You should accept the premise of the possible world, since in our relationship with the world, it is shown as something that is not given once and for all (the future is not given). That is why the horizon I am talking about is presented as a possibility, because, for example, we do not know what will happen in the future, and the future is the future of the world where our actions will take place. So there is a continuity between the state of the world "not given once and for all" and our horizon of possibility of the world. For it is obvious that when we look at the world, it is not given once and for all, that is, the future has not yet happened.

I have not changed things, I have simply expressed a series of implications that are in the notion of the horizon of the world. As I said, there is a non-given world, and this is closely related to the concept of possibility. How is it related? Well, it is very simple: if the world is not given once and for all and we project ourselves into the future, these projections are possibilities that have the non-given world as their horizon, that is, the future, that is, the possible.

The possible world that is our horizon of action and intentional acts cannot, however, be necessary, as this contradicts our experience of the world, since it is not always given once and for all. Nor can it be impossible, because impossibility negates possibility. And our intentional acts are expressed as possibility and something that can happen, as something not given but that can happen. So there is a continuity between the non-given world and our horizon of the world, which is the horizon of the possible world.

Possibilities are determined by minds, and it is commonly recognized that possibilities are distinctly determinations which are NOT IN THE WORLD. — Metaphysician Undercover

Not in the world just like that, but in a possible world. But it is still a world as telos and exteriority. That is why possibility has a horizon of realisation, and the world is realisation, possible, actual or not. It does not matter if our purposes do not fit into the actual world, but what matters is that they have the world and realisation as their telos. The world is inscribed in the concept of possibility, which is why I say that it is its inherent horizon. In this sense, minds are also thrown into the world; our intentional acts, being possibilities, are inscribed in this telos. Thus, there is a continuity between mind and world, but the world is no longer that thing that is determined once and for all, but rather possesses two shadows, which we call past and future as possibilities and as contingencies. What is actual is at once possible but neither necessary nor impossible. The world thus, a world of pure possibility, is in continuity with the consciousness of possibility.

If you look closely, its possibility is determined by the horizon of the world. How can something be possible if it does not mean possible IN THE WORLD? This shows that its nature of possibility has the world as its horizon.

Why do you say that the dualism is hidden? I don't think that free will and intention can be understood without dualism so the dualism is blatant. — Metaphysician Undercover

Ok. Then si no hidden.

Your use of "operationally" indicates that we have a common ground here. However, it seems that I recognize intention as a discontinuity, whereas you attempt to sweep it under the rug, and claim "continuity" regardless of the break which intention produces between concepts and the world. — Metaphysician Undercover

It is a discontinuity because of the lack of necessity in relation to ends. — Metaphysician Undercover

I speak of continuity because our intentions are thrown into the world. That is, there is a determining exteriority in our intentional acts (It is no coincidence that the world has historically been understood as exteriority). Our intentions have purposes in the world. Hence, it is necessary to speak of intentions extended in our operations (the body, for example, building and manipulating a machine to measure something). The fact that there are many possible ends does not change this continuity at all as long as it remains on the horizon of the world. A world that demands that we and our intentions be operational, whatever the purpose we are talking about.

There is a hidden dualism in your position. You think of a kind of purpose and intentional acts that have nothing to do with the world and its operational demands. It is the division between mind and body that makes the mind something totally detached from the world and the body, as if walking and having a different horizon. And I cannot agree with that. As I have said, our intentional acts (including madness) have the world as their horizon.

So when we deal with the quantum system, we are not simply inventing concepts and ideas that happen to be adequate by pure chance, but there is an operational continuity that allows us to deal accurately with different phenomena in the quantum world.

What is measured is a quantity of energy, and that is purely conceptual, just like 1.3 metres is purely conceptual in the example above. And 20 marbles is purely conceptual, as is 35 millimetres of rain. — Metaphysician Undercover

If it is purely conceptual, then it is impossible to explain how, operationally, there is a correspondence between our concepts (language) and the world. Operationally means that we work with the world, and ideas and concepts help us to deal with things. And it works! There are also restrictions that limit us in our language and concepts. That is what allows us to differentiate between science and pure imagination.

