Essay Abstract

This essay presents functional definitions of information, intelligence, and agency. It then applies these concepts to describe: - How the universe is filled with packets of information, including photons and high-energy particles. - How human systems collect and correlate the information streaming around us, resulting in the growth of intelligence and agency. Finally, this essay answers the questions posed by this contest regarding the impact of unknowability and uncertainty on humanity's understanding of the physical world.

Author Bio

Currently working as a system engineer for airborne communication systems. Previously served in the US Navy as a carrier aviator, test pilot, and aeronautical engineer.

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21 days later

I enjoyed reading your essay! So sorry you are not getting more attention as I think you deserve it. I appreciate your focus on questions of intelligence and agency. These seem to me to be a key part of understanding the world, and the are features of both the mental world and the physical one. I have taken an additional step (I hope you will have a change to read my essay) of exploring the features of the mental world (consciousness) and using these as ways of explaining how the whole package of mental, physical and mathematical fit together.

Good luck - George Gantz: The Door That Has No Key: https://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/3494