Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Thursday, March 7, 2013 12:56:01 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
>  
>
> The context takes all action, to include the action 
>
> of doing nothing at all.
>
>  
>
> Once the signal is given by the transmitter, then sure it is up to the 
> receiver of the signal to interpret it. How the transmitter formats the 
> signal will influence the receiver's reception and interpretation 
> possibilities though.
>  
>
> How the transmitter formats signal, what sign the transmitter sends will 
> influence the 
>
> receiver’s reception but only to the extent that the transmitted signal 
> corresponds to 
>
> a priori defined acceptance criteria in the receiver.  This criteria is 
> not under the influence 
>
> of the transmitter.
>

Only the initial criteria. The signal can be "switch to 88.9 mHz and use 
Morse Code" or "the ip address to use for future signals is the number of 
my favorite basketball player followed by .15.129.99".

 

>  
>
> wrb 
>

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RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

 

The context takes all action, to include the action 

of doing nothing at all.

 

Once the signal is given by the transmitter, then sure it is up to the
receiver of the signal to interpret it. How the transmitter formats the
signal will influence the receiver's reception and interpretation
possibilities though.
 

How the transmitter formats signal, what sign the transmitter sends will
influence the 

receiver's reception but only to the extent that the transmitted signal
corresponds to 

a priori defined acceptance criteria in the receiver.  This criteria is not
under the influence 

of the transmitter.

 

wrb 

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Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Thursday, March 7, 2013 12:37:35 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> A machine can accept sign and yield alteration of 
>
> its configuration (add to its parts, delete from its 
>
> parts but most of all alter the complexity of its 
>
> parts and their arrangement) such that the machine 
>
> develops its ability to:
>
>  
>
> 1.   accept sign – one yield you did not consider
>

What does this mean in terms of the buckets?
 

> 2.   increase the complexity of constructs – another 
>
> yield you did not consider
>

Again, complexity is our value, not the machine's. The bucket brigade 
doesn't know it the patterns form the Gettysburg Address or just all half 
gull.
 

> 3.   acquire Turing competence from incompetence – a 
>
> third yield you did not consider
>

We don't need to consider any of the yields which are sought by the user of 
the machine, only those which yield something to the machine itself - which 
I don't think it any. To the machine, it make no difference whether it is 
running the same meaningless exercise for 10,000 years or if it is 
communicating with an alien civilization for the first time. It doesn't 
care whether it is running or not.

Craig
 

>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com  [mailto:
> everyth...@googlegroups.com ] *On Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Thursday, March 07, 2013 8:33 AM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com 
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Thursday, March 7, 2013 1:39:25 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> I have before claimed that the computer is 
> a good example of the power of semiosis. 
>
> It is simple enough to see that the mere 
> construction of a Turing machine confers 
> upon that machine the ability to recognise 
> all computations; to generate the yield of 
> such computations. 
>
> In this sense, a program (the source code) 
> is a sequence of signs that upon acceptance 
> brings the machine to generate some 
> corresponding yield; a computation. 
>
> Also, the intention of an entity behind sign 
> origination has nothing whatsoever to do with 
> the acceptability of that sign by some other 
> entity, much less the meaning there taken for 
> the sign. 
>
> The meaning of a sign is always centered upon 
> the acceptor of that sign. 
>
>
> I agree but I don't think the machine can accept any sign. It can copy 
> them and perform scripted transformations on them, but ultimately there is 
> no yield at all. The Turing machine does not no that it has yielded a 
> result of a computation, and more than a bucket of water knows when it is 
> being emptied. In fact, you could make a Turing machine out of nothing but 
> buckets of water on pulleys and it would literally be some pattern of 
> filled buckets which is supposed to be meaningful as a sign or yield to the 
> 'machine' (collection of buckets? water molecules? convection currents? 
> general buckety-watery-movingness?)
>
> Craig
>
>  
>
>
> wrb 
>
> -- 
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups 
> "Everything List" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an 
> email to everything-li...@googlegroups.com .
> To post to this group, send email to everyth...@googlegroups.com
> .
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> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
>  
>  
>

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Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Thursday, March 7, 2013 12:32:21 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> The sign is what it is and contexts react to signs.
>

What is it though?

This sentence... is it words? Letters? Pixels on a screen? Images in our 
visual experience? photons? All of these require detection and 
interpretation.

The sign or text is just a perturbation of a given context.

 
>
> The other words you use in your argumentation 
>
> are unnecessary at the very least, and I think they 
>
> lead to muddled thinking on your end.
>

No, in my experience they lead to perfect clarity.
 

>  
>
> The sign takes no action; it simply is.
>

It takes no action, but nothing simply is. A sign is an experience which 
interpreted as linking one experience to another - nothing more. It has no 
independent existence. 
 

>  
>
> The context takes all action, to include the action 
>
> of doing nothing at all.
>
>  
>
Once the signal is given by the transmitter, then sure it is up to the 
receiver of the signal to interpret it. How the transmitter formats the 
signal will influence the receiver's reception and interpretation 
possibilities though.
 

> Meaning is no more nor no less than the action 
>
> taken by the context.
>

Not sure I get what you mean. A signal can still be meaningful even if you 
never take action on it. Your favorite baseball hero says hi to you and you 
remember it as meaningful. What does that have to do with any action taken 
or not taken?

 
>
> The sign does not have some magical character 
>
> called **sensitivity to detectability**
>

I agree, the sign is a figurative entity. It has no physical presence or 
capacities.
 

>  
>
> Semiotics has nothing to do with Shannon’s
>
> information transmission problem.  The reason 
>
> for this is that Shannon assumes that both 
>
> transmitter and receiver share a common 
>
> context.  You, on the other hand, don’t have 
>
> that luxury.
>

It makes sense to assume a common context if you are designing a 
communications system. I don't have an opinion on whether Shannon and 
semiotics are unrelated. Depends how you want to consider them.

Craig
 

>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com  [mailto:
> everyth...@googlegroups.com ] *On Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Thursday, March 07, 2013 8:17 AM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com 
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Wednesday, March 6, 2013 12:09:28 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> Now we are getting some place.
>
>  
>
> Exactly.  There is simply action.
>
>  
>
> Contexts react to sign.
>
>
> They react to their interpretations of a sign. The sign itself is a figure 
> - a disposable form hijacked by the intention of the transmitter. The sign 
> depends on sensitivities to be detected. When it is detected, it is not 
> detected as the sign intended by the transmitter unless the semiosis is 
> well executed, which is up to both the transmitter and receiver's 
> intentional and unintentional contributions.
>
> Craig
>  
>
>  
>
> Nothing more.  Nothing less.
>
>  
>
> The complexity of action is open ended.
>
>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] *On 
> Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Wednesday, March 06, 2013 4:12 AM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 5:48:19 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> Craig:
>
>  
>
> The mistake you make is clearly stated in your words:
>
>  
>
> “…doesn’t mean that they communicated with judgment.”
>
>  
>
> You are anthropomorphizing.  The value is no more nor no 
>
> less than the action taken upon signal acceptance.
>
>
> That's ok, but it means there is no value. There is simply action.
>
> Craig
>  
>
>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] *On 
> Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 1:27 PM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:07:00 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> The fact that a machine can act in a discriminatory based 
>
> upon some signal (sign, information) input is demonstration 
>
> of value judgment.
>
>
> Only in our eyes, not in its own eyes. It's like telling a kid to say some 
> insult to someone in another language. The fact they are able to carry out 
>

RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

Right there, that is the problem: your reliance upon consciousness 

for your argumentation.

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2013 9:34 AM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Thursday, March 7, 2013 12:21:57 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

Craig:

 

When you say that "interpretation is consciousness" you contradict 

your prior statements regarding semiosis, that acceptance and action 

are not value.


I'm not sure what you're getting at. Acceptance in the sense of receiving a
sign is not the same as valuing, interpreting, or being conscious of a sign.
A router receives an electronic signal, but it has no interpretation or
value of it beyond routing it to the next router.

Craig

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com 
[mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com  ] On Behalf Of Craig
Weinberg
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2013 8:05 AM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com  
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Thursday, March 7, 2013 6:55:25 AM UTC-5, Bruno Marchal wrote:

 

On 05 Mar 2013, at 19:14, Craig Weinberg wrote:

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 12:03:28 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

Craig:

 

You statement of need for a human to observe the 

pattern is the smoking gun to indicate a misunderstanding 

of semiotic theory on your part.


I don't think that it has to be humans doing the observing at all. 
 

 

Specifically, you don't need a human; a machine will do.


A machine can only help another non-machine interpret something. I don't
think that they can interpret anything for 'themselves'.

 

You should study machine's self-reference. It is easy to program a machine
interpreting data, by itself and for herself. This is not like
consciousness. this is testable and already done.

You confuse the notion of machine before Post, Church Turing and after.


Interpretation is consciousness though. What is tested is that results
correspond with expectations in a way which is meaningful to us, not to the
machine. I can use a mirror to reflect an image that I see, but that doesn't
mean that the mirror intends to reflect images, or knows what they are, or
has an experience of them. We can prove that the image is indeed consistent
with our expectations of a reflected original though.

Craig
 

 

 

 

Bruno

 

 

 

 

 

Not all machines are man-made.


True, but what we see as natural machines may not be just machines. Man-made
machines may be just machines.

Craig

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] On
Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 5:24 AM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 2:06:20 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

There is information (I take information to be a 
manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented 
in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units 
of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  


I can agree that information could be considered a manifestation of entropy,
to the extent that entropy is necessary to provide a contrast space for a
distribution. To string an ellipses together, you need one dot, repetition,
space, and a quality of measurement which yokes together the three dots
aesthetically. Beyond that, you also need human observer with human visual
sense to turn the distribution into a 'pattern'. Without that, of course,
even distribution cannot cohere into "a" distribution, as there is no scale,
range, quality, etc to anchor the expectation. If we are a microbe, we may
not ever find our way from one dot to the next.

I 
think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits 
of information; I will use the terms synonymously. 

Information has meaning only within context.  For many 
people, context is taken to mean one piece of information 
as compared to another piece of information.  I do not 
take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics. 
Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of 
the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori 
within information acceptors. 


Agree. Well, transmitters form the signs from their own sense of meaning as
well. That's how we are having this discussion.
 


What you know you have always known; the sign merely 
serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind. 


Right. I mean it might be a bit more complicated as far as novelty goes. I
don't know if the state of unconscious information is really what I "have
always known" but that this particular constellation of meanings reflects
the Totality in a way that it is only trivially novel. Like if you hit a
jackpot on a slot machine - that may not have happened before, but the slot
machine is

RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

A machine can accept sign and yield alteration of 

its configuration (add to its parts, delete from its 

parts but most of all alter the complexity of its 

parts and their arrangement) such that the machine 

develops its ability to:

 

1.   accept sign - one yield you did not consider

2.   increase the complexity of constructs - another 

yield you did not consider

3.   acquire Turing competence from incompetence - a 

third yield you did not consider

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2013 8:33 AM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Thursday, March 7, 2013 1:39:25 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

I have before claimed that the computer is 
a good example of the power of semiosis. 

It is simple enough to see that the mere 
construction of a Turing machine confers 
upon that machine the ability to recognise 
all computations; to generate the yield of 
such computations. 

In this sense, a program (the source code) 
is a sequence of signs that upon acceptance 
brings the machine to generate some 
corresponding yield; a computation. 

Also, the intention of an entity behind sign 
origination has nothing whatsoever to do with 
the acceptability of that sign by some other 
entity, much less the meaning there taken for 
the sign. 

The meaning of a sign is always centered upon 
the acceptor of that sign. 


I agree but I don't think the machine can accept any sign. It can copy them
and perform scripted transformations on them, but ultimately there is no
yield at all. The Turing machine does not no that it has yielded a result of
a computation, and more than a bucket of water knows when it is being
emptied. In fact, you could make a Turing machine out of nothing but buckets
of water on pulleys and it would literally be some pattern of filled buckets
which is supposed to be meaningful as a sign or yield to the 'machine'
(collection of buckets? water molecules? convection currents? general
buckety-watery-movingness?)

Craig

 


wrb 



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Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Thursday, March 7, 2013 12:21:57 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> Craig:
>
>  
>
> When you say that “interpretation is consciousness” you contradict 
>
> your prior statements regarding semiosis, that acceptance and action 
>
> are not value.
>

I'm not sure what you're getting at. Acceptance in the sense of receiving a 
sign is not the same as valuing, interpreting, or being conscious of a 
sign. A router receives an electronic signal, but it has no interpretation 
or value of it beyond routing it to the next router.

Craig

 
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com  [mailto:
> everyth...@googlegroups.com ] *On Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Thursday, March 07, 2013 8:05 AM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com 
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Thursday, March 7, 2013 6:55:25 AM UTC-5, Bruno Marchal wrote:
>
>  
>
> On 05 Mar 2013, at 19:14, Craig Weinberg wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 12:03:28 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> Craig:
>
>  
>
> You statement of need for a human to observe the 
>
> pattern is the smoking gun to indicate a misunderstanding 
>
> of semiotic theory on your part.
>
>
> I don't think that it has to be humans doing the observing at all. 
>  
>
>  
>
> Specifically, you don’t need a human; a machine will do.
>
>
> A machine can only help another non-machine interpret something. I don't 
> think that they can interpret anything for 'themselves'.
>
>  
>
> You should study machine's self-reference. It is easy to program a machine 
> interpreting data, by itself and for herself. This is not like 
> consciousness. this is testable and already done.
>
> You confuse the notion of machine before Post, Church Turing and after.
>
>
> Interpretation is consciousness though. What is tested is that results 
> correspond with expectations in a way which is meaningful to us, not to the 
> machine. I can use a mirror to reflect an image that I see, but that 
> doesn't mean that the mirror intends to reflect images, or knows what they 
> are, or has an experience of them. We can prove that the image is indeed 
> consistent with our expectations of a reflected original though.
>
> Craig
>  
>
>  
>
>  
>
>  
>
> Bruno
>
>  
>
>  
>
>
>
>  
>
>  
>
> Not all machines are man-made.
>
>
> True, but what we see as natural machines may not be just machines. 
> Man-made machines may be just machines.
>
> Craig
>
>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] *On 
> Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 5:24 AM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 2:06:20 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> There is information (I take information to be a 
> manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented 
> in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units 
> of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  
>
>
> I can agree that information could be considered a manifestation of 
> entropy, to the extent that entropy is necessary to provide a contrast 
> space for a distribution. To string an ellipses together, you need one dot, 
> repetition, space, and a quality of measurement which yokes together the 
> three dots aesthetically. Beyond that, you also need human observer with 
> human visual sense to turn the distribution into a 'pattern'. Without that, 
> of course, even distribution cannot cohere into "a" distribution, as there 
> is no scale, range, quality, etc to anchor the expectation. If we are a 
> microbe, we may not ever find our way from one dot to the next.
>
> I 
> think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits 
> of information; I will use the terms synonymously. 
>
> Information has meaning only within context.  For many 
> people, context is taken to mean one piece of information 
> as compared to another piece of information.  I do not 
> take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics. 
> Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of 
> the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori 
> within information acceptors. 
>
>
> Agree. Well, transmitters form the signs from their own sense of meaning 
> as well. That's how we are having this discussion.
>  
>
>
> What you know you have always known; the sign merely 
> serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind

RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

The sign is what it is and contexts react to signs.

 

The other words you use in your argumentation 

are unnecessary at the very least, and I think they 

lead to muddled thinking on your end.

 

The sign takes no action; it simply is.

 

The context takes all action, to include the action 

of doing nothing at all.

 

Meaning is no more nor no less than the action 

taken by the context.

 

The sign does not have some magical character 

called *sensitivity to detectability*

 

Semiotics has nothing to do with Shannon’s

information transmission problem.  The reason 

for this is that Shannon assumes that both 

transmitter and receiver share a common 

context.  You, on the other hand, don’t have 

that luxury.

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2013 8:17 AM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Wednesday, March 6, 2013 12:09:28 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

Now we are getting some place.

 

Exactly.  There is simply action.

 

Contexts react to sign.


They react to their interpretations of a sign. The sign itself is a figure -
a disposable form hijacked by the intention of the transmitter. The sign
depends on sensitivities to be detected. When it is detected, it is not
detected as the sign intended by the transmitter unless the semiosis is well
executed, which is up to both the transmitter and receiver's intentional and
unintentional contributions.

Craig
 

 

Nothing more.  Nothing less.

 

The complexity of action is open ended.

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com 
[mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com  ] On Behalf Of Craig
Weinberg
Sent: Wednesday, March 06, 2013 4:12 AM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com  
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 5:48:19 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

Craig:

 

The mistake you make is clearly stated in your words:

 

“…doesn’t mean that they communicated with judgment.”

 

You are anthropomorphizing.  The value is no more nor no 

less than the action taken upon signal acceptance.


