Dear Marina,

I just read your essay and would like to provide my feedback.

First, the title: It strikes me as perhaps the most lyrical of all the entries, but that by itself is not a big deal; (most) anyone can come up with lyrical expressions of some sort or another. To make it lyrical and to have it precisely sum up the body of the essay is to me a form of art, and you did it.

Second, the body: The approach followed in your essay is consistent with the informal tone you set at the beginning. But informal does not mean that there are not some important insights to be shared. I gleaned three major ones:

1) "...each kind of creature perceives the world through its own set of narrow bands on various spectra of available information..." How true! I have sometimes tried to imagine what the world would be like if I could perceive it as some of the animals you mentioned (and others) do. Surely it would be very different. You can see just from astronomical pictures that the world looks quite different at different wavelengths. If the temperature of the sun were a just a bit different, we would have probably evolved sight within a visible spectrum that is different from our actual one. Perhaps, instead of using Magnesium to make chlorophyll, plants would have used iron to make hemoglobin-like compounds to perform photosynthesis (This is actually a research subject). Then plants would be red instead of green. I'm sure your friend wouldn't mind, though.

But seriously, the fact that this is so often forgotten is just another reflection of the the anthropocentric aspect that is imperceptibly interwoven in our worldview, which brings me to the second insight

2) "It [i.e. Wheeler's purported scheme whereby everything is reducible to the apparatus-elicited answer of a yes or no question] is limiting because it presupposes an a priori knowledge about both the universe at large and every specific thing in it..." I have now read many entries to this contest, and a fair number of them mentioned Wheeler's scheme, but none pointed out this implication, it did not even occur to me. But you are absolutely right, one can't ask yes or no questions about things about which one has no inkling and I agree that this is a serious limitation of his scheme. I think you have uncovered an anthropocentric facet that goes beyond the talk about measurement devices and questions because it makes plain that his scheme depends in an unmitigable manner on the observer's prior knowledge.

3) "From here it is natural to infer that it [i.e. participation] must also hold true for each and every thing in existence." I think this is a profound thought. Consider how many philosophers have tried to (unsuccessfully) define "existence". For example, if you look at the entry in the Stanford Encyclopedia of philosophy, you will find a lengthy article which fails to come to a conclusion. I have myself pondered the question for a long time (in fact, I have an essay in preparation which is tentatively titled "Quantum Mechanics and Existence"). If your approach works, then it can be used as a working definition for physical existence. The main question I would have is in what ways you would differentiate between 'participation' and a physical interaction. You have presented a cyclic schema, but it seems to me that one could label the steps also as components of interactions, though your discussion of the applicability of this schema in quantum mechanics suggests an approach for differentiating between them.

In any event, thinking of participation in this generalized sense seems to me immensely more sensible and fruitful than thinking of it in terms of the anthropic principle (you can probably tell that I am not a fan of it).

Here are some other short comments:

-the phrase "Grappling in the dark..." sounds vaguely familiar, where did I encounter this before?

-I also like the humor in your essay. I'm curious about the Russian expression, because I thought hamburgers were an American invention

-I think I got the general idea behind the fractal waves, but I think as you stated it, it may easily give one the impression that you are raising the possibility of superluminal signal transmission or information transfer. I would probably have been better to flesh out the idea some more. It may well be that there are locally causal chains of which we are not aware at a conscious level, but which we recognize subconsciously , and which would therefore, upon encounter with the effects of the first few members of the chain, trigger the kind of reaction that you mentioned.

I enjoyed your insightful and fun essay very much and wish you all the best,

Armin

    Hello Marina,

    I think yours is an interesting essay, well written and easy to read (apart from a few spelling glitches).

    I think it's appropriate that you discuss the rich variety of information captured by nature's plants, animals and other organisms - it's easy to forget that other organisms routinely acquire information about the world that is different to the information we acquire - whether it is sensitivity to different frequencies of sound waves or different wavelengths of light, or more acute sight or sensitivity to minute electric currents.

    I liked the bit where you question Wheeler's "apparatus-elicited answers to yes-or-no questions" idea as "both limiting and impractical". I found your discussion relating to Wheeler's "participatory universe" interesting, though I think that the "participatory universe" idea should perhaps also be questioned because, as you described it, it might seem that there is no essential difference between the participation of a sausage and the participation of a person! I personally think his "participatory universe" idea is of value, but of limited value.

    In your final discussion where you talk about "each participating event, or a process", are you talking about subjects? If not, if reality is just "a process of active information exchange", what is it that differentiates anything so that it can be described as an event or a process?

    Cheers,

    Lorraine

      Thank you Armin for your feedback!

