I'm not sure what your reference is to. So wavefunction is total information about a system. Is information then a mathematical construct or a physical reality? — Mark Nyquist

Information is interaction. Ideally it is evolutionary interaction. But within that interaction, something external has to be translated to an internal structure of knowledge ( constructivism style ). At minimum, that knowledge structure gets changed............Bear in mind, I am conceptualizing this to something that makes sense to me. I haven't heard it explained quite like this before. And frankly Information seems to be one of those concepts like consciousness, that we have been largely blind to.

I think the definitions presented earlier are reliable, and I can not find alternative better ones. Have you had any luck?

Information is interaction. — Pop

Why is that? Ten equal pieces of paper with different numbers on them (1 digit) contain the same information (when expressed as a number). The form of the different numbers is different though. The entropic definition of information does not take that into account though. Does interaction?

"The wavefunction is the total information about a system,"

Almost correct. The wavefunction contains only information about the chances where to find a particle. Or the chances of finding a momentum in a certain range. The total information about a system is dependent on the configuration of the particles wrt to each other. But if there is no interaction with the systems surroundings, this wavefunction wavers out in phasespace (well, the position part wavers out while the momentum part collapses). After a while all useful information will be lost. The chances are conserved though (unitarity). Information about these chances, or better, the particles with their chances are conserved whenn falling into a black hole. — Prishon

Hey guys, something cool.

In trying to validate this definition of information. I thought about the double slit experiment and wave function collapse, and much to my delight the definition is consistent. Bear in mind I used no physics at all to arrive at it . I used information theory ( personal understanding ) reductionism, and systems theory, @Daniel was a great help.

Information enables the interaction of form, But it doesn't enable the interaction of something that has no form. You cannot provide me something that has no information - ever! Since in order for information to occur, interaction has to cause a change to a system. So this would explain why the wave function collapses, but get this - it also predicts entanglement cannot contain information, can only contain information at the point of collapse. It also explains Wigner's friend scenario.

The interaction element of information is missing in most understanding of information. What do you think?

** interaction creates information.

I must have failed to make clear that I wanted to interrogate the alleged connection as laid out on the linked wiki page, and follow the definitions used there.

That's probably a bigger ask than I assumed, and less to be expected of physicists than I assumed.

Thanks anyway.

Why is that? Ten equal pieces of paper with different numbers on them (1 digit) contain the same information (when expressed as a number). — Prishon

Not until you interact with them.

You cannot provide me something that has no information - ever! — Pop

A state of matter at zero Kelvin contains zero information. There is only one state. Since S=lnN the information is zero.

Not until you interact with them. — Pop

Also when you interact.

A state of matter at zero Kelvin contains zero information. There is only one state. Since S=lnN the information is zero. — Prishon

That observation is an interaction.

Also when you interact. — Prishon

Yes.

But don't quiz me much further. I'm still trying to understand it myself. :smile:

I think it is a paradigm thing.

** Realists / materialists assume a mind independent world.

That observation is an interaction. — Pop

I dont make an observation of the state. I imagine it. It can exist without me interacting with it. The state came to be because of interaction, thats true. In fact interactions are necessary for systems to develop. Isolation does no good for a system. It gets more and more diffuse. If all the systems mass is converted to photons (by introducing antimatter) the photons posses energy but still the information is zero. Of course their the associated quantum field configuration contains energy. But that's pure energy. Pure energy (photons but also gluons, hypergluons, or gravitons) does not necessarily contain information. The same holds for mass. Its the *form* that contains information. Be it entropic (the number of states) or the different forms containing the same entropic information (the different figures on a oiece of paper). These different forms owe their existence indeed to interactions. A number 8 form is different from the other numbers because of different interactions ( but they contain the same number of information). An 8 written up by us has the information content of being a number. So have the other digits written uo. They need interaction with brain content to get their useful meaning. For a person loving ballgames, the 8 resembles two piled up balls. The 6 can be a head with a hair on one side. Evolution of lifeforms took place because the Earth finds itself rotating between the hot sun on one side and the freezing space on the other. Heat flowed on the surface of the Earth giving rise to different forms in matter like the diiferent digits on the paper. Every living system contains about the same number of information but not maximal nor minimal. Different animals are as it were the different digits on paper. But with eyes and nice different bodies and different internal and external worlds.

Almost correct. The wavefunction contains only information about the chances where to find a particle. — Prishon

I'm not going to reply to each of your daft comments, but as a physicist I guess I'm obliged to treat this. What you've just said is equivalent to "Only the position operator can be used to find expectation values of the wavefunction." Which is, of course, total rubbish.

Good point. I'll correct myself. The wavefunction is our best representation of the information about a system. A crowbar separation there between representation of a thing and a thing itself. The actual information properly belongs to the physical system itself imo, where each of its constituent parts are, not where we represent them to be, how each are moving, not how we represent their motions, what their charges, spins, masses, etc. are. How we represent it is irrelevant to what it is. Always good to demand clarity on that point.

Thanks, your input is invaluable as I don't have a physics background, so could not verify the definition in reference to that knowledge.

It is true you don't make an observation , but imagine one, and the same situation arises, and this still needs to be understood.