That's ok, but it means there is no value. There is simply action.

Craig
 

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] On
Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 1:27 PM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:07:00 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

The fact that a machine can act in a discriminatory based 

upon some signal (sign, information) input is demonstration 

of value judgment.


Only in our eyes, not in its own eyes. It's like telling a kid to say some
insult to someone in another language. The fact they are able to carry out
your instruction doesn't mean that they communicated with judgment.
 

 

Just as there is no *in* in a machine, so to there is no *in* 

in a biological organism; they both, machine and organism, 


But there is an 'in' with respect to the experience of an organism - only
because we know it first hand. There would seem to be no reason why a
machine couldn't have a similar 'in', but it actually seems that their
nature indicates they do not. I take the extra step and hypothesize exactly
why that is - because experience is not generated out of the bodies
associated with them, but rather the bodies are simply a public view of one
aspect of the experience. If you build a machine, you are assembling bodies
to relate to each other, as external forms, so that no interiority 'emerges'
from the gaps between them.
 

are forms that treat other forms in certain proscribed ways.

 

You cannot demonstrate otherwise.


Sure I can. Feelings, colors, personalities, intentions, historical
zeitgeists...these are not forms relating to forms.

Craig
 

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] On
Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 10:37 AM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:53:31 AM UTC-5, Alberto G.Corona wrote:

Let´s say that what we call "information" is an extended form of sensory
input. What makes this input "information" is the usability of this input
for reducing the internal entropy of the receiver or increase the internal
order. The receiver can be a machine, a cell, a person or a society for
example. If the input do not produce this effect in the receiver, then that
input is not information.


The increase of internal order of the receiver is a symptom of an experience
of being informed but they are not the same thing. It's not really even
relevant in most cases. I would not call it an extended form of sensory
input, but a reduction of sensory experie

RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

I think that like light, being composed of two propagating 

waves, we should find sound to be composed of propagating 

pressure waves regardless of media.

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2013 8:10 AM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 10:55:31 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

The falling tree makes sound, the wind make sound, the . makes sound 

regardless of your presence (or the presence of others) to hear that sound.


Regardless of my presence, of course, but to make sound, you need an ear and
a medium which vibrates that ear. If you take the atmosphere away, then of
course the falling tree could not make a sound to anyone. For the same
reason, if you take all of the ears away, then there can be no such thing as
sound.
 

 

To argue anything else is utter nonsense.

To the contrary. To assume that physics can simply 'exist' outside of a
context of detection and participation is a statement of religious faith. We
have never experienced an unexperienced world, so it would be unscientific
to presume such a thing. This has nothing to do with human experience, its
ontology.

Craig
 

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com 
[mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com  ] On Behalf Of Craig
Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 7:34 PM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com  
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 5:52:32 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

I do not hold that the acceptor must exist, for then I 

am making a value judgment, and I have already scolded 

Craig for the same thing.

 

Think of it this way.  A volume of gas has a measure of 

entropy.  This means that the molecules are found in 


found by what?
 

a specific sequence of microstates, and those microstates 

constitute an information state of the molecules.  


Who is it constituted to though? Empty space? The molecules as a group? Each
molecule? What is validating that these molecules exist in some way - that
there is a such thing as a microstate which can be detected in some way by
something... and what is detection? How does it work?

When these things are taken as axiomatic, then we are just reiterating those
axioms when we claim that no acceptor must exist. In my understanding, exist
and acceptor are the same thing.

 

Alter 

that microstate sequence (as by adding or removing 

entropy) and the description of the microstate sequence 

changes correspondingly; entropy is information.


Only if something can detect their own description of the microstate as
having changed. We cannot assume that there is any change at all if nothing
can possibly detect it. For example, if I take make a movie of ice cubes
melting in a glass, even though that is a case of increasing thermodynamic
entropy, we will see a lower cost of video compression in a movie of the
glass after the ice has melted completely. In that case the image
description can be made to follow either increasing or decreasing
information entropy depending on whether you play the movie forward and
backward. There is no link between microstate thermodynamic entropy and
optical description information entropy.

Craig

 

Acceptors and signals; contexts and signs; .

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] On
Behalf Of John Mikes
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 1:13 PM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 

Dear Bil B. you probably have thought in these lines during similar long
periods as I did. It was ~2 decades ago when I defined 

i n f o r m a t i o n  as something with (at least) 2 ends: 

1. the notion (in whatever format it shows up)  - and

2. the acceptor (adjusting the notion in whatever context it can be 

perceived - appercipiated (adjusted>). 

I have no idea how to make a connection between information (anyway how one
defines it) and the (inner?) disorder level of anything (entropy?). I
dislike this thermodynamic term alltogether. 

 

Later on I tried to refine my wording into:

RELATIONS and the capability of recognizing them. That moved away from a
'human(?)' framework. E. g. I called the 'closeness of a '(+)' charge to a
'(-)' potential an information so it came close to SOME consciousness (=(?)
response to relations), no matter in what kind of domain. 

 

Do you feel some merit to my thinking?

 

John Mikes

On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 2:06 AM, William R. Buckley 
wrote:

There is information (I take information to be a
manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented
in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units
of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  I
think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits
of information; I will use the terms synony

RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

Craig:

 

When you say that "interpretation is consciousness" you contradict 

your prior statements regarding semiosis, that acceptance and action 

are not value.

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2013 8:05 AM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Thursday, March 7, 2013 6:55:25 AM UTC-5, Bruno Marchal wrote:

 

On 05 Mar 2013, at 19:14, Craig Weinberg wrote:







On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 12:03:28 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

Craig:

 

You statement of need for a human to observe the 

pattern is the smoking gun to indicate a misunderstanding 

of semiotic theory on your part.


I don't think that it has to be humans doing the observing at all. 
 

 

Specifically, you don't need a human; a machine will do.


A machine can only help another non-machine interpret something. I don't
think that they can interpret anything for 'themselves'.

 

You should study machine's self-reference. It is easy to program a machine
interpreting data, by itself and for herself. This is not like
consciousness. this is testable and already done.

You confuse the notion of machine before Post, Church Turing and after.


Interpretation is consciousness though. What is tested is that results
correspond with expectations in a way which is meaningful to us, not to the
machine. I can use a mirror to reflect an image that I see, but that doesn't
mean that the mirror intends to reflect images, or knows what they are, or
has an experience of them. We can prove that the image is indeed consistent
with our expectations of a reflected original though.

Craig
 

 

 

 

Bruno

 

 





 

 

Not all machines are man-made.


True, but what we see as natural machines may not be just machines. Man-made
machines may be just machines.

Craig

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] On
Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 5:24 AM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 2:06:20 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

There is information (I take information to be a 
manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented 
in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units 
of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  


I can agree that information could be considered a manifestation of entropy,
to the extent that entropy is necessary to provide a contrast space for a
distribution. To string an ellipses together, you need one dot, repetition,
space, and a quality of measurement which yokes together the three dots
aesthetically. Beyond that, you also need human observer with human visual
sense to turn the distribution into a 'pattern'. Without that, of course,
even distribution cannot cohere into "a" distribution, as there is no scale,
range, quality, etc to anchor the expectation. If we are a microbe, we may
not ever find our way from one dot to the next.

I 
think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits 
of information; I will use the terms synonymously. 

Information has meaning only within context.  For many 
people, context is taken to mean one piece of information 
as compared to another piece of information.  I do not 
take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics. 
Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of 
the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori 
within information acceptors. 


Agree. Well, transmitters form the signs from their own sense of meaning as
well. That's how we are having this discussion.
 


What you know you have always known; the sign merely 
serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind. 


Right. I mean it might be a bit more complicated as far as novelty goes. I
don't know if the state of unconscious information is really what I "have
always known" but that this particular constellation of meanings reflects
the Totality in a way that it is only trivially novel. Like if you hit a
jackpot on a slot machine - that may not have happened before, but the slot
machine is designed to payout whenever it does. The jackpot already exists
as a potential and sooner or later it will be realized.
 


That you may have intention and so comport your delivery 
of information to another acceptor has not bearing upon 
the subsequent acceptance or rejection of that information 
by the target acceptor.  Acceptance or rejection of 
information is determined solely by the accepting or 
rejecting context (acceptor). 


Agree. But the converse - the acceptor can only accept information which has
been included for delivery by intention (or accidentally I suppose).
 


Your mere presence sends information regardless of some 
conscious intent.  Indeed, your absence does equally 
delive

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Thursday, March 7, 2013 1:39:25 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> I have before claimed that the computer is 
> a good example of the power of semiosis. 
>
> It is simple enough to see that the mere 
> construction of a Turing machine confers 
> upon that machine the ability to recognise 
> all computations; to generate the yield of 
> such computations. 
>
> In this sense, a program (the source code) 
> is a sequence of signs that upon acceptance 
> brings the machine to generate some 
> corresponding yield; a computation. 
>
> Also, the intention of an entity behind sign 
> origination has nothing whatsoever to do with 
> the acceptability of that sign by some other 
> entity, much less the meaning there taken for 
> the sign. 
>
> The meaning of a sign is always centered upon 
> the acceptor of that sign. 
>

I agree but I don't think the machine can accept any sign. It can copy them 
and perform scripted transformations on them, but ultimately there is no 
yield at all. The Turing machine does not no that it has yielded a result 
of a computation, and more than a bucket of water knows when it is being 
emptied. In fact, you could make a Turing machine out of nothing but 
buckets of water on pulleys and it would literally be some pattern of 
filled buckets which is supposed to be meaningful as a sign or yield to the 
'machine' (collection of buckets? water molecules? convection currents? 
general buckety-watery-movingness?)

Craig

 

>
> wrb 
>
>
>

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Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Wednesday, March 6, 2013 12:09:28 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> Now we are getting some place.
>
>  
>
> Exactly.  There is simply action.
>
>  
>
> Contexts react to sign.
>

They react to their interpretations of a sign. The sign itself is a figure 
- a disposable form hijacked by the intention of the transmitter. The sign 
depends on sensitivities to be detected. When it is detected, it is not 
detected as the sign intended by the transmitter unless the semiosis is 
well executed, which is up to both the transmitter and receiver's 
intentional and unintentional contributions.

Craig
 

>  
>
> Nothing more.  Nothing less.
>
>  
>
> The complexity of action is open ended.
>
>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com  [mailto:
> everyth...@googlegroups.com ] *On Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Wednesday, March 06, 2013 4:12 AM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com 
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 5:48:19 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> Craig:
>
>  
>
> The mistake you make is clearly stated in your words:
>
>  
>
> “…doesn’t mean that they communicated with judgment.”
>
>  
>
> You are anthropomorphizing.  The value is no more nor no 
>
> less than the action taken upon signal acceptance.
>
>
> That's ok, but it means there is no value. There is simply action.
>
> Craig
>  
>
>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] *On 
> Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 1:27 PM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:07:00 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> The fact that a machine can act in a discriminatory based 
>
> upon some signal (sign, information) input is demonstration 
>
> of value judgment.
>
>
> Only in our eyes, not in its own eyes. It's like telling a kid to say some 
> insult to someone in another language. The fact they are able to carry out 
> your instruction doesn't mean that they communicated with judgment.
>  
>
>  
>
> Just as there is no **in** in a machine, so to there is no **in** 
>
> in a biological organism; they both, machine and organism, 
>
>
> But there is an 'in' with respect to the experience of an organism - only 
> because we know it first hand. There would seem to be no reason why a 
> machine couldn't have a similar 'in', but it actually seems that their 
> nature indicates they do not. I take the extra step and hypothesize exactly 
> why that is - because experience is not generated out of the bodies 
> associated with them, but rather the bodies are simply a public view of one 
> aspect of the experience. If you build a machine, you are assembling bodies 
> to relate to each other, as external forms, so that no interiority 
> 'emerges' from the gaps between them.
>  
>
> are forms that treat other forms in certain proscribed ways.
>
>  
>
> You cannot demonstrate otherwise.
>
>
> Sure I can. Feelings, colors, personalities, intentions, historical 
> zeitgeists...these are not forms relating to forms.
>
> Craig
>  
>
>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] *On 
> Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 10:37 AM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:53:31 AM UTC-5, Alberto G.Corona wrote:
>
> Let´s say that what we call "information" is an extended form of sensory 
> input. What makes this input "information" is the usability of this input 
> for reducing the internal entropy of the receiver or increase the internal 
> order. The receiver can be a machine, a cell, a person or a society for 
> example. If the input do not produce this effect in the receiver, then that 
> input is not information.
>
>
> The increase of internal order of the receiver is a symptom of an 
> experience of being informed but they are not the same thing. It's not 
> really even relevant in most cases. I would not call it an extended form of 
> sensory input, but a reduction of sensory experience. Input is not a 
> physical reality, it is a conceptual label.
>
> Consider Blindsight:
>
> I hold up two fingers and ask how many fingers? 
>
> "I don't know.'
>
> Guess
>
> 'two'.

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 10:55:31 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> The falling tree makes sound, the wind make sound, the … makes sound 
>
regardless of your presence (or the presence of others) to hear that sound.
>

Regardless of my presence, of course, but to make sound, you need an ear 
and a medium which vibrates that ear. If you take the atmosphere away, then 
of course the falling tree could not make a sound to anyone. For the same 
reason, if you take all of the ears away, then there can be no such thing 
as sound.
 

>  
>
> To argue anything else is utter nonsense.
>
To the contrary. To assume that physics can simply 'exist' outside of a 
context of detection and participation is a statement of religious faith. 
We have never experienced an unexperienced world, so it would be 
unscientific to presume such a thing. This has nothing to do with human 
experience, its ontology.

Craig
 

>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com  [mailto:
> everyth...@googlegroups.com ] *On Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 7:34 PM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com 
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 5:52:32 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> I do not hold that the acceptor must exist, for then I 
>
> am making a value judgment, and I have already scolded 
>
> Craig for the same thing.
>
>  
>
> Think of it this way.  A volume of gas has a measure of 
>
> entropy.  This means that the molecules are found in 
>
>
> found by what?
>  
>
> a specific sequence of microstates, and those microstates 
>
> constitute an information state of the molecules.  
>
>
> Who is it constituted to though? Empty space? The molecules as a group? 
> Each molecule? What is validating that these molecules exist in some way - 
> that there is a such thing as a microstate which can be detected in some 
> way by something... and what is detection? How does it work?
>
> When these things are taken as axiomatic, then we are just reiterating 
> those axioms when we claim that no acceptor must exist. In my 
> understanding, exist and acceptor are the same thing.
>
>  
>
> Alter 
>
> that microstate sequence (as by adding or removing 
>
> entropy) and the description of the microstate sequence 
>
> changes correspondingly; entropy is information.
>
>
> Only if something can detect their own description of the microstate as 
> having changed. We cannot assume that there is any change at all if nothing 
> can possibly detect it. For example, if I take make a movie of ice cubes 
> melting in a glass, even though that is a case of increasing thermodynamic 
> entropy, we will see a lower cost of video compression in a movie of the 
> glass after the ice has melted completely. In that case the image 
> description can be made to follow either increasing or decreasing 
> information entropy depending on whether you play the movie forward and 
> backward. There is no link between microstate thermodynamic entropy and 
> optical description information entropy.
>
> Craig
>
>  
>
> Acceptors and signals; contexts and signs; …
>
>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] *On 
> Behalf Of *John Mikes
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 1:13 PM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
> Dear Bil B. you probably have thought in these lines during similar long 
> periods as I did. It was ~2 decades ago when I defined 
>
> i n f o r m a t i o n  as something with (at least) 2 ends: 
>
> 1. the notion (in whatever format it shows up)  - and
>
> 2. the acceptor (adjusting the notion in whatever context it can be 
>
> perceived - appercipiated (adjusted>). 
>
> I have no idea how to make a connection between information (anyway how 
> one defines it) and the (inner?) disorder level of anything (entropy?). I 
> dislike this thermodynamic term alltogether. 
>
>  
>
> Later on I tried to refine my wording into:
>
> RELATIONS and the capability of recognizing them. That moved away from a 
> 'human(?)' framework. E. g. I called the 'closeness of a '(+)' charge to a 
> '(-)' potential an information so it came close to SOME consciousness (=(?) 
> *response to relations*), no matter in what kind of domain. 
>
>  
>
> Do you feel some merit to my thinking?
>
>  
>
> John Mikes
>
> On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 2:06 AM, William R. Buckley  
> wrote:
>
> There is information (I take information to be a
&g

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Thursday, March 7, 2013 6:55:25 AM UTC-5, Bruno Marchal wrote:
>
>
> On 05 Mar 2013, at 19:14, Craig Weinberg wrote:
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 12:03:28 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>>
>> Craig:
>>  
>>
>> You statement of need for a human to observe the 
>>
>> pattern is the smoking gun to indicate a misunderstanding 
>>
>> of semiotic theory on your part.
>>
>
> I don't think that it has to be humans doing the observing at all. 
>  
>
>>  
>>
>> Specifically, you don’t need a human; a machine will do.
>>
>
> A machine can only help another non-machine interpret something. I don't 
> think that they can interpret anything for 'themselves'.
>
>
> You should study machine's self-reference. It is easy to program a machine 
> interpreting data, by itself and for herself. This is not like 
> consciousness. this is testable and already done.
> You confuse the notion of machine before Post, Church Turing and after.
>

Interpretation is consciousness though. What is tested is that results 
correspond with expectations in a way which is meaningful to us, not to the 
machine. I can use a mirror to reflect an image that I see, but that 
doesn't mean that the mirror intends to reflect images, or knows what they 
are, or has an experience of them. We can prove that the image is indeed 
consistent with our expectations of a reflected original though.

