The criticism you have been insensitive to is that this is a metaphysics of fundamental substance and so another stab at monistic reductionism. Yet physics itself has moved on to a more properly holistic view of substance as the emergent product of a structure of relations. — apokrisis
Ironically, a "holistic view of substance as the emergent product of a structure of relations"*1 *2 is a good summary of the Enformationism thesis. So, I don't see your criticism as negative, but as supportive of the thesis. It is indeed a "metaphysics of fundamental substance", in a sense similar to Spinoza's "monistic reductionism"*3. I also identify Generic Information with the amorphous Fields*4 of quantum physics (electromagnetic, gravitational, quantum), from which defined physical forms (particles) may emerge. Does that cutting-edge physics fit your "moved-on" description? Perhaps you have only been exposed to bits & pieces of the thesis in various forum threads on specific topics, instead of seeing the whole thesis in its native format.
*1. Information is not a thing, but a holistic structure of interrelationships between things :
Data is a collection of facts, while information puts those facts into context.
https://bloomfire.com/blog/data-vs-information/
*2. Information relationships are mathematical ratios :
Claude Shannon quantified Information not as useful ideas, but as a mathematical ratio between meaningful order (1) and meaningless disorder (0); between knowledge (1) and ignorance (0). So, that meaningful mind-stuff exists in the limbo-land of statistics, producing effects on reality while having no sensory physical properties. We know it exists ideally, only by detecting its effects in the real world.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page11.html
Note --- Relationship = Ratio = Proportion = Statistical Ratio = "for the purpose of inferring proportions in a whole from those in a representative sample".
*3. Benedict de Spinoza: Metaphysics :
Spinoza, however, rejects this traditional view and argues instead that there is only one substance, called “God” or “Nature.”
https://iep.utm.edu/spinoz-m/
Note -- Spinoza's substance is monistic & universal, but it has local corporeal instances (affections).
*4. The Universe as an Information Field :
An approach to a unified theory of everything! . . . "Information"is the only fundamental reality in this universe - everything we see and experience can ultimately always be described in terms of "State" , that is, a set of attributes, and the values of those attributes, pertaining to the entity in question.
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/universe ... ing-singh/
So that is the kind of thing I find absent from your enactionism. It just reads as a caricature of where the science has been heading. It doesn’t engage with the actual metaphysics — apokrisis
I'm not sure what "that" refers to, but I assume it has something to do with using physical examples instead of metaphysical arguments. Yet that approach is necessary when I'm dialoging with posters holding a Materialistic/Pluralistic worldview. Besides, lacking formal training in philosophy, I'm more familiar with Science & Physics than with Philosophy & Metaphysics. So, if you can contribute some meta-physics to fill my deficiency, I'd appreciate it. Ironically, "Causal Absence"*5 is a metaphysical topic I discuss in theBothAnd Blog.
*5. Power of Absence :
Causation In Absentia
http://bothandblog4.enformationism.info/page17.html
You are not talking about a new kind of fundamental substance but about the fundamentally of a triadic relation in which substantial being is an emergent property. — apokrisis
Did you see the "triad" diagram in my previous post? Is that what I am "not talking" about? Again, perhaps you can supply the deficit in my brief overview.
there is thus the adoption of information theory as the new way to smuggle Cartesian dualism back into public discourse. It sounds “sciency” and it’s easy to quote-mine. — apokrisis
Where did you get that erroneous idea? Cartesian Dualism is the exact opposite of the Information Holism of the Enformationism thesis. Perhaps you can "smuggle" some of your own theory into this thread on Monism.
TPF : Science as Metaphysics
Re: TPF : Science as Metaphysics
But you now jump from a point about Shannon's definition of a bit to this guff about "meaningful mind-stuff". You conflate a mathematical claim – the epistemology of a model – with this ontic assumption about "the mind" being this kind of physically general "stuff" that has the intrinsic property of being meaningful – of having "sensory" qualities such as feelings and impressions. — apokrisis
Yes. "To Conflate" means to combine two or more separate things into one concept. That's the job description of philosophical inference and holistic thinking. In this case, abstract mathematical information combined with concrete "ontic" entities into a unique unified cosmology : physics + metaphysics. Or, in other words, Energy into Matter into Mind into Weltanshauung. And that is what cutting edge Quantum theories are pointing to. Not directly, but implicitly, so someone has to do the conflation. And the Enformationism thesis combines lots of those implications into the inference : that Generic (causal) information (power to enform) is equivalent to Energy, which transforms into Matter, and eventually emerges in complex entities as Mind*1.