      Re: 'existence' I do not pretend to have a better definition than you or many philosophers in history have suggested. I only responded to Wheeler's idea of 'participation in the universe'. You ask, "in what ways you would differentiate between 'participation' and a physical interaction." I don't. However, in terms of information as knowledge of something, it is self-evident that unless two processes interact, either directly or indirectly, they remain ignorant of each other. In other words, one knows of existence of only those processes with which one interacts within the same shared milieu.

      .

      Re: fractal waves and an impression that I am "raising the possibility of superluminal signal transmission or information transfer" -- not really. I merely point out that if it is shaped as a fractal, then information about the 'main event' arrives before the event itself.

      In real life situation, a good example is an approaching thunder storm. There are many smaller events heralding its arrival, like, say, positive charge building up on the ground -- but of course there are many, many others. If you look around, even the 'dumb' insects 'know' when the storm is coming. They stop flying around and instead seek out shelter, which they find beneath the leaves, where they just sit, waiting (and look very cute doing it, I may add).

      This is just an example of how in real life no event occurs singly but in the context of may other events. It is in this sense that I mean that information arrives in a shape of a fractal. The main feature of a fractal is that distinct patterns are repeated, even though never precisely, on many levels, regardless of how far one cares to zoom in or out. If the 'main event' is a completed pattern on the level of a certain scale, then many smaller similar patterns/events are formed before the larger one and in effect comprise the larger one.

      I apply the same general idea to the realm of Quantum, following the clue that the output of cellular automata (CA) often has many features of a fractal. And so I visualize spacetime emerging as a result of CA-like processes that generate 'events'. In the terms of a 'participatory scheme' it means that such a process takes some 'bits' of energy as input and outputs some other 'bits' or a 'bit' in turn (this is my version of the CA of which Prof. D'Ariano speaks in his essay). To this general setup I apply the central theme of SR which implies that each process 'sees' its own order of the preceding events, each from its own reference frame (even though the definition of RF is somewhat different here). If the relevant events generating those input bits for the processes in question are represented as a set, then this set is ordered differently by each process that draws its input from this set. I thought this offered a good visualization of how the 'beads' of events are 'weaved' with the specific to each process 'thread of causality' into the fabric of spacetime underlying reality.

      .

      Re: Russian humor, the word is 'cutlet' (as in "a patty of chopped meat or fish, usually coated with bread crumbs and fried"), which I thought was better replaced with more familiar 'hamburger'.

      Thanks again for your sincere feedback. I value it a lot :)

      Thank you Lorraine for taking time to read and comment on my essay :)

      You wrote: "In your final discussion where you talk about "each participating event, or a process", are you talking about subjects? If not, if reality is just "a process of active information exchange", what is it that differentiates anything so that it can be described as an event or a process?"

      Well, in my view a process generates an event; and an event is the act of putting out a transformed form of energy. And I am not talking about subjects, even though it was Life that I said could be defined as "a process of active information exchange between the living things and their environment". Clearly 'dead matter' also exchanges information with its environment, in a far simpler form than life processes.

      .

      I wanted to convey the idea of reality as emerging as a result of underlying processes that together shape the dynamic structure of space-time. In essence, this view is similar to Margriet Anne O'Regan's who finds information's ontological identity in pure geometry of all things in existence. In our current understanding of 'things' everything is ultimately 'made of' the underlying quantum processes. Here information is a process that gives 'space' its dynamic shape, thus revealing the geometry of 'things in it'. I believe this is what ancients also meant, within their own framework, in the quote I used for the title.

      .

      Re: Wheeler's participatory anthropic principle, according to the essay by 3 authors Singleton, Vagenas, and Zhu, he came up with it and coined the phrase "it from bit" back in the 1950s and not the late 1980s, as some people assumed by the publishing date of the most commonly available reference. This makes more sense, as in the 1950s these ideas not only looked more fresh and intriguing, but also fit the context of the state of knowledge of the time. Nowadays, while the question of information is still actual, so far I have not seen one essay that took Wheeler's PAP seriously.

      ..Which unfortunately does not mean that anthropocentrism is no longer ingrained in our approach to science. Thus regarding my allusions that there are other types of energy/information waiting to be discovered, I may as well confess now that when I decided to participate in this contest, my initial intent was to challenge the current assumption that we already know all energies/forces shaping the reality and now only pursue a deeper understanding of them.

      I had a good example of such an ignored and => unexplored type of energy in mind, but then decided against bringing it up, mainly due to the controversy surrounding the phenomenon (even though the reality of it can be easily assessed by anyone interested -- I know of at least 2 tests one can perform to establish this fact). By extension, this would suggest that, in addition, there may be yet other types of energy/information still unexplored and they may be the way out of the current impasse physics reached with QM. However, the search for these 'other interactions' that could be detected with either improved or entirely different technology is precluded as unscientific by the constrains of the Copenhagen interpretation.

