Introduction
For me it all started around seventeen years ago, I was teaching an adult night school course. It was aimed at teaching electrical installations, but included reviewing some very basic science, the students should have learnt at school. On this occasion, I was explaining that energy was ‘the capacity to do work’. One of my students could not except this explanation and insisted that I explain further. It soon became painfully obvious to myself and my students, that I had not got a clue what energy really was!
After that embarrassment I started to research energy, not only so that I would not be caught out again. But teaching in the energy supply industry, I really wanted to know what energy really is. When I looked for an academic explanation of energy, I became very disappointed. It seemed that every explanation I found, seems to describe energy as something that is needed to create some form of motion (do work). In other words, describing what it does rather than what it is. As I continued to study energy and its derivatives, I found it being referred to as a useful bookmark, a mathematical tool, or simply just the way in which the universe moves, all of which are totally unsatisfactory.
The problem is you cannot directly detect or measure energy, just the kinematic movement it produces. This also goes for its derivatives momentum/inertia and therefore mass, force, temperature, radiation, even chemical energy. They can all be described as states of motion. All can only be detected or measured by detecting or measuring motion or movement. It seems, that the only real evidence for energy and its derivatives existence is in the predictable way in which objects move. I find it very hard, admittedly in my naivety, to understand why scientist seem to except the notion of energy without question. It is used as a postulate in most theories, experiments, and other scientific endeavours as a matter of course. Yet energy can really only be described as a concept used to explain motion. It might be because energy, force, mass, etc., are the only realistic way of explaining motion. In any case, I came to conclusion that rather than going round in circles, trying to understand energy in the conventional way. Perhaps I should look at energy and by default the general mechanism by which the universe works from the perspective of what I as an individual entity (human being) can detect and measure, Kinematic motion (pure motion).
After many years of study and trying to apply logical thought using this approach, I have come to what I think are very surprising. conclusion. What follows, is my attempt to explain and justify the concepts and ideas that have led me to this conclusion in a logical and pragmatic and hopefully, in a simple way. To that end, I have drawn up a simple form of flow chart to explain my rationale. The chart shows the pathway between each point of my reasoning. At each stage there are references to notes that explain and justify, the concepts, ideas and arguments that I have considered which has led me to these conclusions.
Note A1 Starting with Human Beings
Reality for us homo sapiens, is a model of a world we produce in our minds known as consciousness. The primary role of consciousness is to allow us to navigate and survive, in the environment outside of our bodies. Consciousness is a unique closed system, which can only be accessed by one individual. As a result, it is impossible to experimentally verify or compare it to other consciousness entities or any other systems. Professor Donald Hoffman (Hoffman 2020) and his collaborators have developed theories which suggest that our consciousness have evolved to allow us to effectively interact with the outside world, without necessarily having an accurate representation (model) of it. Fitness Beats Truth (FBT) theory seems to mathematically show that a gene’s ability to thrive, survive and successfully evolve, its fitness. Overrides the need of its host organism to have an accurate comprehension of its environment (truth). Whilst Interface theory of Perception (ITP) seems to suggest, that we interact with representations of reality; that our sensory perception serves as interface with the outside environment rather than giving us a true picture of it. So, bearing this mind wouldn’t be prudent to go back and reexamine our assumptions about reality and put a side all our preconception and prejudices (including many of the postulates modern physicists base their theories upon) and consider only what is possible to know for certain as cognizant beings i.e. difference, chance and motion.
Note A2 Sensible Measurements
The conventional definition of energy is ‘the capacity to do work’ or ‘the potential to do work’. But what is work? There are many definitions of work, but basically, it is what is required to move something or create movement within something. So, energy is the capacity to move something or the potential to move something. Energy is said to be a quantitative entity (an amount) it cannot in itself create movement in an object just dictate how much the object moves. You could say it is what is used up when something moves. Therefore, you cannot directly measure energy, you can only measure an amount of movement and calculate the energy needed to cause that movement. For example, to measure the chemical energy stored in a battery, its potential energy. You use a battery level indicator of some sort to measure either the voltage or its resistance of the battery, to give a rough indication of its charge. To measure the voltage (potential difference) of the battery a small amount of its charge movement) is used to produce an electromotive force (voltage) which induces a small current (flow/movement of electrons) which is amplified by the indicator to move a needle or change a digital display. So, you are not directly measuring the potential energy inside the battery, but a movement of electrons produced by releasing a small amount of electrical charge (energy) from the battery which can no longer be considered as potential energy as it is being used up. A more complex method can be used to measure the resistance of the battery using an ESR (equivalent series resistance), but there again the meter dose not directly measure the charge (potential energy) in the battery and relies on a current (movement of electrons) to indicate the state of the charge. It doesn’t matter what form of energy it is, Thermal, Chemical, Nuclear, Sound etc. all are only derived from calculations based on the observation/detection of motion.
The same goes for Mass, it also is quantitative, it can only be detected when the mass is in an accelerated motion relative to something else. when a discrepancy between the masses velocity (motion) and the velocity of something else is measured or observed, enabling the mass to be calculated or detected. For example, the expansive or compressive motion of a spring within an accelerometer.
Physicists tell us to create motion or alter its velocity; you need to apply some type of force. Force is said to be a vector quantity, yet you still cannot directly detect or measure it. What you actually measure, or detecting is a change in velocity and displacement of something. For example, the force used to hammer a nail into a piece of wood. What can be observed is the motion of the hammer as it moves to come in contact with the nail, then its velocity slowing down as it move with the nail, as the nail is displaced (move position) into the wood. At no point can you observe this thing called force. This sounds very strange, after all force has been part of scientific reasoning since Aristotle. It is ingrained into our psyche; we all think we experience force on a daily basis. We hold a weight in our hand at arm’s length, and we think we are experiencing force pushing down on our hand. But what we are actually detecting is the movement of electrons, because the movement of the weight is deforming our hand, causing the tissue in our hand to be moved from its natural shape. Which in turn causes the nerves in our hand to send electrical signals (moving electrons) to our brain. On receiving these signals, our brain will send electrical signals to the muscles in our hand and arm to tense up. Which in turn sends electrical signals back to our brain, which we perceive as a feeling of weight press down on our hand. But in fact, we are only interpreting electrical signals (movement of electrons) sent to our brain, in response to changes in our body. In other words, we only experiencing motion, not force! It does not help that when we are taught physics at school, that phrases are used such as “a force of X newtons is applied to an object.”. This makes force sound like an entity, that can be conjured up from nowhere. But this simply is not true: force is an expression of motion that is always the result of other motion (e.g. exchange of virtue particles creating an electromatic force field).
The point I am making is that energy, mass, and forces, are names given to observation and measurement of peculiarities in movement. Which can be used to good effect to calculate and accurately predict subsequent movement. Sir Isaac Newton referred to them as “sensible measurements” (Newton,1689, cited in Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy,2007). However, there is no evidence that they are measurable standalone entities in their own right, apart from convention, prejudice and miss guided intuition.
I think that a true definition of time is a measure of a rate of change in information. In other words, time is a marker the frequency of change in information, like a millimetre is a marker of distance on a ruler. A millimetre is not distance, just a measure of distance. This definition of time may seem odd, because change seems to take place in time. In other words, time seems to be a quantifiable object or entity that we can measure change against. Yet we only really reference events to an amount of change. For example, we might stop work and have lunch when the hour hand on the office clock, changes its position between twelve and one. Time hasn’t passed during the lunch hour, just a measured amount of changes. Also, the rate at which an object is perceived to change, depends on the motion of the perceiver in relation to the object (Doppler effect). Meaning change is relativistic and because time is a measure of change, the perception (see note C4) of time is also relativistic (dependent on motion). But that doesn’t mean time is speeding up or slowing down, it is simple the rate at which change is measured, which has changed.
Neither is it possible to reverse or go back in time. For example, if you went back in time to the death of Julius Caesar on 15th March 44 BC, you would be reverse all the changes since his death. However, there is no such thing as a backward or reverse change, just change. For instance, if you change a liquid into a gas, then turn the gas back into liquid. You would have made two changes, not revered one change. So, if you try to reverse all the changes since Julius Caesar’s death to go back in time, you will actually go forward in time. This is also the reason why causality cannot be violated. To explain this, let’s imagine it is possible for you to build a time machine. You jump inside it and push a button and the universe outside changes back to exactly what it was seventy years ago, seemingly causing you to travel back in time. When you get out of the machine, you look for, and find your grandfather, before he meets your grandmother. You then proceed to have an argument with them and shoot them dead. Luckly for you, you will not suffer any harmful effects, you will not suddenly disappear or cause the destruction of the universe. Because, you have not actually killed your grandfather just an exact copy of him brought about by changes that have been made to the universe. You can only affect the future of the newly changed universe and not the past or your own causal path. Causality is unbreakable law of the universe, simply because time doesn’t exist to break it. The sequence of events is governed by the transfer of information not by some mythical entity called time. I think the notion of time is so embedded into our psyche, because like force we think we experience time. Time to us, is how we transit through reality, something that carries us forward through our lives at a constant rate, independent of other changes. when we only really experience or perceive a series of changes in information, not time.
If we accept the concept of time as just being a marker of change. Rather than it being something that is a real element of the universe, that flows continuously and is woven into the fabric of space and apply it to special relativity. Instead of intervals between events in time increasing, as an object accelerates towards the speed of light. The rate of change the objects experiences, (that is the rate at which its information is perceived) slows downs as it approaches light speed. This will make no difference in the effects and principles laid down in special relativity. However, the results can be interpreted differently.
I think I should pause here and make clear, that there is nothing special about the speed of light. It just happens to travel at the universal speed limit. This is the maximum speed at which information can travel i.e. the maximum speed at which a change in data can be transmitted. This is different to the rate at which information changes or is perceived. Although information cannot change faster than the speed of light.
Let’s look at the famous twin’s paradox: There are a set of twins, one jumps on a rocket ship and shoots off at close to the speed of light. Does a quick U-turn at Alpha Centauri and then returns to earth to find that they have aged less than their sibling, due to the effects described by Lorentz transformations. Of course, the amount of time each twin felt had passed, would depend on their overall emotional state whilst apart (whether engaged, bored, happy, depressed etc.). But the fact that the twin on the rocket ship had aged less (their bodies have experienced less change) and their clocks ticked slower, would lead to the conclusion that time had passed slower for them than the other twin. Yet at no point during the journey did the two-way light speed change for either twin.
Again, I need to pause here and explain why I have used the term ‘two-way speed of light’. It is assumed that the speed of light is the same in all reference frames in all directions, but this might not be the case. The only thing that is certain is the average speed of light is a constant in all reference frames. This is because it is impossible to measure the speed of light in one direction, due to it being impossible to synchronise clocks at a distance. To accurately synchronise two clocks at a distance, you need to send an instantaneous signal between them. Of course, this is impossible because, no signal can travel faster than the speed of light. Therefore, to measure the speed light, must require the light to be reflected back to a single time measuring device to obtain an accurate reading. This means that it is impossible to know if the speed of light is the same in both directions or if the light is traveling faster in one direction than the other. Which could be due to your reference frame’s motion (its velocity) relative to a static frame of reference. Therefore, you can only measure the average speed of light in any frame of reference.
However, because the two-way speed of light remains the same in all frames of reference. This means the speed at which a change in data can be transmitted across a distance is a constant and because time is distance divided by speed, this can give a constant time in every frame of reference, we could call Primary Time. Now let’s get back to the twin’s paradox. Where one twin, gets in a rocket ship and shoots off at close to the speed of light, does a U-turn at Alpha Centauri and then returns to find that they have aged less than their sibling. Both twins experienced the same two-way speed of light, just from the viewpoint of different rates of information change. Meaning, primary time must have always pass, at exactly the same rate for both of them. Therefore, their actual comparable age in primary time never changes. So, the twin on the rocket ship did not travel slower through time than their sibling. Instead, the information in their frame of reference including their own body cells changed at a less frequent rate than information on the earth. This idea that we don’t experience time passing, just information changing, seems so radical and counter intuitive. I think it warrants, looking at more closely.
