These are insightful. The question about classifying phenomena as "fire" reminds me of Plato's forms. It's about how the human cognitive system divvies up the w

These are insightful. The question about classifying phenomena as "fire" reminds me of Plato's forms. It's about how the human cognitive system divvies up the world into abstract models, more than it's about the underlying physics of instances of those forms. Still, the ideas of a fundamental property of reality vs a composite one are themselves forms, abstractions within human cognition, so it seems the answer would be ill-formed. An emergent behavior is a macro phenomenon that arises from simpler ones. We can say that an emergent behavior exists if we can find just one example of it, so the probability of it happening isn't as central. However, establishing for one example that both a structure and its components are sentient is a tall order -- each of us knows only one first-person experience first-hand. We can accept that we are sentient, but could we conclude that each tissue and cell has its own experiences? Thinking about the subconscious helps persuade me that it's possible. Not all carbon exists in crystalline form, but just one example of graphite or diamond makes properties of carbon atoms apparent.