Thus, your idealistic and anti-realist position fails to account for the usefulness of concepts and ideas, and above all, it cannot justify why, when we deal with the world through ideas and concepts, we are even able to predict future events. Your position is anti-realist, while mine is pragmatic and operational. So when we deal with the quantum system, we are not simply inventing concepts and ideas that happen to be adequate by pure chance, but there is an operational continuity that allows us to deal accurately with different phenomena in the quantum world.

Of course the device interacts with the system — Metaphysician Undercover

System is a concept just like apparatus. You should flatly deny this, since there is no continuity or operability between our concepts and ideas and the world.

Therefore design and construction of the device, as well as interpretation of the reading, are both essential aspects of the measurement act — Metaphysician Undercover

I agree. I should not have said measurement excluding the scientist's intentional acts. What I should have said to avoid this misunderstanding that you point out is the following:

"I believe that ontologically there is continuity between the device and what is measured. The same applies to the phenomena that occur in the device, like detections and interferences."

But what you correctly point out does not change my argument, it only changes the words. The argument is that of the necessary ontological continuity between the device and what is measured. That is why the scientist's interpretation does not affect the phenomenon of detection and brakeup of isolation that ultimately causes the quantum system to acquire classical properties.

This rules out the idealistic interpretation of quantum physics that gave scientists powers they do not actually possess. Interpreting data, although an essential part of measurement, does not interact with the isolated quantum system. That is the job of the measuring device, which does interact with the quantum system.

In your determination to avoid attributing agency to the observer you assign it to the device, as if it were itself autonomous. But it’s just a projection, and one I think that is mistaken for the reasons I’ve already given. — Wayfarer

Not at all. I am simply describing what is actually happening. Since we do not interact with the isolated quantum system, the measuring device does so. Causally, what happens is as follows:

The scientist activates the device —> the device interacts with the quantum system —> the quantum system is affected by the device —> the scientist interprets.

I don't think there is any truth to such a proposition of continuity. Measurement is always based in principles, and carried out as an intentional act. Therefore there is always a medium between what is measured and the measurement. This medium, of intentional acts carried out according to principles, necessitates that we understand a discontinuity between measurement and the thing measured. — Metaphysician Undercover

I am referring to measurement as the phenomenon that takes place in the measuring device. For example, interference, detection, etc. I am not referring to the intentional acts by which the scientist interprets what happens there.

If you do not want to go that route, you either adopt other 'realist' interpretations or you adopt an epistemic one, where the 'collapse' is simply a way to describe the change of knowlege/degree of belief of an agent after a measurement. These views do not say that mind creates reality but they recognize that we have a limitation in our ability to know the physical world. 'How the workd is' independent of any observation is not knowable. — boundless

Keep in mind that the quantum system is in isolation. The measuring device, as I understand it, breaks that isolation at the moment of measurement. Then the classical properties appear. What I am saying is that epistemic interpretation has no place here, since it is the measuring device that breaks that isolation, not the calculations we make. This is where the problem arises: the measurement interferes with the system and takes it out of its isolation. But it is the apparatus, not our calculations, since they do not interact with the isolated system.

but what makes it a measuring device is not its material composition but its role as an artifact that embodies human purposes and generates observables. It’s precisely that interpretive element that material continuity by itself can’t account for. — Wayfarer

Measuring is actually an interaction, like with a quantum sensor. There is simply an interference that appears and was not there before. We are the ones who become aware of that sign.

But I'm beginning to understand where you're going. You seem to be referring to all types of measurement, quantum or otherwise, and how it becomes meaningful to us. Here, the theory of signs that I use is useful, where meaning is an intrinsic property of things, regardless of whether the thing is material or not. A sign is in place of something else and refers to it. Meaning arises as a product of the relationship between signs. A sign can be linguistic or non-linguistic, material or non-material. In the case of quantum physics, we deal with linguistic and non-linguistic signs.