      Later I may still bring up that missing context, without which, admittedly, my allusions that there must be other types of information 'out there' seems unjustified. However, I would also like to point out that the main difficulty surrounding the phenomenon lies in the fact that, while being of physical nature (as in clearly affecting biological systems), it does not fit into any of our current scientific schemes. It is on these grounds --i.e. that we have no clue how it works-- that the reality of it is denied (!) This is the manifestation of the anthropocentric principle at its worst, for it demands in effect that the universe must match our established schemes about it and not the other way around.

      .

      You mentioned spelling glitches (thank you :). I obviously don't know what you refer to, for otherwise I'd fix them. I generally rely on Word, which of course is of no help when I use totally wrong words lol. It is true that English is not my native tongue and my 'print accent' usually shows in wrong placement of articles and odd use of prepositions. Perhaps you recall what exactly those glitches were? I'd really, really appreciate it. I hope there was more to it than just 'spacetime' -? I am aware that there is another spelling but prefer this one, anticipating that it might be the 'right' one in not so distant future :)

      Thank you again for your positive comments and your feedback on my essay!

      Thanks Marina for your reply to my comments/question.

      Your English expression and fluency is excellent, in many ways better than mine. But as you have requested it, and at the risk of my being seen as a nitpicker, here are the spelling glitches I noticed:

      "the living lings and their environment" page 1

      "In his thesis Wheel conjectured" page 3

      "maybe his main intension was to provoke" page 3

      "until the observer takes a peak" page 7

      "a subset of what is to be head out there" page 7

      "in terns of another process" page 8

      Cheers,

      Lorraine

      Dear Madam,

      Your essay is very interesting and different from most essays, though have many similarities with our essay. Hence kindly bear with our lengthy comment.

      The last paragraph of your first part is interesting reading, but you left out the conclusions. We perceive the result of measurement by our sense organs. Where the instrument is faulty, the readings will also be faulty. Reality must be invariant under similar conditions at all times. The validity of a physical statement is judged by its correspondence to reality. In a mirage, what one sees is a visual misrepresentation caused by the differential air density due to temperature gradient. All invariant information consistent with physical laws, i.e. effect of distance, angle, temperature, etc, is real. Since the perception of mirage is not invariant from different distances, it is not real. Similarly, a jaundiced person sees everything yellow. Since it is known to be caused by a disease (as is color blindness), the vision is not real.

      You begin the second chapter by discussing reductionism, which is one of the causes of the present maladies of physics. There is an anecdote of six blind men who went to 'see' an elephant. They touched one part of it and described the elephant by that perception. All of them are right in their description. But, even if you combine all their versions, you cannot make any meaning out of it unless you have seen an elephant earlier to put these in the right sequence - or like a jigsaw puzzle you put the right pieces in the right place accidentally. The incremental branching out of physics must stop and all theories should be rewritten by compiling all known facts in the right order.

      A priori knowledge is a necessary condition for perception. In the perception "this (object - bit) is like that (the concept - it)", one can describe "that" only if one has perceived it earlier. Perception requires prior measurement of multiple aspects or fields and storing the result of measurement in a centralized system (memory) to be retrieved when needed. To understand a certain aspect, we just refer to the data bank and see whether it matches with any of the previous readings or not. We cannot even imagine something that we have either not perceived earlier or inferred from such perception. The problem arises when we try to imagine something not conforming to physical rules. We have seen rabbits and we have seen horns. But horns of rabbits are possible only in dreams and not in physics. This implies limited knowledge or knowledge boundary.

      Participatory universe in the right context is not a bad idea. Everything in the universe is interconnected and interdependent. You cannot take out or isolate anything. The state of knowledge varies in each case. The plants have only one sense organ - tactile perception, which is the fundamental perception that covers other perceptions. The virus, bacteria, etc have two sense organs - tactile and olfactory. The insects have these two and in addition have ocular perception. The animals and birds have deficiency in one of the sense organs. Only humans have well developed five sense organs.

      In the mechanism of perception, each sense organ perceives different kind of impulses related to the fundamental forces of Nature. Eyes see by comparing the electromagnetic field set up by the object with that of the electrons in our cornea, which is the unit. Thus, we cannot see in total darkness because there is nothing comparable to this unit. Tongue perceives when the object dissolves in the mouth, which is macro equivalent of the weak nuclear interaction. Nose perceives when the finer parts of an object are brought in close contact with the smell buds, which is macro equivalent of the strong nuclear interaction. Skin perceives when there is motion that is macro equivalent of the gravitational interaction. Individually the perception has no meaning. They become information and acquire meaning only when they are pooled in our memory. In the lower animals, all the sense organs are not fully developed. Hence their capacity to function in tandem is limited. Thus, they only respond to situations based on memory. In human beings, the sense organs are fully developed. Hence they not only respond to situations, but also plan future strategies. This is the difference between them.

