Next Article in Journal
A Short Reference Differential Chaos Shift Keying Cooperative Communication System Based on Modified Code Index Modulation
Previous Article in Journal
Memory-Driven Dynamics: A Fractional Fisher Information Approach to Economic Interdependencies
 
 
Font Type:
Arial Georgia Verdana
Font Size:
Aa Aa Aa
Line Spacing:
Column Width:
Background:
This is an early access version, the complete PDF, HTML, and XML versions will be available soon.
Article

The Origin of Shared Emergent Properties in Discrete Systems

1
School of Computer Science and Mathematics, Kingston University, London KT1 1LQ, UK
2
Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston, SC 29425, USA
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
These authors contributed equally to this work.
Retired.
Entropy 2025, 27(6), 561; https://doi.org/10.3390/e27060561 (registering DOI)
Submission received: 5 May 2025 / Revised: 15 May 2025 / Accepted: 23 May 2025 / Published: 26 May 2025
(This article belongs to the Section Entropy and Biology)

Abstract

Here, we propose that the shared emergent properties reproducibly observed in discrete systems can be explained by a theory that embeds the Conservation of Hartley–Shannon Information (CoHSI) in a statistical mechanics framework. Specific predictions of global properties that represent the most likely equilibrium state should be apparent in all qualifying systems, regardless of provenance. We demonstrate that these predictions of emergent global properties hold true in systems as disparate as collections of software written in the programming language C and collections of proteins. The implication is that the emergence of such shared properties is not driven by any specific local mechanism as the systems are so different. This raises the interesting prospect that important properties of biological systems (exemplified here by the length and multiplicity distributions of proteins) have little, if anything, to do with natural selection. Similarly, the size distribution of components and the frequency of tokens observed in computer software in C emerge as the most likely states, and are thus properties that are divorced from human agency, regardless of functionality.
Keywords: emergent properties; Hartley–Shannon information; super-aggregator; CoHSI emergent properties; Hartley–Shannon information; super-aggregator; CoHSI

Share and Cite

MDPI and ACS Style

Hatton, L.; Warr, G. The Origin of Shared Emergent Properties in Discrete Systems. Entropy 2025, 27, 561. https://doi.org/10.3390/e27060561

AMA Style

Hatton L, Warr G. The Origin of Shared Emergent Properties in Discrete Systems. Entropy. 2025; 27(6):561. https://doi.org/10.3390/e27060561

Chicago/Turabian Style

Hatton, Les, and Greg Warr. 2025. "The Origin of Shared Emergent Properties in Discrete Systems" Entropy 27, no. 6: 561. https://doi.org/10.3390/e27060561

APA Style

Hatton, L., & Warr, G. (2025). The Origin of Shared Emergent Properties in Discrete Systems. Entropy, 27(6), 561. https://doi.org/10.3390/e27060561

Note that from the first issue of 2016, this journal uses article numbers instead of page numbers. See further details here.

Article Metrics

Back to TopTop