<blockquote style="margin-right: 0px; margin-left:15px;"><font size="3">Dear Gordana, Stu and Karl,<br><br>It is a matter of scientific fact that apart from this brief reference by Gordana, for which thanks, what I have written on the subject of potential and potentiality has been systematically ignored. May I please start this response by giving the title of my 2017 article in arXiv Physics with R. Bishop:<br> <br><span> </span>"Potentiality, Actuality and Non-Separability in Quantum and Classical Physics: <i>Res Potentiae </i>in the Macroscopic World".<br><br>I have suggested that information fits the schema defined in this paper and the science on which it is based. In addition, it offers the major advantage (in my mind) of being able to describe information and other complex human cognitive phenomena without going outside the laws of physics in the spacetime in which we normally evolve - the macroscopic world. <br><br>The value for me of a non-transcendental explanation for thought and feeling is that requires the highest level of individual responsibility. I can not "pan off", to use an obsolescent trope, any of this responsibility to possible aspects of the universe of which I have no knowledge. When a radioactive nucleus emits a particle is outside the thermodynamic world of (non-standard) logic and responsibility.<br><br>I thus will insist, if I may, on the use of "probable" rather than "possible" in the debate. Possible is epistemic, and lets one off the hook. Probable is ontic and means real, even if low or small. Potential information is therefore for me something very concrete, present in or accompanying actual information, with a real probability that can be ascribed to its evolution.<br><br>I would much welcome comments on the above,<br><br>Best,<br>Joseph<br><br></font><br>De : gordana.dodig-crnkovic@chalmers.se<br>Date : 27/02/2024 - 16:47 (E)<br>À : michael.levin@allencenter.tufts.edu<br>Cc : fis@listas.unizar.es<br>Objet : Re: [Fis] [External] Re: "express matter and energy in terms of information"<br><br><style>p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {
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<p class="MsoPlainText">On 2024-02-27, 15:42, "Fis on behalf of Levin, Michael" <fis-bounces@listas.unizar.es <mailto:fis-bounces@listas.unizar.es> on behalf of michael.levin@allencenter.tufts.edu <mailto:michael.levin@allencenter.tufts.edu>> wrote:
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<p class="MsoPlainText">> 'latent information' exists: waiting to be *discovered* … waiting to
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<p class="MsoPlainText">be *invented* as new views,
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<p class="MsoPlainText">this is a very important and interesting point.
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Thanks, Mike and Marcus.
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Indeed! We have been discussing the world as ”potential information” (in the sense of Aristotle’s potentiality) several times. In the sense of Informational structural realism (Floridi), also in exchanges with Joseph.
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<p class="MsoPlainText">I have been working on a notion of this (Platonic?) space of potential inventions, ideas,
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<p class="MsoPlainText">etc. as being under “positive pressure” in some sense - it is not
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<p class="MsoPlainText">observed, but it *wants* to be observed, it's pushing outward.
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">In the Aristotelian sense, potentiality is in the world.
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">In the Platonic sense</span><span style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">, the material world that we perceive with our senses is not the real world but merely a shadow of the real world. The real world, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">for</span><span style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"> Plato, is a non-physical realm that consists of ideal forms or ideas.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"> I think we can safely say that the Platonic ideal world is in our heads.
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<p class="MsoPlainText">So can we define a notion in which something is not directly observed (yet) but
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<p class="MsoPlainText">does exert some kind of “influence” in the world before it is directly
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<p class="MsoPlainText">embodied/perceived? Can Observers be influenced by things they haven’t
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<p class="MsoPlainText">yet observed (but are putting themselves in a position to be able to
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Yes, in the Platonic sense of ideas in our heads, our ideas exert real-world influence as they guide our behavior.
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<p class="MsoPlainText">Is it possible to formalize the idea of a subtle influence
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<p class="MsoPlainText">from the denizens of the latent space - a kind of causality (akin to
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<p class="MsoPlainText">that of synchronicity?) which is not normal physical causality but also
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<p class="MsoPlainText">not nothing?
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Currently, I am not aware of such a framework to express the contents of our heads. <br> But in principle, why not.
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<p class="MsoPlainText">When can you trace a causal chain back to something that
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<p class="MsoPlainText">*doesn’t* physically exist? do thoughts that haven’t been thought yet
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<p class="MsoPlainText">contribute to the shape of an agent’s cognitive landscape?
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Freud would say, surely.
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<p class="MsoPlainText">is that what cognitive agents are - transducers (bridges) from the latent space to
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<p class="MsoPlainText">the physical space, which collapse or amplify potentialities from that
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">They surely are. They are processing actual information on the level of language plus the potential information which can under certain conditions become actual for an agent.
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Thank you Marcus and Mike for this important point. By Maturana quote* I wanted to point out the importance of an observer for actual knowledge of the world that we are sharing.
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">But there is a potential information both in the world and embodied in cognizing agents.
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<p class="MsoPlainText">Mike
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Gordana
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Avenir Book";color: rgb(4,50,255);mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">* After the advent of ChatGPT Maturana’s quote is no longer valid. <br> There are utterances made by agents which are not observers.
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<p class="MsoPlainText">------ Original Message ------
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<p class="MsoPlainText">From "Marcus Abundis" <55mrcs@gmail.com <mailto:55mrcs@gmail.com>>
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<p class="MsoPlainText">To "Gordana Dodig-Crnkovic" <gordana.dodig-crnkovic@mdu.se <mailto:gordana.dodig-crnkovic@mdu.se>>
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<p class="MsoPlainText">Cc "fis" <fis@listas.unizar.es <mailto:fis@listas.unizar.es>>
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<p class="MsoPlainText">Date 2/27/24, 9:17:09 AM
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<p class="MsoPlainText">Subject [External] Re: [Fis] "express matter and energy in terms of
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<p class="MsoPlainText">information"
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<p class="MsoPlainText">>A nice synopsis Gordana, thanks!
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<p class="MsoPlainText">>I would add (predictably) not ALL information is observed. For example,
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<p class="MsoPlainText">>'latent information' exists: waiting to be *discovered* in our many
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<p class="MsoPlainText">>'logical gaps', or waiting to be *invented* as new views, devices, and
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<p class="MsoPlainText">>tools by humanity's very-few skilled individuals. Only when Truly
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<p class="MsoPlainText">>Perfect Knowledge of the cosmos is achieved (if ever possible) can we
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<p class="MsoPlainText">>say all information is observed.
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<p class="MsoPlainText">>Marcus
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<p class="MsoPlainText">_______________________________________________
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