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Not School: P.W. Anderson’s “More Is Different” on Emergence

December 20, 2013 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

Featuring Dylan Casey, Bill Burgess, Casey Fitzpatrick, Ernie Prabhakar, and Evan Gould. Recorded 12/20/13.

In this famous, 1972 paper, Anderson argues that the sciences don’t form a reductive whole — that chemistry isn’t applied physics and psychology isn’t applied biology — taking early aim at the conceits of the uber-reductionist elementary particle physicists. Part of his argument is an articulation of how the principles of symmetry-breaking make this non-reductionism clear in the physical world. We discuss all these matters trying to sort out Anderson’s claims and what we think of the evidence for them.

Not School Digest Jan 2013: A Bonus Quasisode

January 23, 2013 by Mark Linsenmayer 4 Comments

Not School

Excerpts of discussions about Deleuze & Guattari’s A Thousand Plateaus, an article on emergence called “More Is Different” by Nobel Prize Winning physicist P.W. Anderson, John Searle’s Mind: A Brief Introduction, and Italo Calvino’s trippy science fantasy novel Cosmicomics.

A Discussion of PW Anderson’s “More is Different”

December 28, 2012 by Dylan Casey Leave a Comment

Earlier this month I had the pleasure of discussing P.W. Anderson’s famous 1972 article More is Different as part of  a PEL Not School study group on emergence with Not Schoolers Bill Burgess, Casey Fitzpatrick, Ernie Prabhakar, and Evan Gould. Anderson argues that the sciences don’t form a reductive whole — that chemistry isn’t applied physics and psychology isn’t applied biology — taking Continue Reading …

Nagel’s Mind and Cosmos

October 24, 2012 by Getty Lustila 24 Comments

[Editor’s Note: Here’s a post by Getty from our Hume/Smith on ethics episode. Incidentally, Getty will be leading a Not School Reading group on Harry Frankfurt’s The Reasons of Love. Go join.] Thomas Nagel, professor of philosophy and law at NYU, is notorious for his heterodox philosophical positions (this was discussed a bit on PEL here). He is a scientific Continue Reading …

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The Partially Examined Life is a philosophy podcast by some guys who were at one point set on doing philosophy for a living but then thought better of it. Each episode, we pick a text and chat about it with some balance between insight and flippancy. You don’t have to know any philosophy, or even to have read the text we’re talking about to (mostly) follow and (hopefully) enjoy the discussion

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