Let’s look at the most famous thought experiments used to explain relativistic time and space. That is of a speeding train moving at a constant velocity close to the speed of light traveling through a station. On the train is an observer with a theoretical light clock, which measures a tick every time a light pulse is emitted from a light source, travels horizontally up to a mirror through a vacuum and is reflected back down to the source, which doubles up as a detector. On the platform of the station, stands a second observer with an identical light clock. To the observer on the platform, there light clock ticks faster than the clock on the train. This is because, although light is traveling at the same speed in both clocks. The light in the clock on the train has to travel further due to the relative motion of the train, from the point of view of the observer on the platform. Meaning it ticks slower than the light clock on the platform. The light pulse is indicating the universal speed limit (the maximum speed at which information can travel) in other words providing information on a universal constant. In fact, the light pulse is two types of information. Pure information in form of a data wave carrying a photon, and intellectual information in the form of light we see (see note C3). In both cases they are examples of information traveling at its maximum speed which cannot be changed. But what can and dose change is the rate at which the information is perceived. This is the rate at which information or data interacts to create new information (see notes 4a).
Let’s look at the light pulse more closely. There is not one pulse of light but two separate light pulses. The light waves that make up the pulse of light doesn’t reach the mirror then turn 180o and travel back to the source/detector. Instead, when the light waves reach the mirror. protons interact with the particles in the mirror and light waves are emitted, back down to the source/detector. So, there is not one pulse of light that changes its velocity but two, with theoretically but not provable equivalent velocities in two opposite directions. Secondly the light waves that are emitted from the source and mirror, carry data (about the photon). This data is not recognised as pure information (a proton), until it interacts with other data (i.e. particle data), in the mirror and detector, when they are perceived, (becomes new information). Therefore, the rate at which light pulses on the train are perceived in respect to the light clock on the platform are slowed down. Meaning that the rate of change in information from the light clock on the train is slower than the light clock on the platform giving the appearance that it is ticking slower. However, it is not only light the clock on the train that appears to slow down. Everything else on the train also appears to slow down. This is because the observer along with the train, light source, mirror and everything else on the train, are created from subatomic particles and each subatomic particle is like mini light clock. Ticking when the particle wave interacts and is perceived by a pure information system. Of course, these particle waves, are moving in every possible direction and except for the massless particles, will travel at different sub light speed. Which would seem to suggest that matter is a googolplex of tiny subatomic particle clocks, all ticking at different rate. But more importantly, as matter approached the speed light. Its tiny subatomic particle clocks would slow down at different rates which means they would age at different rates. However, within matter subatomic particles are mainly bound up in atoms, by interactions we perceive as nuclear and electromagnetic forces. Making the different aging effect unmeasurable and making the atom oscillate at a very high frequency. These oscillations will reduce in frequency, as an atom increases in speed towards the speed of light. But it is the interactions between atoms at the molecular scale. The sharing, receiving or donating electrons with one another, which are responsible for the rate of chemical change in matter that we notice slowing down, as the matter approaches the speed of light. Which we intellectualise as the slowing down of the ageing process of matter.
However, the exchanged electrons, like the photon in the light clock only perceive or in other words cause changes in pure information, when they interact with other subatomic particles. Therefore, in pure information terms, the electron, and all other elementary particles, do not experience ageing. Ageing belongs exclusively to intellectual information or more to the point, how we perceive and measure age. For example, a muon traveling at near light speed to earth from the upper atmosphere doesn’t reach the ground because it has aged less than a muon apparently at rest and therefore lives longer. It is simply the weak interaction, that is responsible for the muon’s decay, reacting at a slower rate relative to the muon at rest. Therefore, the muon doesn’t experience time dilation or length contraction, just a different rate of change.
The notion of time has only been around for a short period of our evolutionary journey, perhaps it came about when humans first developed agriculture. Up until then we just accepted change. E.g. when certain berries turn red, they became safe to eat or when it gets dark you need to find a safe place to sleep. Now in our modern world the awareness of time is essential to being able function on a day-to-day basis, so much so it is woven into our psyche. It is almost unthinkable to us that time is just an intellectual invention we use to keep a track or monitor the rate at which things change, and not a real entity driving us forward through reality. But where is the poof? I find it strange that no physicist, have ever questioned the validity of time as an entity. All seem except the notion of time as fourth dimension, as something palpable we all travel forwards in and could possibility travel back in. With the theory of special relativity often sighted as proof of time’s existence, were as it could equally just prove that information changes at different rates relative to different observers. The fact is, we as cognitive beings cannot measure time, we can only compare differences in the rate of change in something. However, the main argument against time being, a real phenomenon is that it is not needed. The universe can evolve perfectly well by simply constantly changing, it does not need time to exist in.
Note A4a Difference
Distinguish a difference between two things is the most basic action any living organism can achieve i.e. the difference between light and dark, hot and cold, predator and prey. We are born with this ability it is such a basic instinct that we never give it a second thought. Yet it is difference or a potential to be different that give things a value at the most fundamental level, giving everything identity and existence. For example, a black dot on a white background has an identity and existence because it is different to the background. If it wasn’t different from the background in any way, it wouldn’t have an identity or existences. Of course, there are several differences between black dot and the background, colour, shape, size, etc. This is data, that gives the black dot its information that depicts its identity. You can define data as a single object, event, or quantity, without a context, but when put in contexed with other data will yield information e.g. one symbol of written script, one pixel of a photo or one gene of a chromosomes. Just one difference i.e. on/off, black/white, there/not there, is generally referred to as a bit of information or bit. Each bit holds the smallest amount of information possible which we could call primary data. The primary data held in one bit, has only the potential to be different to something else. In isolation it has no difference, giving it a non-transitive value (much like the game, rock paper scissors). We can call this value a Data Value. This means that although data values can be different, to one another, no data value is greater or less than any other data value, meaning primary data has no inherent value on its own. However, when two or more bits (primary data) are considered or combined, they have a joint value, let’s call it a difference value, which gives each bit an identity, in other words allows each bit to hold a small piece of potential information. Therefore, it is the difference between bits that has an inherent value which gives identity and has a potential to hold a bit of information, not the bit itself.
Let me try to explain; to our visual system no one colour has any greater value than any other colour. For example, if everything in the world was black you would be blind, you would have no visual information. However, if everything in the world was white you would still not have any visual information, or if everything orange, or blue, etc. Meaning no individual colour holds visual information giving it identity. If you are totally blind colour is meaningless to you, it would not exist. It is only when there is a contrast (a difference) between two or more colours that they have value as data that can produce visual information.
Note A4b Change
If the value of primary data is in its difference or potential difference between it and other primary data, ‘it’s difference value’. For that difference value to be identified and contribute towards an information value, there must be a change. Change is an action that identifies a difference, without change there can be no difference. A simple example, if you have two pieces of paper in front of you, one piece is blue, and the other is red. Immediately you can notice (identify) a difference between them because you have perceived a change in data value a change from blue to red or red to blue. This might seem very obvious but nevertheless is important and although I have used a simple example it applies to absolutely any difference between anything.
For any type of change to take place, require some form of change in motion. Using the previous example of the two-coloured pieces paper. For you to notice the difference between them requires a change in motion. i.e. the motion change between the motion (the frequence) of the light reflected off the two different coloured papers and your retina in your eye, and the change of motions of the neural signals from the retina to your brain. Another example might be a light bulb. To change a light bulb from being off to on, not only requires the movement of a switch but also requires a change in the motion of the electrons within the lighting circuit and filament and also motion of the photons admitted from the filament. Again, I have used a simple example, but this applies to absolutely any change between or within anything. Change always requires some form of motion or modification of motion. This means that difference, change and motion are all intrinsically linked.
Note A4c kinematic or Pure Motion
When I first tried to research what motion is. I could only find literature that referred to the cause of motion i.e. in terms of momentum, force, kinetic energy etc. But I want to know what motion is, then perhaps I could fully understand what causes it or controls it. I know this sounds ludicrous, as we don’t even bother to teach our children what movement or motion is. Everybody instinctively knows what it is. It is just the change in objects position over time. However, this only describes what happens to the object, i.e. it changes its position over a period, not the means (the actual motion) by which it is done. So, I thought to myself, what would happen if all motion was stopped?
If you stopped all motion, you would stop all change, and if time is a measure of change, it would be like stopping time. In science fiction films they depict stopping time. by freeze frame image, with flying objects frozen in mid-air. But this is obviously not the case. For a start, light waves, sound waves, and molecules would have no motion. Therefore, there would be no light, no sound, no odours heat etc. This is because information is only transferred or transmitted through motion. However, this would suggest that objects would still exist, you just would not have any information about them. But I don’t think this is the case. Take Quantum Field Theory for example, it says that the fundamental building blocks of the universe, subatomic particles, are just disturbances within designated fields. However, if there is no movement in these field, subatomic particles could not be created and nothing would exist. As far as I can tell this goes for all fundamental theories, if you stop the motion of virtual particle, stings etc. nothing would exist. So, if you were to stop all motion nothing would exist or be able to exist, in-fact, nothing would have ever existed. This tells me whatever motion is it is vital for existence, not just information.
As I thought more deeply about motion or movement. It occurred to me that because motion can only be observed relative to a frame of reference. It stands to reason that whenever motion is observed, the frame of reference in which it is being observed, is also in motion and contributing to the overall motion in the universe. In other words, if I stop an object moving it would change its velocity, so it is stationary relative me and other things I regard as at rest. However, I would have also changed its magnitude and direction (It’s vector quantity), relative to everything else in the universe. In such a way as to preserve the overall motion within the universe. Meaning motion is conserved (it cannot be created or destroyed), it has no fixed vector quantity. An object only has a quantifiable velocity within a frame of reference. Outside, of any frame of reference, an object is not at rest, neither is it in motion. It will effectively be travelling at the speed of light but won’t be going in any direction.
The reason I am saying that every object outside of a reference frame is traveling at the speed of light. Is because the speed of light is the maximum speed anything can travel, it is a universal speed limit and is the same in every reference frame. But as I have already stated light is not special it just happens to travel at the universal speed limit. What actually defines the universal speed limit is the speed that information can be conveyed. No information can be communicated fast than the universal speed limit outside or inside any reference frame. You could say that motion cannot go any faster than information! In fact, you require information to initiate motion, as well as characterising its magnitude and direction. Yet paradoxically, motion is required to perceive and transmit information. This suggest that along with difference and change, motion and information are closely interrelated.
Note A5 Scalar Motion and the Speed of Light
There are two distinct forms of motion, I will refer to the first as Vector Motion. This type includes linear, rotary, oscillating, and circular motion etc. This is when an object moves a distance within a frame of reference from one reference point to another or back to the same reference point, following one or a multiple directional path at a relative velocity. The other type of motion I will refer to as Scalar Motion, this is a non-vector motion. It is the uniform motion which occurs within an object when it expands or contraction. Instead of the object traveling a distance between reference points, reference points move within the object. The object does not travel any distance, however; it does require greater or lesser space depending on the scalar motion’s direction.
Like vector motion, scalar motion seems to have a relative velocity, meaning it requires an observer or a reference point for an object to move relative to. For example, supposing there were an ant and an elephant, floating in the middle of a vast empty space, with no other reference points. And the ant suddenly started increasing in size, relative to the elephant. The elephant would say that the ant is getting bigger, but the ant would say that the elephant was getting smaller and both would be right? However, you could also have a situation where, they both were expanding or both shrinking at the same rate, and neither would know.
However, light travels at the same speed in all frames of reference. The speed of light is the same whether observed by the ant or the elephant or refenced against an atom or a star. Light travels the same distance in the standard measurement of a period (time) at all scales. This is incredibly important; to explain this let’s imagine that we are in a plain room, the only other things in the room are a clock on the wall and the traditional light clock. A light source that emits a pulse of light which travels a set distance across the room to a mirror then is reflexed back to the light source which doubles up as a detector that registers a tick. If we suddenly started to shrink, the distance between the light source and the mirror, will increase relative to us. This means the frequency the light pulses is slowing down relative to us as they move over a greater relative distance. But the rate at which the light clock ticks compared to the clock on the wall doesn’t change. However, our watches which are shrinking with us, would be ticking faster than the clock on the wall. This is because, the distance the escapement mechanism on our watches has to travel, has decreased as it shrinks causing the watches mechanism to speed up. The molecular structure of our bodies is also shrinking, meaning messages between cells have less distance to travel causing their regeneration and subsequent damage to speed up the aging prosses. Also, the neuro signals in our brains have less distance to travel, therefore our perception (see note C4) also speeds up. The effect of this is similar to speeding up the film in a cine camara then playing the film back at normal speed, all the captured images move slower. So, for us our watches appear to be ticking at its normal rate, and the light pulses have not changed speed, it is just traveling a further distance, causing the light clock to tick slower. The clock on the wall also seems to ticket slower, as it remains in synchronisation with the light clock. This gives the impression that time is slowing down, for everything in the room. However, I want to stress, that nothing in the room has changed. what has changed is our perception, the way we measure change.
