Emergent properties are characteristics or behaviors that arise when individual components interact within a system, but do not exist in the individual parts themselves. For example, in a flock of birds, each bird follows simple rules, yet together they create complex patterns of movement that cannot be predicted by examining a single bird. These properties are often seen in various fields, such as biology, where the behavior of a cell can lead to the emergence of a tissue, or in sociology, where individual actions contribute to the dynamics of a community. Understanding emergent properties helps explain how complex systems function.