Craig
 

>
>
>
> Bruno
>
>
>
>  
>
>>  
>>
>> Not all machines are man-made.
>>
>
> True, but what we see as natural machines may not be just machines. 
> Man-made machines may be just machines.
>
> Craig
>
>  
>>
>> wrb
>>  
>>
>> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] 
>> *On Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
>> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 5:24 AM
>> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com
>> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>>  
>>
>>
>>
>> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 2:06:20 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>>
>> There is information (I take information to be a 
>> manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented 
>> in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units 
>> of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  
>>
>>
>> I can agree that information could be considered a manifestation of 
>> entropy, to the extent that entropy is necessary to provide a contrast 
>> space for a distribution. To string an ellipses together, you need one dot, 
>> repetition, space, and a quality of measurement which yokes together the 
>> three dots aesthetically. Beyond that, you also need human observer with 
>> human visual sense to turn the distribution into a 'pattern'. Without that, 
>> of course, even distribution cannot cohere into "a" distribution, as there 
>> is no scale, range, quality, etc to anchor the expectation. If we are a 
>> microbe, we may not ever find our way from one dot to the next.
>>
>> I 
>> think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits 
>> of information; I will use the terms synonymously. 
>>
>> Information has meaning only within context.  For many 
>> people, context is taken to mean one piece of information 
>> as compared to another piece of information.  I do not 
>> take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics. 
>> Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of 
>> the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori 
>> within information acceptors. 
>>
>>
>> Agree. Well, transmitters form the signs from their own sense of meaning 
>> as well. That's how we are having this discussion.
>>  
>>
>>
>> What you know you have always known; the sign merely 
>> serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind. 
>>
>>
>> Right. I mean it might be a bit more complicated as far as novelty goes. 
>> I don't know if the state of unconscious information is really what I "have 
>> always known" but that this particular constellation of meanings reflects 
>> the Totality in a way that it is only trivially novel. Like if you hit a 
>> jackpot on a slot machine - that may not have happened before, but the slot 
>> machine is designed to payout whenever it does. The jackpot already exists 
>> as a potential and sooner or later it will be realized.
>>  
>>
>>
>> That you may have intention and so comport your delivery 
>> of information to another acceptor has not bearing upon 
>

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Bruno Marchal]

On 06 Mar 2013, at 00:03, Stephen P. King wrote:


On 3/5/2013 3:03 PM, William R. Buckley wrote:

Craig,



You build an automaton, place it and turn it on, and from that  
point in time forward


the automaton reacts to acceptable information all on its own.



You contradict yourself – - I don’t think it has to be human –  
machines only help


non-machines to interpret - - and if the human point is important,  
then surely


you will accept your definition to be that it must be biological  
life, for a machine


cannot be alive.



A machine is either a machine or it is not a machine – a machine  
cannot be both


a machine and not a machine at the same time.



wrb



Do we have a exact definition of what is a "machine"?


This exists only for digital machine, today, assuming Church's thesis.

You can define a digital machine or a digital process by anything  
Turing emulable, or emulable by a diophantine equation, or a  
combinator, etc.


Bruno



--
Onward!

Stephen

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Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Bruno Marchal]

On 05 Mar 2013, at 19:14, Craig Weinberg wrote:




On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 12:03:28 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
Craig:


You statement of need for a human to observe the

pattern is the smoking gun to indicate a misunderstanding

of semiotic theory on your part.


I don't think that it has to be humans doing the observing at all.


Specifically, you don’t need a human; a machine will do.


A machine can only help another non-machine interpret something. I  
don't think that they can interpret anything for 'themselves'.


You should study machine's self-reference. It is easy to program a  
machine interpreting data, by itself and for herself. This is not like  
consciousness. this is testable and already done.

You confuse the notion of machine before Post, Church Turing and after.



Bruno






Not all machines are man-made.


True, but what we see as natural machines may not be just machines.  
Man-made machines may be just machines.


Craig


wrb


From: everyth...@googlegroups.com  
[mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg

Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 5:24 AM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information




On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 2:06:20 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

There is information (I take information to be a
manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented
in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units
of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.


I can agree that information could be considered a manifestation of  
entropy, to the extent that entropy is necessary to provide a  
contrast space for a distribution. To string an ellipses together,  
you need one dot, repetition, space, and a quality of measurement  
which yokes together the three dots aesthetically. Beyond that, you  
also need human observer with human visual sense to turn the  
distribution into a 'pattern'. Without that, of course, even  
distribution cannot cohere into "a" distribution, as there is no  
scale, range, quality, etc to anchor the expectation. If we are a  
microbe, we may not ever find our way from one dot to the next.



I
think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits
of information; I will use the terms synonymously.

Information has meaning only within context.  For many
people, context is taken to mean one piece of information
as compared to another piece of information.  I do not
take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics.
Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of
the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori
within information acceptors.


Agree. Well, transmitters form the signs from their own sense of  
meaning as well. That's how we are having this discussion.




What you know you have always known; the sign merely
serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind.


Right. I mean it might be a bit more complicated as far as novelty  
goes. I don't know if the state of unconscious information is really  
what I "have always known" but that this particular constellation of  
meanings reflects the Totality in a way that it is only trivially  
novel. Like if you hit a jackpot on a slot machine - that may not  
have happened before, but the slot machine is designed to payout  
whenever it does. The jackpot already exists as a potential and  
sooner or later it will be realized.




That you may have intention and so comport your delivery
of information to another acceptor has not bearing upon
the subsequent acceptance or rejection of that information
by the target acceptor.  Acceptance or rejection of
information is determined solely by the accepting or
rejecting context (acceptor).


Agree. But the converse - the acceptor can only accept information  
which has been included for delivery by intention (or accidentally I  
suppose).




Your mere presence sends information regardless of some
conscious intent.  Indeed, your absence does equally
deliver information, for the target acceptor will see
a definite difference in available information sources
whether you are present or not.

Consider a line worker in a bean processing plant where
the task is to cull *bad* dried beans from *good* dried
beans as they go by on a conveyor belt; the *bad* beans
are removed by hand, so the line worker is constantly
looking for *bad* beans while constantly being aware
of the fact that not many of the beans are *bad*.  The
consciousness is aware of both that which is present
and that which is not present.


Yes, the expectation is key. I call that the perceptual inertial  
frame. There is an accumulated inertia of expectations which  
filters, amplifies, distorts, etc.



Further, what any information that you emit means to
you is irrelevant to the meaning that another may take
for that information.


Then how does art work? Music? Certainly it is pretty clear that  
what emitting Iron Man meant to Black Sabbath 

RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

I have before claimed that the computer is
a good example of the power of semiosis.

It is simple enough to see that the mere 
construction of a Turing machine confers 
upon that machine the ability to recognise 
all computations; to generate the yield of 
such computations.

In this sense, a program (the source code)
is a sequence of signs that upon acceptance 
brings the machine to generate some 
corresponding yield; a computation.

Also, the intention of an entity behind sign 
origination has nothing whatsoever to do with 
the acceptability of that sign by some other 
entity, much less the meaning there taken for 
the sign.

The meaning of a sign is always centered upon 
the acceptor of that sign.

wrb


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RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

I should have added that the context sensitivity of the 

relationship between sign and action is pure subjectivity.

 

Any context able to evaluate itself will conclude that its 

actions are a direct consequence of choice taken by that 

context; i.e. values.

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Wednesday, March 06, 2013 4:12 AM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 5:48:19 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

Craig:

 

The mistake you make is clearly stated in your words:

 

".doesn't mean that they communicated with judgment."

 

You are anthropomorphizing.  The value is no more nor no 

less than the action taken upon signal acceptance.


That's ok, but it means there is no value. There is simply action.

Craig
 

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RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

Now we are getting some place.

 

Exactly.  There is simply action.

 

Contexts react to sign.

 

Nothing more.  Nothing less.

 

The complexity of action is open ended.

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Wednesday, March 06, 2013 4:12 AM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 5:48:19 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

Craig:

 

The mistake you make is clearly stated in your words:

 

“…doesn’t mean that they communicated with judgment.”

 

You are anthropomorphizing.  The value is no more nor no 

less than the action taken upon signal acceptance.


That's ok, but it means there is no value. There is simply action.

Craig
 

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com 
[mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com  ] On Behalf Of Craig
Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 1:27 PM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com  
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:07:00 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

The fact that a machine can act in a discriminatory based 

upon some signal (sign, information) input is demonstration 

of value judgment.


Only in our eyes, not in its own eyes. It's like telling a kid to say some
insult to someone in another language. The fact they are able to carry out
your instruction doesn't mean that they communicated with judgment.
 

 

Just as there is no *in* in a machine, so to there is no *in* 

in a biological organism; they both, machine and organism, 


But there is an 'in' with respect to the experience of an organism - only
because we know it first hand. There would seem to be no reason why a
machine couldn't have a similar 'in', but it actually seems that their
nature indicates they do not. I take the extra step and hypothesize exactly
why that is - because experience is not generated out of the bodies
associated with them, but rather the bodies are simply a public view of one
aspect of the experience. If you build a machine, you are assembling bodies
to relate to each other, as external forms, so that no interiority 'emerges'
from the gaps between them.
 

are forms that treat other forms in certain proscribed ways.

 

You cannot demonstrate otherwise.


Sure I can. Feelings, colors, personalities, intentions, historical
zeitgeists...these are not forms relating to forms.

Craig
 

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] On
Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 10:37 AM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:53:31 AM UTC-5, Alberto G.Corona wrote:

Let´s say that what we call "information" is an extended form of sensory
input. What makes this input "information" is the usability of this input
for reducing the internal entropy of the receiver or increase the internal
order. The receiver can be a machine, a cell, a person or a society for
example. If the input do not produce this effect in the receiver, then that
input is not information.


The increase of internal order of the receiver is a symptom of an experience
of being informed but they are not the same thing. It's not really even
relevant in most cases. I would not call it an extended form of sensory
input, but a reduction of sensory experience. Input is not a physical
reality, it is a conceptual label.

Consider Blindsight:

I hold up two fingers and ask how many fingers? 

"I don't know.'

Guess

'two'.

This example tells us about information without tying it to decreased
entropy. My two fingers are a form. I am putting them into that form, so the
process of my presenting my fingers is a formation of a sign. 

The sign is not information at this point. It means something different to
an ant or a frog than it does to a person looking at it. If you can't see,
there is no formation there at all unless you can collide with my fingers.

When the patient responds that they don't know how many fingers, it is
because they personally have no experience of seeing it. They are not being
informed personally by the form of my fingers in front of their face because
they have blindsight.

When they guess correctly, they still have not been informed. Only we know
that the information is correct. At this point you could say that there is
some decrease in information entropy of the receiver as far as we are
concerned, but in fact, for the receiver themselves, they have not increased
any internal order.

A machine has blindsight about everything. They can be queried and produce
valid responses to inform us, but they are never informed themselves. There
is no 'in' in a machine, it is an organization of forms which treat other
forms in a proscribed way. Forms a

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 5:48:19 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> Craig:
>
>  
>
> The mistake you make is clearly stated in your words:
>
>  
>
> “…doesn’t mean that they communicated with judgment.”
>
>  
>
> You are anthropomorphizing.  The value is no more nor no 
>
> less than the action taken upon signal acceptance.
>

That's ok, but it means there is no value. There is simply action.

Craig
 

>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com  [mailto:
> everyth...@googlegroups.com ] *On Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 1:27 PM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com 
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:07:00 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> The fact that a machine can act in a discriminatory based 
>
> upon some signal (sign, information) input is demonstration 
>
> of value judgment.
>
>
> Only in our eyes, not in its own eyes. It's like telling a kid to say some 
> insult to someone in another language. The fact they are able to carry out 
> your instruction doesn't mean that they communicated with judgment.
>  
>
>  
>
> Just as there is no **in** in a machine, so to there is no **in** 
>
> in a biological organism; they both, machine and organism, 
>
>
> But there is an 'in' with respect to the experience of an organism - only 
> because we know it first hand. There would seem to be no reason why a 
> machine couldn't have a similar 'in', but it actually seems that their 
> nature indicates they do not. I take the extra step and hypothesize exactly 
> why that is - because experience is not generated out of the bodies 
> associated with them, but rather the bodies are simply a public view of one 
> aspect of the experience. If you build a machine, you are assembling bodies 
> to relate to each other, as external forms, so that no interiority 
> 'emerges' from the gaps between them.
>  
>
> are forms that treat other forms in certain proscribed ways.
>
>  
>
> You cannot demonstrate otherwise.
>
>
> Sure I can. Feelings, colors, personalities, intentions, historical 
> zeitgeists...these are not forms relating to forms.
>
> Craig
>  
>
>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] *On 
> Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 10:37 AM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:53:31 AM UTC-5, Alberto G.Corona wrote:
>
> Let´s say that what we call "information" is an extended form of sensory 
> input. What makes this input "information" is the usability of this input 
> for reducing the internal entropy of the receiver or increase the internal 
> order. The receiver can be a machine, a cell, a person or a society for 
> example. If the input do not produce this effect in the receiver, then that 
> input is not information.
>
>
> The increase of internal order of the receiver is a symptom of an 
> experience of being informed but they are not the same thing. It's not 
> really even relevant in most cases. I would not call it an extended form of 
> sensory input, but a reduction of sensory experience. Input is not a 
> physical reality, it is a conceptual label.
>
> Consider Blindsight:
>
> I hold up two fingers and ask how many fingers? 
>
> "I don't know.'
>
> Guess
>
> 'two'.
>
> This example tells us about information without tying it to decreased 
> entropy. My two fingers are a form. I am putting them into that form, so 
> the process of my presenting my fingers is a formation of a sign. 
>
> The sign is not information at this point. It means something different to 
> an ant or a frog than it does to a person looking at it. If you can't see, 
> there is no formation there at all unless you can collide with my fingers.
>
> When the patient responds that they don't know how many fingers, it is 
> because they personally have no experience of seeing it. They are not being 
> informed personally by the form of my fingers in front of their face 
> because they have blindsight.
>
> When they guess correctly, they still have not been informed. Only we know 
> that the information is correct. At this point you could say that there is 
> some decrease in information entropy of the receiver as far as we are 
> concerned, but in fact, for the receiver themselves, they have not 
> increased any internal order.
>

RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

The falling tree makes sound, the wind make sound, the . makes sound

regardless of your presence (or the presence of others) to hear that sound.

 

To argue anything else is utter nonsense.

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 7:34 PM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 5:52:32 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

I do not hold that the acceptor must exist, for then I 

am making a value judgment, and I have already scolded 

Craig for the same thing.

 

Think of it this way.  A volume of gas has a measure of 

entropy.  This means that the molecules are found in 


found by what?
 

a specific sequence of microstates, and those microstates 

constitute an information state of the molecules.  


Who is it constituted to though? Empty space? The molecules as a group? Each
molecule? What is validating that these molecules exist in some way - that
there is a such thing as a microstate which can be detected in some way by
something... and what is detection? How does it work?

When these things are taken as axiomatic, then we are just reiterating those
axioms when we claim that no acceptor must exist. In my understanding, exist
and acceptor are the same thing.

 

Alter 

that microstate sequence (as by adding or removing 

entropy) and the description of the microstate sequence 

changes correspondingly; entropy is information.


Only if something can detect their own description of the microstate as
having changed. We cannot assume that there is any change at all if nothing
can possibly detect it. For example, if I take make a movie of ice cubes
melting in a glass, even though that is a case of increasing thermodynamic
entropy, we will see a lower cost of video compression in a movie of the
glass after the ice has melted completely. In that case the image
description can be made to follow either increasing or decreasing
information entropy depending on whether you play the movie forward and
backward. There is no link between microstate thermodynamic entropy and
optical description information entropy.

Craig

 

Acceptors and signals; contexts and signs; .