For a Reductive thinker such a notion is unthinkable. But Holistic (or Systems) thinking can discover properties of an integrated system that go beyond anything found in its parts. For example, a human brain is a complex integrated system of neural & supportive cells, that are not in themselves conscious. But working together, they produce the ontic phenomenon that we call "Awareness" or "Aboutness". However, a Materialistic worldview or a Reductive Analysis of Awareness will never find an explanation for the evolutionary emergence of Life & Mind from a purely physical Big Bang. But a "Big Conception" might point the way.
So yes, Enformationism is my own personal philosophical conflation. It begins with the novel conclusion, from post-Shannon Information Theory, that Generic Information*2 is the fundamental substance of the universe, which we know primarily in its physical activities as "Energy". This is not common knowledge, so in my posts, I have to provide lots of links to the inferences of scientists, who are pushing the envelope of Information Theory. The thesis began the explication of a core insight : that Information >> Energy >> Matter >> Mind. And the BothAnd blog continues to explore the philosophical implications of that conflation, in areas such as Monism and Metaphysics. If a non-dual notion of Matter & Mind doesn't appeal to you though, then you won't be motivated to investigate further into the controversial thesis of Enformationism.
*1. Information is :
*** Claude Shannon quantified Information not as useful ideas, but as a mathematical ratio between meaningful order (1) and meaningless disorder (0); between knowledge (1) and ignorance (0). So, that meaningful mind-stuff exists in the limbo-land of statistics, producing effects on reality while having no sensory physical properties. We know it exists ideally, only by detecting its effects in the real world.
*** For humans, Information has the semantic quality of aboutness , that we interpret as meaning. In computer science though, Information is treated as meaningless, which makes its mathematical value more certain. It becomes meaningful only when a sentient Self interprets it as such.
*** When spelled with an “I”, Information is a noun, referring to data & things. When spelled with an “E”, Enformation is a verb, referring to energy and processes.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html
*2. Generic Information : I coined this term to distinguish causal Information from inert Shannon Information. It's similar to the ancient notion of Panpsychism (all is information), but with supporting scientific evidence and without the mystical extravagances. As you put it : "the mind" being this kind of physically general "stuff"
Note -- the little-known Casual aspect of Information is supported in the news that "In 2019, physicist Melvin Vopson of the University of Portsmouth proposed that information is equivalent to mass and energy," https://www.zmescience.com/science/news ... uivalence/
a day ago
Yes. "To Conflate" means to combine two or more separate things into one concept. That's the job description of philosophical inference and holistic thinking. In this case, abstract mathematical information combined with concrete "ontic" entities into a unique unified cosmology : physics + metaphysics. Or, in other words, Energy into Matter into Mind into Weltanshauung. And that is what cutting edge Quantum theories are pointing to. Not directly, but implicitly, so someone has to do the conflation. And the Enformationism thesis combines lots of those implications into the inference : that Generic (causal) information (power to enform) is equivalent to Energy, which transforms into Matter, and eventually emerges in complex entities as Mind*1.
For a Reductive thinker such a notion is unthinkable. But Holistic (or Systems) thinking can discover properties of an integrated system that go beyond anything found in its parts. For example, a human brain is a complex integrated system of neural & supportive cells, that are not in themselves conscious. But working together, they produce the ontic phenomenon that we call "Awareness" or "Aboutness". However, a Materialistic worldview or a Reductive Analysis of Awareness will never find an explanation for the evolutionary emergence of Life & Mind from a purely physical Big Bang. But a "Big Conception" might point the way.
So yes, Enformationism is my own personal philosophical conflation. It begins with the novel conclusion, from post-Shannon Information Theory, that Generic Information*2 is the fundamental substance of the universe, which we know primarily in its physical activities as "Energy". This is not common knowledge, so in my posts, I have to provide lots of links to the inferences of scientists, who are pushing the envelope of Information Theory. The thesis began the explication of a core insight : that Information >> Energy >> Matter >> Mind. And the BothAnd blog continues to explore the philosophical implications of that conflation, in areas such as Monism and Metaphysics. If a non-dual notion of Matter & Mind doesn't appeal to you though, then you won't be motivated to investigate further into the controversial thesis of Enformationism.
*1. Information is :
*** Claude Shannon quantified Information not as useful ideas, but as a mathematical ratio between meaningful order (1) and meaningless disorder (0); between knowledge (1) and ignorance (0). So, that meaningful mind-stuff exists in the limbo-land of statistics, producing effects on reality while having no sensory physical properties. We know it exists ideally, only by detecting its effects in the real world.
*** For humans, Information has the semantic quality of aboutness , that we interpret as meaning. In computer science though, Information is treated as meaningless, which makes its mathematical value more certain. It becomes meaningful only when a sentient Self interprets it as such.
*** When spelled with an “I”, Information is a noun, referring to data & things. When spelled with an “E”, Enformation is a verb, referring to energy and processes.
