I argue that a recently developed framework for emergence in the physical sciences prompts a conception of fundamentality that is relative: namely, fundamentality as limited to a given level, domain or subject matter. The conception is also ontological: for it concerns relations between the distinct ontological levels associated with theories. I argue that, although the kind of fundamentality that appears in ontological emergence can, in some cases, be understood as grounding, this understanding is limited to very special interpretations of physical theories: namely, to those for which supervenience obtains. Thus the resulting picture of the world, suggested by emergence in theories of physics, is one of ontological levels or domains, which are relatively fundamental and are partially, though not totally, ordered.
Sebastian De Haro