TY - JOUR
T1 - Humeanism, Best System Laws, and Emergence
AU - Sartenaer, Olivier
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2019, University of Chicago Press. All rights reserved.
PY - 2019/10/1
Y1 - 2019/10/1
N2 - In the current article and contrary to a widespread assumption, I argue that Humeanism and ontological emergence can peacefully coexist. Such a coexistence can be established by reviving elements of John Stuart Mill’s philosophy of science, in which an idiosyncratic account of diachronic emergence is associated with extensions of the Humean mosaic and the correlative coming into being of new best system laws, which have the peculiarity of being temporally indexed. Incidentally, this reconciliation of Humeanism and emergence allows for conceiving the autonomy of the special sciences in an interesting way, consistently with the reductionist ideal of a unified science.
AB - In the current article and contrary to a widespread assumption, I argue that Humeanism and ontological emergence can peacefully coexist. Such a coexistence can be established by reviving elements of John Stuart Mill’s philosophy of science, in which an idiosyncratic account of diachronic emergence is associated with extensions of the Humean mosaic and the correlative coming into being of new best system laws, which have the peculiarity of being temporally indexed. Incidentally, this reconciliation of Humeanism and emergence allows for conceiving the autonomy of the special sciences in an interesting way, consistently with the reductionist ideal of a unified science.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85072878521&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1086/704979
DO - 10.1086/704979
M3 - Article
SN - 0031-8248
VL - 86
SP - 719
EP - 738
JO - Philosophy of Science
JF - Philosophy of Science
IS - 4
ER -