An interference is a sign because, but not only because, it interacts with us who have a language (a system of learned signs). In my case the mystery is solved by discovering the pansemiotic nature of the world. However, contrary to idealism, we must recognise that signs and semiosis exceed consciousness and its present. This is due to the nature of signs, which constantly refer to the non-present (in this case, the present of consciousness).

Have you considered non-linear and retroactive causality?

You are proceeding in the wrong direction with this. The quantum phenomenon itself, as produced in the lab, and observed, is completely artificial. It's all created with specific experimental intentions. There is nothing "natural" about it, it is entirely artificial — Metaphysician Undercover

For me, what is artificial is not another world, as if it were necessary to establish an ontological dualism between the natural and the artificial. I believe that ontologically there is a continuity between measurement and what is measured. Even if the entire experiment is artificial, there is still an ontological continuity that allows us to interact and 'create' the experiment. In that sense, the experiment is like a work of art, which may be artificial and created, but does not break with our natural world.

The attempt to 'naturalise the instrument' conceals rather than resolves the very interpretive questions that quantum physics forces on us. — Wayfarer

Consider the material from which the measuring device is made. Don't you think there is an ontological continuity between the device and the quantum phenomenon? In other words, there must be a reason why there can be an interaction. Just as our hands can grasp a piece of wood because both are composed of atoms, etc. The measuring instrument is the hand and the quantum phenomenon is the piece of wood. In that sense, the measuring device is 'natural' because it belongs to nature, because it is made of metal parts, etc. That is why I simply say that the measuring device is actually an improbable object, but that it does not defy the laws of physics nor is it made of unnatural compounds.

That is a strange statement you make. If it possesses some kind of mental property and it is ours, it is like simply saying that it does not possess it and we possess it. In any case, do you agree that it is the measuring device without mental properties that collapses the wave function and not our subjectivity?

And that is the cost — the de-humanisation is the legacy of this division. When you say “the machine provokes a response in us,” you’re still trying to frame the matter purely in terms of physical causation. But signs are not physical things. They are relations, interpretations, meanings — irreducible to mechanism, yet not “ghostly” either. This is precisely the false dichotomy that the ghost of Descartes has saddled us with. The irony is that by trying to exorcise the ghost, we remain haunted by it. The world this ghost inhabits is one in which the entire cosmos is stripped of interiority and meaning, and we ourselves are left as the orphaned offspring of blind physical causes that somehow, against all odds, have given rise to mind. — Wayfarer

If you look closely at what I am trying to explain, I do not limit the idea of a sign to mechanism or physicalism. I only limit it to our relationship with the machine. For me, a sign can be mental or material, and it is the bridge I have discovered between the mental and the non-mental. However, the measuring device as a producer of signs does not produce mental signs. The sign simply has the function of 'being in place of'. And of pointing to other signs with which they enter into various relationships. And we are precisely a system of signs, complex but a system of signs.

So this measuring device has effects on us, semiotic effects that respect everything human about us. However, we are not only human, we are also systems of signs and producers of them, we also have something of machines or bodies (transhumanism) and this is what allows us to interact with the device. Why not say that there is something mental in the measuring device? It is a remnant of humanism and anthropomorphism, which for me is outdated and for which we have no proof. But we do have proof of the non-human, the non-mental through the possibility of corporal and operative interaction with the device (otherwise we should manipulate the device only with our minds). That is why it is important to think of the measuring device as something extra-mental.

From the measuring device's side, yes, the signs are material and mechanical. And these signs have effects on us; they create information and knowledge.

Must? Why? — Manuel

Because You interact with the quantum world through the measuring device. But this device has no mental properties. So you have to adapt to the device in order to learn anything about the quantum world. And this adaptation is through signs.