Something else we would notice is that the pulse of light appears to stretch as the distance between the source and mirror appears to increase. In fact, from our point of view the difference between the light pulse’s individual waves (its wavelength) is increases, so their frequence is decreasing causing the light from each pules to shift towards the infrared spectrum.
Now supposing instead of just us shrinking, everything in the room started shrinking at the same rate, causing our frame of reference to shrink. What would we notice happening? Well not a lot! Because as everything is shrinking at the same rate, distances and sizes all appear to remain the same with the light clock remaining synchronised with both the clock on the wall and our watches. Our rate of perception would be changing so we would not notice anything speeding up. However, the speed of light would not change, just because our frame of reference is changing. It remains the same in all reference frames. Therefore, we would notice that light of each pulse would be shifting towards the inferred. So, we would have evidence that we were shrinking.
According to cosmologists we are living in an expanding universe, were the space between very large objects (galaxies) is increasing. My understanding is that cosmologically speaking, all objects are subject to both vector and scalar motion. An object’s vector motion is when it is said to travel over a proper distance, with what is known as a peculiar velocity, which cannot be greater than the universal speed limit, the speed of light. But all object, are also subject to scalar motion, due to the expansion of the Universe (the universal co-moving frame). Were the distance between objects motion due to changing co-ordinance rather than through vector motion. This allows the distance between galaxy clusters to increase faster than the universal speed limit, the speed of light. This type of faster than light motion is known as recessive velocity.
Of course, this is assuming that space is expanding. Because we are matter, we naturally have the perception that space is expanding in relation to us. But suppose, we view the universe from the perspective of an observer, who is subject to scalar motion, moving (expanding) relative to the cosmological co-moving frame and viewing the cosmos from an incredibly large scale so that it appears uniform (Homogeneous in nature). From this perspective, matter would be shrinking, whilst the total volume of the universe (space) remained unaltered. So, could this be the case, could matter including us be shrinking in a fixed volume of space? Well, no because cosmologists only measure red shift across space between galaxies. If we were shrinking then all light we measure, would have a red shift or if we and all matter were expanding a blue shift towards ultraviolet. This means you cannot perform an experiment to tell if you are at rest or moving at a constant speed over a distance (subject to vector motion) but, you can conduct an experiment to show whether, you are expanding or contracting (subject to scalar motion). That’s why we can say with confidence that we are not shrinking or expanding and the space between galaxy clusters is expanding.
What does all this mean and why is it important? It means that if the universe has a reference point (the speed of light) to gauge scalar motion by, it must mean that the speed of light must have an absolute size. But how can a speed have size? The speed of light is only a universal speed limit, the maximum speed that information can be transmitted. Transmission occurs when one change happens after another across a distance, in this case the change in information. The speed at which information is transmitted is determined by the maximum rate at which each of its bits change. Therefore, one bit of information (a difference) must have a size; an absolute (standard) size by which everything else in the universe can be measured against.
Note A6 Nothingness
In notes A4(a, b, c) I said that without a difference, change and motion there is nothing. So, what is nothing or as I am referring to it as an entity nothingness? Nothingness is something that has no location, no form, no size, contains or displaces no space and does not exist in the present, pass or future. I am not going to attempt, to explain, what nothingness is far greater intellects than mine have tried and failed. However, it occurs to me that nothingness must have at least one characteristic, it must be an invariant, it must be the same everywhere. Because it is the ultimate fundamental entity, if it contained a variation, it simply would not be nothing. Therefore, must also be a perfect solid.
Note B1 Physical Motion is Impossible
One of the main characteristics of motion is it always take place inside something that has dimensions. A physical object moves by moving through a medium of some kind, something that, has a degree of fluidity allowing the object, to displace it. For example, we move through air by displacing it, but what does air displace. If we apply reductionism, air is made of free gas molecules which are just bound atoms, which are constructed from subatomic particles. So, what are subatomic particles moving in? According to Field Theory subatomic particles are excitations in quantum fields. There is one field for each fundamental subatomic particle and its antiparticle. When a field is in its lowest energy state i.e. when there is no subatomic particle present (it is not being excited) a quantum vacuum state exists. This is said to be the closes state to nothing (empty space) that can possibly exist. However, particle field have zero-point energy meaning their energy levels are not stable hovering around zero but are never zero, causing these fields to fluctuate. What is more if we are talking about physical existence, particle fields would have a physical present. Even if you consider particle fields to be a form of pure energy, as Einstein showed mass and energy are interchangeable. So, if mass is a quantity of matter and matter has a physical presence, so would fluctuations in energy or in other words, subatomic particles the building blocks of matter. So, what is the medium that allows the motion for differences and changes i.e. fluctuations and excitations within particle fields to take place. The only thing left is pure space. Pure space is simply nothingness with dimensions. However, there is a big problem with this. Nothingness must be an invariant and therefore a perfect solid. it would be impossible for motion to take place within it.
I know how ridiculous, this sounds’ that nothing is solid, nevertheless, if you follow a logical thought process, it makes sense. Let me explain using a simple thought experiment. I’ll start off by imagining an infinite volume with absolutely nothing in it. (a pure space). I will place two objects, “A” and “B” into this space. I need the second object to be a reference, for the first object to move in relation to. The question is, is it possible for me to induce motion in object “A” relative to object “B”. Object “A” cannot push through the nothingness, because the nothingness is a perfect solid so has no fluidity, i.e. it has no differences (distinct elements) that can change position relative to one another. The only other way for object “A” to move, is for the object to replaces nothingness, in the direction of its travel, while nothingness replaces the object as it moves forward. This of course is impossible, for a physical object or parts of physical objects, (see notes B3) they cannot dissolve into nothing or appear out of nothing.
It does not matter what reductionism theory you apply to physicality (a physical world). You will always come to a stage where a something will have to move in a pure space (nothing). which is impossible. Of course, there are those who will try to get over this problem, by claiming that we are traveling in time, through a medium first conceptualised by Hermann Minkowski, called spacetime. Which was only intended to be a mathematical model that unites three dimensions space and time into a single, four-dimensional continuum, but seems now to be treated as an established fact. However, I have explained that time cannot be a discrete entity (see note A3), so may be time is a dimension.
According to general relativity, even if I took out every particle of matter, and antimatter, and all associated fields, and anything else that may exist such as energy out of the universe. You would be left with space time, a nothingness with four dimensions. The problem is that spacetime cannot be a nothingness, because it is supposed to be able to curve around mass. This is logically impossible, because you cannot bend a solid without warping it, and if you warp it, you change its structure, and if you change its structure, it will no longer be an invariant. And if it is no longer an invariant, it cannot be nothing, meaning, space time must be a something. What’s more it must be physical something, because physical objects paths follow its curvature. Which leaves you with same conundrum as with vacuum space. What does spacetime curve in. which can only be pure space which is a solid so does not allow movement. You could I suppose, think of space time as a three-dimensional space of solid nothingness with a flexible fourth dimension of time on which all matter travels. The trouble is time on its own is not a vector quantity. It doesn’t seem to matter which way you look at it. IT IMPOSSIBLE FOR A PHYSICAL OBJECT TO MOVE!
Note B2 Something Cannot Come from Nothing
Whether we exist in a physical or in a pure information world, the only absolute certainty we have is that we do exist (I think so I am). But where did existence originate from? All our natural instincts tell us that something (existence) emerged out of nothingness. However, nothingness is a perfect invariant, it by definition is physically unable to hold a difference and physically cannot allow any motion within it, so change could never occur. Therefore, if true nothingness had ever existed, we wouldn’t exist now.
Note B3 Physical Universe V.S. A Purely Information Universe
We like to think of ourselves as living in a vast universe. But in truth we are trapped and isolated inside our minds. Our only source of information comes second-hand from our senses. producing a realistic if not accurate model of the world, full of colour, sounds and smells which don’t really exist. Acting as a screen stopping us knowing for certain what is going on in the world outside of our minds. The truth is no matter how open minded we are in seeking the truth, or how clever we become at experimentation. We will never have a verifiable accurate picture of the environment outside of our minds. As Werner Heisenberg once said, “What we observe is not nature itself, but nature exposed to our method of questioning.” (Heisenberg1962 p.25), you could add ‘or our means of observation’.
However, this should not and will not stop humans from trying to understand the nature of the universe and having a good guess at what it really looks like. To do this we not only need to be careful and meticulous in experimentation but also be prepared to question our senses and intuition when analysing the results of experiments. I also believe that we must ask very simple but pertinent questions, such as is time an integral part of our universe or is it just a misguided perception of reality (see note A3), or is the world outside of our minds full of physical entities or is it just full of information? For example, if I was to place my hand on my desktop and press down, I would have information that the desktop was solid. But is it because the molecular and atomic forces within my hand and the desktop are preventing my hand passing through the desktop or is it an interaction of data within pure information, creating information which we intellectualise as a solid desk, preventing the motion of the hand. Both these scenarios are equally possible, and it is experimentally impossible to establish which one is correct, so shouldn’t we give equal credence to both.
A physical world feels far more intuitive to the extent that it seems madness to even contemplate that what we see, and touch is not really there. Even things that are not tangible and cannot be seen such as radio waves have a physical presence, i.e. a presence in reality. Basically, if something has a physical presence it exists and can have an effect on reality, if something has not got a physical presence, it only exists as a concept or idea and is not real. For example, neutrinos although they are very hard to detect, nevertheless has a physical presence, because they can be physically detected (very occasionally causes physical movement of charged particles or photons light flashes (Cherenkov radiation)) that can be detected) and are therefore real. Even dark mass and dark energy, which are only theoretical concepts that have not been physically detected, are thought to exist because of the motion of the cosmos, so must have a physical presence. However, a Pixie which cannot create motion of any kind that can be detected, only exists as a concept in book and children’s imaginations and therefore not real and doesn’t physically exist. We can define something as physical if it can cause physical motion or a physical change in position. However as discussed in notes B1 & B2, physical motion is impossible. As is a physical something coming from nothing and since in a physical world only physical things are considered to be real and therefore exist. This then creates the mother of all conundrums.
So could we be living in a purely information world. This seems far less intuitive, the idea that outside of our minds is a world of just information, and that we ourselves are just information interacting with other information, sounds a lot like science fiction. Yet, scientists and engineers, can already build crude virial reality machines, that can by simply modifying the information going to our senses, give us the illusion of being in an environment that is different to the one, we are actually in. So maybe it could be possible that we do exist in a purely information environment.
I think it would be prudent, to pause at this point and make it very clear that just because I have mentioned virtual reality and discussing a non- physical world. Does not mean that I am suggesting that we exist in some sort of virtue reality controlled by a great computer programmer in the sky. Nor am I suggesting that our reality is somehow not real, and we are living in a sort of dream. I am sure that all the kindness, suffering and pain, that goes on in the world is very, very, real.
What I am suggesting is that it might be possible that reality for us, is solely a product of information and that perhaps physicality (Physical form) is as much a part of our intellectual interpretation of the world as, colour, sound and odours. Simply a product (intervention) of our consciousness to help us build a model of the world, that only exists in our minds. However, before trying to rationally explore and determine the feasibility of a pure information reality. Perhaps, we should first try to establish what information is.