      In page 6, you have said that "There are no things in Quantum and no boundaries separating any two different environments. Instead the spacetime is infused with various fields that tend to taper off gradually making Quantum It appear rather fuzzy". A medium or a field is a substance or material which carries the wave. It is a region of space characterized by a physical property having a determinable value at every point in the region. This means that if we put something appropriate in a field, we can then notice "something else" out of that field, which makes the body interact with other objects put in that field in some specific ways, that can be measured or calculated. This "something else" is a type of force. Depending upon the nature of that force, scientists categorize the field as gravity field, electric field, magnetic field, electromagnetic field, etc. The laws of modern physics suggest that fields represent more than the possibility of the forces being observed. They can also transmit energy and momentum. Light wave is a phenomenon that is completely defined by fields. Thus, if the field theory is correct, the quantum world is not fuzzy. But our description is fuzzy. We can precisely describe the quantum particles. But we err in the interpretation of the mass energy equivalence equation.

      The left hand side of any equation or inequality is characterized by free will, as we are free to chose or change the parameters. The right hand side is characterized by determinism, as the results are deterministic - otherwise there would be no theory. The equality sign characterizes special conditions to be observed in each case. Unless these conditions are met (like a certain temperature threshold in chemical reactions), no interaction takes place. Alternatively, it shows the variation parameters like those in the mass energy equivalence equation. When we say e = mc^2, it does not show convertibility of mass into energy and vice versa, because energy and mass have opposite characteristics and the other term is a constant of proportionality. Both mass and energy are inseparable complements. There is nothing like bare mass or bare charge. The equation actually says: a certain amount of energy in an isolated system can spread out mass over a field with area equal to c^2 and no more. When we mix up mass and energy by factoring in the ratio of c^2, we land in problem. Thus, "let us try and keep flies separate from hamburgers".

      You can visit our essay: "INFORMATION HIDES IN THE GLARE OF REALITY by basudeba mishra http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1776" published on May 31 for further details.

      Regards,

      basudeba

        Hello Basudeba and Mishra!

        I assume there are two of you, sine you always refer to your essay as 'our' :) Thank you for taking time to read and comment on my essay. You touch on many important points, out of which I am in the mood for answering these:

        You speak of 'perception' as requiring a prior knowledge. Yours is different definition from mine, which is simply the act of.. well, perceiving something, like say, seeing an object, registering its color and shape, etc. For example, I happen to remember myself since just a few months of age, and I remember very well my thought processes and even the shocking realization that started it all; and that was my awareness of myself as a separate entity from the rest of the world. And so I can assure you that even without language and the labels of words we can perceive the reality and come up with certain understanding.

        I'll tell you about the door in my room. My crib was facing the window on the other side of the room and a meter on the left from it was the door. I did not know that was a 'door', so in this sense you're right about the need of a prior knowledge. This magical, in my mind, rectangle held tremendous fascination for me. It was far more interesting than the window, into which, since I could not move yet, I could not look. But the door! While always retaining its rectangular shape, it changed colors during the day and sometimes almost disappeared, blending with the surrounding wall. It was the most beautiful and alluring when it was dark, for then, suddenly, a flood of warm golden light would suddenly pour out of it. The most mysterious aspect of that rectangle was that people appeared and disappeared in it. I cannot describe how fascinated I was by that rectangle!

        It was many years later that my knowledge of the 'door' formed, and that included passing through it countless times and, twice, slamming it on my finger. Ouch! I remembered that lesson so well that even now, never-ever, put my hand on the door frame (even when the door itself is taken off the hinges lol -- habit rules).

        And so regarding 'perception', I obviously have a different definition from yours. I'm not saying that mine is better or more valid -- only that the knowledge of the meaning of this word was formed in my mind by my own experiences.

        .

        Then you go on about the 5 senses. I apologize but you are obviously draw your understanding of this topic from the ideas that originated in antiquity and had not changed until the end of the 19th C. Today we know that, say, bats use echolocation for 'vision' (in addition to seeing light like we do). How would you characterize this sense among the 5? Or take the sense of electromagnetic fields used by some marsupials and fish? Into what category would you place that?