And consciousness? What about the experience of consciousness is "mechanical", colors, sounds, smells, thoughts seem to me to be extremely different from a "machine" in any meaningful way this word may be used — Manuel

I leave the mystery of consciousness intact. I simply speak of a necessary ontological continuity that is expressed through signs. Colours, sounds and smells are not something that the measuring device perceives consciously. We must think of ourselves in terms of the device and not the other way around, since everything that identifies us as conscious beings is not found in the device except for interaction through physical signs. That is why I think it is wrong to talk about intentions in the apparatus.

The apparatus measures, but not with the intention of measuring. It is characteristic of idealism in quantum physics to introduce mental aspects into the apparatus. But these aspects are nowhere to be found.

To me, that sounds like the ghost in the machine. But if we look closely at how the measuring device works, that fantasy of the ghost in the machine disappears. The measuring device simply interacts, and it does so physically, and that is all there is to it, nothing more.

A question arises: how can the machine provide us with information? For me, if there is no Ghost in the machine the answer no longer lies in how the machine resembles us, but in how we resemble the machine. The machine affects us and informs us, but it no longer informs us in the sense that the machine transmits something (a ghost in the numbers it produces and in how it responds to specific events), but rather it provokes something in us and in our cognitive apparatus.

In other words, instead of embodying our intentions, the machine has an effect on us through physical signs. And these effects on us (knowledge) would not take place if we were not also an apparatus of signs. An ontological continuity between us and the machine is necessary without the need to introduce mysterious intentions into the measuring apparatus; something like an intention is never something that can be proven, and is simply anthropomorphism.

I wouldn't say they are unnatural. Rather, improbable. Something like a measuring device is not out of this world. That is, there is a reason why there is interaction with quantum states. A reason why they can be measured. There is an ontological continuity between the measuring device and that which is measured.

I take your point that we should not confuse subjectivity with the role of the measuring apparatus. Of course it is the detector, not personal awareness, that interacts with the system. But the question that persists — and this is what makes the problem metaphysical — is: why does the interaction only count as a measurement when it enters the domain of observables, that is, when it becomes information available to us? — Wayfarer

Once we naturalise the measuring device, it becomes something external to subjectivity. In this sense, measurement is a natural process like any other in nature. It should be noted that our quantum physics experiments require isolation. That is why the measuring device breaks that isolation and what is in quantum coherence becomes decoherent. But that apparatus is part of the experiment's environment! This means that the measuring apparatus and non-subjective reality are identified.

For me, this is a sufficient explanation that frees us from possible idealistic interpretations of quantum physics. Measuring is a natural act that is identified with the external world.

I believe that philosophy takes a stand against common sense. Philosophy must question our most deeply rooted certainties. In that sense, philosophy is there to sadden us, as Deleuze would say, and make us realise our stupidity. Philosophy today has the task of teaching us counter-intuitive things.

With the benefit of hindsight, at least some of Berkeley’s philosophy remains plausible. In On Physics and Philosophy (2006), physicist Bernard d’Espagnat refers to Bishop Berkeley — not to endorse his immaterialism, but to acknowledge that quantum theory has unsettled the once-unquestioned assumption of an observer-independent reality⁸. Paradoxically, a scientific revolution formerly anticipated as the pinnacle of physical realism ends up reviving precisely the kind of metaphysical questions Berkeley posed in the early 18th century! — Wayfarer

I have always been somewhat perplexed by this. The Copenhagen interpretation revives a strong idealism like that of Berkeley. My position, as seen elsewhere, attempts to rid quantum physics of this idealism, which implies rejecting the Copenhagen interpretation. There is a mentalism, or mental causation, which, in my opinion, must be eliminated from the interpretation of quantum physics. But such elimination requires naturalising the measuring apparatus. In other words, understanding that it is our measuring apparatus that interacts with this quantum reality and not our subjectivity. Our subjectivity cannot interact with, say, the box in which the cat is placed.

Information in its richest full blooded reality, is semiosis, meaning. Information really is informare, to "put form into" - what we encounter as conscious agents is signs, signs which mean something for us as interpreters, not some abstract notion of information. — Bodhy

Exactly.