Note C1 Predictability
When researching information, I found it very hard to find a definitive answer to what information was. For most people information is what is needed to gain knowledge, i.e. what is needed to become less uncertain. In physics, information is a measure of the distinguishability or order within a system, as opposed to entropy which is a measure of randomness or disorder. Having information about a system reduces the number of possible states it could be in, which in turn decreases its entropy (its uncertainty). Essentially, information is what distinguishes one physical state from another. Many scientists, particularly computer scientists, subscribe to the idea that information allows the possessor to make predictions with accuracy better than chance. Information can also be defined as what is shared between two systems (set of variables) that have a dependence on one another. The more knowledge (more certainty) you have about one system, reduces the uncertainty of the second. However, in general largely through the work of Claude Shannon, information is linked to predictability, the more surprising or the less predictable or uncertain a sequence of events or entities (data) are the more potential information they hold. So rather than trying to define what information is, perhaps it would be better to first define what it is in.
Information is within a pattern of differences, (differences between data) in a sequence of data. This is because a patten is defined by its predictability and predictability always forms a pattern. Information is transmitted or transferred, through the interactions of these patterns of variations in data. Remember data in the form of events or entities can also be information which can be reduced down into data and that data into other data and so on until finally you get primary data. Primary data is the smallest amount of information possible, one bit (one difference). Primary data has no inherent value on its own, having a non-transitive value. However, when two or more bits (primary data) are considered or combined, they have a difference value, which gives each bit an identity, in other words allows each bit to hold a small piece of potential information. Therefore, it is the difference between bits or the change between data that has an inherent value which gives identity and has a potential to hold a bit of information see note A4a.
However, information is not in data heterogeneity, the amount of difference between data (difference values). It is in the predictability, of pattern of differences, in a sequence of data changes. So, information is not, a direct manifestation of data change but a manifestation of the predictability of those data changes. Any given sequence of data will have an overall difference value. The lower the difference value, the less differences (changes) there are in the data sequence the simpler the patten of difference so the more predictable those differences become. The higher the difference value, the greater the differences, the more complex the pattern of changes and the more random the sequence of data changes become. The more random a sequence of data changes is, the more information it can hold. So, the higher its difference value the more likely it is to yield information. However just because, a sequence of data has a high difference value does not mean that it will yield useful information. So, information is not defined by how predictable a set of data is.
Note C2 Information Systems
What actually defines information is not the predictability of pattern of data changes, but what perceives those patterns of changes. For changes in data to have an information value, they must have a level of predictability a particular patten. All sequences of data have a difference value, but not all are perceived as information. For example, the sequence of data change shown in figures a & b do not create useful information while the data sequence in figure c, does.
a {a,f,i,i,m,n,n.o,o,r,t}
b {o,m,f,t,n,i,a,o,i,r,n}
c {i,n,f,o,r,m,a,t,i,o,n}
This is because, although all three data sequences, are potential information, only sequence ‘c’ is recognised by the English Literature Information System. The English literature information system recognises predictable sequences of symbols, i.e. patterns of letters as information. by the predictability in the order of the letters within a sequence. For example, it is likely that a ‘q’ will be followed by a ‘u’ and ‘qu’ will represent the same sound and it is also likely that certain vowels will modify that sound in a certain way etc.
So, what is an information system? It is a system where only a specific set of data values are perceived. (I will explain perception later see note C4) Take a radio-controlled model car’s information system for example. The model car receives radio signals, transmitted by a radio control unit. These radio signals contain sequences of data values, that provide information to the model car to change its mode of operation, i.e. to move forwards, backwards, left, or right. However, even if the model car is not receiving any information from the transmitter to move. It is still gaining information from the system, which is not to move. Because no information to move is information not to move. So, within an information system no information can be information. However, if the radio control unit is switched off, so it is no longer part of the model car’s information system. The model car; is then not receiving any information. Although, this might not be strictly true, because the antenna on the model car, is still receiving signals (Potential information) from radio stations, TV stations, satellite, etc. However, the data values from these signals are not part of the model cars information system. So, the model car does not perceive them, in fact, to the model car they don’t exist. This applies to all information systems. For example, a basic binary system represented by ones and zeros. Where there are only two data values, zero representing no signal and one representing a signal. A sequence of zeros is information; it represents no message or do nothing. Even though there is no variation in the data sequence values. This is because there is a possibility that a one could be part of the sequence. Therefore, a sequence of zeros does have a small information value. Yet a sequence of other symbols: 2,3,4,a,b,c, etc. are not information. Because they are a different type of data, so have no data value in the system meaning they do not exist to the system. Even though they have a data value in other systems.
Therefore, if an information system is a system, where only a specific set of data values are perceived. High information values are found, somewhere between predictable and unpredictable in patterns of data. Let’s look at some data represented by grey and black pixels.
Fig 1
Figure 1: has no change in data (no Heterogeneity) and the sequence of data is totally predictable. Therefore, this data set has no information value.
Fig 2
Figure 2: has very high Heterogeneity, but again the sequence of data is totally predictable. Therefore, has little information value.
Fig 3
Figure 3: Has high Heterogeneity and has high unpredictability or randomness in its sequence of data, so holds a lot of information. However, to an information system that recolonises Latin script characters, for example, it will hold no information value.
Fig 4
Figure 4: Has lower Heterogeneity, and lower unpredictability in its sequence of data than figure 3. However, to an information system that recognises Latin script characters, it will have a high information value.
To summarise: although the quantity or density of information is dependent on the uncertainty of the changes in data, its difference value. The value of information (the measure of its usefulness) is dependent on the information system where it is perceived. This I feel, is incredibly important because isn’t every human on the planet a unique intellectual information system. We only recognise a finite set of intellectualised data values. This means that pure information such as radio waves only exist to us as an abstract entity (an idea). Up until their discovery they simply did not exist. Even though, radio waves emitted from space, have been part of the environment on earth, since its formation. It seems, something only exists, if it is information to something else, in other words, recognised by an information system. This means that for something to be real it must be part of an information system, and since there are many information systems, there must be many realities. In the case of humans over six billion realities, as we all perceive, the world very slightly differently. However, we all believe our reality to be the real one
Note C3 Types of Information
As living entities, we use neuroactivity in our brains to create a model of the world we call reality, and we regard that model of reality as a true reflection of the world around us. So, for instance if I was to look at an object, I would have information about the object. Because light reflecting off the object, strikes the retina in the back of my eye. Which has the effect of producing a sequence of electrical signals, which fires neurons in the brain. Which causes changes in my mind to creates an image that I recognise as the object. However, whilst the information that is transmitted from the object, through the varies mediums to the neurons in my brain remains unchanged. The process of changing the pattern of neuro signals into an image of the object is intellectualised. Intellectualisation, as far as I am aware, only take place inside a biological brain. It is a process, where information from our sensory system is subject to alteration through neurological processes. These processes filter out information that is not needed and use additional information from our memory and subconscious. Which create a model of the world in our minds, that we can use to survive and navigate in the environment that is outside of our bodies (I will go into this in far more detail note C6). This means that the imagery or in other words, the information we experience from the model of reality, is created in our brain and does not accurately reflect the environment outside our body. Of course, this is well known, I remember, my chemistry teacher at school, fifty years ago. Teaching us, that our school desks were not solid, but was made up of mainly empty space between atoms.
However, many may argue that the information from the model of reality our brain produces, is essentially the same as the information our senses obtain from the environment, just in a different format. But, as things like optical and audible illusion along with many scientific studies including the forementioned research by Professor Hoffman and his team have shown. That our model of reality, have little or no similarities to what is really going on in the world outside our minds. For this reason, I think there should be a distinction between, the information governing the evolution of the universe outside of our minds. Let’s call it Pure Information and the information created by our minds, our model of reality which I will call Intellectual information. I think there is enough evidence to treat them as two different systems.
Pure Information: is naturally occurring information, that does not have intellectual involvement in either its creation or its utilization. It is transmitted through motion, in a process known as cause and effect.
Examples:
• The formation of molecules from the chemical bonding of elements.
• The shape of the land scape due to erosion processes.
• Gene sequences: dictating how cells divide.
So, what is this information in its purest form? This is not an easy question to answer, it is perhaps easier to establish what pure information is not, before I establish what is. So obviously, it is not the information we use to obtain knowledge and understanding. But it is also not information used to recognise something, (This is recognition as opposed to perception which is something different see not C4) because recognition is a process that require an intellectual understanding of the thing that needs to be identified. This can be confusing because for example, artificial intelligence (neural networks), are used in medicine to identify cancer. However, neural networks identify the cancer by manipulating image data and constantly compare this data until it matches a set of criteria. They never actually recognise the cancer. And surprisingly pure information is not what is used to describe status or to issue instructions, as once again this involves intellectualisation. For an example, if a moving snooker ball collides with a second snooker ball, there is information transferred to the second ball, that will dictate its future motion. Yet, the first ball, doesn’t relay a set of instructions for the second ball to follow. In fact, despite me referring to it as information, pure information does not inform. As previously mentioned, many scientists particularly computer scientists, subscribe to the idea that information allows the possessor to make predictions with accuracy better than chance. However, making predictions is an intellectual activity, AI can only calculate probability. Although, it is true that, pure information can cause something to act in a more predictable way. So perhaps, pure information insures the outcomes from cause-and-effect, act in a consistent way, so that order exists in the universe.
Whereas Intellectual Information is when naturally occurring data is intellectualised, before it is utilized as information. It is the information we use to construct our reality.
Examples:
• The feeling pain, when our bodies are damaged.
• The sensation of weight, when lifting something.
• Recognising a frequency of the electromagnetic spectrum as a colour.
I believe it is important to distinguish between the two, because all information we receive about the world, goes through an intellectualising process. This means, we don’t ever actually perceive the real environment outside of our minds. All our understanding and knowledge of the universe, comes from an intellectualised model of reality our minds produce. That means we cannot separate our feelings from our understanding.
Contrast this, with an artificial intelligence used to control a driverless car for example. It can by the clever uses of algorithms, learn how to manoeuvre a car safely on its own. However, it never acquires understanding, it just becomes more efficient at manipulates data. So, although it may be better at being able to avoid, running over and killing a child than a human driver, it could never understand, the emotional consequences of severely injuring or killing a child. To the A.I system a child doesn’t exist as a sentient being. A child is just a series of electronic signals, it is neural network has been trained to respond to. Whereas a human driver makes conscious decisions. However, their driving decisions can be effected by feelings such as, nervousness, or anger. True their senses, are responding to information from the outside environment (pure information). But that information is intellectualised, contaminated if you like, to create a personal reality. It is this contaminated information that we use to interact with the pure information environment.
We can change the natural environment, or in other words the course of pure information, by creating Programmed Information. Programmed information is pure information that has been modified through intellectual intervention. This is when intellectual ideas are used to change, the natural environment and/or the way it behaves. Such as, ploughing a field, a key shaped to open a lock, weaving of twisted fibre to make cloth or the shape of an aircraft’s wing to change air flow. Programmed information can also be used as a medium to communicate ideas. Such as in a caved painting, language and the written word etc. Although the information contained in the idea that is being communicated is Abstract Information.
Abstract information is created by an intellect and requires intellectual understanding in its utilization. Abstract information is used when we construct models of the world outside the range of our bodily senses. It can also be used to imagine thing that are not real, that only can exist in an intellectual environment. Both programmed and abstract information are products of intellectual information. All three are products of consciousness and only programmed information, has any effect on the pure information environment and that is only temporary due to entropy.
Note C4 Perception
When you perceive something, you gain information (knowledge) of something or about that something. The word perception is often defined as become aware of something or understanding or interpreting something. However I believe, these definitions of perception are inaccurate because they imply that perception (gaining information) is solely an intellectual action. That an entity requires awareness or understanding to perceive information upon which it can act. Yet an inanimate object can receive information to act differently through differences in stimuli. For example, a golf ball cannot be aware of, or can it understand a golf club or the force which the golf club strikes it. However, it must perceive the force that it has been stuck with, to be able to have the information to follow a particular trajectory, through the air. i.e. the ball must gain Information from the force of the club striking it. Therefore, a better definition of perception is simply ‘when a change in data (a difference) create information within a system’.
The thing that is perceiving information (in a solely information-based reality), is other information, an information system. This means that perception is the interaction between information, in which new information is created. An interaction between information occurs when two or more data sets either swop data or combine to modify their information or create new information. For example: when two objects in motion collide, they perceive one another’s motion and change their velocities. or during a chemical reaction when different subatomic particles perceive one another, changing their motion information creating and destroying molecular bonding.
