BothAndBlog Forum

I believe energy is that which is because it is. Energy doesn't have a cause other than itself. — Benj96

In my own Information-based thesis, EnFormAction (generic energy) is the pre-space-time Cause of all change, including the Big Bang. It's the Cause of all causes.

How can we reconcile your term "action" into my terms: space, time and matter? Because the other 2: information and energy, are already agreed upon between us. — Benj96

EnFormAction*1 is only intended to be an evocative name for the universal causal Force or Energy behind all change in the world*2. And "Action" is simply what it does (it's job). EFA transforms Potential into Actual. And yes, the "form" element includes both Platonic ideal (the abstract design) and real material forms (the enformed thing)*3. "Space" is a necessity for "Matter", and "Time" is a consequence of Action.

*1. EnFormAction :
That neologism is an analysis and re-synthesis of the common word for the latent power of mental contents : “Information”. “En” stands for energy, the physical power to cause change; “Form” refers to Platonic Ideals that become real; “Action” is the meta-physical power of transformation, as exemplified in the amazing metamorphoses of physics, whereby one kind of thing becomes a new kind of thing, with novel properties. In the Enformationism worldview, EnFormAction is eternal creative potential in action : it's how creation-via-evolution works.
https://bothandblog3.enformationism.info/page23.html

*2. EFA is not a scientific theory, but a philosophical conjecture. It's only intended to be way to make sense of the multifarious roles of Generic Information in the world. If it makes sense to you, then that's all that "matters". If not, ignore it.

*3. For clarity, I spell the Platonic Ideal as "Form", and the real things built upon that logical structure, as "forms". Otherwise, people tend to confuse one with the other : the Ideal with the Real or vice-versa.


This is why I prefer the term "Potential" instead of EnFormAction. As simply put, potential has less assumption (imbedded or hidden information) in it than EnFormAction which conceals time, matter and space in the term "Action". — Benj96

I agree that Potential is more fundamental & comprehensive. Yet the distinction I make is that capital "P" potential is eternal & unchanging, while EFA creates (actualizes) the evolving space-time world. It's not intended as a religious concept. But as a biblical metaphor, it could be likened to the Holy Spirit moving across the face of the deep to create the world. Some will take EFA literally, as-if I'm saying its a real thing, or even a god*4. But for me, it's just a way to think about how Information (power to enform) works in the real world. So, yes, Potential came first.

*4. I don't pretend to know what that abstract Eternal Potential thinks. But if it is an intelligent being, "I am that I am" might be descriptive. Personally, I try to avoid personalizing the creative Potential that uses trial & error evolutionary methods to create a world from scratch over eons of time. "Scratch" being nothing but Enformation = Energy (causation) + Laws (intention).

For me the "I am that I am" can be qualified by all: whos, what's, where's, when's, how's, and whys of existence and thus encapsulates or captures all distinctions or sets within it's universal Venn Diagram — Benj96

Yes. I sometimes refer to the infinite pool of Potential --- from which our space-time world probably emerged --- not as an eternal regression of Multiverses --- but simply as THE ALL. It's the unknowable, but imaginable, WHOLE -- "universal Venn diagram" -- of which all concrete things are parts. And one of those emergent features is the feeling of self-existence (Ego ; I am) characteristic of sentient observers. So, it's easy to imagine that the Whole is also self-aware. There is a human tendency to personify such abstract concepts metaphorically, to make them seem more real & tangible. But history shows how such a reified metaphor can go wrong.

Therefore, since I have no reliable knowledge of anything existing before the Big Bang. I think philosophical modesty requires us to avoid epitomizing the hypothetical ALL into a humanoid god. To paraphrase Wittgenstein : whereof we do not know, we must not speak. FWIW, in order to avoid the errors & excesses of world religions, I avoid imagining the philosophically necessary Eternal Potential as a humanoid ruler of the universe.

For the purposes of my Information-centric thesis*1 though, I do sometimes refer to that source of all forms as The Enformer*2, or The Programmer. I even sometimes call it "G*D", as an ambiguous reference to an almost universal human concept. Unfortunately, the intentional ambiguity is lost on some literal-minded posters, who interpret it as a reference to Jupiter or Jehovah.


*1. A thesis, not about ideal deities, but about how the information-based real world works. Since Shannon, scientists have learned that Information is both physical and mental. Physicist John A. Wheeler posited his "it from bit" theory, which other scientists are still developing into a useful way of understanding how the world works.

*2. The Enformer :
AKA, the Creator. The presumed eternal source of all information, as encoded in the Big Bang Singularity. That ability to convert conceptual Forms into actual Things, to transform infinite possibilities into finite actualities, and to create space & time, matter & energy from essentially no-thing is called the power of EnFormAction. Due to our ignorance of anything beyond space-time though, the postulated enforming agent remains undefined. Metaphorically I call it The Programmer.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html