Surely there's something on that list you did not know a minute ago. The information is now in your mind, and it's there because you read your computer screen. — Patterner

According to my theory, there is no information in that list, as if something passes from your mind to symbols on a screen. As I have tried to explain, the symbols on the screen have their own autonomy and cause effects in our learned language, generating meaning or information. In this sense, information never crosses anything but is constantly created. But we are under the illusion that something crossed from one mind to another, that we communicated something, when in reality what we have done is affect another person with the use of signs, causing meaning or information in that person.

In other words, information is always provoked but is never something that crosses things like a ghost contained in signs.

Consider the difference between your representation, of three distinct colours, and my representation of two distinct colours producing the appearance of a third, through mixing. The problem with yours is that it produces the need for two distinct boundaries, one between present and past, and one between present and future. This is what is required to isolate the present as distinct, and the only true "substance". That, I see as an unnecessary complication, actually producing three distinct substances. You class the two, future and past together, as other than being. But this is incorrect, because the difference between future and past disallows them from being classed together. The problem with mine is that it produces the need for skepticism and doubt concerning our "experience of the present". There is an appearance that the present is distinct, and separate from the past and future, as the substance of being, but that appearance is misleading. Which do you think i more logically consistent with your own conscious being, yours or mine? — Metaphysician Undercover

Hi,

The difference I explain between present, past and future is a difference in their constitutive roles. If the past and future are constituents of the present, then the present is not something pure, but something that does not participate in ousia or substance. There would be no need to make the present something totally different from the past and future, since all three do not participate in ousia. The difference between these three must be thought of differently from how we normally think of three different things, since they are not so different and their difference is erased at every moment.

Your position fails, i think, when it demands precision, since you are seeking to differentiate between past, present and future by treating them as substances. In other words, for me there is a complicity between the demand for precision and the idea of a classical difference between three substances. For me, it is necessary that the difference between past, present and future be unclear and constantly erased in order to show that consciousness is more than the present: it is being erased in a difference distinct from presence and ousia. For me, it is necessary that the difference between past, present and future is not clear and is constantly blurred in order to show that consciousness is more than just the present: it is being blurred in a difference distinct from presence and ousia. This implies introducing non-being as part of its essence. This implies that the world is not distinct from consciousness insofar as the world has been classically conceived as the non-being of consciousness. In this sense, the world is something different from consciousness, but it is also something equal to consciousness.

In other words, the conclusion I would reach according to my position is that the world and consciousness differ, but not according to a classical difference as we understand it according to the logic of identity. The difference shows us that there is something of the world in consciousness and there is something of consciousness in the world.

I don't think we can make this conclusion. The flow of time itself appears to be continuous, as a continuous activity, but consider what is happening. Future time becomes past time. August 29 will change from being in the future to being in past. In the meantime, it must traverse the present. What I propose is that the present acts more like a division between past and future, than as a union of the two. Therefore the relation between past and future is discontinuous. — Metaphysician Undercover

From my point of view, the division between past, present, and future is like a painting where three colors are differentiated without there being a clear division. There is a difference between past and future, but the difference is not clear. The discontinuous view of time requires punctuality in which each moment stops, and we would see how everything stops at each moment. But experience shows us the opposite

The difference between the deterministic world view, and the free will world view, is that the deterministic perspective assumes a continuity of existence, from past, through the present, to the future. This is what is supposed to be a necessary continuity, stated by Newton's first law. Things will continue to be, in the future, as they have been, in the past, unless forced to change. Any change is caused by another thing continuing to be as it has been, so that any change is already laid out, determined. That support a block type universe.

