Reductionism, Emergence and Levels of Reality

Preface.- A Galilean Dialogue.- A random journey.- History.- Reductionism: the philosophical point of view.- Reduction in physics and philosophy.- Emergence.- A first attempt to tame complexity.- A short history of statistical mechanics.- Towards a systematic theory.- The paradigmatic Brownian motion.- Critical Phenomena.- Discussion.- From microscopic to macroscopic realities.- The problem of irreversibility.- Irreversibility and emergence.- From microscopic to macroscopic equations.- From atoms to cold fronts.- Concluding remarks.- Determinism, chaos and reductionism.- General remarks on determinism.- An excursus on chaos.- Chaos and complexity.- Chaos and probability.- Quarrels on chaos and determinism.- Concluding remarks.- Quantum Mechanics.- Classical versus quantum mechanics.- Chemistry vs applied Quantum Mechanics.- Summary and conclusions.- Some conclusions.- Unity of science beyond reductionism.- It from bit?.- Concluding remarks.

Este título pertence ao(s) assunto(s) indicados(s). Para ver outros títulos clique no assunto desejado.

• Filosofia da Ciência
• História da Ciência
• A física quântica (mecânica quântica e teoria quântica de campos)

Born-Oppenheimer Approximation;Brownian Motion;Chaos and Determinism;Critical Phenomena;Determinism, Chaos and Reductionism;Emergence in Science;Foundations of Statistical Mechanics;From Microscopic to Macroscopic;Irreversibility and Emergence;Reductionism in Science;The Problem of Irreversibility