Argumenta – Journal of Analytic Philosophy

This paper will consider how the account of weak emergence presented by Wilson in the book Metaphysical emergence (2021) can be used to explore the relation between biochemical functions and chemical structure in biochemical molecules, as vitamin B12. The structure of the paper is the following. Section 2 will introduce why biochemical functions are interesting from a philosophical perspective and why their relation to molecular structure can be seen as problematic. In doing so, it will consider the definition of biochemical functions as in Bellazzi (2022) for which they can…

Metaphysical emergence has often been used to help understand the relationship between the entities of physics and the entities of the special sciences. What are the prospects of using metaphysical emergence within physics, to help understand the relationship between three-dimensional physical entities, and the non-three-dimensional entities that have been recently posited in certain interpretations of quantum mechanics and quantum gravity? This paper explores Jessica Wilson’s (2021) analysis of certain cases of metaphysical emergence in terms of degrees of freedom and raises several questions that need to be answered in order…

I critically examine Jessica Wilson’s views concerning the relationship between Weak emergence and Physicalism and between Strong emergence and Physicalism, and also her defense of libertarian free will in Metaphysical Emergence (2021).