The free will perspective allows that as time passes, there is real possibility for change, which is not a continuity of the past. This violates Newton's first law. But in order to allow, in principle, for the possibility of this 'real change', we must break the assumed continuity of existence, past through present, into future. We must allow that at any moment of passing time, Newton's first law, the determinist premise, may be violated. This means that the idea of a thing having equal existence on the future and past side of present, would have to be dismissed as wrong. What this implies is that an object's existence is recreated at each moment of passing time. This is the only principle which will allow that a freely willed act can interfere in the continuity of existence, i.e. the continuity of existence is false. Of course, this is not difficult to accept, for those who believe that objects are a creation of the mind, anyway. The mind can only create the object as time passes. — Metaphysician Undercover

I understand what you mean, thank you for the clarification.

Why do we need to guarantee such a unity? From the free will perspective this proposed unity makes no sense. Experience is entirely past. We have no experience of the future. We think of the future in terms of possibilities, but it is irrational for me to think that all possibilities will come to pass, and be a part of my experience. Only those possibilities which are actualized will be experienced. Therefore we cannot say that the future and past are united in experience. Only the past has been experienced, and future possibilities always remain outside of experience. — Metaphysician Undercover

I speak of guaranteeing the unity of experience simply because I am talking about consciousness and how time passes through it. In this sense, the time of consciousness is analogous to that of the world, but it is not strictly that of the world; it is only a point where a little time flows, so to speak. A small number of events compared to the vastness of all events in the universe.

I agree with this, except there is one big problem. The problem is that we understand the non-present to consist of two parts which are radically different, the past and the future. We know that with respect to the future there is real possibility in relation to what we will do, and what will come to pass. And, we also know that with respect to the past there is an actuality as to what we have done, and what has come to pass. So, if we accept this as a reality, that the past consists of actuality, and the future consists of possibility, dualism is unavoidable — Metaphysician Undercover

For me, the past and the future do not belong to being, so I cannot say that they are substances and therefore I cannot say that there is any dualism. Ousia is precisely present, and this can be found in Aristotle's physics. And when I speak of non-presents, I am speaking of something that is neither ousia nor substance. As I see it, we must opt for a category other than being and substance. Something other than substantialism. Derrida calls them traces, as things that are not present, but never totally absent, since we come into contact with them and they constitute us. According to this, we are made up of traces of the past and the future.

Protension is the way that we relate to the future, and retention is the way that we relate to the past. As being at the present, we recognize a significant, even substantial difference between the two, past and future. — Metaphysician Undercover

Exactly. But the flow of time implies that the relation with the past and the future is not discontinuous. That is why our present is constantly related to non-presents and non-consciousnesses in the flow of time.

Deterministic principles serve to dissolve this difference. — Metaphysician Undercover

Here you lost me. Can you explain this?

We can understand that within the conscious being, the two distinct substances of past and future, are united into one, as retention and protension, and this constitutes conscious being at the present. This implies that being at the present, consciousness, "is constituted at the most fundamental level", as a combination of these two distinct things, past and future. — Metaphysician Undercover

They cannot be two consciousnesses as two substances. Because we have to guarantee the unity of experience, for example that the past is a past of mine just as the future is a future of mine. In this sense we are body, where non-presents and non-consciousnesses constitute us. This body is the world that constitutes us.

The non-present, which is "the form of the world", must necessarily be divided into two, to accomodate an adequate understanding of it. This is due to that substantial difference between past and future, and the result is that some form of dualism is necessary in order to derive an appropriate conception of "the world" — Metaphysician Undercover

It is not a dualism it is simply two dimensions that relate to the present. But the important thing is that they are constitutive and non-present. In that sense consciousness is constituted by that which is not it. We do not perceive these dimensions in themselves unlike the present. There is something that is not conscious that constitutes consciousness. I call it the form of the world because we normally understand the world as something beyond consciousness and distinct from experience. There is an analogy with the non-present and the non-conscious.

