“In principle, a self-organising system cannot be constructed, since its organisation and behaviour cannot be prescribed and created by an external source. It emerges autonomously in certain conditions (which cannot be prescribed either). The task of the researcher is to investigate in what kind of systems and under what kind of conditions self-organisation emerges.”

—  Rein Vihalemm

Source: Chemistry as an Interesting Subject for the Philosophy of Science, 2001, p. 195

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Estonian philosopher of chemistry 1938–2015

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