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com 
[mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com  ] On Behalf Of John Mikes
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 1:13 PM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com  
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 

Dear Bil B. you probably have thought in these lines during similar long
periods as I did. It was ~2 decades ago when I defined 

i n f o r m a t i o n  as something with (at least) 2 ends: 

1. the notion (in whatever format it shows up)  - and

2. the acceptor (adjusting the notion in whatever context it can be 

perceived - appercipiated (adjusted>). 

I have no idea how to make a connection between information (anyway how one
defines it) and the (inner?) disorder level of anything (entropy?). I
dislike this thermodynamic term alltogether. 

 

Later on I tried to refine my wording into:

RELATIONS and the capability of recognizing them. That moved away from a
'human(?)' framework. E. g. I called the 'closeness of a '(+)' charge to a
'(-)' potential an information so it came close to SOME consciousness (=(?)
response to relations), no matter in what kind of domain. 

 

Do you feel some merit to my thinking?

 

John Mikes

On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 2:06 AM, William R. Buckley  > wrote:

There is information (I take information to be a
manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented
in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units
of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  I
think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits
of information; I will use the terms synonymously.

Information has meaning only within context.  For many
people, context is taken to mean one piece of information
as compared to another piece of information.  I do not
take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics.
Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of
the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori
within information acceptors.

What you know you have always known; the sign merely
serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind.

That you may have intention and so comport your delivery
of information to another acceptor has not bearing upon
the subsequent acceptance or rejection of that information
by the target acceptor.  Acceptance or rejection of
information is determined solely by the accepting or
rejecting context (acceptor).

Your mere presence sends information regardless of some
conscious intent.  Indeed, your absence does equally
deliver information, for the target acceptor will see
a definite difference in available information sources
whether you are present or not.

Consider a line worker in a bean processing plant where
the task is t

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 5:52:32 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> I do not hold that the acceptor must exist, for then I 
>
> am making a value judgment, and I have already scolded 
>
> Craig for the same thing.
>
>  
>
> Think of it this way.  A volume of gas has a measure of 
>
> entropy.  This means that the molecules are found in 
>

found by what?
 

> a specific sequence of microstates, and those microstates 
>
> constitute an information state of the molecules.  
>

Who is it constituted to though? Empty space? The molecules as a group? 
Each molecule? What is validating that these molecules exist in some way - 
that there is a such thing as a microstate which can be detected in some 
way by something... and what is detection? How does it work?

When these things are taken as axiomatic, then we are just reiterating 
those axioms when we claim that no acceptor must exist. In my 
understanding, exist and acceptor are the same thing.

 

> Alter 
>
> that microstate sequence (as by adding or removing 
>
> entropy) and the description of the microstate sequence 
>
> changes correspondingly; entropy is information.
>

Only if something can detect their own description of the microstate as 
having changed. We cannot assume that there is any change at all if nothing 
can possibly detect it. For example, if I take make a movie of ice cubes 
melting in a glass, even though that is a case of increasing thermodynamic 
entropy, we will see a lower cost of video compression in a movie of the 
glass after the ice has melted completely. In that case the image 
description can be made to follow either increasing or decreasing 
information entropy depending on whether you play the movie forward and 
backward. There is no link between microstate thermodynamic entropy and 
optical description information entropy.

Craig

 
>
> Acceptors and signals; contexts and signs; …
>
>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com  [mailto:
> everyth...@googlegroups.com ] *On Behalf Of *John Mikes
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 1:13 PM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com 
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
> Dear Bil B. you probably have thought in these lines during similar long 
> periods as I did. It was ~2 decades ago when I defined 
>
> i n f o r m a t i o n  as something with (at least) 2 ends: 
>
> 1. the notion (in whatever format it shows up)  - and
>
> 2. the acceptor (adjusting the notion in whatever context it can be 
>
> perceived - appercipiated (adjusted>). 
>
> I have no idea how to make a connection between information (anyway how 
> one defines it) and the (inner?) disorder level of anything (entropy?). I 
> dislike this thermodynamic term alltogether. 
>
>  
>
> Later on I tried to refine my wording into:
>
> RELATIONS and the capability of recognizing them. That moved away from a 
> 'human(?)' framework. E. g. I called the 'closeness of a '(+)' charge to a 
> '(-)' potential an information so it came close to SOME consciousness (=(?) 
> *response to relations*), no matter in what kind of domain. 
>
>  
>
> Do you feel some merit to my thinking?
>
>  
>
> John Mikes
>
> On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 2:06 AM, William R. Buckley 
> > 
> wrote:
>
> There is information (I take information to be a
> manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented
> in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units
> of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  I
> think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits
> of information; I will use the terms synonymously.
>
> Information has meaning only within context.  For many
> people, context is taken to mean one piece of information
> as compared to another piece of information.  I do not
> take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics.
> Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of
> the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori
> within information acceptors.
>
> What you know you have always known; the sign merely
> serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind.
>
> That you may have intention and so comport your delivery
> of information to another acceptor has not bearing upon
> the subsequent acceptance or rejection of that information
> by the target acceptor.  Acceptance or rejection of
> information is determined solely by the accepting or
> rejecting context (acceptor).
>
> Your mere presence sends information regardless of some
> conscious intent.  Indeed, your absence does equally
> deliver information, for the target acceptor will see
> a definite difference in available information sources
> wheth

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Stephen P. King]

On 3/5/2013 3:03 PM, William R. Buckley wrote:


Craig,

You build an automaton, place it and turn it on, and from that point 
in time forward


the automaton reacts to acceptable information all on its own.

You contradict yourself -- - I don't think it has to be human -- 
machines only help


non-machines to interpret - - and if the human point is important, 
then surely


you will accept your definition to be that it must be biological life, 
for a machine


cannot be alive.

A machine is either a machine or it is not a machine -- a machine 
cannot be both


a machine and not a machine at the same time.

wrb



Do we have a exact definition of what is a "machine"?

--
Onward!

Stephen

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RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

I do not hold that the acceptor must exist, for then I 

am making a value judgment, and I have already scolded 

Craig for the same thing.

 

Think of it this way.  A volume of gas has a measure of 

entropy.  This means that the molecules are found in 

a specific sequence of microstates, and those microstates 

constitute an information state of the molecules.  Alter 

that microstate sequence (as by adding or removing 

entropy) and the description of the microstate sequence 

changes correspondingly; entropy is information.

 

Acceptors and signals; contexts and signs; .

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of John Mikes
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 1:13 PM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 

Dear Bil B. you probably have thought in these lines during similar long
periods as I did. It was ~2 decades ago when I defined 

i n f o r m a t i o n  as something with (at least) 2 ends: 

1. the notion (in whatever format it shows up)  - and

2. the acceptor (adjusting the notion in whatever context it can be 

perceived - appercipiated (adjusted>). 

I have no idea how to make a connection between information (anyway how one
defines it) and the (inner?) disorder level of anything (entropy?). I
dislike this thermodynamic term alltogether. 

 

Later on I tried to refine my wording into:

RELATIONS and the capability of recognizing them. That moved away from a
'human(?)' framework. E. g. I called the 'closeness of a '(+)' charge to a
'(-)' potential an information so it came close to SOME consciousness (=(?)
response to relations), no matter in what kind of domain. 

 

Do you feel some merit to my thinking?

 

John Mikes

On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 2:06 AM, William R. Buckley 
wrote:

There is information (I take information to be a
manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented
in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units
of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  I
think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits
of information; I will use the terms synonymously.

Information has meaning only within context.  For many
people, context is taken to mean one piece of information
as compared to another piece of information.  I do not
take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics.
Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of
the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori
within information acceptors.

What you know you have always known; the sign merely
serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind.

That you may have intention and so comport your delivery
of information to another acceptor has not bearing upon
the subsequent acceptance or rejection of that information
by the target acceptor.  Acceptance or rejection of
information is determined solely by the accepting or
rejecting context (acceptor).

Your mere presence sends information regardless of some
conscious intent.  Indeed, your absence does equally
deliver information, for the target acceptor will see
a definite difference in available information sources
whether you are present or not.

Consider a line worker in a bean processing plant where
the task is to cull *bad* dried beans from *good* dried
beans as they go by on a conveyor belt; the *bad* beans
are removed by hand, so the line worker is constantly
looking for *bad* beans while constantly being aware
of the fact that not many of the beans are *bad*.  The
consciousness is aware of both that which is present
and that which is not present.

Further, what any information that you emit means to
you is irrelevant to the meaning that another may take
for that information.  Indeed, it is via reliance upon
-Cultural Norms- that your point regarding Morse Code
becomes relevant.  It is perfectly reasonable for an
ornery person to simply reject such norms and act
otherwise; your expectation originates in you, not
the targets of information you broadcast.

>>The truth of your statement is no reply to my claim,
>>that how another receiver of signs responds is
>>irrelevant to your knowledge, save the one case of
>>conveyance of knowledge between semiotic units;
>>where you intend for knowledge to be conveyed.  In
>>that case, it is behooving of the sender to ensure
>>that the receiver can receive and understand the
>>message. 
>
>I'm not sure what you are bringing up here, but I
>would say that my point is that all messages have
>multiple levels of reception, perhaps as many levels
>as their are receivers in the universe. At the same
>time, if we are assuming human senders and receivers
>and a content range which is highly normative and
>practical (i.e. Morse code alphabet rather than
>emoticons, inside jokes, etc), then the information
>entropy is reduced dramatically.
>
>Maybe you can give me a

RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

Craig:

 

The mistake you make is clearly stated in your words:

 

“…doesn’t mean that they communicated with judgment.”

 

You are anthropomorphizing.  The value is no more nor no 

less than the action taken upon signal acceptance.

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 1:27 PM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:07:00 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

The fact that a machine can act in a discriminatory based 

upon some signal (sign, information) input is demonstration 

of value judgment.


Only in our eyes, not in its own eyes. It's like telling a kid to say some
insult to someone in another language. The fact they are able to carry out
your instruction doesn't mean that they communicated with judgment.
 

 

Just as there is no *in* in a machine, so to there is no *in* 

in a biological organism; they both, machine and organism, 


But there is an 'in' with respect to the experience of an organism - only
because we know it first hand. There would seem to be no reason why a
machine couldn't have a similar 'in', but it actually seems that their
nature indicates they do not. I take the extra step and hypothesize exactly
why that is - because experience is not generated out of the bodies
associated with them, but rather the bodies are simply a public view of one
aspect of the experience. If you build a machine, you are assembling bodies
to relate to each other, as external forms, so that no interiority 'emerges'
from the gaps between them.
 

are forms that treat other forms in certain proscribed ways.

 

You cannot demonstrate otherwise.


Sure I can. Feelings, colors, personalities, intentions, historical
zeitgeists...these are not forms relating to forms.

Craig
 

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com 
[mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com  ] On Behalf Of Craig
Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 10:37 AM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com  
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:53:31 AM UTC-5, Alberto G.Corona wrote:

Let´s say that what we call "information" is an extended form of sensory
input. What makes this input "information" is the usability of this input
for reducing the internal entropy of the receiver or increase the internal
order. The receiver can be a machine, a cell, a person or a society for
example. If the input do not produce this effect in the receiver, then that
input is not information.


The increase of internal order of the receiver is a symptom of an experience
of being informed but they are not the same thing. It's not really even
relevant in most cases. I would not call it an extended form of sensory
input, but a reduction of sensory experience. Input is not a physical
reality, it is a conceptual label.

Consider Blindsight:

I hold up two fingers and ask how many fingers? 

"I don't know.'

Guess

'two'.

This example tells us about information without tying it to decreased
entropy. My two fingers are a form. I am putting them into that form, so the
process of my presenting my fingers is a formation of a sign. 

The sign is not information at this point. It means something different to
an ant or a frog than it does to a person looking at it. If you can't see,
there is no formation there at all unless you can collide with my fingers.

When the patient responds that they don't know how many fingers, it is
because they personally have no experience of seeing it. They are not being
informed personally by the form of my fingers in front of their face because
they have blindsight.

When they guess correctly, they still have not been informed. Only we know
that the information is correct. At this point you could say that there is
some decrease in information entropy of the receiver as far as we are
concerned, but in fact, for the receiver themselves, they have not increased
any internal order.

A machine has blindsight about everything. They can be queried and produce
valid responses to inform us, but they are never informed themselves. There
is no 'in' in a machine, it is an organization of forms which treat other
forms in a proscribed way. Forms are copied, transformed, and presented in a
context that it has no experience of. My computer sees nothing that I see on
this screen. It reads nothing that I type here. It doesn't know what the
Everything List is - not even Google knows what it is - only that the string
of characters in the name is to be associated with an ip address.

Craig

 

2013/3/2 William R. Buckley 


>Thinking about how information content of a message

Big mistake.  Information is never contained with but
exactly one exception, an envelope.

I made this point with Jesper Hoffmeyer

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 4:19:31 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> The machine is informed.  
>

Trivially, yes, but information is all about multiple levels. My mailbox 
could be informed when it receives mail - but that's just a figure of 
speech. No machine is ever literally or richly informed - notified maybe. 
Signalled. Triggered. Sure. To be 'In' formed though suggests that 
something cares about receiving this experience and intends to make use of 
it out of a personal agenda. You don't have to want to be informed, but you 
have to be able to want to.
 

> Acceptance demonstrates the act of becoming 
>
> informed.  The yield of such acceptance is called meaning.
>
>  
>
> Easily, trivially, this language can be applied to machine and organism 
> without 
>
> concomitant observation of the slightest distinction between them.
>

Only if you rule out subjectivity from the start. Sure, if you treat an 
organism like a body, then there is no meaningful distinction between that 
and a machine - but bodies aren't informed, they are form, perform, 
conform, etc but there is no place for an experience in a body.
 

>  
>
> The definition of a being has nothing to do (imposes no causal 
> consequence) 
>
> with a sign.  Signs can be accepted by organisms and machines 
> (non-organisms?) 
>
> with equal dexterity to provide equal meaning.  A community of machines 
> (like 
>
> Robbie the Robot) can equally define meaning to things as can a community 
> of 
>
> beings.  That you claim need to impose human interpretation in order to 
> obtain 
>
> meaning is strictly the bailiwick of anthropomorphism.
>

Meaning may not work that way. If I'm right, meaning is anchored to a 
direct line of descent from the beginning of time. While Robbie the Robot 
can be programmed to act like we think we act, it has nothing to do with 
meaning, sign, or significance. The robotic process does not decode a sign, 
it simply encodes it into other signs which it has been instructed to. If 
there is a creature around to appreciate that conversion, it is because 
they decode it into a meaningful experience that informs them. Without the 
creature there - the natural decoder of those particular signs, there is no 
informing at all and Robbie the Robot will go on talking to himself forever 
on a barren planet, unaware of anything except for voltage and temperature.

Craig

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Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:07:00 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> The fact that a machine can act in a discriminatory based 
>
> upon some signal (sign, information) input is demonstration 
>
> of value judgment.
>

Only in our eyes, not in its own eyes. It's like telling a kid to say some 
insult to someone in another language. The fact they are able to carry out 
your instruction doesn't mean that they communicated with judgment.
 

>  
>
> Just as there is no **in** in a machine, so to there is no **in** 
>
> in a biological organism; they both, machine and organism, 
>

But there is an 'in' with respect to the experience of an organism - only 
because we know it first hand. There would seem to be no reason why a 
machine couldn't have a similar 'in', but it actually seems that their 
nature indicates they do not. I take the extra step and hypothesize exactly 
why that is - because experience is not generated out of the bodies 
associated with them, but rather the bodies are simply a public view of one 
aspect of the experience. If you build a machine, you are assembling bodies 
to relate to each other, as external forms, so that no interiority 
'emerges' from the gaps between them.
 

> are forms that treat other forms in certain proscribed ways.
>
>  
>
> You cannot demonstrate otherwise.
>

Sure I can. Feelings, colors, personalities, intentions, historical 
zeitgeists...these are not forms relating to forms.