Form seems to be the thing the universe is evolving. This impression converges from several angles, and you are suggesting something of the sort.

Form is endlessly variable and open ended. But it enables a substance to mesh into the larger system, such that it can interact.** form is something the universe needs itself. :smile:

Only the position operator can be used to find expectation values of the wavefunction." Which is, of course, total rubbish. — Kenosha Kid

Where did I state that? The momentum operator can too. I do QM in phasespace.

Honestly the first thought that came into my head when you @ed me was, "I think this guy's gonna be a waste of time." Unfortunately the second thought was "He's @ed me, it's polite to answer". My final thought is "Politeness with this guy is a waste of time." :rofl:

The wavefunction is our best representation of the information about a system — Kenosha Kid

Rubbish!

Where did I state that? The momentum operator can too. — Prishon

Then the wavefunction doesn't merely encode position, but also momentum. In fact, the wavefunction encodes any property for which you can construct a complete basis set of eigenstates, which is why the statement:

The wavefunction contains only information about the chances where to find a particle. — Prishon

is bullshit.

I do QM in phasespace. — Prishon

Do you really mean phase space rather than reciprocal space? Then you're doing it wrong. Or, more likely, lying about doing it at all.

I dont make an observation of the state. I imagine it. It can exist without me interacting with it. — Prishon

I guess we would have to say your imagination is a physical interaction neurally?

Do you really mean phase space rather than reciprocal space? Then you're doing it wrong. Or, more likely, lying about doing it at all. — Kenosha Kid

I mean phasespace. The combined view. Luckily I had a good teacher. The Wigner function rules suppreme there. Position wavers and momentum converges.When the system doesnt interact.

Do you really mean phase space rather than reciprocal space? Then you're doing it wrong. Or, more likely, lying about doing it at all. — Kenosha Kid

Why are you not the one lying?For a physicist, as yiu claim to be, you make a lot of fundamental mistakes...

I guess we would have to say your imagination is a physical interaction neurally? — Pop

Good observation! Yes, the forms whirling around (forms are indeed the thing) in my inner world couldnt exist without interaction. Like the forms in the ohysical world. In my neural network virtual ALL forms cen whirl around. Interactions shape bith forms (in bothe the outside and insude world(. Both forms are interdependent.

Excuses for the spelling. My phone. My girlfriend tells (shouts) to get my ass from behind that phone... :smile:

That's not the wavefunction. The wavefunction is a probability amplitude. The Wigner function is a probability field. You lose information going from the former to the latter in the same way you lose information going from the wavefunction to the density, or density matrix. (That said, Hohenberg & Kohn... That said, steady-state currents...)

Why are you not the one lying? — Prishon

Because I'm the one who knows that you can get more than positions out of a wavefunction maybe? Which suggests I've at least seen the time-independent Schrödinger equation.

Because I'm the one who knows that you can get more than positions out of a wavefunction maybe? — Kenosha Kid

Again you jump to unexamied conclusions. Where did I state you cant get more than position from the wavefunction? Calling the Wigner function a fiekd I find very strange. QFT is not what we discuss now. We discuss the wavefunction which is derivable from fields. Who is the liar? You.

Which suggests I've at least seen the time-independent Schrödinger equation. — Kenosha Kid

Im way past that equation. Sorry...

As Thompson’s recent reappraisal of Husserl indicates, it was never phenomenology that trafficked in Cartesianism and representationalism, it was the early Anglo-American interpreters of Husserl who imposed their own bias on phenomenology. — Joshs

As I noted at the start, Husserl seemed surprisingly keen to contribute to this misunderstanding then.

No philosopher of the past has affected the sense of phenomenology as decisively as René Descartes, France’s greatest thinker. Phenomenology must honor him as its genuine patriarch. It must be said explicitly that the study of Descartes’ Meditations has influenced directly the formation of the developing phenomenology and given it its present form, to such an extent that phenomenology might almost be called a new, a twentieth century, Cartesianism.

Husserl E. (1964) The Paris Lectures

How we represent it is irrelevant to what it is. — Kenosha Kid

Then I agree.

You should have paused to understand it en route. At least you'd have been exposed to more than the position operator.

Where did I state you cant get more than position from the wavefunction? — Prishon

The wavefunction contains only information about the chances where to find a particle. — Prishon

Unless you're suggesting you can get information out of the system that isn't in it to begin with...

Calling the Wigner function a fiekd I find very strange. QFT is not what we discuss now. — Prishon

Oh god. A field is a mathematical object that takes different values at different coordinates and that supports addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. Quantum fields of QFT are fields, yes. Not all fields are quantum fields. Like how all squares are rectangles but not all rectangles are squares, yes?

:up:

At fundamental energy, two wavicles modulate their information ( frequency, amplitude, etc ) to a resultant wavicle that "integrates that information".

This is all that ever happens, can happen.

This continues to amass until it gets to a density of elementary particles, then atoms, then molecules, etc

These are all symbolized forms. Forms are the things that represent order, in pockets of the universe experiencing a phase state of self organization. forms are the thing evolving.

Is there some bosonic force creating this order?

This would be the thing doing the thinking? - Integrating the information to various forms.