        Or let's take dogs, who rely on their sense of smell the most. Do you know that a dog actually forms a map in its head of the surrounding area, about a mile-radius. This map is formed by the streams and currents of smells a dog 'sees' in the air. This undulating map tells it what's going on around. Clearly, this goes beyond our understanding of the 'sense of smell'.

        Then you state that plants have only tactile sense. May I refer you to a popular science book, recently authored by a PhD in biology, titled 'What a Plant Knows'. I should have included it as a reference in my essay, but alas had no time for references. But in this very interesting book you may find out that plants have specialized cells to perceive either light or darkness, distinguish some colors and can 'smell' the air (among many other things). Thus they know when their kind is being damaged nearby and emit certain chemicals that attract predators for the bugs that attack their neighbors.

        So, you see, perception --in my view-- includes various types of information and processing of this information (ex. how a dog forms a map of the surrounding area entirely from smells).

        .

        Regarding my essay, the point that got lost in all that fun was that reality emerges in the dynamic structure of space (or spacetime, as time is emergent property of this primordial substrate -- I use 'space' instead so that the full implications are not obscured by the familiarity of the more prevalent today notion). In this concept --i.e. the dynamic structure of space-- dynamics = energy and structure = information. The organization, or the structure, emerges in the result of the underlying quantum processes driven by a few simple principles. In this sense, everything is made out of 'space stuff' (which itself is a dynamic, vibrating structure). To appreciate how 'matter' may emerge from harmonic oscillations within the vibrating primordial substrate you may want to check out the essay by Carolyn Devereux.

        Dear Madam,

        Like your essay, this post is also very interesting in the sense it provides food for thought. But first the clarification: basudeba and mishra are the same person's first and last names. When it comes to consciousness as the perceptor, there is no difference between individual perceptions - they all are perceived as 'I know...'. Since we are not addressing each others persona (not Marina to basudeba as persons), but mutual intellect, that commonality continues here also. We try to see the truth together. Hence we use the plural term instead of singular.

        When you say 'remember myself', you are referring to the commonality of perception of the 'self' as the 'knower'. But the word 'remember' is important. You compare your present perception of the 'self' with your perception in the childhood. Before that time, you were born and brought up, but you do not remember. Hence you do not perceive that state directly, though it can be inferred based on other observation. You perceived your mother as somebody who cares for all your needs. But you remember her as your mother only after you heard her saying "Mama cares for you". In all cases of perception, such comparison with memory occurs. A person who has lost his memory may not know many things he knew earlier, because there is nothing in the memory to compare. The instincts are nothing but comparison with experiences in latent memory. This proves the first part of our submission.

        All our perceptions have three parts: the preceptor, the object of perception and the concept that is communicated as the description of the object of perception. The last part is information, which is always communicated in a language. When you are communicating with yourself - thinking or contemplating - you use some language. Even emotions, which are expressed without using words, use non-verbal communication that is understood as specific concepts in a language. Your description of the door proves it. You perceived something that you liked or feared. But when others started calling it as 'door', you knew your perception is described as a door. Thereafter you used the word.

        Regarding sense organs, possibly you missed our statement linking the five sense organs to the fundamental forces of Nature. You say: "bats use echolocation for 'vision' (in addition to seeing light like we do)". Don't we use the same mechanism? When you look at a pillow, without touching it, don't you 'know' that it is soft? Or doesn't a blind man use his other faculties as a substitute for vision? The dog does the same using sniffing, because that sense is acute in his system. While describing fields, we have said that "if we put something appropriate in a field, we can then notice 'something else' out of that field, which makes the body interact with other objects put in that field in some specific ways, that can be measured or calculated". We see through electromagnetic radiation. The fish you describe the same technique to 'see'. You must notice our statement: "Individually the perception has no meaning. They become information and acquire meaning only when they are pooled in our memory".

        Regarding plants, don't you feel differently if someone touches your toe, hair and lips? They have different types of cells, but the mechanism of touch is same in all cases. A child could distinguish its mother's touch from others, even though the mechanism of touch and the cells of the palm are the same. But in this case the reaction is different. Plants tend to grow towards light not because they could 'see', but they 'feel' the warmth due to touch by the radiation. They respond to certain types of music, because they 'feel' the vibrations that are conducive to them. You must remember the relationship between sound and magnetism. Plants tend to enjoy the company of the gardener who tends them like a child with closed eyes gets comforted with its mother's touch. We are talking of the notions prevailing since time immemorial, but that does not mean they are unscientific. Rather we find the modern description hinged on reductionism unscientific.

