Hi Bruce: What if eternal recurrence were true? Wouldn't it be the case that, though we like to speak of emergent properties as different from 1st order causal properties, these emergent properties would come and go as if predicated only on 1st order properties? I think the answer is yes while that answer leaves empirical study wide open as ever. Note that eternal recurrence is one tricky idea, some saying it can't even be thought. Here's where I lose it: Causal closure of the physical. Circle of life. Edges of the circle = events. Which ones exactly? For example, the circular edge might be thin or thick. Idea: Thin or thick, think eternal recurrence. What recurs is of any of the following forms: 1. Each "point" on the edge of the "circle of life" is one event in a thin string. 2. Each point ... is a nexus of events. 3. Each point ... is a nexus of the complete number of events in some small to n-huge dissipative system. 4. Each point is a full recurrence of everything to the point where a conceptual limit is reached (where I lose the idea). 5. Each point is any of the points 1-4. Burn this post after reading, since it won't self-destruct on its own! Cheers, Budd ========================================= Need Something? Check here: http://ludwig.squarespace.com/wittrslinks/