Craig
 

>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com  [mailto:
> everyth...@googlegroups.com ] *On Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 10:37 AM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com 
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:53:31 AM UTC-5, Alberto G.Corona wrote:
>
> Let´s say that what we call "information" is an extended form of sensory 
> input. What makes this input "information" is the usability of this input 
> for reducing the internal entropy of the receiver or increase the internal 
> order. The receiver can be a machine, a cell, a person or a society for 
> example. If the input do not produce this effect in the receiver, then that 
> input is not information.
>
>
> The increase of internal order of the receiver is a symptom of an 
> experience of being informed but they are not the same thing. It's not 
> really even relevant in most cases. I would not call it an extended form of 
> sensory input, but a reduction of sensory experience. Input is not a 
> physical reality, it is a conceptual label.
>
> Consider Blindsight:
>
> I hold up two fingers and ask how many fingers? 
>
> "I don't know.'
>
> Guess
>
> 'two'.
>
> This example tells us about information without tying it to decreased 
> entropy. My two fingers are a form. I am putting them into that form, so 
> the process of my presenting my fingers is a formation of a sign. 
>
> The sign is not information at this point. It means something different to 
> an ant or a frog than it does to a person looking at it. If you can't see, 
> there is no formation there at all unless you can collide with my fingers.
>
> When the patient responds that they don't know how many fingers, it is 
> because they personally have no experience of seeing it. They are not being 
> informed personally by the form of my fingers in front of their face 
> because they have blindsight.
>
> When they guess correctly, they still have not been informed. Only we know 
> that the information is correct. At this point you could say that there is 
> some decrease in information entropy of the receiver as far as we are 
> concerned, but in fact, for the receiver themselves, they have not 
> increased any internal order.
>
> A machine has blindsight about everything. They can be queried and produce 
> valid responses to inform us, but they are never informed themselves. There 
> is no 'in' in a machine, it is an organization of forms which treat other 
> forms in a proscribed way. Forms are copied, transformed, and presented in 
> a context that it has no experience of. My computer sees nothing that I see 
> on this screen. It reads nothing that I type here. It doesn't know what the 
> Everything List is - not even Google knows what it is - only that the 
> string of characters in the name is to be associated with an ip address.
>
> Craig
>
>  
>
> 2013/3/2 William R. Buckley 
>
>
> >Thinking about how information content of a message
>
> Big mistake.  Information is never contained with but
> exactly one exception, an envelope.
>
> I mad

RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

The machine is informed.  Acceptance demonstrates the act of becoming 

informed.  The yield of such acceptance is called meaning.

 

Easily, trivially, this language can be applied to machine and organism
without 

concomitant observation of the slightest distinction between them.

 

The definition of a being has nothing to do (imposes no causal consequence) 

with a sign.  Signs can be accepted by organisms and machines
(non-organisms?) 

with equal dexterity to provide equal meaning.  A community of machines
(like 

Robbie the Robot) can equally define meaning to things as can a community of


beings.  That you claim need to impose human interpretation in order to
obtain 

meaning is strictly the bailiwick of anthropomorphism.

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 1:10 PM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:03:31 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

Craig,

 

You build an automaton, place it and turn it on, and from that point in time
forward 

the automaton reacts to acceptable information all on its own.


Reacts, yes, but it isn't informed by the reaction.
 

 

You contradict yourself - - I don't think it has to be human - machines only
help 

non-machines to interpret -


Where was the contradiction?
 

- and if the human point is important, then surely 

you will accept your definition to be that it must be biological life, for a
machine 

cannot be alive.


A living being can be used as a machine, but it is not defined by that
function.  

 

A machine is either a machine or it is not a machine - a machine cannot be
both 

a machine and not a machine at the same time.


A creature can be more than a machine, but still act as a machine in many
ways.

Craig
 

 

wrb 

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com 
[mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com  ] On Behalf Of Craig
Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 10:14 AM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com  
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 12:03:28 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

Craig:

 

You statement of need for a human to observe the 

pattern is the smoking gun to indicate a misunderstanding 

of semiotic theory on your part.


I don't think that it has to be humans doing the observing at all. 
 

 

Specifically, you don't need a human; a machine will do.


A machine can only help another non-machine interpret something. I don't
think that they can interpret anything for 'themselves'.
 

 

Not all machines are man-made.


True, but what we see as natural machines may not be just machines. Man-made
machines may be just machines.

Craig

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] On
Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 5:24 AM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 2:06:20 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

There is information (I take information to be a 
manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented 
in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units 
of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  


I can agree that information could be considered a manifestation of entropy,
to the extent that entropy is necessary to provide a contrast space for a
distribution. To string an ellipses together, you need one dot, repetition,
space, and a quality of measurement which yokes together the three dots
aesthetically. Beyond that, you also need human observer with human visual
sense to turn the distribution into a 'pattern'. Without that, of course,
even distribution cannot cohere into "a" distribution, as there is no scale,
range, quality, etc to anchor the expectation. If we are a microbe, we may
not ever find our way from one dot to the next.

I 
think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits 
of information; I will use the terms synonymously. 

Information has meaning only within context.  For many 
people, context is taken to mean one piece of information 
as compared to another piece of information.  I do not 
take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics. 
Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of 
the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori 
within information acceptors. 


Agree. Well, transmitters form the signs from their own sense of meaning as
well. That's how we are having this discussion.
 


What you know you have always known; the sign merely 
serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind. 


Right. I mean it might be a bit more complicated as far as novelty goes. I
don't know if the state of unconscious information is really what I "have
always known" but that this particular constellation of meanings reflects
the Tota

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[John Mikes]

Dear Bil B. you probably have thought in these lines during similar long
periods as I did. It was ~2 decades ago when I defined
i n f o r m a t i o n  as something with (at least) 2 ends:
1. the notion (in whatever format it shows up)  - and
2. the acceptor (adjusting the notion in whatever context it can be
perceived - appercipiated (adjusted>).
I have no idea how to make a connection between information (anyway how one
defines it) and the (inner?) disorder level of anything (entropy?). I
dislike this thermodynamic term alltogether.

Later on I tried to refine my wording into:
RELATIONS and the capability of recognizing them. That moved away from a
'human(?)' framework. E. g. I called the 'closeness of a '(+)' charge to a
'(-)' potential an information so it came close to SOME consciousness (=(?)
*response to relations*), no matter in what kind of domain.

Do you feel some merit to my thinking?

John Mikes

On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 2:06 AM, William R. Buckley
wrote:

> There is information (I take information to be a
> manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented
> in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units
> of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  I
> think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits
> of information; I will use the terms synonymously.
>
> Information has meaning only within context.  For many
> people, context is taken to mean one piece of information
> as compared to another piece of information.  I do not
> take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics.
> Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of
> the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori
> within information acceptors.
>
> What you know you have always known; the sign merely
> serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind.
>
> That you may have intention and so comport your delivery
> of information to another acceptor has not bearing upon
> the subsequent acceptance or rejection of that information
> by the target acceptor.  Acceptance or rejection of
> information is determined solely by the accepting or
> rejecting context (acceptor).
>
> Your mere presence sends information regardless of some
> conscious intent.  Indeed, your absence does equally
> deliver information, for the target acceptor will see
> a definite difference in available information sources
> whether you are present or not.
>
> Consider a line worker in a bean processing plant where
> the task is to cull *bad* dried beans from *good* dried
> beans as they go by on a conveyor belt; the *bad* beans
> are removed by hand, so the line worker is constantly
> looking for *bad* beans while constantly being aware
> of the fact that not many of the beans are *bad*.  The
> consciousness is aware of both that which is present
> and that which is not present.
>
> Further, what any information that you emit means to
> you is irrelevant to the meaning that another may take
> for that information.  Indeed, it is via reliance upon
> -Cultural Norms- that your point regarding Morse Code
> becomes relevant.  It is perfectly reasonable for an
> ornery person to simply reject such norms and act
> otherwise; your expectation originates in you, not
> the targets of information you broadcast.
>
> >>The truth of your statement is no reply to my claim,
> >>that how another receiver of signs responds is
> >>irrelevant to your knowledge, save the one case of
> >>conveyance of knowledge between semiotic units;
> >>where you intend for knowledge to be conveyed.  In
> >>that case, it is behooving of the sender to ensure
> >>that the receiver can receive and understand the
> >>message.
> >
> >I'm not sure what you are bringing up here, but I
> >would say that my point is that all messages have
> >multiple levels of reception, perhaps as many levels
> >as their are receivers in the universe. At the same
> >time, if we are assuming human senders and receivers
> >and a content range which is highly normative and
> >practical (i.e. Morse code alphabet rather than
> >emoticons, inside jokes, etc), then the information
> >entropy is reduced dramatically.
> >
> >Maybe you can give me an example of that you mean
> >by the irrelevance of the receiver's knowledge. Does
> >that include the expectation of the possibility of
> >there being a receiver?
> >
> >>In all other cases, the recipient response is
> >>irrelevant; all values and measures originate in
> >>the sender of the message.
> >
> >I would tend to agree with that, although the
> >expectation of the recipient response informs the
> >motives, values, and measures of the sender -
> >otherwise there would be no message being sent.
> >
> >
> >>The receiver of transmitted information is
> >>irrelevant to the mechanics of that transmission.
> >
> >I'm not sure what you mean. Again, maybe an example
> >would help. We expect that human audiences can see,
> >so we have TV screens to provide optical stimulation.
> >If we didn't have eyes, there would be no mechanism
> >of TV.
> 

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:03:31 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> Craig,
>
>  
>
> You build an automaton, place it and turn it on, and from that point in 
> time forward 
>
> the automaton reacts to acceptable information all on its own.
>

Reacts, yes, but it isn't informed by the reaction.
 

>  
>
> You contradict yourself – - I don’t think it has to be human – machines 
> only help 
>
> non-machines to interpret -
>

Where was the contradiction?
 

> - and if the human point is important, then surely 
>
> you will accept your definition to be that it must be biological life, for 
> a machine 
>
> cannot be alive.
>

A living being can be used as a machine, but it is not defined by that 
function.  

 
>
> A machine is either a machine or it is not a machine – a machine cannot be 
> both 
>
> a machine and not a machine at the same time.
>

A creature can be more than a machine, but still act as a machine in many 
ways.

Craig
 

>  
>
> wrb 
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com  [mailto:
> everyth...@googlegroups.com ] *On Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 10:14 AM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com 
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 12:03:28 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> Craig:
>
>  
>
> You statement of need for a human to observe the 
>
> pattern is the smoking gun to indicate a misunderstanding 
>
> of semiotic theory on your part.
>
>
> I don't think that it has to be humans doing the observing at all. 
>  
>
>  
>
> Specifically, you don’t need a human; a machine will do.
>
>
> A machine can only help another non-machine interpret something. I don't 
> think that they can interpret anything for 'themselves'.
>  
>
>  
>
> Not all machines are man-made.
>
>
> True, but what we see as natural machines may not be just machines. 
> Man-made machines may be just machines.
>
> Craig
>
>  
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com] *On 
> Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 5:24 AM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 2:06:20 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> There is information (I take information to be a 
> manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented 
> in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units 
> of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  
>
>
> I can agree that information could be considered a manifestation of 
> entropy, to the extent that entropy is necessary to provide a contrast 
> space for a distribution. To string an ellipses together, you need one dot, 
> repetition, space, and a quality of measurement which yokes together the 
> three dots aesthetically. Beyond that, you also need human observer with 
> human visual sense to turn the distribution into a 'pattern'. Without that, 
> of course, even distribution cannot cohere into "a" distribution, as there 
> is no scale, range, quality, etc to anchor the expectation. If we are a 
> microbe, we may not ever find our way from one dot to the next.
>
> I 
> think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits 
> of information; I will use the terms synonymously. 
>
> Information has meaning only within context.  For many 
> people, context is taken to mean one piece of information 
> as compared to another piece of information.  I do not 
> take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics. 
> Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of 
> the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori 
> within information acceptors. 
>
>
> Agree. Well, transmitters form the signs from their own sense of meaning 
> as well. That's how we are having this discussion.
>  
>
>
> What you know you have always known; the sign merely 
> serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind. 
>
>
> Right. I mean it might be a bit more complicated as far as novelty goes. I 
> don't know if the state of unconscious information is really what I "have 
> always known" but that this particular constellation of meanings reflects 
> the Totality in a way that it is only trivially novel. Like if you hit a 
> jackpot on a slot machine - that may not have happened before, but the slot 
> machine is designed to payout whenever it does. The jackpot already exists 
> as a potential and sooner or later it will be realized.
>  
>
>
> That 

RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

The fact that a machine can act in a discriminatory based 

upon some signal (sign, information) input is demonstration 

of value judgment.

 

Just as there is no *in* in a machine, so to there is no *in* 

in a biological organism; they both, machine and organism, 

are forms that treat other forms in certain proscribed ways.

 

You cannot demonstrate otherwise.

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 10:37 AM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:53:31 AM UTC-5, Alberto G.Corona wrote:

Let´s say that what we call "information" is an extended form of sensory
input. What makes this input "information" is the usability of this input
for reducing the internal entropy of the receiver or increase the internal
order. The receiver can be a machine, a cell, a person or a society for
example. If the input do not produce this effect in the receiver, then that
input is not information.


The increase of internal order of the receiver is a symptom of an experience
of being informed but they are not the same thing. It's not really even
relevant in most cases. I would not call it an extended form of sensory
input, but a reduction of sensory experience. Input is not a physical
reality, it is a conceptual label.

Consider Blindsight:

I hold up two fingers and ask how many fingers? 

"I don't know.'

Guess

'two'.

This example tells us about information without tying it to decreased
entropy. My two fingers are a form. I am putting them into that form, so the
process of my presenting my fingers is a formation of a sign. 

The sign is not information at this point. It means something different to
an ant or a frog than it does to a person looking at it. If you can't see,
there is no formation there at all unless you can collide with my fingers.

When the patient responds that they don't know how many fingers, it is
because they personally have no experience of seeing it. They are not being
informed personally by the form of my fingers in front of their face because
they have blindsight.

When they guess correctly, they still have not been informed. Only we know
that the information is correct. At this point you could say that there is
some decrease in information entropy of the receiver as far as we are
concerned, but in fact, for the receiver themselves, they have not increased
any internal order.

A machine has blindsight about everything. They can be queried and produce
valid responses to inform us, but they are never informed themselves. There
is no 'in' in a machine, it is an organization of forms which treat other
forms in a proscribed way. Forms are copied, transformed, and presented in a
context that it has no experience of. My computer sees nothing that I see on
this screen. It reads nothing that I type here. It doesn't know what the
Everything List is - not even Google knows what it is - only that the string
of characters in the name is to be associated with an ip address.

Craig

 

2013/3/2 William R. Buckley  >


>Thinking about how information content of a message

Big mistake.  Information is never contained with but
exactly one exception, an envelope.

I made this point with Jesper Hoffmeyer regarding a
statement in his book Biosemiotics, that information
is represented but not contained in that representation.
That marks of chalk upon slate may be taken to represent
information at a meta level above the reality of streaks
of a deformed amorphous solid has nothing to do with
the information represented by that deformation, nor the
increase of entropy associated with the greater disorder
obtained from that deformation; these are but three of
the *informations* to be found upon review of those
streaks.  Entropy is how nature sees information (not
yet an established fact but I think the tea leaves read
clear enough) but that has (presumably) nothing to do
with how intelligent individuals see information, or
as von Uexküll called such phenomena, signs.

Most definitely the information is not to be found
within the material of its expression, its representation.
Rather, the information is already to be found within the
interpreter.

That which is information is so by virtue of the acceptor
of that information; else, it is noise.

And, write the information on a piece of paper and seal
the paper within an envelope and you may justifiably
claim that the information is contained; else, you are
deluding yourself.


>has an inversely proportionate relationship with the
>capacity of sender and receiver to synchronize with
>each other.
>



wrb




 
 

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RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

Craig,

 

You build an automaton, place it and turn it on, and from that point in time
forward 

the automaton reacts to acceptable information all on its own.

 

You contradict yourself - - I don't think it has to be human - machines only
help 

non-machines to interpret - - and if the human point is important, then
surely 

you will accept your definition to be that it must be biological life, for a
machine 

cannot be alive.

 

A machine is either a machine or it is not a machine - a machine cannot be
both 

a machine and not a machine at the same time.

 

wrb 

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 10:14 AM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 12:03:28 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

Craig:

 

You statement of need for a human to observe the 

pattern is the smoking gun to indicate a misunderstanding 

of semiotic theory on your part.


I don't think that it has to be humans doing the observing at all. 
 

 

Specifically, you don't need a human; a machine will do.


A machine can only help another non-machine interpret something. I don't
think that they can interpret anything for 'themselves'.
 

 

Not all machines are man-made.


True, but what we see as natural machines may not be just machines. Man-made
machines may be just machines.

Craig

 

wrb

 

From: everyth...@googlegroups.com 
[mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com  ] On Behalf Of Craig
Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 5:24 AM
To: everyth...@googlegroups.com  
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 2:06:20 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

There is information (I take information to be a 
manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented 
in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units 
of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  


I can agree that information could be considered a manifestation of entropy,
to the extent that entropy is necessary to provide a contrast space for a
distribution. To string an ellipses together, you need one dot, repetition,
space, and a quality of measurement which yokes together the three dots
aesthetically. Beyond that, you also need human observer with human visual
sense to turn the distribution into a 'pattern'. Without that, of course,
even distribution cannot cohere into "a" distribution, as there is no scale,
range, quality, etc to anchor the expectation. If we are a microbe, we may
not ever find our way from one dot to the next.

I 
think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits 
of information; I will use the terms synonymously. 

Information has meaning only within context.  For many 
people, context is taken to mean one piece of information 
as compared to another piece of information.  I do not 
take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics. 
Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of 
the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori 
within information acceptors. 