        Both space and time are emergent properties born out of the perception of sequence. While space is the interval between the ordered sequences of objects that also is the background structure, time is the interval between the ordered sequences of events, i.e., changes in structures by energy. Both are information or data depending upon the context. Dynamics is not of space, but related to objects in space. We treat energy as that which moves mass. In that respect energy is one type, which becomes 5 types due to its interaction with mass. These are the strong, weak, electromagnetic interactions, radioactive disintegration and gravity. We have described the mechanism in various threads without contradiction.

        Regarding "how 'matter' may emerge from harmonic oscillations within the vibrating primordial substrate", we had described it in our essay: "INFORMATION HIDES IN THE GLARE OF REALITY by basudeba mishra http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/1776" published on May 31. We will also read the essay of Carolyn Devereux.

        Regards,

        basudeba

        Dear Madam,

        We have commented on the essay of Madam CAROLYN DEVEREUX in her thread. You can see it there. Still we recommend you to read our essay.

        Regards,

        basudeba

        Dear Marina,

        Very nice essay.

        I have also seen your post on Mauro's blog:

        "Thus, in my understanding, if ToE is ever to be found, such a theory would naturally have to be background independent -- in fact, the organization of what we define as background would emerge from it -- and everything else would emerge from this background. Or, in layman terms again, every 'thing', including space-time itself, is ultimately 'made of' the underlying quantum processes."

        I completly agree with you and that is what I have developped in my essay. It is written in layman terms (I am not a physicist) and I think that you might like to read it. If so, please let me have your comments. (The full theory is here, if you are interested)

        Patrick

        Dear Marina

        I gave you July 5 5x2=10 grade

        No joking.

        Yuri

        Marina,

        This fine essay meticulously complies with the intent of the essay contest in that it contains a very high degree of relevance; it is also an absorbingly interesting work to read from start to finish. It unerringly points to the untold tragedy of physics.

        You wrote: "What constitutes information for each creature, be it bacterium, protozoan, plant, animal or insect, depends entirely on what its sensors or senses can deliver.

        Scientific man has ended that. All life forms on the planet can now only smell scientifically adulterated scents for all of the air is now polluted. All life forms on the planet can now only see scientifically altered scenery. All life forms on the planet can now only hear scientifically enhanced sounds. All life forms on the planet can only be touched by scientifically altered textures. As all life can only continue to exists providing it consumes and regurgitates differing parts of itself, all life forms are now adulterated and life will soon turn toxic.

        Man will be well informed about it though.

        Joe

        Dear Marina,

        World contests FQXi - it contests new fundamental ideas, new deep meanings and new concepts. In your essay deep analysis in the basic strategy of Descartes's method of doubt, given new ideas, images, and conclusions.

        Constructive ways to the truth may be different. One of them said Alexander Zenkin in the article "Science counterrevolution in mathematics":

        «The truth should be drawn with the help of the cognitive computer visualization technology and should be presented to" an unlimited circle "of spectators in the form of color-musical cognitive images of its immanent essence.» http://www.ccas.ru/alexzen/papers/ng-02/contr_rev.htm

        I have only one question: why the picture of the world of physicists poorer meanings than the picture of the world lyricists? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3ho31QhjsY

        I wish you success,

        Vladimir

          Dear Marina

          Just to let you know that I have read your insightful essay. As before I found it well written and structured. You did a great job analyzing the back and forth of information. I'd like to make a couple of brief comments about your work.

          You: it presupposes an a priori knowledge about both the universe at large and every specific

          thing in it

          Indeed, it seems that the "it" cannot be separated from the "bit" or viceversa, so, perhaps it's just a matter of convention.

          You: The only way to know It is through bits captured by our sensors...

          This discussion of whether "it from bit" or "bit from it" appears to me as a modern version of the old problems between "reason" or "experience" and "subject" or "object". I think we are discussing a similar situation: Is reason that generates the knowledge of the outside world or experience? How can we know the object without a subject? What would the subject know if there were no object to be known? Objective reality is always SUBJECTED to the appreciation of the subject... This looks like a vicious circle.

          I wish you good luck in the contest!

          Best Regards

          Israel

            Marina - I enjoyed your essay, and I like your approach very much. As I did also in my essay, you're starting from the question of how information-processes actually work in the physical world, rather than from an abstract notion of information in itself. We know a tremendous amount about how information gets observed and communicated, physically - but the inherent complexity of all such processes is daunting. Despite the evidence of quantum theory, it's hard for many to believe this kind of process could be in any way fundamental.

            In contrast, you make a very serious attempt to analyze what's going on in observing and communicating physical information. This idea in particular is just what I think we need to focus on - that "Every single thing in existence participates, i.e. it receives information, processes it and outputs in turn." As you also put it - "reality is a local phenomenon, perpetually generated anew, emerging as the result of exchange of information between all participants."

