From sbelknap@UIC.EDU Thu Feb 27 13:34:23 2003 Return-Path: X-Sender: lojban-out@lojban.org X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_2_3_4); 27 Feb 2003 21:34:22 -0000 Received: (qmail 28322 invoked from network); 27 Feb 2003 21:34:22 -0000 Received: from unknown (66.218.66.216) by m9.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 27 Feb 2003 21:34:22 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO digitalkingdom.org) (204.152.186.175) by mta1.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 27 Feb 2003 21:34:22 -0000 Received: from lojban-out by digitalkingdom.org with local (Exim 4.12) id 18oVfa-00033O-00 for lojban@yahoogroups.com; Thu, 27 Feb 2003 13:34:22 -0800 Received: from digitalkingdom.org ([204.152.186.175] helo=chain) by digitalkingdom.org with esmtp (Exim 4.12) id 18oVfL-000333-00; Thu, 27 Feb 2003 13:34:07 -0800 Received: with ECARTIS (v1.0.0; list lojban-list); Thu, 27 Feb 2003 13:34:05 -0800 (PST) Received: from larch.cc.uic.edu ([128.248.155.164]) by digitalkingdom.org with smtp (Exim 4.12) id 18oVfE-00032u-00 for lojban-list@lojban.org; Thu, 27 Feb 2003 13:34:00 -0800 Received: (qmail 32636 invoked from network); 27 Feb 2003 15:33:53 -0600 Received: from cis5044.uicomp.uic.edu (HELO uic.edu) (128.248.250.44) by larch.cc.uic.edu with SMTP; 27 Feb 2003 15:33:53 -0600 Date: Thu, 27 Feb 2003 15:33:32 -0600 Subject: [lojban] Emergence, Fuzziness, and Scale Types Content-Type: text/plain; charset=WINDOWS-1252; format=flowed Mime-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v551) To: lojban-list@lojban.org Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by Ecartis In-Reply-To: <20030227110939.K90896-100000@granite.thestonecutters.net> Message-Id: <1E9100C0-4A9B-11D7-B69A-000393629ED4@uic.edu> X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.551) X-archive-position: 4198 X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0 Sender: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org Errors-to: lojban-list-bounce@lojban.org X-original-sender: sbelknap@uic.edu Precedence: bulk X-list: lojban-list From: Steven Belknap Reply-To: sbelknap@uic.edu X-Yahoo-Group-Post: member; u=810567 Emergent properties may not emerge crisply. Copper starts acting "metallic" in some respects at around 200 atoms. In other respects copper doesn't start acting "metallic" until you get 10^8 or more atoms. Some emergent properties emerge in a linear fashion, others show discontinuities. The mass/collection/set problems have been discussed extensively on several occasions on this listserv. It is not clear to me that the recent discussion is more definitive in any way than past discussions. In addition to emergence it may also be worth considering fuzzy sets and scale types (i.e. nominal, ordinal, interval, ratio). Interested persons might enjoy reading the following on emergence, fuzziness, and scale types respectively: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/properties-emergent/ Zadeh, Lotfi Fuzzy sets, Inf. Control 8, 338-353, 1965 Stevens, S.S. On the Theory of Scales of Measurement Science 103(2684): 677–680 1946 All are short and sweet. -Steven