We only experience intellectual perception. For example, when we touch something, we cause touch receptors in our fingers, to induced electron motion in our nerves system sending signals (information) to our brain. These signals interact with the structure of our brain. causing physical biological and chemical changes in it. Creating Pure Cognitive Information that we intellectualise as the perception of touch. Pure cognitive information is pure information that is produced in a brain, in the form of patterns of neuro activity that produces (by means unknown) intellectual data. This data contributes to the intellectual information the mind uses to produce a model of the world (reality).
Note C5 The Scale of Perception
The value of information obtained from a system depends on the scale of perception within the system. This might seem a bit of a rash and bold statement to make but nevertheless is true and the key to understanding our reality. Perception in the pure information universe, which exists outside of our minds (the place we think of as the real world our bodies exist in), only takes place at the microscopic scale, when two subatomic particles interact. For example, when two snooker balls in motion collied on a snooker table and change velocity. There is no actual perception between the snooker balls, in fact they are not information to the universal pure information system, The interaction between information or in other words the perception, is taking place at the subatomic level within the snooker balls. Causing motion of the individual atoms within the snooker balls. However, the information that we base our model of the world on, is an amalgamation of a huge multitude of subatomic interactions. In other words, we perceive and thereby intellectualise, on a macro scale. So, we perceive the overall motion of atoms (atoms being interactions, between subatomic particles) as snooker balls in motion. To do this our brains receive a vast amount of pure information from our sensory system, in form of subatomic particle, electrical signals that create physical and chemical changes to the brain, producing pure cognitive information. However, the information we receive, is no longer the sum of all the microstates, perceived by a pure information system. That information has been lost when it was converted into intellectual information. Instead, the information we base reality upon, our world model, is the sum of the cognitive information from our brain and the intellectualisation process of our minds. Creating intellectual information, that only exists in our own personised information system. Allowing us to create a useful model of our environment.
This of course means that our model of the world our reality, is not only a result of our Intellectualisation of pure information, but also on the scale that we perceive it. On subatomic scales, pure information is very rare or rather the information recognised, by our universal pure information system is rare. For example, the distance between atom shells, compared to the size of an electron is vast. But this does not mean that gap between the shells is empty devoid of any information. There is data there, but it does not have a level of predictability to be recognised (perceived) by our universal pure information system. Nevertheless, it is only our universal pure information that we intellectualise and if we intellectually perceived universal pure information at the subatomic scale, the world would be incomprehensible to us. Because we would not have any capacity to recognise anything, such as, shapes, surfaces, temperature etc.
Note C6 Consciousness
Consciousness is a unique phenomenon, whilst it is a depiction of our pure information environment (what is generally believed to be the physical environment), it is not a part of that environment. And although it can through influencing neuro patterns in the brain create motion in the body to change the pure information environment, it cannot directly influence it. For example, you cannot create motion in an object simply by manipulating your consciousness i.e. thinking an object to move. Furthermore, any effect conscious intervention, has on the pure information environment, is only temporary because of entropy. All the structures that we design and build, all the images we imagine and paint, all the knowledge we record, in books, etc. as well as our brains the cradle of our consciousness will eventually succumb to entropy. But could conscious intervention reverse entropy?
The idea of intellectual intervention reversing entropy, was first highlighted in a famous thought experiment, proposed by James Clark Maxwell. The experiment is usually depicted as, a box separated by a partition down the middle. In each side of the box there is a gas, at the same ambient temperature. On top of the box, sits an intellectual creature, which is generally called a demon. The demon monitors the temperature, or rather the energy levels of each molecule of gas in both sides of the box. He then sorts the molecules with high than the average energy levels and those with lower than the average energy levels, into different sides of the partition by opening a trap door in the partition. Producing a temperature difference between the two sides. Thereby, lowering the systems entropy, creating a potential heat engine, that could produce useful energy.
However, you can only produce, useful energy in this way if the heat engine is a closed system. Otherwise, you would have energy transfer between the engine and the outside environment. Which would cause, a lowering in temperature difference between the two sides of the partition, increasing entropy, rather than lowering it. But is the demon part of the closed system or not? At first sight it seems that he is not, because his actions of opening and shutting the trap door, require energy. And this energy would be greater than any energy gain by the transfer of a single molecule. So, the demon could simply sit on top of the box, looking through it (The box could be made of a transparent material.), opening and closing the trap door, having no effect on the system, other than deciding which molecule goes into which side. However, there is a problem with this. If the partitioned box is a closed system, then information cannot leave that system. Anything that could transmit information also carries energy, (i.e. photons) and is not permitted to leave the system. Therefore, the demon must be part of the closed system, in order to gain information about the energy level, of each molecule. The demon would have to cease being a separate entity and become the intellect of the system itself.
To be able to sort molecules with different energy leaves, to different sides of the box. The demon (The System’s intelligence) would need information about the position and properties of each molecule. But to utilise this information, to physically sort the molecules, it must also record or memorise the energy level, position and velocity, of each molecule. This can only be done by creating programme information. Altering, some of the pure information within the system. However, sooner or later the capacity of the system to create programme information will be reached, So, then the altered pure information must be returned to its original state, in order to create more programme information. In other words, the demon’s memory, must be wiped. The process of wiping the demon’s memory is said to produce energy in the form of heat. Taking exactly the same amount of energy from the system as gained by system. This was foretold by Charles Henry Bennett in 1982 (Bennett 2003) based on Landauer’s principle of erasure of information and later was experimentally verified. However, heat energy is just pure information, a form of motion. Sometimes referred to as useless energy, it is simply the vigorous motion of molecules.
The point I am making here is, it is only the demon’s memory, the creation and destruction of programable information, which affects the system’s energy. Whereas the decision to sort the molecules and deciding which molecule goes in which side, the pure intellectual part of the system, doesn’t appear to use or create energy. In other words, does not change motion in the system, so does not physically add or takeaway from the system. Yet, it is essential to the process, of lowering entropy in the system. If we were to get a computer to do the same task. It would do it by inputting pure information, digital electrical signals from its sensers and then uses logic gates to processes these signals. By combine them with digital information held on its memory chips to send electrical signals to operate the trap door. It is exclusively a pure information process, a manipulation of atoms and electron interactions that uses energy, at every stage of the process and throughout the system. However, despite the terms like machine intelligence and AI, manmade computational machines do not possess an intellectual understanding.
Our minds work very differently to the logic circuits of a computer. Yes, it is true our brain uses a huge proportion of the energy that our body produces. It is also true that our brains use energy, when responding to signals from our sensory systems, as we gather information from the pure information environment. Our brains also use energy when we think or dream. Because to think or dream we must constantly create and erase memories and create emotions. But like the demon we do this by engineering pure information into programable information in our brain. However, our brains have two distinct outputs or functions. One is a signal output, the electric signals sent to muscles, such us the myocardium, phonatory or biceps, allowing us to maintain our bodily functions and interact in a pure information environment and is totally energy dependent (autonomic and somatic nervous systems). But the second output is a conscious model of the world, that we think we exist in. But does this conscious model require energy? It is known that different areas of our brains perform different functions and that these areas are linked. But there seems to be no central processing area in the brain, no place or places where it is possible to say, this is where consciousness is created or exists.
Wouldn’t it be interesting, if it was possible to carry out an experimental study, to see if consciousness used energy. For example, you could monitor a person eating something that they find extremely pleasurable. Measure, the exact amount of energy used by the body’s metabolism whilst the person is experiencing this pleasure. Then calculate how much energy the person’s body would use activating the nervous system and create chemical and physical changes in the brain and body etc, while feeling this pleasure. If there is a discrepancy, between the energy calculated to cause physical changes and the energy actually used. It would suggest that the feeling of pleasure, uses energy and consciousness could be considered to be a physical phenomenon. If there is not a discrepancy, then consciousness does not require energy and would not be part of what we would consider, to be the physical world. Yet, logic seems to dictate, that consciousness developed as part of a physical biological evolutionary process.
Where and how biological evolution began has not been established. However, life appears to have been present here on earth around 3.5 billion years ago. It seems that complex molecular structures started to evolve. Some of these complex molecular structures evolved further to be become self-sustaining through replication. In other words, the living entity was born. As these living entities continued to evolve, some of them started to develop a primitive nervous system, allowing them to interact with their pure information environment. These nervous systems simply carry pure information in the form of electrical signals between a nerve receptor and a membrane or muscle. Then something special happened, organisms evolved that could control their environment. To do this the living organisms needed to evolve a way of make decisions, using data collected in a memory. This is the data from sensory input or genetically embedded data (instinct). The mystery is, why did these early organisms go on to evolve a consciousness. Surly it would have been easier and more efficient for evolution to continue progressing in a similar way to a neural network in a modern computer.
Neural nets used in deep learning are comprise of a network of interconnecting layers of nodes. Each node has an input, weighted value, a bias or threshold and an output. Data is fed through the network to find a critical path to produce an output that best conforms to a cost function (goal) Through back propagation, the progressive adjustment of weights, the network is incrementally trained. Until the output is a close match to the cost function. This makes them highly efficient at learning, processing and problem solving, constantly improving over time, without the need to have feelings or to be self-aware. Whereas a conscious mind, is susceptible to making illogical decision and not always learning from mistakes. Nevertheless, these neural networks are only really products of mathematical functions, complex manipulation of cause and effect. They also require large amounts of training data input.
Evolution is also a pure information process. The passing, of genetic data from one generation to the next, in the form of genetic code, in a similar way to artificial neural networks. With each generation or layer of individuals receiving slightly different weighted and bias data. The problem for evolution using this as a data correction or learning system, is that there is no contingency for fatal error data, to be fed back into the system. A simplified example would be: An herbivore evolves in a lush green valley it is well camouflaged and adapted to the valley and simply wanders around eating grass. At one end of the valley is the only exit a rocky ravine where lives a carnivore. Any herbivore wandering into the ravine, no longer camouflaged and not having any personal awareness of danger. Simple wanders into the path of a carnivore and is eaten. However, because that herbivore no longer exists, it can no longer procreate and therefore, cannot feed genetic information back into the evolutionary system and so cannot influence the herbivore’s evolutionary development and change their behaviour. Meaning that in each generation of herbivore, there will be some individuals who wander into the ravine to be eaten. The herbivore’s evolutionary system will adjust, by increasing the population to counterbalance the loses of individuals in the ravine. But essentially the individual herbivores are never aware of the carnivore or recognise the threat it poses. Nevertheless, this system of evolution is very successful particularly for microscopic organisms, plants, and invertebrates. Where individual organisms are not very important to the overall evolution of the species. And in the case where individual organisms act as a collective in colonies such as ants, a higher form of collective intelligence can evolve.
However, as the size of the organism increase it requiring more resources and a larger territory to obtain those resources. Therefore, the individual becomes more important to the evolutionary process. No longer is the strategy of multiple expendable organisms viable. There are simply not enough resources to sustain that strategy. Instead, individual organisms have to actively compete with others of the same species. The individual that can out compete their rivals being the one who can back propagate their data (passes on their genes), into the evolutionary system. But this requires the individual to become selfish, to have sense of self preservation. This means that not only must they have a perception of self, but also a cognizance of self in the context of their immediate environment in other words, a consciousness. To explain the reason for the evolution of consciousness is easy. To explaining how it works and how it evolved is a different matter. Because consciousness or conscious perception cannot be a direct result of pure information interactions.