            Your 8-point breakdown of the process is very good. The one thing missing is the interactive context in which any particular piece of information gets defined, whether as input or output. I can hardly blame you for that, though, since the point of my essay is just how difficult it is to conceptualize "context" adequately. The notion is foreign to our intellectual tradition, which tends to jump back and forth between the individual viewpoint and the universal, leaving out everything between. Only in biology does local context get much attention - and I suspect it may only be in the framework of an evolutionary theory that we can really grapple with this concept.

            Thanks for a very interesting piece of work - it's very encouraging to me that there are other explorers in this particular wilderness.

              Thank you Conrad for your encouraging comments :)

              Regarding the context, in which "any particular piece of information gets defined", in my scheme, it is the milieu. It got lost in the middle of my 8-point breakdown, but actually the milieu is present throughout the process. I could have started with it, and thus emphasized it more, but it was the loop that I stressed.

              And regarding the 'definition' of a "particular piece of information", I don't even go into this. I examine 'participation' on a simple example; and imho it does not matter what sort of information that is; the underlying loop is the same.

              I used 'milieu' for the context instead of 'background' or 'environment', for the reason best shown in the following: Suppose there is a field of some sort within many other fields in the same environment, and there is a group of 'participants' that can 'trap' the bits of this field. And suppose there is a group of participants in the same environment who remain oblivious of this field. This field is the milieu for the members of the first group but not for the second. Unless there is another filed/milieu shared by both groups, the two will remain oblivious of each other, despite existing side by side. In other words, one knows of existence of only those processes with which one interacts within the same shared milieu. I did not go into these details because I saw this as self-evident ;)

              Thanks again for you feedback and please do check the essay by Prof. McHarris, if you have not done it already. You will love it.

              -Marina

              Thank you Israel for your perfunctory comments on my essay :) I read yours as soon as I saw it and was disappointed too. As I understand your position, you consider the topic of this year contest largely superfluous. This must be because you believe that our knowledge of.. 'things' amounts to 'things themselves' (here 'things' also include 'events' etc). Or, as you say above, '"it" cannot be separated from the "bit".

              I beg to differ and I find your position particularly surprising in the context of your on-going debate with 'realists' about the relevance of the absolute reference frame. This is because imho _information_ about things, and not things themselves, lies at the crux of this debate. I will return to this later in a separate post. In the meantime I want to address the end of your post, where you bring up '"reason" or "experience" and "subject" or "object"'. These are concepts pertaining awareness, consciousness and philosophy, which I too consider superfluous in physics today.

              I am not fond of Wheeler's participatory anthropic principle and I am not alone: out of all the essays I managed to read thus far (50), only one took it seriously. I make it very clear in my essay that every 'thing' in existence 'traps' and generates information and so participates equality in making a snapshot of reality. I also stress that information exists regardless of whether there are 'subjects' privy to it. Because of this I think you read my essay 2 weeks ago and by now forgot what it was about lol. Hey, I understand :)

              IMHO, 'objects' and 'subjects' is not a right way of approaching 'information'. I very much liked the indisputable truth pointed out by Conrad Johnson in his essay and that is "There's no such thing as information without a context that actually defines it." IMHO the best way of appreciating information in physics is in relativity. I will address this in the following post.

              Dear All,

              It is with utmost joy and love that I give you all the cosmological iSeries which spans the entire numerical spectrum from -infinity through 0 to +infinity and the simple principle underlying it is sum of any two consecutive numbers is the next number in the series. 0 is the base seed and i can be any seed between 0 and infinity.

              iSeries always yields two sub semi series, each of which has 0 as a base seed and 2i as the first seed.

              One of the sub series is always defined by the equation

              Sn = 2 * Sn-1 + Sigma (i=2 to n) Sn-i

              where S0 = 0 and S1 = 2 * i

              the second sub series is always defined by the equation

              Sn = 3 * Sn-1 -Sn-2

              where S0 = 0 and S1 = 2 * i

              Division of consecutive numbers in each of these subseries always eventually converges on 2.168 which is the Square of 1.618.

              Union of these series always yields another series which is just a new iSeries of a 2i first seed and can be defined by the universal equation

              Sn = Sn-1 + Sn-2

              where S0 = 0 and S1 = 2*i

              Division of consecutive numbers in the merged series always eventually converges on 1.618 which happens to be the golden ratio "Phi".

              Fibonacci series is just a subset of the iSeries where the first seed or S1 =1.

