Philosophical musings on Quanta & Qualia; Materialism & Spiritualism; Science & Religion; Pragmatism & Idealism, etc.
Post 30. 04/16/2018
Enformation Engines
Physical & Virtual Information Processors
Philosopher David Wolf coined the term "enformation" as a combination of "energy" and "information" [see Post 28]. Even pragmatic quantum physicists have concluded that physical Energy and metaphysical Information are equivalent. So I am not alone in noticing the dual functions of the stuff we also call "knowledge". Originally, “to enform” referred to the act of creating meaning (form) in a mind, the imparting of knowledge [Wiktionary 5]. Today, "information" is more often used to indicate digital data in a computer. But my own coinage, EnFormAction, combines both the physical sense of energy, along with its embodiment in matter, and the metaphysical sense of conscious knowing, awareness and consciousness.
As we have learned in the 20th century, a mysterious feature of information is that it can transform from energy to matter, and to knowledge, and back again. For example, a computer programmer has an idea in mind, types it in code, then converts the code into energy pulses, that he can transmit to another computer, whereupon it can be converted back into an idea in the reader's conscious mind. Such information transformation & transfer is a kind of technological telepathy.
An early computer was called Babbage's automatic computing "engine". Engines are machines that convert energy from one form to another, usually from locked-up matter to free energy, from condensed-but-inert potential to flowing directed action, which produces practical side-effects that serve human needs, and eventually to the useless dissipated form of energy that we call Entropy. The directing of energy toward those artificial functions is what we call "purpose" or "intention" or "design"1.
The name for such synthetic energy processors is derived from Latin ingenium, the root of “ingenuity”, and originally meaning “talent”. So an engine is anything with a special ability to produce useful things or actions that suit human purposes. Yet, another form of energy is the mind-stuff we call Ideas or Information. That's why the Google app on your computer is called a “search engine”. It processes heaps of raw data in order to produce useful knowledge in the mind of the seeker. Another kind of software processor is a Game Engine, which is a specialized set of algorithms designed to render complex graphic images in video games. Some of those games involve virtual worlds that exist only as images and ideas.
The information engine we are most familiar with is the human brain. It receives raw data inputs from the five senses, and renders them into useful forms of information that we call “meaning”. Just as Energy is the physical cause of all sensible effects in the phenomenal world, immaterial Information can be considered the meta-physical cause of all mental effects in the noumenal world of ideas. Directed or intentional actions are the key to any Information Engine. And the ultimate IE is the universe itself. So just as a Game Engine has a programmer, the Cosmic Engine must have an Engineer, who designed2 the system we call Nature. To create an organic Cosmos from raw data (Chaos), that implicit designer presumably created “logic gates” and channels to direct the flow of energy & information, by establishing physical limits in cosmic constants, and physical laws serving as limiting boundaries for energy flow.
Post 30 continued . . . click Next
Quantum theory is relativistic & probabilistic, whereas Newton's theories were absolute & predictable. Newton's worldview was on the macro scale of the naked eye, assisted by weak technologies. QT goes beyond the limitations of human senses, into the micro and cosmic scales of reality. There, we see intimations of ultimate reality, but only via mentally constructed models (theories).
Observing a quantum system requires acting upon it, which triggers a reaction. Hence, observation is inter-action, a new relationship. Quantum systems interact with each other randomly, hence the total system is neutralized, canceled out, for the moment. But human probes come from outside the system in question. So the observation is intentional, and the reaction is meaningful.
Prototype Enformation Engine by Babbage & Lovelace
1. Intention : The physical operations of the brain merely analyze incoming sensory data into categories by placing them into brain modules : sound, vision, smell, touch. Those physical classes of information are further sub-divided into things & properties. This fragmented information has no agenda in its stored physical form. Only when converted into active mental form, does raw data synthesize into goal-directed behaviors we call Intention or Will.
2. Cosmic Designer : The alternative to design as an explanation for the existence of the universe, is the shoulder-shrug that it just happened for no reason. But that cosmic-accident bandaid is not a scientific position, because science is a search for reasons.
Virtual Worlds : Powerful computers have allowed ordinary people to become god-like by creating new worlds, first in their minds, and then in coded structures that exist only when energy is flowing through circuit boards. In these simulated realities, the mind of a human player can embody a virtual character, just as Hindu gods were thought to incarnate in human form. The notion that our own reality might be a simulation is taken seriously by some thinkers, including tech magnate Elon Musk. So maybe my own model of PanEnDeism is not so far fetched. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_world https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/oct/11/simulated-world-elon-musk-the-matrix
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