Also, where our intellectual model of reality exists is a very difficult question to answer, because the model is not part of the pure information system. In other words, doesn’t exist in the pure information reality. Similarly, a colour representing a wavelength of light within our intellectual model, doesn’t exist in the pure information reality. Even the motion within the image does not exist in pure information reality, because that motion is preserved differently in pure information. This goes for anything that informs us of our surroundings, sound, smell, pain etc., anything that changes our model of reality. Although these are created through a causal pathway, that pathway is totally non-reversible, even by reversing the direction of change. For instance, colour cannot affect the frequency of a light wave. Whereas with pure information theoretically all pathways can be reversed. This means for us to have an effect on our local information environment; there must be a different pathway. To cause change to the pure information environment. Our brains must first, read or sense voluntary changes in our intellectual model, and change pure information values, in the form of electric and chemical signals in our brains and muscles. Allowing us to consciously move and make changes to our local pure information environment. This means that there is no direct connection between our sensory neural pathways and our voluntary motor neural pathways. They are two separate functions of the brain and can only be linked through intellectual intervention. For example, touching something hot might cause you to pull your hand away, because you experience pain. But you could make a conscious decision to leave your hand on the hot object and endure the pain for a time. Furthermore, you might decide to respond differently to the hot object on different occasions. This means that the relationship between the hot object and movement of your hand touching it, is not causal, nor is it down to chance. It requires an independent action, a decision which requires intellectual intervention (thought). This allows an animal to decide to suffer pain and sustain injury in a fight if the reward of passes on their genes outweigh the risks of death. Or on another occasion to run from a fight to protect their ability to pass on their genes in the future. However, these decisions are very complex and difficult to make, requiring consideration of many factors and often need to be made instantaneously under stress. Which is way beyond the mental agility (speed of reasoning) of any conscious life form, including us.
However, many of the decisions we make, particularly under stress, are at least part controlled by feelings, not just through logical reasoning. This goes back to the development of early nervous systems. Alongside the sensory system and autonomic system that control involuntary body functions, such as breathing, heart rate, digestion etc. A sympathetic system developed that primarily controlled the fight-or-flight response, but also produced basic emotional responses, fear anxiety aggression sextual attraction and pleasure. Emotions are physiological responses, they are pure information interactions, and we and other conscious creatures, do not experience them, we experience feelings. A feeling is intellectual information, created by changes to our world model in response to sensory stimuli. Feelings like other intellectual information such as colour, sound and pain, do not exist in the pure information reality. Although feelings are used by the brain to trigger an emotional response. They are more diverse and complex than emotions and can be overridden or counteracted by other feeling. For example, a conscious creature ability to balance the feelings of curiosity and caution, helps them to explore their environment much more effectively and safely. Creatures, with less developed consciousness, rely more heavily on feelings, instincts and sensory input. Making it very hard to discern between primitive creatures with a consciousness and ones without. But as intellectual ability has evolved, probably in response to more complex social interactions between individuals within groups. Higher intellectual creatures such as us, have developed methods of utilizing memory, to imagine, envisage, reason and empathise. It is these abilities along with feeling and our sensory model, that define us.
The point here is that what defines us, and our reality is intellectual information. Although both pure and intellectual information are information, created from predictability in patterns of data (patterns of differences). These data patterns are very different, neither one exists as information in the other information system. It is only through the remarkable ability of the brain, to interpret pure information and create an intellectual model of the world, that allows us to exist as sentient beings. However, our model of the world is only an interpretation and with all interpretation, information is lost. So, the world we perceive is only real to us, is not a true reflection of the pure information environment, we exist in. I think that it is important that as curious beings, we bear in mind the type of information we receive when try to understand our environment. Our model of the world has evolved to allow us to survive and thrive in our local environment, Therefore, when we try to find answers, as Werner Heisenberg intimated. We can only create questions and conduct experimentation that will yield results that can be interpreted by us, through the distorted lens of our intellectual comprehensions of the world. I know that scientists, pay lip service to the notion that the world is different to the one our senses portray but I don’t think that’s enough. I think, true understanding will come from the realisation that what we see, and experience is only real to us. If reality and understanding depend on information, shouldn’t we first understand how information works?
Note D1 The Concept of Pure Space
In notes B1 I said that physical motion was impossible, because it did not matter what reductionism theory you apply in a physical world. You will always come to a stage where a something will have to move in pure space. Pure space is simply nothingness with dimensions. So physical motion is impossible, because nothingness is an invariant and therefore a perfect solid. This suggests that reality does not arise from a physical existence, yet we do exist.
The problem is, how can a solid space allow movement so that existence can arise. I said a physical object cannot move in space, because it or part of it cannot dissolve into nothing or appear out of nothing. But, what about an object consisting of pure information. Because you can change data to create information of either something or nothing. And changes in data value can also create both information of movement, and tangible movement of information. For example, Let’s imagine we are watching a racing car, speeding around a track on television. The images of the racing car are created from changing patterns of pixels (or pattern of differences) on the digital television screen. These moving patterns create images, information of the racing car and its motion. But these images along with the images of the land scape around the car, tangibly moves around on the television screen as well. It could be argued that this is not real movement, it is just apparent movement created in our brains. Nevertheless, the information (the image) has physically changed position over time, on the screen. Therefore, movement of information can be achieved in a sequence or pattern of differences. Yet, there can be no patten of differences, in pure space (nothingness), because it is an invariant and is constant throughout. Perhaps we need to re-imagine pure space from a different perspective.
I have said that nothingness must be an invariant. which means it should look and be the same everywhere and at every scale. But earlier, I discussed the possibility of the universe having a scale referenced to the speed of light (see notes A5). Since the universe must have evolved from nothingness, could that nothingness or space have a scale to gauge size? Absolute nothingness has no scale it can be infinitely big and infinitely small at the same time. However, pure space, has dimensions, and thanks to the universal speed of light, has a scale within those dimensions. Although pure space is infinite, the concept of large and small, could be applied to it and have meaning. So, if I observed pure space, I would be doing it from the perspective of a particular scale. Therefore, I could identify volumes of my space as either large or small, in relation to the scale, I am observing it at. This is crucial, because this allows me to have a smallest possible point in pure space. This is a point so small that it has no dimensions, viewed from my scale. Let’s call this point of pure space a Bitpoint. Of course, bitpoints are scale dependent. Viewed from a scale infinitely smaller than the bitpoint, it would be exactly the same as the infinitely nothingness of space I have described, just a nothingness with three dimensions, an invariant that is a true fundamental object. Yet from the perspective of my scale, it would be perfectly reasonable to say, that pure space consists of an incalculable number of small points (bitpoints) of nothingness that prevent movement. Because bitpoins are the smallest thing possible at my scale, you could say that they are the smallest bit of information (data) possible in my information system. However, if every bit point held exactly the same information, then pure space would be an invariant. It would be stable, and existence could never come into being. For existence to occur, pure space must be unstable.
Instability by definition, is when something is in a state that is unpredictable and liable to change. Something can only change if has the ability to be different. For this to happen each individual bitpoint in pure space must be capable of change, to be different, to be in more than one state. I have used the word ‘state’ in this contexed, to denote a difference between nothingness. Which seems wrong because the word state is normally used to denote a difference in properties, which does not apply in this case, because nothingness doesn’t have any properties. However, I just cannot think of or find a better word to describe how one nothing is different to another, so I will continue to refer to them as in different states. But how can I describe nothingness as containing multiple differences, when it is neither a physical entity nor information. In fact, what nothing or nothingness actually is unknowable.
However, that does not mean that there cannot be multiple nothings. Because by our measure, nothingness, is simply an invariant. Which means it is perfectly possible, that as long, as it remains a perfect invariant, it could be in one of any number of different states. I believe there might be many states of nothingness, therefore many states bitpoints can be in. Each state would have its own unique identity, its own data value. It is also probable that each bitpoint in pure space, would have an effect and would be affected by the bitpoints adjacent to it, due to changes in difference values. Means that each bitpoint would be in a constantly changing state. These random changing states of the bitpoints, could be likened to the zero-point energy fields as describe in quantum field theory. Instead of fluctuating changes in energy values at each point in space, there are fluctuating changes of bitpoint difference values. This would mean that pure space would, seemingly be in a constant state of chaos. The difference in values between bitpoint, would be constantly cancelling each other out. So, a volume of pure space would have a total bit-point difference value fluctuating around zero but not zero
This chaotic state of pure space can be thought of as a type of nothingness, it’s near zero fluctuating difference values causing it to be devoid of information, an invariant because it is chaotic at every point, making it the same everywhere, a nothingness, but an unstable nothingness. If all pure space remained in this chaotic value state, the information we use to predicate reality would not exist, because information require order. To create order from chaos there must be a level of predictability, a level of repetition that creates patterns and increases the difference value. In other words, the value of difference in a volume of pure space must increase, move away from zero. This could be achieved through synchronisation. Occasionally and sporadically throughout pure space clusters of bitpoint could naturally start to synchronise changes in states. This would happen in isolation, in microscopically small volumes of pure space according to my scale. These isolated synchronised bitpoint values through repetition cause patterns of bitpoint states. Causing, the difference value to move away from zero. However, these patterns of bitpoint values are instantly broken down, because the volume of pure space surrounding it is always tending towards a zero value, throwing the synchronised clusters out of synchronisation back into disorder. You could think of these synchronised patterns of bitpoint clusters as brief disturbances of uniformity within a stable chaotic environment. But these disturbances are enough to destabilise, the chaotic value state of pure space. Occasionally allowing much more ordered sequences of values to form. Crucially some of these sequences of values patterns are self-replicating, activating an identical sequence of values, in an adjacent volume of pure space, with that volume of pure space repeating the process (as demonstrated in such cellular automation machines as John Conway’s Game of life (Toffoli and Margolus, 1987)). Causing a series of rise and falls of ‘difference values, to move over a distance in pure space, in a wave like pattern.
The motion of these difference value waves, is not physical movement, nothing changes position. Nevertheless, it is movement of ‘difference values, in the same way in which a physical wave, is supposed to cause movement of energy values. Therefore, it will act in the same way as a physical wave. In the way it disperses and interacts with other waves. But these difference value wave patterns are not information. They only have the ability to carry potential information. They are wave patterns of high and low differences, between bitpoins (data). The speed at which these waves of differences can travel through pure space is limited by the rate of change between bitpoints, i.e. the delay between one bitpoint effecting another. At the bitpoint scale, the rate of change is immeasurably fast so as to be considered instantaneous. However, at a macro scale, you would find that the rate of change over 299,792 kilometres would be approximately 1 second, the speed of light, the maximum speed that information can be transmitted.
To recap, I am postulating that behind reality is a pure space, made from infinitesimal points of nothing. Which I have called bitpoints. The truly fundamental building blocks of reality. These bitpoints are static, but in a constant state of change. Interacting with each other and creating within the general body of nothingness, a chaotic myriad of difference values. Through, synchronisation of bitpoint clusters, patterns of difference values can form, which move in a wave like way. These waves of difference values carry pattens of data that are potential information to our pure information system and can travel no faster than the speed of light.
But there seems to be a glaring problem with this idea. If existence is based on pure space, a lattice of fixed bit points. You would have only one static frame of reference, so, you could assign a fixed point in space. This goes against nature as it been understood since Galileo. However, as I have already stated, information is not in bit point heterogeneity, the amount of difference between bitpoints (difference values). It is in the predictability, of pattern of differences, in a sequence of bitpoint change. So, pure information is not, a direct manifestation of bitpoint change but, a manifestation of the predictability of those bitpoint changes and does not correlate exactly to changes in pure space. Therefore, because our reality consists only of informion objects, they only move relative to each other, not to any fixed point in pure space. Also, information is not a physical entity, so has no physical presents or location. It just testifies to an entity, and a location.
Although changes in a sequence of bitpoint differences (a change in difference values) do not necessarily correlate to changes in information. The overall value of individual bitpoints (data value), has an effect on the probability that information will be found in any particular volume of space. Any volume of pure space will have its own constantly changing unique difference value. Which is the sum of difference values of smaller volumes of pure space, contained within it. It will also in turn contribute its data values of larger volumes of pure space, right up to the volume of pure space that contains, the whole of the universe as we know it.
The larger the volume of pure space, the closer its overall difference between bitpoints (difference value) will be to zero and more stable it will become. This has an influence on all its constituent volumes, causing their values to move towards a zero value. Dispersing data/potential information more evenly throughout pure space, which in turn causes its value to move even closer to zero. This propensity for pure space values to move closer to zero, due its tendency towards its natural state of chaos. I believe is the driving force of reality, causing information to change and pure information to disperse throughout pure space in a process known as entropy.
Note D2 The True Nature of Particles
I have stated in note D1 that within pure space, waves of difference values carry pattens of data that are potential information to our pure information system. However, these pattens of data are potential information they are not information because they are not perceived by our pure information system. They only become information when they interact with another pattens of data, causing patterns of data that can be perceived by our pure information system as elementary (subatomic) particles.
