ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the subjects that are traditionally covered by philosophy of science, i.e. the ontology and epistemology underlying subsequent scientific approaches. Philosophy can help us to clarify the principles of thought that characterise complexity science and that distinguish it from its predecessors. In the 1980s, a new approach emerged which is usually labelled as complex adaptive systems or, more generally, complexity science. Like Newtonian science, systems science strives towards a unification of all the scientific disciplines – from physics to biology, psychology and sociology – but by investigating the patterns of organisation that are common to different phenomena rather than their common material components. Systems theory considers directions, the downward direction of reduction or analysis, and the upward direction of holism or emergence, as equally important for understanding the true nature of the system.