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page8.html
*2. Generic Information : I coined this term to distinguish causal Information from inert Shannon Information. It's similar to the ancient notion of Panpsychism (all is information), but with supporting scientific evidence and without the mystical extravagances. As you put it : "the mind" being this kind of physically general "stuff"
Note -- the little-known Casual aspect of Information is supported in the news that "In 2019, physicist Melvin Vopson of the University of Portsmouth proposed that information is equivalent to mass and energy," https://www.zmescience.com/science/news ... uivalence/
a day ago
Re: TPF : Science as Metaphysics
It definitely isn’t. Holism is about the triadic story of the unity of opposites. Dialectics. You have to break a symmetry and discover its new equilibrium balance. You have to dichotomise and discover how this then leads to a self-stabilising asymmetry - a world where thesis and antithesis can persist as balanced synthesis. . . . .
All a bunch of hand-waving glued together by the causal placeholder of “emergence”. — apokrisis
I didn't intend to get into a technical argument about Dialectics or Biosemiotics or Triadics. I have no expertise in those arcane fields. Following your example though, I could accuse you of "hand-waving" or babbling, due to the use of technical terminology that I am not familiar with : "You have to dichotomise and discover how this then leads to a self-stabilising asymmetry". Do I really "have to"?
My "hand-waving" is coming from a completely different direction : Quantum Theory & Information Theory. Like your own personal favorite theories, Enformationism is complex, and can't be adequately explained in a forum post. That's why, for those who are really interested, I provide links to more complete explanations, and provide definitions for uncommon terminology right there in the post. Since you don't seem to be open to another unofficial personal theory --- an alternative understanding of Physics & Metaphysics --- I'll just dialog with other posters, who don't already have final answers of their own.
Hand-waving : An incomplete, inadequate, superficial, surface, incomplete, or partial explanation
Basically it amounts to covering your ears.
200w.gif?cid=6c09b952nwl6xq3elyn83ucgt9d5sf3g1itk3hrcc3z4ftao&ep=v1_gifs_search&rid=200w.gif&ct=g
All a bunch of hand-waving glued together by the causal placeholder of “emergence”. — apokrisis
I didn't intend to get into a technical argument about Dialectics or Biosemiotics or Triadics. I have no expertise in those arcane fields. Following your example though, I could accuse you of "hand-waving" or babbling, due to the use of technical terminology that I am not familiar with : "You have to dichotomise and discover how this then leads to a self-stabilising asymmetry". Do I really "have to"?
My "hand-waving" is coming from a completely different direction : Quantum Theory & Information Theory. Like your own personal favorite theories, Enformationism is complex, and can't be adequately explained in a forum post. That's why, for those who are really interested, I provide links to more complete explanations, and provide definitions for uncommon terminology right there in the post. Since you don't seem to be open to another unofficial personal theory --- an alternative understanding of Physics & Metaphysics --- I'll just dialog with other posters, who don't already have final answers of their own.
Hand-waving : An incomplete, inadequate, superficial, surface, incomplete, or partial explanation
Basically it amounts to covering your ears.
200w.gif?cid=6c09b952nwl6xq3elyn83ucgt9d5sf3g1itk3hrcc3z4ftao&ep=v1_gifs_search&rid=200w.gif&ct=g
Re: TPF : Science as Metaphysics
But as was made clear by the four causes, 4 is the perfect answer here. — simplyG
How so? Energy is not a cause.
Inches & miles are conventional measures of space, not space itself. — Gnomon
Energy is a measure of capacity, not the thing it is measuring. It is not a cause. It cannot be a cause. It is also not a thing that exists as if it has a categorical substance. Please define "energy". If energy exists, it's because there are things! — L'éléphant
I suppose you are restricting the term "cause" to some particular traditional definition. But ↪simplyG
and Gnomon are simply including a modern term from physics in the ancient notion of "causation". Because, as you say, it's not a physical thing, most attempts to define what-Energy-is are quite vague : ability, capacity, etc. Plato & Aristotle were forced to use gods or other metaphors to define their notion of Causation. Even the Wiki definition below sounds a bit mysterious or ghostly*1.
Some people still think of Energy as a material substance or fluid of some kind. But it's now clear that Energy does not have a material existence. Instead, it is merely a (mathematical??) relationship between things*2. Not a thing itself. And the kind of relationship is Causal (change). The expanded post-Shannon theory of Information has equated mental (meaningful) Information with physical causal Energy*3. What kind of relationship can cause a change of form in a thing? A causal relationship?
If the ability or capacity or power or force that we refer to as Energy is not a Cause, what is it? Isn't Causation what Energy does? Yet Energy is only detectable in its causal effects, not in its per se identity. So yes, if there were no material things, there would be no causal relationships, that we call "energy". One way to define that interrelationship is E=MC^2, where the constant "C" is a dimensionless ratio*4. But a Ratio is not a physical thing, it's a metaphysical idea. No?
