Information as the source of life; not by chance II (Introduction)

by David Turell , Thursday, May 14, 2020, 23:19 (1435 days ago) @ dhw

QUOTES: "The concept of information makes no sense in the absence of something to be informed—that is, a conscious observer capable of choice, or free will (sorry, I can't help it, free will is an obsession). If all the humans in the world vanished tomorrow, all the information would vanish, too."

dhw: I was tempted to ignore this, as we have covered it over and over again. The whole discussion is pointless unless the writer defines what he means by information. Information to me means the facts about a given subject or object or event or person etc. etc. The sun must contain millions of facts. It takes a mind to observe or record them, but that does not mean that the facts are not there without being observed. This is solipsism gone mad!

The info is there with or without humans, but is unrecognized without minds being present to understand it. Information can also exist if it is instructional information as to how to run processes that create life, but they must come from a mind because minds and information are always tied together. You never have production of coded instructive information without mind/minds to create it. But it is also perfectly reasonable that the mind that creates the code can also give what is produced the ability to interpret and follow the coded instructions automatically.