Agree. Well, transmitters form the signs from their own sense of meaning as
well. That's how we are having this discussion.
 


What you know you have always known; the sign merely 
serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind. 


Right. I mean it might be a bit more complicated as far as novelty goes. I
don't know if the state of unconscious information is really what I "have
always known" but that this particular constellation of meanings reflects
the Totality in a way that it is only trivially novel. Like if you hit a
jackpot on a slot machine - that may not have happened before, but the slot
machine is designed to payout whenever it does. The jackpot already exists
as a potential and sooner or later it will be realized.
 


That you may have intention and so comport your delivery 
of information to another acceptor has not bearing upon 
the subsequent acceptance or rejection of that information 
by the target acceptor.  Acceptance or rejection of 
information is determined solely by the accepting or 
rejecting context (acceptor). 


Agree. But the converse - the acceptor can only accept information which has
been included for delivery by intention (or accidentally I suppose).
 


Your mere presence sends information regardless of some 
conscious intent.  Indeed, your absence does equally 
deliver information, for the target acceptor will see 
a definite difference in available information sources 
whether you are present or not. 

Consider a line worker in a bean processing plant where 
the task is to cull *bad* dried beans from *good* dried 
beans as they go by on a conveyor belt; the *bad* beans 
are removed by hand, so the line worker is constantly 
looking for *bad* beans while constantly being aware 
of the fact that not many of the beans are *bad

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:53:31 AM UTC-5, Alberto G.Corona wrote:
>
> Let´s say that what we call "information" is an extended form of sensory 
> input. What makes this input "information" is the usability of this input 
> for reducing the internal entropy of the receiver or increase the internal 
> order. The receiver can be a machine, a cell, a person or a society for 
> example. If the input do not produce this effect in the receiver, then that 
> input is not information.
>

The increase of internal order of the receiver is a symptom of an 
experience of being informed but they are not the same thing. It's not 
really even relevant in most cases. I would not call it an extended form of 
sensory input, but a reduction of sensory experience. Input is not a 
physical reality, it is a conceptual label.

Consider Blindsight:

I hold up two fingers and ask how many fingers? 

"I don't know.'

Guess

'two'.

This example tells us about information without tying it to decreased 
entropy. My two fingers are a form. I am putting them into that form, so 
the process of my presenting my fingers is a formation of a sign. 

The sign is not information at this point. It means something different to 
an ant or a frog than it does to a person looking at it. If you can't see, 
there is no formation there at all unless you can collide with my fingers.

When the patient responds that they don't know how many fingers, it is 
because they personally have no experience of seeing it. They are not being 
informed personally by the form of my fingers in front of their face 
because they have blindsight.

When they guess correctly, they still have not been informed. Only we know 
that the information is correct. At this point you could say that there is 
some decrease in information entropy of the receiver as far as we are 
concerned, but in fact, for the receiver themselves, they have not 
increased any internal order.

A machine has blindsight about everything. They can be queried and produce 
valid responses to inform us, but they are never informed themselves. There 
is no 'in' in a machine, it is an organization of forms which treat other 
forms in a proscribed way. Forms are copied, transformed, and presented in 
a context that it has no experience of. My computer sees nothing that I see 
on this screen. It reads nothing that I type here. It doesn't know what the 
Everything List is - not even Google knows what it is - only that the 
string of characters in the name is to be associated with an ip address.

Craig


>
> 2013/3/2 William R. Buckley >
>
>>
>> >Thinking about how information content of a message
>>
>> Big mistake.  Information is never contained with but
>> exactly one exception, an envelope.
>>
>> I made this point with Jesper Hoffmeyer regarding a
>> statement in his book Biosemiotics, that information
>> is represented but not contained in that representation.
>> That marks of chalk upon slate may be taken to represent
>> information at a meta level above the reality of streaks
>> of a deformed amorphous solid has nothing to do with
>> the information represented by that deformation, nor the
>> increase of entropy associated with the greater disorder
>> obtained from that deformation; these are but three of
>> the *informations* to be found upon review of those
>> streaks.  Entropy is how nature sees information (not
>> yet an established fact but I think the tea leaves read
>> clear enough) but that has (presumably) nothing to do
>> with how intelligent individuals see information, or
>> as von Uexküll called such phenomena, signs.
>>
>> Most definitely the information is not to be found
>> within the material of its expression, its representation.
>> Rather, the information is already to be found within the
>> interpreter.
>>
>> That which is information is so by virtue of the acceptor
>> of that information; else, it is noise.
>>
>> And, write the information on a piece of paper and seal
>> the paper within an envelope and you may justifiably
>> claim that the information is contained; else, you are
>> deluding yourself.
>>
>> >has an inversely proportionate relationship with the
>> >capacity of sender and receiver to synchronize with
>> >each other.
>> >
>>
>> 
>>
>> wrb
>>
>>
>>
>>  
>>  
>>
>> --
>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups 
>> "Everything List" group.
>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an 
>> email to everything-li...@googlegroups.com .
>> To post to this group, send email to everyth...@googlegroups.com
>> .
>> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
>> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
>>
>>
>>
>
>
> -- 
> Alberto. 
>

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Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 12:03:28 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> Craig:
>
>  
>
> You statement of need for a human to observe the 
>
> pattern is the smoking gun to indicate a misunderstanding 
>
> of semiotic theory on your part.
>

I don't think that it has to be humans doing the observing at all. 
 

>  
>
> Specifically, you don’t need a human; a machine will do.
>

A machine can only help another non-machine interpret something. I don't 
think that they can interpret anything for 'themselves'.
 

>  
>
> Not all machines are man-made.
>

True, but what we see as natural machines may not be just machines. 
Man-made machines may be just machines.

Craig

 
>
> wrb
>
>  
>
> *From:* everyth...@googlegroups.com  [mailto:
> everyth...@googlegroups.com ] *On Behalf Of *Craig Weinberg
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 05, 2013 5:24 AM
> *To:* everyth...@googlegroups.com 
> *Subject:* Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
>
>  
>
>
>
> On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 2:06:20 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> There is information (I take information to be a 
> manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented 
> in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units 
> of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  
>
>
> I can agree that information could be considered a manifestation of 
> entropy, to the extent that entropy is necessary to provide a contrast 
> space for a distribution. To string an ellipses together, you need one dot, 
> repetition, space, and a quality of measurement which yokes together the 
> three dots aesthetically. Beyond that, you also need human observer with 
> human visual sense to turn the distribution into a 'pattern'. Without that, 
> of course, even distribution cannot cohere into "a" distribution, as there 
> is no scale, range, quality, etc to anchor the expectation. If we are a 
> microbe, we may not ever find our way from one dot to the next.
>
> I 
> think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits 
> of information; I will use the terms synonymously. 
>
> Information has meaning only within context.  For many 
> people, context is taken to mean one piece of information 
> as compared to another piece of information.  I do not 
> take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics. 
> Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of 
> the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori 
> within information acceptors. 
>
>
> Agree. Well, transmitters form the signs from their own sense of meaning 
> as well. That's how we are having this discussion.
>  
>
>
> What you know you have always known; the sign merely 
> serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind. 
>
>
> Right. I mean it might be a bit more complicated as far as novelty goes. I 
> don't know if the state of unconscious information is really what I "have 
> always known" but that this particular constellation of meanings reflects 
> the Totality in a way that it is only trivially novel. Like if you hit a 
> jackpot on a slot machine - that may not have happened before, but the slot 
> machine is designed to payout whenever it does. The jackpot already exists 
> as a potential and sooner or later it will be realized.
>  
>
>
> That you may have intention and so comport your delivery 
> of information to another acceptor has not bearing upon 
> the subsequent acceptance or rejection of that information 
> by the target acceptor.  Acceptance or rejection of 
> information is determined solely by the accepting or 
> rejecting context (acceptor). 
>
>
> Agree. But the converse - the acceptor can only accept information which 
> has been included for delivery by intention (or accidentally I suppose).
>  
>
>
> Your mere presence sends information regardless of some 
> conscious intent.  Indeed, your absence does equally 
> deliver information, for the target acceptor will see 
> a definite difference in available information sources 
> whether you are present or not. 
>
> Consider a line worker in a bean processing plant where 
> the task is to cull *bad* dried beans from *good* dried 
> beans as they go by on a conveyor belt; the *bad* beans 
> are removed by hand, so the line worker is constantly 
> looking for *bad* beans while constantly being aware 
> of the fact that not many of the beans are *bad*.  The 
> consciousness is aware of both that which is present 
> and that which is not present. 
>
>
> Yes, the expectation is key. I call that the perceptual inertial frame. 
> There is an accumulated inertia of expectations which filters, amplifies, 
> distorts, etc.
>

RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

Craig:

 

You statement of need for a human to observe the 

pattern is the smoking gun to indicate a misunderstanding 

of semiotic theory on your part.

 

Specifically, you don't need a human; a machine will do.

 

Not all machines are man-made.

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2013 5:24 AM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 2:06:20 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

There is information (I take information to be a 
manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented 
in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units 
of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  


I can agree that information could be considered a manifestation of entropy,
to the extent that entropy is necessary to provide a contrast space for a
distribution. To string an ellipses together, you need one dot, repetition,
space, and a quality of measurement which yokes together the three dots
aesthetically. Beyond that, you also need human observer with human visual
sense to turn the distribution into a 'pattern'. Without that, of course,
even distribution cannot cohere into "a" distribution, as there is no scale,
range, quality, etc to anchor the expectation. If we are a microbe, we may
not ever find our way from one dot to the next.



I 
think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits 
of information; I will use the terms synonymously. 

Information has meaning only within context.  For many 
people, context is taken to mean one piece of information 
as compared to another piece of information.  I do not 
take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics. 
Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of 
the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori 
within information acceptors. 


Agree. Well, transmitters form the signs from their own sense of meaning as
well. That's how we are having this discussion.
 


What you know you have always known; the sign merely 
serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind. 


Right. I mean it might be a bit more complicated as far as novelty goes. I
don't know if the state of unconscious information is really what I "have
always known" but that this particular constellation of meanings reflects
the Totality in a way that it is only trivially novel. Like if you hit a
jackpot on a slot machine - that may not have happened before, but the slot
machine is designed to payout whenever it does. The jackpot already exists
as a potential and sooner or later it will be realized.
 


That you may have intention and so comport your delivery 
of information to another acceptor has not bearing upon 
the subsequent acceptance or rejection of that information 
by the target acceptor.  Acceptance or rejection of 
information is determined solely by the accepting or 
rejecting context (acceptor). 


Agree. But the converse - the acceptor can only accept information which has
been included for delivery by intention (or accidentally I suppose).
 


Your mere presence sends information regardless of some 
conscious intent.  Indeed, your absence does equally 
deliver information, for the target acceptor will see 
a definite difference in available information sources 
whether you are present or not. 

Consider a line worker in a bean processing plant where 
the task is to cull *bad* dried beans from *good* dried 
beans as they go by on a conveyor belt; the *bad* beans 
are removed by hand, so the line worker is constantly 
looking for *bad* beans while constantly being aware 
of the fact that not many of the beans are *bad*.  The 
consciousness is aware of both that which is present 
and that which is not present. 


Yes, the expectation is key. I call that the perceptual inertial frame.
There is an accumulated inertia of expectations which filters, amplifies,
distorts, etc.


Further, what any information that you emit means to 
you is irrelevant to the meaning that another may take 
for that information. 


Then how does art work? Music? Certainly it is pretty clear that what
emitting Iron Man meant to Black Sabbath is different from what emitting the
Four Seasons meant to Vivaldi. I agree that the receiver bears the brunt of
the decoding, but why deny that the broadcaster can do intentional encoding,
when they know the audience?
 

 Indeed, it is via reliance upon 
-Cultural Norms- that your point regarding Morse Code 
becomes relevant.  It is perfectly reasonable for an 
ornery person to simply reject such norms and act 
otherwise; your expectation originates in you, not 
the targets of information you broadcast. 

>>The truth of your statement is no reply to my claim, 
>>that how another receiver of signs responds is 
>>irrelevant to your knowledge, save the one case of 
>>conveyance of knowledge bet

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Tuesday, March 5, 2013 2:06:20 AM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> There is information (I take information to be a 
> manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented 
> in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units 
> of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  


I can agree that information could be considered a manifestation of 
entropy, to the extent that entropy is necessary to provide a contrast 
space for a distribution. To string an ellipses together, you need one dot, 
repetition, space, and a quality of measurement which yokes together the 
three dots aesthetically. Beyond that, you also need human observer with 
human visual sense to turn the distribution into a 'pattern'. Without that, 
of course, even distribution cannot cohere into "a" distribution, as there 
is no scale, range, quality, etc to anchor the expectation. If we are a 
microbe, we may not ever find our way from one dot to the next.


I 
> think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits 
> of information; I will use the terms synonymously. 
>
> Information has meaning only within context.  For many 
> people, context is taken to mean one piece of information 
> as compared to another piece of information.  I do not 
> take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics. 
> Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of 
> the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori 
> within information acceptors. 
>

Agree. Well, transmitters form the signs from their own sense of meaning as 
well. That's how we are having this discussion.
 

>
> What you know you have always known; the sign merely 
> serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind. 
>

Right. I mean it might be a bit more complicated as far as novelty goes. I 
don't know if the state of unconscious information is really what I "have 
always known" but that this particular constellation of meanings reflects 
the Totality in a way that it is only trivially novel. Like if you hit a 
jackpot on a slot machine - that may not have happened before, but the slot 
machine is designed to payout whenever it does. The jackpot already exists 
as a potential and sooner or later it will be realized.
 

>
> That you may have intention and so comport your delivery 
> of information to another acceptor has not bearing upon 
> the subsequent acceptance or rejection of that information 
> by the target acceptor.  Acceptance or rejection of 
> information is determined solely by the accepting or 
> rejecting context (acceptor). 
>

Agree. But the converse - the acceptor can only accept information which 
has been included for delivery by intention (or accidentally I suppose).
 

>
> Your mere presence sends information regardless of some 
> conscious intent.  Indeed, your absence does equally 
> deliver information, for the target acceptor will see 
> a definite difference in available information sources 
> whether you are present or not. 
>
> Consider a line worker in a bean processing plant where 
> the task is to cull *bad* dried beans from *good* dried 
> beans as they go by on a conveyor belt; the *bad* beans 
> are removed by hand, so the line worker is constantly 
> looking for *bad* beans while constantly being aware 
> of the fact that not many of the beans are *bad*.  The 
> consciousness is aware of both that which is present 
> and that which is not present. 
>

Yes, the expectation is key. I call that the perceptual inertial frame. 
There is an accumulated inertia of expectations which filters, amplifies, 
distorts, etc.


> Further, what any information that you emit means to 
> you is irrelevant to the meaning that another may take 
> for that information. 


Then how does art work? Music? Certainly it is pretty clear that what 
emitting Iron Man meant to Black Sabbath is different from what emitting 
the Four Seasons meant to Vivaldi. I agree that the receiver bears the 
brunt of the decoding, but why deny that the broadcaster can do intentional 
encoding, when they know the audience?
 

>  Indeed, it is via reliance upon 
> -Cultural Norms- that your point regarding Morse Code 
> becomes relevant.  It is perfectly reasonable for an 
> ornery person to simply reject such norms and act 
> otherwise; your expectation originates in you, not 
> the targets of information you broadcast. 
>
> >>The truth of your statement is no reply to my claim, 
> >>that how another receiver of signs responds is 
> >>irrelevant to your knowledge, save the one case of 
> >>conveyance of knowledge between semiotic units; 
> >>where you intend for knowledge to be conveyed.  In 
> >>that case, it is behooving of the sender to ensure 
> >>that the receiver can receive and understand the 
> >>message.  
> > 
> >I'm not sure what you are bringing up here, but I 
> >would say that my point is that all messages have 
> >multiple levels of reception, perhaps as many levels 
> >as their are receivers in the universe. At the same 
> >time, if we are assum

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Alberto G. Corona]

Let´s say that what we call "information" is an extended form of sensory
input. What makes this input "information" is the usability of this input
for reducing the internal entropy of the receiver or increase the internal
order. The receiver can be a machine, a cell, a person or a society for
example. If the input do not produce this effect in the receiver, then that
input is not information.