*1. Aristotle considers the formal "cause" (εἶδος, eîdos) as describing the pattern or form which when present makes matter into a particular type of thing, which we recognize as being of that particular type.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_causes
Note -- The terms "pattern" & "form" in this definition imply that a Cause is the power to enform : to change the defining pattern or conceptual form of a thing. Thus placing Causation & Energy into the broader post-Shannon category of general Information, that allows a mind to "recognize" a type of thing, but can also change the form of the thing, to place it into a different category (e.g. phase change). If you are only aware of the narrow Shannon definition of Information, this may not make sense. But even Shannon noticed the relationship of Information to Entropy (the inverse of Energy).
*2. Can energy exist by itself? :
Energy is relative, but what's interesting that for any observer, it's always conserved. No matter what the interactions are, energy is never seen to exist on its own, but only as part of a system
https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswith ... 889e43762a
Note -- Hence, Energy is a Holistic (mathematical/metaphysical) relationship between elements & systems
*3. Energy & Information :
Research into the relation between energy and information goes back many years, but the era of precise yet general quantification of information began only with Claude E. Shannon's famous 1948 paper "The Mathematical Theory of Communication." . . . . recent advances in information theory how why information is needed for transformations of energy.
https://www.esalq.usp.br/lepse/imgs/con ... mation.pdf
*4. Dimensionless Ratio :
A dimensionless ratio calculated by dividing the amount of useful energy provided by a given activity by the culturally mediated energy dissipated in providing it.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/en ... less-ratio
How so? Energy is not a cause.
Inches & miles are conventional measures of space, not space itself. — Gnomon
Energy is a measure of capacity, not the thing it is measuring. It is not a cause. It cannot be a cause. It is also not a thing that exists as if it has a categorical substance. Please define "energy". If energy exists, it's because there are things! — L'éléphant
I suppose you are restricting the term "cause" to some particular traditional definition. But ↪simplyG
and Gnomon are simply including a modern term from physics in the ancient notion of "causation". Because, as you say, it's not a physical thing, most attempts to define what-Energy-is are quite vague : ability, capacity, etc. Plato & Aristotle were forced to use gods or other metaphors to define their notion of Causation. Even the Wiki definition below sounds a bit mysterious or ghostly*1.
Some people still think of Energy as a material substance or fluid of some kind. But it's now clear that Energy does not have a material existence. Instead, it is merely a (mathematical??) relationship between things*2. Not a thing itself. And the kind of relationship is Causal (change). The expanded post-Shannon theory of Information has equated mental (meaningful) Information with physical causal Energy*3. What kind of relationship can cause a change of form in a thing? A causal relationship?
If the ability or capacity or power or force that we refer to as Energy is not a Cause, what is it? Isn't Causation what Energy does? Yet Energy is only detectable in its causal effects, not in its per se identity. So yes, if there were no material things, there would be no causal relationships, that we call "energy". One way to define that interrelationship is E=MC^2, where the constant "C" is a dimensionless ratio*4. But a Ratio is not a physical thing, it's a metaphysical idea. No?
*1. Aristotle considers the formal "cause" (εἶδος, eîdos) as describing the pattern or form which when present makes matter into a particular type of thing, which we recognize as being of that particular type.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_causes
Note -- The terms "pattern" & "form" in this definition imply that a Cause is the power to enform : to change the defining pattern or conceptual form of a thing. Thus placing Causation & Energy into the broader post-Shannon category of general Information, that allows a mind to "recognize" a type of thing, but can also change the form of the thing, to place it into a different category (e.g. phase change). If you are only aware of the narrow Shannon definition of Information, this may not make sense. But even Shannon noticed the relationship of Information to Entropy (the inverse of Energy).
*2. Can energy exist by itself? :
Energy is relative, but what's interesting that for any observer, it's always conserved. No matter what the interactions are, energy is never seen to exist on its own, but only as part of a system
https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswith ... 889e43762a
Note -- Hence, Energy is a Holistic (mathematical/metaphysical) relationship between elements & systems
*3. Energy & Information :
Research into the relation between energy and information goes back many years, but the era of precise yet general quantification of information began only with Claude E. Shannon's famous 1948 paper "The Mathematical Theory of Communication." . . . . recent advances in information theory how why information is needed for transformations of energy.
https://www.esalq.usp.br/lepse/imgs/con ... mation.pdf
*4. Dimensionless Ratio :
A dimensionless ratio calculated by dividing the amount of useful energy provided by a given activity by the culturally mediated energy dissipated in providing it.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/en ... less-ratio
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