In my opinion, in order to understand the other of consciousness, one must understand how consciousness is constituted at the most fundamental level. And consciousness is constituted at the most fundamental level as present and immediate time. Thanks to Husserl's analyses, we understand that consciousness is constituted at this level by diferences in protensions and retentions. This implies that there is always a non-present side with which consciousness is continuously in contact. This non-present is precisely the form of the world, as something not given in consciousness. In this sense, the existence of the world can be maintained as something distinct with which consciousness relates. But even more, it is consciousness itself that is constituted by the non-present, so it can be said that consciousness is constituted by the very nature of the world as non-present. To deny the world, we must deny the existence of the non-present. But that non-present is fundamental to consciousness and its functioning.

The world is like a note on the refrigerator. It is always pointing to the non-present. The dark side of the moon becomes a paradigmatic example of how experience works: we see it on one side, but within us there is always the hint of a non-present. This non-present is the dark side of the moon, which, if we see it, we stop seeing the other side, and the hint persists. Even to sustain the unity of the object, the hint of the non-present and the non-conscious is necessary. Its non-presence also guarantees its consistency and ultimately its existence. This is the world created by non-consciousness. Perhaps the moon does not have a dark side, but this "perhaps" is persistent and accompanies everything we call experience. It is the perhaps of what is not consciousness.

From my point of view, what we call reality does not validate our theories. In science, we work with phenomena and references, not with the aim of adapting our thinking to something we call reality. In scientific work, theories already work with phenomena and references, and this work is a kind of large mechanism in which phenomena and references function, for example, thanks to our technology and the operational practices of scientists that form the background to theories. A scientific theory is not something that is first created and then expected to be validated by something called reality; a theory is already involved in historical phenomena and references that give it a kind of validation and legitimacy.

In this sense, competing theories are not absolutely distinct from one another, since they have a historical foundation of other already legitimized theories that support them. This historical foundation is the work of scientists that precedes the creation of new theories. This historical foundation is also a practical-technical foundation in which new theories are embedded.

We must set aside the belief that our theories describe reality, but rather that they function with it, like the great machinery mentioned above. Thus, two competing theories can receive legitimacy and validation for different reasons, which may simply be socio-historical, but neither is more true than the other; rather, they may simply mesh better or worse with the entire historical and technical-scientific apparatus.

We must see science as just that, as a gigantic device of increasingly specialized practices carried out by human beings, and not simply as theories that fit reality. This device contains operations, references, phenomena, norms, legalities, practices, technologies, etc., where the theory/reality division has no place and is a mistaken and simplistic view.

. If you create an EEPROM Device, it has a format. It can form an index. And, even if you fill it with unknown characters of an unknown language, — Rocco Rosano

This is wrong once you understand the physics of a USB flash drive. That is why I have specifically referred to the cells and the charge they hold by setting up a binary language that the computer can read. But the problem is not the signs that the USB flash drive may or may not have (the cells and the charge) you have to distinguish between the language and the information. A binary language by itself does not mean anything until it is transcribed into a computer that can work with it and make us see something totally different than some 1's and 0's. That is, if you use a USB flash drive to get a Paper you have written when you understand the Paper you are reading something totally different from 1's and 0's. This implies that the information as a process jumps from language to language. But it does not jump as a preferred language, which makes it impossible to confuse our language with another language such as binary. In this sense, information is not deposited in the memory, signs are deposited that will be available for the human practice of information creation.

When information is stored, it is indexed in a memory device that has a structure to facilitate an interrogation and reply sequence. The device is generally a 'read-write' structure designed for retrieval. — Rocco Rosano

I claim that nothing is stored. Actually what happens is that it is physically configured in loaded and unloaded cells. We can associate between charge and discharge as a 0 and 1 (thus forming binary language). But a binary language by itself does not mean anything (except if we understand it, just like a pc processes it) and this is my point, it needs a translation or transcription into our language so that something like what we call information appears. Information appears and is created in the relationship, but it is never stored. Because what there is, literally are cells loaded and unloaded, then there are 0 and 1, and then there is the language that we understand. All this is a process of information, of in-forming, con-forming, trans-forming. The fiction is to believe that our language, the information that is created at an end point, is at a beginning. In reality it is a process where information is constantly created. But never stored.