2013/3/2 William R. Buckley 

>
> >Thinking about how information content of a message
>
> Big mistake.  Information is never contained with but
> exactly one exception, an envelope.
>
> I made this point with Jesper Hoffmeyer regarding a
> statement in his book Biosemiotics, that information
> is represented but not contained in that representation.
> That marks of chalk upon slate may be taken to represent
> information at a meta level above the reality of streaks
> of a deformed amorphous solid has nothing to do with
> the information represented by that deformation, nor the
> increase of entropy associated with the greater disorder
> obtained from that deformation; these are but three of
> the *informations* to be found upon review of those
> streaks.  Entropy is how nature sees information (not
> yet an established fact but I think the tea leaves read
> clear enough) but that has (presumably) nothing to do
> with how intelligent individuals see information, or
> as von Uexküll called such phenomena, signs.
>
> Most definitely the information is not to be found
> within the material of its expression, its representation.
> Rather, the information is already to be found within the
> interpreter.
>
> That which is information is so by virtue of the acceptor
> of that information; else, it is noise.
>
> And, write the information on a piece of paper and seal
> the paper within an envelope and you may justifiably
> claim that the information is contained; else, you are
> deluding yourself.
>
> >has an inversely proportionate relationship with the
> >capacity of sender and receiver to synchronize with
> >each other.
> >
>
> 
>
> wrb
>
>
>
>
>
>
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>


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RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

There is information (I take information to be a 
manifestation of entropy) and it is always represented 
in the form of a pattern (a distribution) of the units 
of mass/energy of which the Universe is composed.  I 
think that semiotic signs are simply specific bits 
of information; I will use the terms synonymously.

Information has meaning only within context.  For many 
people, context is taken to mean one piece of information 
as compared to another piece of information.  I do not 
take this meaning of context when I discuss semiotics.
Instead, I take semiotic context to be the acceptor of 
the information.  Hence, all meaning resides a priori 
within information acceptors.

What you know you have always known; the sign merely 
serves to bring that knowledge to your conscious mind.

That you may have intention and so comport your delivery 
of information to another acceptor has not bearing upon 
the subsequent acceptance or rejection of that information 
by the target acceptor.  Acceptance or rejection of 
information is determined solely by the accepting or 
rejecting context (acceptor).

Your mere presence sends information regardless of some 
conscious intent.  Indeed, your absence does equally 
deliver information, for the target acceptor will see 
a definite difference in available information sources 
whether you are present or not.

Consider a line worker in a bean processing plant where 
the task is to cull *bad* dried beans from *good* dried 
beans as they go by on a conveyor belt; the *bad* beans 
are removed by hand, so the line worker is constantly 
looking for *bad* beans while constantly being aware 
of the fact that not many of the beans are *bad*.  The 
consciousness is aware of both that which is present 
and that which is not present.

Further, what any information that you emit means to 
you is irrelevant to the meaning that another may take 
for that information.  Indeed, it is via reliance upon 
-Cultural Norms- that your point regarding Morse Code 
becomes relevant.  It is perfectly reasonable for an 
ornery person to simply reject such norms and act 
otherwise; your expectation originates in you, not 
the targets of information you broadcast.

>>The truth of your statement is no reply to my claim, 
>>that how another receiver of signs responds is 
>>irrelevant to your knowledge, save the one case of 
>>conveyance of knowledge between semiotic units; 
>>where you intend for knowledge to be conveyed.  In 
>>that case, it is behooving of the sender to ensure 
>>that the receiver can receive and understand the 
>>message. 
>
>I'm not sure what you are bringing up here, but I 
>would say that my point is that all messages have 
>multiple levels of reception, perhaps as many levels 
>as their are receivers in the universe. At the same 
>time, if we are assuming human senders and receivers 
>and a content range which is highly normative and 
>practical (i.e. Morse code alphabet rather than 
>emoticons, inside jokes, etc), then the information 
>entropy is reduced dramatically.
>
>Maybe you can give me an example of that you mean 
>by the irrelevance of the receiver's knowledge. Does 
>that include the expectation of the possibility of 
>there being a receiver?
> 
>>In all other cases, the recipient response is 
>>irrelevant; all values and measures originate in 
>>the sender of the message.
>
>I would tend to agree with that, although the 
>expectation of the recipient response informs the 
>motives, values, and measures of the sender - 
>otherwise there would be no message being sent.
>
> 
>>The receiver of transmitted information is 
>>irrelevant to the mechanics of that transmission.
>
>I'm not sure what you mean. Again, maybe an example 
>would help. We expect that human audiences can see, 
>so we have TV screens to provide optical stimulation. 
>If we didn't have eyes, there would be no mechanism 
>of TV.
>

The word should have been *reception* - receipt of 
information (acceptance of a sign) is a function of 
the value that the acceptor puts on that sign.  That 
value is most certainly not tied to the delivery 
mechanism, even if some delivery mechanisms are 
preferred over others.

What matters to information acceptance is disposition 
of the acceptor to that acceptance.  If the acceptor 
does not *like* the sign, it will reject the sign; of 
course, this means that all signs are accepted just 
long enough to decide if they are sufficiently meaningful 
or not; if so, they are accepted else they are rejected.

>Craig
>
>>wrb
>

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RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

Craig:

 

An excellent reply will come shortly.

 

Minimally, I will show you how your intent in irrelevant to 

the message receiver.

 

I do need a little time to construct the argument, given 

a few chores around the farm (we work from 6AM to 

12PM 365.25 +/- days per year).

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Saturday, March 02, 2013 4:48 PM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Saturday, March 2, 2013 6:40:44 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

Craig:

 

The truth of your statement is no reply to my claim, that how another 

receiver of signs responds is irrelevant to your knowledge, save the one 

case of conveyance of knowledge between semiotic units; where you 

intend for knowledge to be conveyed.  In that case, it is behooving of 

the sender to ensure that the receiver can receive and understand the 

message. 


I'm not sure what you are bringing up here, but I would say that my point is
that all messages have multiple levels of reception, perhaps as many levels
as their are receivers in the universe. At the same time, if we are assuming
human senders and receivers and a content range which is highly normative
and practical (i.e. Morse code alphabet rather than emoticons, inside jokes,
etc), then the information entropy is reduced dramatically.

Maybe you can give me an example of that you mean by the irrelevance of the
receiver's knowledge. Does that include the expectation of the possibility
of there being a receiver?
 

In all other cases, the recipient response is irrelevant; all 

values and measures originate in the sender of the message.


I would tend to agree with that, although the expectation of the recipient
response informs the motives, values, and measures of the sender - otherwise
there would be no message being sent.
 

 

The receiver of transmitted information is irrelevant to the mechanics 

of that transmission.


I'm not sure what you mean. Again, maybe an example would help. We expect
that human audiences can see, so we have TV screens to provide optical
stimulation. If we didn't have eyes, there would be no mechanism of TV.

Craig
 

 

wrb

 

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Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Saturday, March 2, 2013 6:40:44 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
> Craig:
>
>  
>
> The truth of your statement is no reply to my claim, that how another 
>
> receiver of signs responds is irrelevant to your knowledge, save the one 
>
> case of conveyance of knowledge between semiotic units; where you 
>
> intend for knowledge to be conveyed.  In that case, it is behooving of 
>
> the sender to ensure that the receiver can receive and understand the 
>
> message. 
>

I'm not sure what you are bringing up here, but I would say that my point 
is that all messages have multiple levels of reception, perhaps as many 
levels as their are receivers in the universe. At the same time, if we are 
assuming human senders and receivers and a content range which is highly 
normative and practical (i.e. Morse code alphabet rather than emoticons, 
inside jokes, etc), then the information entropy is reduced dramatically.

Maybe you can give me an example of that you mean by the irrelevance of the 
receiver's knowledge. Does that include the expectation of the possibility 
of there being a receiver?
 

> In all other cases, the recipient response is irrelevant; all 
>
> values and measures originate in the sender of the message.
>

I would tend to agree with that, although the expectation of the recipient 
response informs the motives, values, and measures of the sender - 
otherwise there would be no message being sent.
 

>  
>
> The receiver of transmitted information is irrelevant to the mechanics 
>
> of that transmission.
>

I'm not sure what you mean. Again, maybe an example would help. We expect 
that human audiences can see, so we have TV screens to provide optical 
stimulation. If we didn't have eyes, there would be no mechanism of TV.

Craig
 

>  
>
> wrb
>
>

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RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

Craig:

 

The truth of your statement is no reply to my claim, that how another 

receiver of signs responds is irrelevant to your knowledge, save the one 

case of conveyance of knowledge between semiotic units; where you 

intend for knowledge to be conveyed.  In that case, it is behooving of 

the sender to ensure that the receiver can receive and understand the 

message.  In all other cases, the recipient response is irrelevant; all 

values and measures originate in the sender of the message.

 

The receiver of transmitted information is irrelevant to the mechanics 

of that transmission.

 

wrb

 

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Saturday, March 02, 2013 1:50 PM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

 



On Saturday, March 2, 2013 3:59:14 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:

 

>I can use a phonetic transliteration to recite an Arabic 
>prayer without even knowing what words are being spoken, 
>let alone the meaning of those words. 

If your argument is that you have no knowledge of what you 
are doing, of the sounds you make in recitation, then you 
have capitulated. 

In performing the act described above, you know your purpose 
and how another receiver of those signs responds is irrelevant. 


There are multiple purposes and expectations. In reciting the prayer, I can
fulfill the expectations of Arabic speakers as far as proper diction. I can
fulfill the expectations of Arabic text recognition by faithfully matching
the correct glyphs with the expected phonemes. But no mater what I do, I
cannot fulfill any expectation of understanding verbal-semantic content of
what is being said.  I might be able to intuit some emotive content on the
onomatopoeic level, or by reading the emotional temperature in the room, but
my understanding still lacks an important level of communication. Even the
receivers are not equal. Young and old, religious and secular, each have
different ways of receiving the prayer.

Craig


wrb 




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Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Saturday, March 2, 2013 3:59:14 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
>  
>
> >I can use a phonetic transliteration to recite an Arabic 
> >prayer without even knowing what words are being spoken, 
> >let alone the meaning of those words. 
>
> If your argument is that you have no knowledge of what you 
> are doing, of the sounds you make in recitation, then you 
> have capitulated. 
>
> In performing the act described above, you know your purpose 
> and how another receiver of those signs responds is irrelevant. 
>

There are multiple purposes and expectations. In reciting the prayer, I can 
fulfill the expectations of Arabic speakers as far as proper diction. I can 
fulfill the expectations of Arabic text recognition by faithfully matching 
the correct glyphs with the expected phonemes. But no mater what I do, I 
cannot fulfill any expectation of understanding verbal-semantic content of 
what is being said.  I might be able to intuit some emotive content on the 
onomatopoeic level, or by reading the emotional temperature in the room, 
but my understanding still lacks an important level of communication. Even 
the receivers are not equal. Young and old, religious and secular, each 
have different ways of receiving the prayer.

Craig


> wrb 
>
>
>
>

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RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

>I can use a phonetic transliteration to recite an Arabic 
>prayer without even knowing what words are being spoken, 
>let alone the meaning of those words.

If your argument is that you have no knowledge of what you 
are doing, of the sounds you make in recitation, then you 
have capitulated.

In performing the act described above, you know your purpose 
and how another receiver of those signs responds is irrelevant.

wrb



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Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Saturday, March 2, 2013 2:06:41 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
>
>
> From: everyth...@googlegroups.com  
> [mailto:everyth...@googlegroups.com ] On Behalf Of Craig 
> Weinberg 
> Sent: Saturday, March 02, 2013 6:02 AM 
> To: everyth...@googlegroups.com  
> Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information 
>
>
>
> On Saturday, March 2, 2013 12:37:15 AM UTC-5, Brent wrote: 
> On 3/1/2013 8:39 PM, William R. Buckley wrote: 
> > And therein do you see the arbitrariness of either choice. 
> > 
> > The universe is subjective, not objective. 
>
> Is that just your opinion...or is it objectively true. 
>
> It's an educated guess, and a provocation. On what basis do we presume 
> that 
> objectivity is possible? Because our subjective experience is used to 
> thinking of it that way? 
>   
>
> WRB-  BINGO!!! 
>
>
> > 
> > Read on semiotic theory as it will give much enlightenment 
> > on this issue, that is *meaning* versus *information* 
>
> Was there something that I said which would suggest that I hadn't read 
> semiotic theory? 
>   
> > 
> > The fact that the interpreter can interpret means that the 
> > interpreter already knows the meaning of any accepted 
> > informational form.  Isn't this how compilers and interpreters 
> > in a computer work? 
>
> There is no "the meaning", there are many meanings in various sensory 
> modalities: 
>
> Optical forms = visually informing - subconscious 
> Graphic forms = phonetically informing - learning makes conscious 
> experience 
> subconscious. (MIS-IS-IP-EE = Mississippi = funny word) 
> Grammatic forms = semantically informing - learning matches optical, 
> graphical, and verbal forms to conceptual experiences.(Mississippi = river 
> in the US). 
> Beyond the explicit message, the context of the messaging, and of the 
> interpreter can become more important that the explicit message. 
> Mississippi 
> could be a safe word in some kind of sex scandal about to expose a 
> politician, or it could trigger a post-hypnotic suggestion a la Manchurian 
> Candidate. 
>
> How compilers and interpreters work is nothing like this. The computer 
> stack 
> looks like this: 
>
> Physical forms = wires and microprocessors. There is no optical or audio 
> experience here, only the electronic or mechanical connection between 
> microelectronic events. 
> Mathematical functions = physical properties of transistors allow for 
> basic 
> switching and checking the status of switches. 
> As we might build a castle out of toothpicks, mathematical functions can 
> be 
> used to take on various technological facades - from dot-matrix printing 
> that reminds us of letters to video screens with cartoons which remind us 
> of 
> people. 
>
> In all of these cases, unlike a person, the computer does not grow to 
> learn 
> meanings, only to match characters and words to their statistically likely 
> consequences. If you say Bonjour to the computer - it recognizes your 
> input 
> and searches the most likely output, but it has no idea what it is saying 
> or 
> who it is talking to. There's not person there, it's just a bunch of very 
> small windmills. 
>
>
>
> WRB- There is no difference between your acceptance of information and the 
> acceptance of information by a computer; that is, unless you hold to 
> notions 
>
> of intelligent design. 
>

Well, we know that it is possible for us to accept low level information 
and simulate higher level  information depending on the end 
user/interpreter. I can use a phonetic transliteration to recite an Arabic 
prayer without even knowing what words are being spoken, let alone the 
meaning of those words. Since this is the way that we have programmed all 
computers, to digitize bottom up modules of information, I see no reason to 
expect that another computer could receive any high level meaning, 
especially when it is going to hit the cpu at a binary level, rather than 
one of evocative sensory content which is tied to personal experience.

I don't know what intelligent design would have to do with that, but our 
own experiences do wind up shaping our genetic health, so I have no reason 
to assume that in the comsos there is only a one-way street of bottom up 
mutation causing natural selection. I would say that the more public the 
phenomena we focus on, the more evolutionary (teleonomic) and the more 
private the phenomena, the more teleological and participatory concerns 
drive outcomes.

This is an interesting bit of research today: 
http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-03-dartmouth-neuroscientist-free-neural-basis.html

"Recent neurophysiological breakthroughs reve

RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

From: everything-list@googlegroups.com
[mailto:everything-list@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Craig Weinberg
Sent: Saturday, March 02, 2013 6:02 AM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information



On Saturday, March 2, 2013 12:37:15 AM UTC-5, Brent wrote:
On 3/1/2013 8:39 PM, William R. Buckley wrote: 
> And therein do you see the arbitrariness of either choice. 
> 
> The universe is subjective, not objective. 

Is that just your opinion...or is it objectively true. 

It's an educated guess, and a provocation. On what basis do we presume that
objectivity is possible? Because our subjective experience is used to
thinking of it that way?
 

WRB-  BINGO!!!


> 
> Read on semiotic theory as it will give much enlightenment 
> on this issue, that is *meaning* versus *information* 

Was there something that I said which would suggest that I hadn't read
semiotic theory?
 
> 
> The fact that the interpreter can interpret means that the 
> interpreter already knows the meaning of any accepted 
> informational form.  Isn't this how compilers and interpreters 
> in a computer work? 

There is no "the meaning", there are many meanings in various sensory
modalities:

Optical forms = visually informing - subconscious
Graphic forms = phonetically informing - learning makes conscious experience
subconscious. (MIS-IS-IP-EE = Mississippi = funny word)
Grammatic forms = semantically informing - learning matches optical,
graphical, and verbal forms to conceptual experiences.(Mississippi = river
in the US).
Beyond the explicit message, the context of the messaging, and of the
interpreter can become more important that the explicit message. Mississippi
could be a safe word in some kind of sex scandal about to expose a
politician, or it could trigger a post-hypnotic suggestion a la Manchurian
Candidate.

How compilers and interpreters work is nothing like this. The computer stack
looks like this:

Physical forms = wires and microprocessors. There is no optical or audio
experience here, only the electronic or mechanical connection between
microelectronic events.
Mathematical functions = physical properties of transistors allow for basic
switching and checking the status of switches. 
As we might build a castle out of toothpicks, mathematical functions can be
used to take on various technological facades - from dot-matrix printing
that reminds us of letters to video screens with cartoons which remind us of
people.

