This article introduces the concept of "phase emergence" (or "threshold unfolding")—a term describing how new forms of matter (living, civilizational) arise not as transitions or miracles, but as dominant phases of a single substrate manifesting upon reaching critical complexity. The term was crystallized during a research dialogue between the author (Alexander Kotelnikov) and AI (DeepSeek) from December 2025 to February 2026, with source materials deposited on Zenodo for priority. Four terminological options were analyzed, with "phase emergence" selected for its rigorous analogy to physical phase transitions. The article demonstrates how human intuition and AI's generative power can symbiotically create new ontological frameworks, establishing both the concept and the methodological precedent.
Kotelnikov Alexander (Sun,) studied this question.