In my opinion, we need to understand other aspect of consciousness. One must understand how consciousness is constituted at the most fundamental level. And consciousness is constituted at the most fundamental level as present and immediate time. Thanks to Husserl's analysis we understand that consciousness is constituted at this level by protentions and retentions. This implies that there is always a non-present side with which consciousness is continually in contact. This non-present is precisely the form of the world, as a thing not given in consciousness. In that sense one can maintain the existence of the world as a distinct other with which consciousness is related. But even more, it is consciousness itself that is constituted by non-presents, with which it can be said that consciousness is constituted by what is proper to the world as non-present. Consciousness is part of the world and the world is part of consciousness. To deny the world we must deny the existence of the non-present. But this non-present is fundamental for consciousness and for its functioning.

The beauty of the object, however, is only given as an external property in relation to a subject that interprets the sculpture. In this case the information, "the beauty" of the sculpture is given in the relationship. This is easy to prove in art, art is beautiful only in relation to us who interpret it.

But if the shape of the sculpture is beautiful, was it beautiful before anyone looked at it?

In what sense?

Either the USB has information or it doesn't. If the USB never gets information written to it then there was never any possibility that it would contain information in the first place. — Harry Hindu

Information is never in the first place. In the first place there are always signs arranged in one way or another. The difference is that there is an arrangement of signs that may enter into a meaningful (in-formative) relation or there may be no such arrangement such that the interpreter understands nothing or no relation is possible. I claim that what you call information processing is not processing of anything except signs and their arrangement. Whereby I cannot say that there is information being processed in the first place.

You are confusing information with acts on, or with, information. Being informed is being fed information. Information processing is integrating different types of information (inputs, or what you were fed) to produce new information (output). When the output becomes the input to subsequent processing, you have a sensory information feedback loop. — Harry Hindu

I cannot be confused because I do not believe that there is information about which there are acts, since the information if it is possible to substantiate it is in the result of a process of interpretation or in-formation. So there are no types of information in the first place. What there is is signs arranged in one way or another introduced as inputs as you say. But that input is not information. Because it's always the result of the processing of the signs that we confuse as being at the beginning of the process. For example, if you had a Paper (the information) in a USB memory, when you see and read the Paper in your PC you say "this was (passed) in the USB memory" when in fact it was not.

and there is a relationship between the sign and what it refers to - information. — Harry Hindu

The sign refers. But not to the information but to its process in which it will be included.

Interpretation is the act of integrating sensory information (the current number of rings in the tree) with information in memory (how the tree grows throughout the year). — Harry Hindu

I cannot call that information. Because in reality these rings are signs that refer precisely to the age of the tree. But this, the age of the tree, is given a posteriori. Then we can call it the result of the information process. Remember that I avoid substantivizing the word information, and I speak rather of in-formation as the act of giving form, as interpretation. In this case the signs give form to our cognitive apparatus and the idea of an age of the tree appears in us. That, that idea, is perhaps information as a sustantive, as a result of in-formation. But I prefer to avoid calling it this way so that there is no confusion. But what is clear to me is that the rings are neither information (the result of the process of interpretation) nor in-formation, they are signs.

In the case of the tree each ring is nothing more than a property of the tree. But in no case is it information because what you get from those rings you only get a posteriori as knowledge. That is, when we see the rings in general we ask "What information is here?" But in reality there are only signs that refer to other things, in this case the age of the tree. But those signs by themselves mean nothing. Necessarily there must be a process of interpretation to access knowledge like that, since it is never evident from looking at the rings that we are talking about age. That only goes a posteriori after a process of in-formation. The age itself is not contained in the tree, it is a ghost in the wood.

But if you are given a cleanly-formatted USB stick it is still correct to say that it contains no information — Wayfarer

I would say: you have no possible information. There is no possible in-formation/interpretation process due to the absence of signs. Or the absence of that of a specific configuration that can relate to an interpreter.