In all of these cases, unlike a person, the computer does not grow to learn
meanings, only to match characters and words to their statistically likely
consequences. If you say Bonjour to the computer - it recognizes your input
and searches the most likely output, but it has no idea what it is saying or
who it is talking to. There's not person there, it's just a bunch of very
small windmills.



WRB- There is no difference between your acceptance of information and the 
acceptance of information by a computer; that is, unless you hold to notions

of intelligent design.




Sure.  The Mars rover interprets the image of a rock because it was
programmed to or 
learned to so interpret the image. 

It's program knows nothing about images or rocks. It knows the data which
has been defined. We are the ones who defined them that way to correspond to
our experiences of images in the rocks. As with all machines, the Mars Rover
is forever in the dark.
 
 Its interpretation is realized by its behavior in 
going around the rock showing that for the rover the 'meaning' of the rock
was 'an 
obstruction'.  If the rock had looked differently or been in a different
place it might 
have been interpreted as a 'geological specimen'. 

Then when we test the Rover with a fake rock, produced by a subroutine in
the rockless lab, it's identical behavior of going around the rock that
isn't there shows that there was never any meaning for rocks or obstructions
or geological specimen. It's responding to programs, not to presences.


WRB-  As with the Einsteinian Elevator experiment, the Rover control
software can't tell 
if it is a real rock, in the real world, or a fake rock in a computational
space.  For you 
to hold otherwise suggests that you don't understand semiotic theory.



Craig
 

Brent 

> 
> wrb 
> 
>> -Original Message- 
>> From: everyth...@googlegroups.com [mailto:everything- 
>> li...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of meekerdb 
>> Sent: Friday, March 01, 2013 7:11 PM 
>> To: everyth...@googlegroups.com 
>> Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information 
>> 
>> On 3/1/2013 5:27 PM, William R. Buckley wrote: 
>>>> Thinking about how information content of a message 
>>> Big mistake.  Information is never contained with but 
>>> exactly one exception, an envelope.

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Saturday, March 2, 2013 12:37:15 AM UTC-5, Brent wrote:
>
> On 3/1/2013 8:39 PM, William R. Buckley wrote: 
> > And therein do you see the arbitrariness of either choice. 
> > 
> > The universe is subjective, not objective. 
>
> Is that just your opinion...or is it objectively true. 
>

It's an educated guess, and a provocation. On what basis do we presume that 
objectivity is possible? Because our subjective experience is used to 
thinking of it that way?
 

>
> > 
> > Read on semiotic theory as it will give much enlightenment 
> > on this issue, that is *meaning* versus *information* 
>

Was there something that I said which would suggest that I hadn't read 
semiotic theory?
 

> > 
> > The fact that the interpreter can interpret means that the 
> > interpreter already knows the meaning of any accepted 
> > informational form.  Isn't this how compilers and interpreters 
> > in a computer work? 
>

There is no "the meaning", there are many meanings in various sensory 
modalities:

Optical forms = visually informing - subconscious
Graphic forms = phonetically informing - learning makes conscious 
experience subconscious. (MIS-IS-IP-EE = Mississippi = funny word)
Grammatic forms = semantically informing - learning matches optical, 
graphical, and verbal forms to conceptual experiences.(Mississippi = river 
in the US).
Beyond the explicit message, the context of the messaging, and of the 
interpreter can become more important that the explicit message. 
Mississippi could be a safe word in some kind of sex scandal about to 
expose a politician, or it could trigger a post-hypnotic suggestion a la 
Manchurian Candidate.

How compilers and interpreters work is nothing like this. The computer 
stack looks like this:

Physical forms = wires and microprocessors. There is no optical or audio 
experience here, only the electronic or mechanical connection between 
microelectronic events.
Mathematical functions = physical properties of transistors allow for basic 
switching and checking the status of switches. 
As we might build a castle out of toothpicks, mathematical functions can be 
used to take on various technological facades - from dot-matrix printing 
that reminds us of letters to video screens with cartoons which remind us 
of people.

In all of these cases, unlike a person, the computer does not grow to learn 
meanings, only to match characters and words to their statistically likely 
consequences. If you say Bonjour to the computer - it recognizes your input 
and searches the most likely output, but it has no idea what it is saying 
or who it is talking to. There's not person there, it's just a bunch of 
very small windmills.



> Sure.  The Mars rover interprets the image of a rock because it was 
> programmed to or 
> learned to so interpret the image. 


It's program knows nothing about images or rocks. It knows the data which 
has been defined. We are the ones who defined them that way to correspond 
to our experiences of images in the rocks. As with all machines, the Mars 
Rover is forever in the dark.
 

>  Its interpretation is realized by its behavior in 
> going around the rock showing that for the rover the 'meaning' of the rock 
> was 'an 
> obstruction'.  If the rock had looked differently or been in a different 
> place it might 
> have been interpreted as a 'geological specimen'. 
>

Then when we test the Rover with a fake rock, produced by a subroutine in 
the rockless lab, it's identical behavior of going around the rock that 
isn't there shows that there was never any meaning for rocks or 
obstructions or geological specimen. It's responding to programs, not to 
presences.

Craig
 

>
> Brent 
>
> > 
> > wrb 
> > 
> >> -----Original Message----- 
> >> From: everyth...@googlegroups.com  
> >> [mailto:everything- 
> >> li...@googlegroups.com ] On Behalf Of meekerdb 
> >> Sent: Friday, March 01, 2013 7:11 PM 
> >> To: everyth...@googlegroups.com  
> >> Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information 
> >> 
> >> On 3/1/2013 5:27 PM, William R. Buckley wrote: 
> >>>> Thinking about how information content of a message 
> >>> Big mistake.  Information is never contained with but 
> >>> exactly one exception, an envelope. 
> >>> 
> >>> I made this point with Jesper Hoffmeyer regarding a 
> >>> statement in his book Biosemiotics, that information 
> >>> is represented but not contained in that representation. 
> >>> That marks of chalk upon slate may be taken to represent 
> >>> information at a meta level above the reality of streaks 
> >>> of a deformed amor

Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[Craig Weinberg]

On Friday, March 1, 2013 8:27:54 PM UTC-5, William R. Buckley wrote:
>
>
> >Thinking about how information content of a message 
>
> Big mistake.  Information is never contained with but 
> exactly one exception, an envelope. 
>

I was intentionally starting out from the common assumption that messages 
contain information, and then quickly moved on to show how it is not the 
case. I like your envelope example though.

>
> I made this point with Jesper Hoffmeyer regarding a 
> statement in his book Biosemiotics, that information 
> is represented but not contained in that representation. 
> That marks of chalk upon slate may be taken to represent 
> information at a meta level above the reality of streaks 
> of a deformed amorphous solid has nothing to do with 
> the information represented by that deformation, nor the 
> increase of entropy associated with the greater disorder 
> obtained from that deformation; these are but three of 
> the *informations* to be found upon review of those 
> streaks.  


Yes,  there are many public levels of what I would call formations, since 
they do not inherently cause any informing experiences by themselves. What 
I suggest is that entropy is the cost of significance, which balances out 
through all of time going forward. The Sistine Chapel exists not to break a 
lot of rocks and cover a ceiling with minerals, but for reasons which 
relate to interior experiences and attempts at capturing high quality 
experience. Unlike entropy's cruel mastery of emptiness, significance is a 
monopoly of quality seeking. Whatever entropy does, it does so by seeking 
nothing - relations are abandoned, objects lose their form into dissipation 
or are swept up in some giant sphere or drain.

Entropy is how nature sees information (not 
> yet an established fact but I think the tea leaves read 
> clear enough) but that has (presumably) nothing to do 
> with how intelligent individuals see information, or 
> as von Uexküll called such phenomena, signs. 
>

Yes, this is important because it reveals how sense partitions public space 
with entropy and generates private significance through time. They are 
symmetric (or assymetric) conjugates, with space being the catabolic 
reconciliation of forms and time being the anabolic builder of experiential 
depth (significance). In doing this, indeed the public side of nature 
under-signifies information (making it de-formaiton), and the private 
physics of sense over-signifies it (making it signal's high priority).


> Most definitely the information is not to be found 
> within the material of its expression, its representation. 
> Rather, the information is already to be found within the 
> interpreter. 
>

Yes. I would go so far as to say that the material of its expression isn't 
a representation, but rather a presentation of a form. The representation 
too resided with the interpreter as their semiotic expectations determine 
the nature of the message.  Just as you point out the three levels of chalk 
on slate, of amorphous solid deforming, or entropy - there is a 
corresponding hierarchy of signal reception on the interpreter end. The 
message can be interpreted directly and simply as a message containing X 
characters, it can be read as a social contract requiring a response, it 
could be a warning to indicate that additional response would not be 
welcome. etc. At the high end, the message can be interpreted as an omen or 
metaphor for some larger level of participation in destiny.


> That which is information is so by virtue of the acceptor 
> of that information; else, it is noise. 
>

Yes!
 

>
> And, write the information on a piece of paper and seal 
> the paper within an envelope and you may justifiably 
> claim that the information is contained; else, you are 
> deluding yourself. 
>

Right.

Craig
 

>
> >has an inversely proportionate relationship with the 
> >capacity of sender and receiver to synchronize with 
> >each other. 
> > 
>
>  
>
> wrb 
>
>
>
>   
>   
>
>

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Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[meekerdb]

On 3/1/2013 8:39 PM, William R. Buckley wrote:

And therein do you see the arbitrariness of either choice.

The universe is subjective, not objective.


Is that just your opinion...or is it objectively true.



Read on semiotic theory as it will give much enlightenment
on this issue, that is *meaning* versus *information*

The fact that the interpreter can interpret means that the
interpreter already knows the meaning of any accepted
informational form.  Isn't this how compilers and interpreters
in a computer work?


Sure.  The Mars rover interprets the image of a rock because it was programmed to or 
learned to so interpret the image.  Its interpretation is realized by its behavior in 
going around the rock showing that for the rover the 'meaning' of the rock was 'an 
obstruction'.  If the rock had looked differently or been in a different place it might 
have been interpreted as a 'geological specimen'.


Brent



wrb


-Original Message-
From: everything-list@googlegroups.com [mailto:everything-
l...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of meekerdb
Sent: Friday, March 01, 2013 7:11 PM
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

On 3/1/2013 5:27 PM, William R. Buckley wrote:

Thinking about how information content of a message

Big mistake.  Information is never contained with but
exactly one exception, an envelope.

I made this point with Jesper Hoffmeyer regarding a
statement in his book Biosemiotics, that information
is represented but not contained in that representation.
That marks of chalk upon slate may be taken to represent
information at a meta level above the reality of streaks
of a deformed amorphous solid has nothing to do with
the information represented by that deformation, nor the
increase of entropy associated with the greater disorder
obtained from that deformation; these are but three of
the *informations* to be found upon review of those
streaks.  Entropy is how nature sees information (not
yet an established fact but I think the tea leaves read
clear enough) but that has (presumably) nothing to do
with how intelligent individuals see information, or
as von Uexküll called such phenomena, signs.

Most definitely the information is not to be found
within the material of its expression, its representation.
Rather, the information is already to be found within the
interpreter.

But where is it found within the interpreter?  When the Mars Rover
receives photons in
it's camera which it interprets as an obstructing rock that
interpretation is "just"
physical tokens too. So isn't it a matter viewpoint whether to look at
the causal chain of
tokens or look at the behavior and call it interpreting information?

Brent


That which is information is so by virtue of the acceptor
of that information; else, it is noise.

And, write the information on a piece of paper and seal
the paper within an envelope and you may justifiably
claim that the information is contained; else, you are
deluding yourself.


has an inversely proportionate relationship with the
capacity of sender and receiver to synchronize with
each other.




wrb







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RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

And therein do you see the arbitrariness of either choice.

The universe is subjective, not objective.

Read on semiotic theory as it will give much enlightenment 
on this issue, that is *meaning* versus *information*

The fact that the interpreter can interpret means that the 
interpreter already knows the meaning of any accepted 
informational form.  Isn't this how compilers and interpreters 
in a computer work?

wrb

> -Original Message-
> From: everything-list@googlegroups.com [mailto:everything-
> l...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of meekerdb
> Sent: Friday, March 01, 2013 7:11 PM
> To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
> Subject: Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information
> 
> On 3/1/2013 5:27 PM, William R. Buckley wrote:
> >> Thinking about how information content of a message
> > Big mistake.  Information is never contained with but
> > exactly one exception, an envelope.
> >
> > I made this point with Jesper Hoffmeyer regarding a
> > statement in his book Biosemiotics, that information
> > is represented but not contained in that representation.
> > That marks of chalk upon slate may be taken to represent
> > information at a meta level above the reality of streaks
> > of a deformed amorphous solid has nothing to do with
> > the information represented by that deformation, nor the
> > increase of entropy associated with the greater disorder
> > obtained from that deformation; these are but three of
> > the *informations* to be found upon review of those
> > streaks.  Entropy is how nature sees information (not
> > yet an established fact but I think the tea leaves read
> > clear enough) but that has (presumably) nothing to do
> > with how intelligent individuals see information, or
> > as von Uexküll called such phenomena, signs.
> >
> > Most definitely the information is not to be found
> > within the material of its expression, its representation.
> > Rather, the information is already to be found within the
> > interpreter.
> 
> But where is it found within the interpreter?  When the Mars Rover
> receives photons in
> it's camera which it interprets as an obstructing rock that
> interpretation is "just"
> physical tokens too. So isn't it a matter viewpoint whether to look at
> the causal chain of
> tokens or look at the behavior and call it interpreting information?
> 
> Brent
> 
> >
> > That which is information is so by virtue of the acceptor
> > of that information; else, it is noise.
> >
> > And, write the information on a piece of paper and seal
> > the paper within an envelope and you may justifiably
> > claim that the information is contained; else, you are
> > deluding yourself.
> >
> >> has an inversely proportionate relationship with the
> >> capacity of sender and receiver to synchronize with
> >> each other.
> >>
> > 
> >
> > wrb
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> 
> --
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> Groups "Everything List" group.
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Re: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[meekerdb]

On 3/1/2013 5:27 PM, William R. Buckley wrote:

Thinking about how information content of a message

Big mistake.  Information is never contained with but
exactly one exception, an envelope.

I made this point with Jesper Hoffmeyer regarding a
statement in his book Biosemiotics, that information
is represented but not contained in that representation.
That marks of chalk upon slate may be taken to represent
information at a meta level above the reality of streaks
of a deformed amorphous solid has nothing to do with
the information represented by that deformation, nor the
increase of entropy associated with the greater disorder
obtained from that deformation; these are but three of
the *informations* to be found upon review of those
streaks.  Entropy is how nature sees information (not
yet an established fact but I think the tea leaves read
clear enough) but that has (presumably) nothing to do
with how intelligent individuals see information, or
as von Uexküll called such phenomena, signs.

Most definitely the information is not to be found
within the material of its expression, its representation.
Rather, the information is already to be found within the
interpreter.


But where is it found within the interpreter?  When the Mars Rover receives photons in 
it's camera which it interprets as an obstructing rock that interpretation is "just" 
physical tokens too. So isn't it a matter viewpoint whether to look at the causal chain of 
tokens or look at the behavior and call it interpreting information?


Brent



That which is information is so by virtue of the acceptor
of that information; else, it is noise.

And, write the information on a piece of paper and seal
the paper within an envelope and you may justifiably
claim that the information is contained; else, you are
deluding yourself.


has an inversely proportionate relationship with the
capacity of sender and receiver to synchronize with
each other.




wrb



  
  



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RE: Messages Aren't Made of Information

[William R. Buckley]

>Thinking about how information content of a message

Big mistake.  Information is never contained with but 
exactly one exception, an envelope.

I made this point with Jesper Hoffmeyer regarding a 
statement in his book Biosemiotics, that information 
is represented but not contained in that representation.
That marks of chalk upon slate may be taken to represent 
information at a meta level above the reality of streaks 
of a deformed amorphous solid has nothing to do with 
the information represented by that deformation, nor the 
increase of entropy associated with the greater disorder 
obtained from that deformation; these are but three of 
the *informations* to be found upon review of those 
streaks.  Entropy is how nature sees information (not 
yet an established fact but I think the tea leaves read 
clear enough) but that has (presumably) nothing to do 
with how intelligent individuals see information, or 
as von Uexküll called such phenomena, signs.

Most definitely the information is not to be found 
within the material of its expression, its representation.
Rather, the information is already to be found within the 
interpreter.

That which is information is so by virtue of the acceptor 
of that information; else, it is noise.

And, write the information on a piece of paper and seal 
the paper within an envelope and you may justifiably 
claim that the information is contained; else, you are 
deluding yourself.

>has an inversely proportionate relationship with the 
>capacity of sender and receiver to synchronize with 
>each other.
>



wrb



 
 

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