The patterns of bitpoints that are representing or holding the information of the subatomic particle e.g. an electron, could be anywhere within a value pattern containing billions of constantly changing bitpoints. Therefore, it could never have a precise location. In fact, this potential information has no location, it is only when it interacts with other data (i.e., another subatomic particle / value pattern) that patterns of values are produced. Which can hold information that can be deciphered by our universal pure information system, as an entity in a general location with identifiable characteristics of motion which we intellectualise as an electron. That is why a sub-atomic particle, before it has interacted with another particle, to us does not appear to exist in a particular location because it has no pure information value. The subatomic particle’s potential information is within a difference value wave function, somewhere between high and low difference values. With a greater possibility that it is within difference values conducive with producing predictable bitpoint patterns. So, its position and velocity on detection will always be probabilistic. Even after particles have interacted with one another and been detected. There is still as a certain amount of waviness. This because it is solely pure information, having a pure information value that can only indicate an imprecise location or velocity in our information system. It is only when pure information values are amassed together, when information is perceived on the macro scale. That intellectual information values are produced, that allow us to perceive object, as having a more precise location and motion. We can liken difference value wave in pure space to disturbances waves in a field and the perception of particles in our pure information system as excitations in particle fields.
As cognitive intellectual beings our intellectualised reality is created from perception of a of vast amounts of amalgamated and simplified or filtered pure information data. In the form of interactions of elementary particles, but what are these particles really. Our intellectual instincts tell us that these must be the smallest bits of everything in reality. And since we intuitively believe that we live in a physical reality, we endower particles with physical attributes. Yet they do not have any presents, acting as a wave within a field until they are detected. And then they can only be detected when they interact with each other, when they are perceived. No detector we can conceive or build, can directly detect any subatomic particle or its presents without effecting it. They are also said to have no size, being points in space, while being everywhere in space at the same time? Most of the particles predicted by the standard model are very short lived and pay little or no part in the creation and the maintaining of matter in the universe. Fermions are said to be subject to physical forces and Bosons are said to mediate those physical forces, Yet, in the case of the strong force and the strong nuclear force, they only act over very small and precise distances, despite being immensely powerful. Whereas, the weak nuclear force, has just the right amount strength and acts over just the right range to balance out both the strong and electromatic forces. To allow elements to form and nuclear fusion and fission to take place. Elementary particles are also said to have an angler momentum (spin), with fermions having half integer spin, breaking the physical laws of symmetry. This physical attribute of particle spin is essential to the understanding of how particles interact. Yet it is impossible for an elementary particle to physically spin and as shown by the Stern–Gerlach experiment (McIntyre 2022), that if it was spinning, its spatial orientation would be quantized. Which is not a natural consequence of physical angular momentum forces. And then there are the interaction between the various particles themselves, mediated by virtual particles. Which are said not to be actual particles, but excitations in particle fields, if they exist? All these particle phenomena and many more are explained as physical quantum behaviour regulated by the uncertainty principle.
I admit that I probably have a very weak understanding of particle physics and quantum behaviour. It’s not through a lack of trying or because the subject is counter intuitive. It is simply that I don’t have the intellectual ability to understand the maths and the full complexity of the subject. Unsurprising really, because this subject has been studied and contributed to by some of the greatest minds of modern times, but there lies the paradox! The original aim of physics was to discover the simple fundamental building blocks and processes which our complex universe is built on. Yet the answers and explanations physicists give, are becoming more and more elaborate and complex. Involving a bewildering number of particles, antiparticles and not to mention virtual particles, with theories which envisage things such as, vibrating strings, multiple universe and looped space. Surly there must be a simple mechanism underlying all this complexity.
Richard Feynman, developed the technique of using simple diagrams to simplify particle interaction calculations. His diagrams only depict exchanges of information between varies particles. They do not describe the particle or its behaviour, accept when they interact with another particle. Nor do they explain how a force is created or the mechanism by which a force works. In fairness, Feynman diagrams are only meant to be a mathematical hack. They are not meant to describe actual particle behaviour, yet they have become a very powerful tool in particle physics. Could this be because these diagrams represent a limit to what we could possibly know, about subatomic particle behaviour.
I think it is more likely that elementary particles are not a physical entity, not a peace of matter, but a byte of information, a sequence or package of data, carried on a wave of bits of information. Which are outside of our information system, and when these packages of data interact with other such packages, they exchange data (virtual particles) allowing them to be perceived as something with a present’s, in our information system. Surely, it makes sense to think of particles as the smallest bits of information we can be aware of, not necessarily a physical object. With particle interactions being the smallest thing, we can perceive. This concept of particle being the smallest bits of information that it is possible to preserve, just seems to explain the subatomic world more logically, especially when applied it to things like the double slit experiment. I think, the weirdness associated with quantum and particle physics, and the resulting confusion, comes from our human dogged determination to envisage elementary particles as physical entities.
The concept of pure space can also help explain quantum behave. For example, because the value of pure information is not only determined by interactions but also by the difference value of pure space. You might say its difference value environment. This could mean that it is highly likely that, two virtue particles destroying each other, in one part of the universe, could instantly cause two new virtue particles to come into existence in another part of the universe. As the pure space volume that the universe occupies attempts to achieve a zero difference values. All this happens instantaneously (faster than the speed of light), because value change is instantaneous. However, no information was exchanged between the two sets of virtue particles. This could also explain phenomena like entangled particle or quantum tunnelling. For example, take two entangled particles with opposite spin, if one is measured it will affect the spin of the other at a distance, seemingly faster than the speed of light. But this is not through faster than light communication, or Einstein’s dreaded hidden variables at least not in the particles themselves. It is because, both particles are interacting, with the wider difference value environment. Which can be affected by the measurement, of one of the particles. In the case of quantum tunnelling. A particle may not be able to pass through a barrier, because it’s information value will not allow it. However, if the difference value levels either side of the barrier are just right, it could seemingly disappear from one side of the barrier, for another particle to instantaneously appear on the other side. Thus, giving the illusion that the particle has passed through the barrier.
Note D3 Information and Entropy
Claude Shannon, established, that information, was in predictability. The more predictable a data sequence was, the less information it carried. Therefore, the more random data becomes, the more information it carries. A process known as information entropy. This means, because the universe is subject to entropy (order naturally transitions into disorder), the amount of information the universe contains will constantly increase. This seems to make sense up to a certain point. However, most astrophysics believe that the universe will keep on expanding and get cooler and cooler. So that in the far distance future, all matter and energy interaction will cease, and the universe will become one temperature, gravity would not have any influence, so the universe, would be unchanging. It would be totally predictable and would hold no information. Which doesn’t fit with the idea, of information constantly increasing. So maybe, information doesn’t increase or decrease, maybe it cannot be destroyed, maybe its value just changes, either being able to be recognised by a particular information system or not.
This begs the question, is information, information if it is not part of our information system? I think that depends on what type of information it is. For example, if I was to delete this document off my laptop and then empty my recycle bin. I would have removed this abstract information from my files. However, it may be possible to recover this information, from trace patterns of coding remaining on the hard drive (hidden programme information). I could take out the hard drive and destroy it, thereby destroying all the programme information it held. But this would not have necessarily destroyed, the abstract information, because that information also exists in my brain, in the form of memory. An alteration or strengthening of synapses, connections between neurons in my brain, a sort of biological hard drive. This means, I can access my memory, by intellectualising this information, recovering the abstract information. Which I could write down on paper, creating new programmed information. To be intellectualise, by someone else, who is then able to obtain the same abstract information. However, the paper and the hard drive along with all other programme information, will eventually age and breakdown into basic elements due to entropy. This of course, will include the brains of all intellectual beings, insuring that all intellectualised information will be irretrievably destroyed, but what about pure information?
If I was to delete this document from my hard drive, destroying programme and abstract information. Would some pure information also be destroyed? No, because deleting the document, only requires minor rearrangement to the hard disc’s molecules, without changing their structure. which change the magnetic properties of the disc, creating the programmed information. This process is reversable, and I could restore this document back on to the hard disc. So, through rearranging pure information I can create, destroy or reverse changes to programmable information. However, essentially the pure information itself, has remained unaffected. what if, I decided to destroy the hard drive. with a hammer? Smashing it into pieces, destroying some of the molecular bonds. However, this will also not destroy its pure information (i.e. its atomic structure) it will just be in a less ordered form. So, I could, if I was patient enough and had the means to repair molecular bonds. Reconstruct the hard drive, restoring an order to the pure information allowing it to be identified as a hard drive. But of course, the hard drive will eventually succumb to entropy. How long this takes depends on the environment, the hard drive is in. Eventually it will age and decay, its chemical structure will breakdown and its atoms will scatter. Even then, if I had a god like ability I could locate, each atom and reassemble, the hard drive. However, as time goes on the hard drive’s atoms will disperse all over the universe. Until in theory at least, over an unimaginable long period of time. The atoms that were the hard drive, will begin to break down into their subatomic components. At this point, no intellectual intervention could restore the hard drive, due to the quantum effect. It would be impossible to locate any of the original subatomic components of the atoms due to the uncertainty principle.
What has essentially happened is that each atom has broken down into parts that have no information value, in our universal’s pure information system. So, at the predicted end of our universe, when all subatomic particles have been dispersed throughout space, pure information will not exist. However, there will be information, but this information will be in the chaotic difference patterns of pure space. And there is a strong possibility, that once again, out of these seemingly chaotic difference patterns of pure space. Perhaps, through synchronisation, that more ordered patterns are produced, with greater data values. That can produce information values, that could be recognised by ours or similar universal pure information system. Triggering a creation event. Starting the process of establishing a new universal system and starting a new cycle of pure information existence. Therefore, the total amount of potential information does not increase or decrease. Just the amount of information available to any one particular system. Not only is information preserved, but motion would also be preserved at the predicted end of our universe in the chaotic changes of the bitpoints. This ties in with what I stated in note A4c that the overall motion in the universe is conserved (it cannot be created or destroyed), and that it has no fixed vector quantity.
This may take us closer to answering the question that everybody asks, ‘How and why are we here?’ In other words, how did existence happen. It is clear that existence, or something could not have come from nothingness, that would be physically impossible. Whereas if you decided to create reality purely from information, all you would need is some differences. That is any kind of difference within anything, even nothing. Because without a difference, there is nothing, with just one difference there is something. Also, because ordered can come from chaos. Just by applying rudimentary rules, to apparently chaotic interactions, you can create ordered patterns. And by applying the principles of cellular automation, these pattens can be self-replicating. So that is why I think that the notion, of a purely information reality, based on every point of the universe, holding a finite bit of information (a potential to be different), worthy of serious consideration from those with far greater minds than mine.
Note D4 Energy, Mass and Gravity
Energy and mass are definitely linked in some way the question is how? And if time doesn’t exist and space doesn’t bend where does gravity come from and how is it linked to mass and energy? My first thought was that energy is simply bitpoint interaction, the constant changing of bitpoint values in pure space, that very occasionally produce pure information. Powering the pure information that that gives us the presents of matter and movement. However, this would mean, energy and information would be spread evenly through the universe, but the universe is full of concentrated energy and information. Predominately in stars and other celestial objects where high-density potential energy or pure information are concentrated in the form of mass. There again, if I am right in what I have been saying, bitpoint interaction are a limiting factor of motion. Limiting the maximum speed of any object to the universal speed limit (speed of light). It is interesting that the only objects that can obtain the speed of light, cannot have mass and are considered to be pure energy. This I think gives us a clue to what energy and mass are.
I am postulating that motion is primarily derived from a sequence of linear data changes, creating the movement of data values in pure space, let’s call it Data Transition. Data transition only has one speed, regulated by the bit point speed, the speed at which a bit point can change state. However, its motion can be in any direction and can change direction at any point. This means that data transition motion, although it always travels at the same speed in pure space. Its path (overall velocity) through pure space, can be anywhere between a straight line (constant motion in one dimension), let’s refer to it as Rectilinear Motion and constantly changing directional path, which I will refer to as Erratic-directional Motion. It is a balance between these two types of data transition motion, which creates the moving bitpoint patterns, that can hold potential pure information.
