Dear Andrei and FIS colleagues,
Your expression, days ago, about "information transformers" is very
suggestive in the sense that it highlights far better than other terms
(e.g., proposed by complexity theoreticians: "information gatherers" &
"information users") what happens, say, to an informational entity coupled
to its open-ended environment. What happens is not a computation, or any
information processing event: it is closer to the discussion of abduction
we had in this list a couple of years ago -- I have also used
the "processual" embedded rather than the disembodied "processing", as the
info transformation is irreducibly tied to the advancement of a life cycle.
Relating this to objectivity of informational laws looks adventurous, but
maybe OK. We converge on informational capabilities of photons, by
theoretical tools, by optical instruments, by our photoreceptors ---like
other opsin pigments of vertebrate eyes, and like bacterium's
"bacteriorhodopsin."
(The little problem in my view is that in the two previous paragraphs there
are at least three or four different usages of "information" conflated!)
Anyhow, bacteria has around several million bases of structural information
to "couple" to its environment and act as an "information transformer". A
rudimentary social animal (insects) has around the same number of neurons
to act as a new type of "info trans." Let us get ahead to big brained human
individuals in a society, or to scientists socially coupled amidst the
practise of a scientific discipline. Each one cuts but a fine slice of its
open ended environment... And also to the level of the basic quantum grain
at the Planck scale? Therein, the global informational limitation regarding
the "distinction on the adjacent" capabilities has been disciplinarily
couched under conservation of energy and uncertainty principles. Let me
wonder whether Koichiro's approach to time out from energy conservation may
be one of the few ways to advance towards a "bit accounting" of the quantum
possibilities in its coupling to the infinite environment...
Sorry for having put together all these top-of-the-head, nonsense comments!
Pedro
At 16:53 14/09/2006, you wrote:
>
>In this way we turn back to the concluding topic of our discussion (that
>might be a starting point of a new discussion) -- about <<reality of
>information laws>>. In my picture of reality <<information
reality>> is
>not less real than <<material reality>>. You wrote about
>social construction of human knowledge... In my book <<transformers
of
>information>> are not less objective than electrons or photons.
Roughly
>speaking this imply that <<transformers of information>> with
>completely different physical realization would generate the same social
>structure of science, just because the objectivity of information laws.
>But, as I wrote, this idscussion induces deep philosophic questions...
>
>All the best, Andrei
>
>
> > Dear Andrei and colleagues,
> >
> > Thanks a lot for your re-capping of the session. It is a very
> > thoughtful
> > perspective on information from the quantum side. My only comments
> > would
> > relate to your (partial) identification of models, reality, and
> > mathematics. It sounds too strong to my hears. We have cut science
> > from its
> > human origins, and then we resort to very curious reification myths.
> > How
> > does the practice of science relate to our human nature? The
> > tentative new
> > branch of \"neuromathematics\" (it has already surfaced in
past
> > discussions)
> > could throw interesting new light on the several fascinating topics
> > around
> > the necessarily \"social\" construction of human
knowledge...
> >
> > I join your concerns when you state:
> >
> > >I am trying to sell the idea that the whole quantum enterprise
is
> > about
> > >simplification of description of extremely complex physical
> > phenomena.
> > >I developed models in that the quantum probabilistic model
appears
> > as a
> > >projection of more complex classical statistical model.
> > >Then I proceed: Wau! In such a case it seems that quantum
> > probability
> > >theory and quantum information could be used everywhere where we
> > could
> > >not provide the complete description of phenomena and we just
try
> > to
> > >create a simplified representation in complex Hilbert space.
> > >So one can apply quantum information theory everywhere, from
> > financial
> > >mathematics to genetics.
> >
> > Months ago, when discussing on biomolecular networks, I argued that
> > rather
> > than a classical \"state\" the central info construct of
the living
> > cell
> > should be the \"cycle\", then implying the advancement of
a \"phase\"
> > (recapitulating and somehow making continuous the classical
> > biomolecular
> > views of Start, Gap1, Mitosis, Gap2 as discrete phases of the cell
> > cycle)
> > maintaining at the same time a continuous adaptation of the inner
> > molecular
> > population to the environmental demands. These biological sentences
> > may
> > sound very different from quantum statements, but I do not think so.
> > My
> > opinion is that the the living cell and other genuine
\"informational\"
> >
> > entities share a fundamental \"adaptability\" problem,
having to fit
> > with
> > with limited processing resources to an open ended environment, and
> > then
> > having to tune their production-degradation engines to cope with
> > both
> > their own phase in the cycle and their external happenstance.
Michael
> >
> > Conrad produced great stuff on formal quantum-inspired approaches to
> >
> > ecological adaptability (see Kevin Kirby in this list too). And it
> > could be
> > done for aspects of nervous systems and economic life too...
> > Unfortunately
> > a Gordian knot of themes appears: sensibility, robustness,
> > networking,
> > fitness-value-meaning, adaptability, evolvability (to mention but a
> > few).
> > The future will tell whether we are able to trascend formal
analogies
> >
> > between realms and achieve a new, more catholic approach to
> > information
> > --none of the current approaches has achieved a breakthrough yet, so
> > the
> > need for our exchange of views!
> >
> > I also think that recent developments in string theory are a good
> > help
> > --and quite inspiring-- for our problems. See Leonard Suskind, with
> > his
> > \"Landscape\" approach (The Cosmic Landscape, 2005).
Breaking the
> > continuous
> > at the Planck scale means also a new hint on \"where\" we
can situate
> > fundamental laws of nature \"physically\" --a question not
responded
> > yet in
> > the discussion, for my taste.
> >
> > Thanking your inspiring comments,
> >
> > Pedro
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > fis mailing list
> > fis@listas.unizar.es
> > http://webmail.unizar.es/mailman/listinfo/fis
> >
>
>
>
>With Best Regards,
>
>Andrei Khrennikov
>
>Director of International Center for Mathematical Modeling in Physics,
>Engineering, Economy and Cognitive Sc.,
>University of Vaxjo, Sweden
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Received on Tue Sep 26 17:58:41 2006
