-linear systems, that is meant to express the state of affairs in which multiple combinations of factors can lead to a particular behavioural outcome. The behavior is emergent if no single factor by itself determines whether the behavior may arise. Put another way, it is the appearance in either evolution or development of a structure or function from lower-level processes that were not pre-specified to determine that structure or function. Thus, emergent properties are properties of the ‘whole’ that are not possessed by any of the individual parts making up that whole. Emergent behaviors are typically novel and unanticipated. The distinction between emergent and non-emergent properties is credited to John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) in his book System of logic (1843).
See Biogenetic processes, Complex system, Consciousness, Control parameter, Developmental bootstrapping, Developmental emergence, Diachronic emergence, Dynamical coupling, Epigenetic emergence, Evolutionary emergence, Law, Laws of nature, Levelism, Levels of development, Life course analysis, On-line emergence, Open system, Order parameter, Pattern formation, Quantitative and qualitative change, Self-organization, Symmetry breaking (and preservation), Systemic causality, Systemogenesis, Systems approach, Whole is greater than the sum of its parts