However, as I have already stated, bitpoint change does not correlate directly to information change. Therefore, we are never aware of data transition motion. The motion we experience comes from information change, which takes place in somewhere I will call Real Space. Real space is no more real than real time, it is the place we think we move and exist in. It’s a fundamental part of our model of the world, created by intellectualized information. And because it is information it can be malleable, so can be stretched or warped. Real space is sort of superimposed on pure space, although we are never aware of pure space and there is no direct connection between them.
The motion we experience, or rather the apparent motion we experience, is caused by a linear sequence of perceptions (information interactions) transiting through real space, not through data transition motion in pure space. Let me try to explain, take a freed photon that travels at the speed of light. All of its motion appears to be one direction, except, it doesn’t really have a one-dimensional direction because it behaves like a wave, not like matter traveling through space. Its precise direction is only apparent once it has interacted with something else and its wave function has collapsed. In other words, only once it has been perceived does it become information. Therefore, it only travels at the speed of light, when it holds no pure information, which is the same as saying it is not information. It’s just a probabilistic wave of data. The actual transfer of information of the proton from source to detection, is propagated through data transitional motion. In other words, bit point changes in pure space, not through pure information motion in real space.
However, this is not the case for an atom. An atom is a complex system generated through interactions between its constituent parts/particles. Such interactions are described by particle physicists as the exchanging of bosons or virtual particles between fermions. Primarily by gluons being exchanged between quarks or quarks and antiquarks creating, the strong nuclear force and the residual strong force. And by virtual photons being exchanged between charged particles (protons and electrons) to create an electromagnetic force. The balance of these fundamental forces is said to be responsible for binding the atom’s particles together, causing it to be a stable entity (matter). However, these forces could easily be described as actions or consequential information as a result of exchanges of data between particles. In other words, atoms are product of data interaction.
For an atom to exist as information and remain stable, it would require a vast number of data exchanges to take place between its particles every second. Particles being patterns of data in pure space. The exact amount would have to be calculated by someone far more cleverer than I. The point is, all these data interactions, causes data transition motion. This is because, exchanging data and the creation of new data requires the movement of data between particles/data-patterns. This motion is not all in one direction, but fluctuates in all directions, i.e. erratic-directional data transition motion. However, this will only create the potential information to produce a static atom. To create the potential information of a moving atom, the position of its individual data patterns (particles) and the data interactions between them, must move continuously in unison in one direction across space. To do this requires rectilinear data transitional motion (motion in one direction). Therefore, a moving atom is a product of both these type of directional motion of data in pure space. Meaning, the atom’s data transition motion will have an overall velocity between any two points in space consisting of rectilinear plus erratic-directional motion. Because of this, its progress (speed) between the two points will be slower than it would be, if its particles/data patterns where not interacting with each other. In the same way that if two cars ‘X’ and ‘Y’ travel from ‘A’ to ‘B’, both travel at the same speed. If ‘X’ goes directly to ‘B’, but ‘Y’ takes a less direct route, car ‘X’ will reach ‘B’ first, simply because it travels less distance. To get to the point! what I am trying to say in my inept way, is that interactions between data patterns (particles), in an atom slow down its rectilinear data transition motion (vector motion) across space.
You might want to point out here, that a freed atom act like a wave in the same way as a freed photon. This is true, because they are only potential information, in the form of data pattens. The interactions between the data patterns, do not in themselves cause perception (create pure information). It is not until the atom interacts with something else, such as an x-ray (electromagnetic radiation) or another particle, can it be perceived as pure information and be detected. Incidentally, the particles of its nucleus can only be detected separately, if it is destroyed in a particle accelerator and its particles interact with a magnetic field. However, once an atom has been detected, it will be found to have mass greater, than the sum of the mass of its particles.
So, what is mass? It is usually described as a measure of inertia or a bodies resistance to a change in velocity. Yet, to change a bodies velocity require a force. I have already stated force is not something that can be proven to exist (see note A2). It only a peculiarity of movement, a motion which is applied to something, a sensible measure. On the subatomic scale (pure information perception scale), force is the result of the movement of data, between data patterns (particles). Producing pure information of motion, creating the strong & residual strong forces, weak force, and electromagnetic force. So, if mass is a measure of inertia or a bodies resistance to a change in velocity. Looking at a single atom inside a moving object, from the prospective of pure information motion. This time our atom is a part of a molecular system inside an object moving through space, so is constantly interacting with particles around it. The atom or rather the data that creates the information of an atom, has both rectilinear and erratic-directional data transition motion. Its rectilinear data transition motion is giving the atoms data a velocity through pure space. While its erratic-directional data transition motion, is slowing down the atoms data’s progress though pure space. As the atom is part of a mass, it is bound to other atoms through electromagnetic interactions into molecules. This molecular interaction adds to the mass’ overall chaotic data transition motion, slowing its progress though space further.
To bring the object to a stop relative to something, would require an amount of rectilinear motion in the opposing direction equal to the combined rectilinear motions of all the atoms in the object. That opposite rectilinear motion would have to be not only equal to all the atoms rectilinear motion, but also, to their erratic-directional motion. This gives the object the appearance of having momentum. Remember, we are taking about motion and objects as information, not physical entities. To cause the object to move in relation to something, requires an increase in rectilinear data transitional motion, in the direction you want the object to travel. However, it also requires extra motion to account for the extra erratic-directional data transition motion required, as the various interaction between particles move across space in unison with the partials. This gives our object the appearance of having inertia requiring a force or in real terms extra motion to cause it to change its velocity. So, if in physical terms mass is the measure of inertia or a bodies resistance to a change in velocity. In purely information terms, mass is the quantity of erratic-directional data transition motion an object requires to sustain it, as information. In other words, an objects mass will depend on the amount of interactions between the subatomic particles within its atoms. This is the amount of data transition motion required to maintain its atom’s form (its atom’s atomic mass) and the nature and density of its molecular structure, maintaining the objects form. In essence the more data transition motion an object has the greater its mass.
But, what about Higgs field, which is said to be responsible for the mass of particles? The Higgs field like all fields is a volume that contains a value/data at each point within it, value and data being interchangeable in this case. Pure space is a volume that contains a data value at each point, so can be likened to a field. In the same way as a particle is said to interact with the Higgs field, (Higgs mechanism or exchange of data). As a data pattern (particle) moves through pure space it increases difference values within the volume of pure space it occupies. The greater the data erratic-directional motion within a pattern the greater the difference value increase in the volume of space it occupies. This increase in difference value in pure space is constantly opposed by pure spaces propensity towards zero difference value. This has the effect of slowing the particles rectilinear progress slightly. Massless particles have very little erratic-directional data motion so are not affected by this phenomenon.
The idea of variations of difference and data values throughout pure space is not only key to understanding individual particles, mass and things like supposed communication between entangled particles. It is also key to understanding gravity. Although gravity is considered by many as a force, according to Einstein, it’ is an effect of the warping of space time on the path of an object passing through it. The actual forces keeping us fixed to the earth surface, being the normal force of the earth pushing us up, rather than gravity pushing us down. To explain, gravity in terms of information, I need to go back over the properties of pure space. I have said that pure space consists of points of nothingness, I have called bitpoints. Fundamental elements of existence, that can change their state and introduce differences into the world. The difference between bitpoints has a value, a difference value. And because any difference is potential data, each bitpoint has a non-transitive data value, in other words, can hold one bit of information. Also, each bitpoint has an influence upon and is influenced by its adjacent bipoint’s value. Meaning every bitpoint is in a constant state of change, causing a sort of flow of differences throughout pure space. However, this flow of differences is not like the flow of a river that flows in one direction, it flows in all directions at the same time. This means that each individual difference value, is cancelled out by all the other different bitpoint values around it. So that in a given volume of empty space, (space devoid of information) the overall difference value of near zero but never zero. If, however, a volume of space contains a mass, mass being a cluster of interacting information patterns. The overall difference value of the volume of pure space the mass occupies will move away from zero. Remember, bitpoint values in a volume of pure space, always tend towards zero but, never actually achieve zero. This means that the volume of space, the mass occupies wants to move towards a chaotic difference value near to zero. This causes a gradient of different value, between empty space and the mass.
Let’s remind ourselves of the effects difference values have on data and by extension information. Zero difference values are where everything is the same and there is no difference between anything. Therefore, with no difference there can be no data or data change, so no information. Where there are differences, you will have difference values. With the high the contrast between differences, producing higher difference value. However, the higher the difference value, the less data change there is and the more predictable the data becomes and the less information it holds. The lower the contrast between differences, the lower the difference value, but the higher the rate of data change. Increasing the amount of information held, but causing the data to be more chaotic, meaning, the less useful that information becomes to an information system.
Let’s get back to our difference value gradient between near zero-difference value (empty space) and a mass (constant interacting data values). Because the volume of space, the mass occupies wants to move towards a chaotic difference value near to zero. The gradient of differences values wants to flatten out back to a constant near zero-difference value. Of course, it cannot do this because the mass is creating stable different values, maintaining uniform gradient around it. However, if two mass come in proximity to each other their difference value gradient’s start to merge. Causing the two masses to move towards one another, as the difference value gradients around them tries to become one uniform gradient. This effect is what is mistaken as a gravitational force. Of course, gravity is not that simple.
Space is littered by different masses of various sizes, meaning space is a web of interconnecting difference value gradients, creating a sort of gravity or differences field throughout space. Influencing the motion and direction of mass and massless particles and even relaying motion in the form of gravity waves. The other consequence of different value gradients is because that the higher the difference value, the less data change there is. It means that particularly with large masses, where there is a large different value gradient, the closer you get to the mass, the more dater change slows down. Slowing down the rate of perception, meaning that the rate at which information changes also slows’ down. Causing real time to appear to slow down for any information object approaching the large mass.
Finally, I need to decide on a definition of energy. Although, bit point change is the driver or the engine for all motion and the formation of information, I think energy is just stored data transition motion. Data transitional motion is the motion created by a changing sequence of data creating a movement of data values across pure space. It is this movement that carries pure information objects i.e. subatomic particles across space, producing what we perceive as movement in real space. The data value motion can be in any direction and its path through pure space can vary from a continues motion in one direction, rectilinear motion, to continuously changing direction, erratic-directional motion. The mass always takes a rectilinear path unless subject to an external motion. This is because the object moves the greatest distance through space for the least amount of bitpoint changes. However, as I explained earlier, mass is also subject erratic-directional motion, due to interactions between subatomic particles and between particles which hold the mass together. This additional erratic-directional data transition motion means a mass not only has a vector motion across space, but also an internal motion. Energy is created when a mass is formed by the conversion of the disordered changes of bitpoints into erratic-directional data transition motion. Caused by the interactions (data exchanges) that bind the mass (particles) together. The mass retains this additional erratic-directional data transition motion as potential motion (energy), as long as the mass is stable. After a period, the mass will break down due to pure space difference values always tending towards zero (tendency towards maximum entropy). At this point the additional transitional motion, is released. This additional motion can be used to form new mass or to give additions rectilinear transitional motion to another mass. i.e. additional motion. In essence, energy is the motion required within matter that is necessary to maintain it as information, giving it a presents and velocity (remember all matter has a constant relative velocity).
References
Bennett, C. (2003) ‘Notes on Landauer’s principle, reversible computation, and Maxwell’s Demon’, Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics 34 pp 501–510.
Heisenberg, W. (1962) Physics and philosophy. New York: Reprinted in Penguin Classics 2000.
Hoffman, D. (2020) The Case Against Reality, How evolution hid the truth from our eyes. Great Britton: Penguin Books.
McIntyre, D. (2022) Stern-Gerlach Experiments, Great Britton: Cambridge University Press & Assessment, Available at: https://assets.cambridge.org/97810093/10611/excerpt/9781009310611_excerpt.pdf
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2007) Newton’s Scholium on Time, Space, Place and Motion, Paragraph VII Available at:
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/newton-stm/scholium.html
Toffoli, T. and Margolus, N. (1987) Cellular Automata Machines: A New Environment for Modeling p20 MIT Press Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/220693404_Cellular_Automata_Machines_A_New_Environment_for_Modeling
Copyright © 2026 Dean Francis Hall. All Rights Reserved.