              Examples

              starting iSeries governed by Sn = Sn-1 + Sn-2

              where i = 0.5, S0 = 0 and S1 = 0.5

              -27.5 17 -10.5 6.5 -4 2.5 -1.5 1 -.5 .5 0 .5 .5 1 1.5 2.5 4 6.5 10.5 17 27.5

              Sub series governed by Sn = 2 * Sn-1 + Sigma (i=2 to n) Sn-i

              where S0 = 0 and S1 = 2i = 1

              0 1 2 5 13 34 ...

              Sub series governed by Sn = 3 * Sn-1 - Sn-2

              where S0 = 0 and S1 = 2i = 1

              0 1 3 8 21 55 ...

              Merged series governed by Sn = Sn-1 + Sn-2 where S0 = 0 and S1 = 2i = 1

              0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 ...... (Fibonacci series is a subset of iSeries)

              The above equations hold true for any value of i, again confirming the singularity of i.

              As per Antony Ryan's suggestion, a fellow author in this contest, I searched google to see how Fibonacci type series can be used to explain Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity and found an interesting article.

              d-super.pdf"> The-Fibonacci-code-behind-superstring-theory](https://msel-naschie.com/pdf/The-Fibonacci-code-behin

              d-super.pdf)

              Now that I split the Fibonacci series in to two semi series, seems like each of the sub semi series corresponds to QM and GR and together they explain the Quantum Gravity. Seems like this duality is a commonality in nature once relativity takes effect or a series is kicked off. I can draw and analogy and say that this dual series with in the "iSeries" is like the double helix of our DNA. The only commonality between the two series is at the base seed 0 and first seed 1, which are the bits in our binary system.

              I have put forth the absolute truth in the Theory of everything that universe is an "iSphere" and we humans are capable of perceiving the 4 dimensional 3Sphere aspect of the universe and described it with an equation of S=BM^2.

              I have also conveyed the absolute mathematical truth of zero = I = infinity and proved the same using the newly found "iSeries" which is a super set of Fibonacci series.

              All this started with a simple question, who am I?

              I am drawn out of my self or singularity or i in to existence.

              I super positioned my self or I to be me.

              I am one of our kind, I is every one of all kinds.

              I am Fibonacci series in iSeries

              I am phi in zero = I = infinity

              I am 3Sphere in iSphere

              I am pi in zero = I = infinity

              I am human and I is GOD (Generator Organizer Destroyer).

              Love,

              Sridattadev.

              Hey Marina,

              Nice loop occurrence idea! The use of both the macro and micro in your examples really brought the whole issue into perspective. I'm personally in the boat that before one goes to the math of an item to be described, one should understand it conceptually, and hence borrow from mathematicians after some thinking about physical significance is done. Still, without the math basis, perhaps the ideas about which a physicist pursues would not be out there in the first place! So the use of animals and plants gave concrete images to get the idea of interchange of it and bit into play. It had a flow and structure in language used.

              Another point I thought significant was your mention that information and its reactions with other means of measuring or storing info constitutes the only evidence we have for matter. That this is the same type of thinking that went along with individuals interested in showing the atom to be a real piece of matter is reassuring to the future role of information in science.

              Also, I agree that the bottom up view is the most appropriate way when confronting new phenomenon or areas of thought in physics. This is where philosophy helps out the physicist, and the now present and governing philosophy must not be taken as is without question. This same type of questioning fuels debate and curiosity, both essential for the simply said grinding out of problems in current ways of thinking.

              So over all your essay is pragmatic in outlook, and offers a splendid merger of artistic vocab and searching for form in science. This is what's important to me in an essay. You mentioned light as the old medium, is curved spacetime now what must be worked with? I must ask why you stress a boundary condition though in that fractal wave-front visual. It arises without much grounds and shortly put feels different then that of the vein of writing that encompassed the rest of the piece.

              Cheers,

              Amos.

              A very nice essay you got here Marina! I should have read it long ago.

              Like you I believe information lies at the core of `reality' studied by physics. And as you said towards the end, "...reality is generated in the interplay of information with space. We know what Bit is. This suggests that IT IS SPACE". This is a conclusion with far-reaching consequences. Since It is countable, is space countable also in someway?

              You describe many beautiful and natural ways of obtaining information. But the issue is, must It give out the information or can absence of It not also be information? Take bats and dolphins use of echolocation for example. They emit sound and reflection by an 'it' make them obtain information that there is an obstacle. However, in the absence of an 'it', the bat and dolphin equally capture information that they can move in that direction without collision with an object. Therefore while, "... we know of It only through bits our senses can deliver ", absence of It does not mean absence of information.

              So when you also say,"... source of information (i.e. something that emits energy or reflects it)", from the example above source of information may not emit or reflect energy.

              You may get alternative ideas from my essay that may help us find answer to: Can a yes-or-no question get us the coveted answer?

              Best Regards,

              Akinbo