Our “physical beings” and everything we interact with in this physical realm is purely data/information. LIGHT ENERGY is the only authentic part of this realm and what keeps it intact. Light and darkness have been grossly mistranslated by men of religion for all of “time”. Blessings to you and your family🙏❤️🌎
I recommend The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood by James Gleick, which won the Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books 2012. It's a beautifully written overview of how the concept of information evolved, from early communication systems to Shannon’s Information Theory and its implications for understanding our world.
Things I have been reading lately:
A New Kind of Science by Stephen Wolfram. This is a hefty 1200-page book (although there are a lot of pictures). I will cover some of Wolfram's ideas next week.
J.S. Avery's Information Theory and Evolution. This is a fascinating book! It explores how information theory, particularly Shannon's work, can be applied to evolutionary biology and the emergence of complexity in living systems.
Thank you. I will read the Gleick. I admired his biography of Newton greatly. I enjoy flirting with evolutionary biology but one thing at a time and Steve Stewart-Williams has my attention presently :)
That’s the trouble with so many interests - and why I appreciate your recommendations. All the best, John.
Ah, at last one can say that the new year has begun, and, as always, with a bang. Can you clarify something for me, though? You say the butterflies all fly to an area no larger than a square mile. Do they all go to the same area? Or do different ones go to different areas?
Great Question. I'm no butterfly expert, but I believe they tend to return to the same overwintering location as their ancestors, but different populations of monarchs migrate to different overwintering sites. The ones on the east coast will return to the same groves of trees in the mountainous regions of Mexico, where their great-great-grandparents overwintered. And those on the West Coast will return to specific coastal sites in California.
Hopefully, someone who knows more than me can confirm.
Here are links to two papers I read about butterfly migration:
I used to visit the grove of trees where they gather in Monterey. A tiny little grove it is too! You’d have trouble finding it if you lived in Monterey and had a map. Nevermind after flying a couple of thousand miles.
Happy New Year Suzi. The 'additional information' comes from performing work on the data to create abstraction. That was the answer to the question I posed to you in comments last year. Genes have four bases but all the sequences confound each other which is why genetic markers for certain characteristics are difficult to isolate - their function in embryology is as a recipe for a sequence of events. To understand how certain technologies are inherent to different animals - nests/birds, dams/beavers, hives/bees, parasitic manipulation at a distance etc... I would recommend The Extended Phenotype by Richard Dawkins although in all but the earliest editions, The Selfish Gene also provides a good introduction to this concept. I am going to share this as a Note too so I can find the comment again.
I look forward to your explorations on information.
Somebody once said to me that "variance was where it's at in statistics." Well I think information is where it's at in science amd metaphysics. Surprise is unexplained information. Science's job is to eliminate surprise.
PS: FWIW the over-wintering Monarchs in Mexico live a lot longer - and apparently they're mostly males
It's interesting that you mention surprise. I've been thinking a lot about surprises lately. It seems very much related to information and prediction.
Really!? That's very interesting... I just looked it up. Apparently, the monarchs that overwinter in Mexico are part of a 'super generation' that lives up to 8 months!! Their shorter-lived summer counterparts only live about 4 weeks. That's crazy! Thanks for letting me know.
I tend to see information as causation, or maybe more precisely, patterns that are a snapshot of causal processes. The meaning of information comes from the causal light cone that converges on those patterns and its relationship to the potential future light cone that could result.
In that sense, I think our practice of separating information from action, as we do with contemporary computing devices, is more a reflection of how we think and what is easier for us to understand. But biology doesn't seem to make that distinction. Information in DNA, neurons, and synapses, isn't just passive static patterns, but actors. Of course, we could interpret that as information being the wrong paradigm to understand what's happening. But I think a more productive one is accepting that it is information, but also action. At least that's what I think today.
On the butterfly navigation routes, it doesn't seem like the butterfly's genome could or needs to have the entire route encoded. What seems more likely is the butterfly's brain has reactions and dispositions to patterns that occur on the routes, and those dispositions are side effects of the affects of their genes on patterns in the environment. From what I've read, genes depend heavily on those patterns in the surrounding environment to have their phenotypic effects. So it's not just the genes, but the repeating patterns around them (in cells, tissue, organs, the environment, etc).
"What seems more likely is the butterfly's brain has reactions and dispositions to patterns that occur on the routes, and those dispositions are side effects of the affects of their genes on patterns in the environment." Makes sense, but this would seem to make them extremely sensitive to climate change, since anywhere in their long migration could send them in a wrong direction, I would guess.
Good point! Genes evolved across a long time span, which probably include a lot of climate variances. So I would think there's some resilience to the normal climate changes that happen across geological time frames.
Human caused climate change is probably another matter. I've read and seen in documentaries how much things like city lights and engine noise from river boats disrupt the patterns animals depend on, often in ways no one predicted ahead of time.
"A snapshot of causal processes" is such an interesting way of putting it, and I think you're onto something important. I completely agree that we often make the mistake of viewing biological systems as static when they’re inherently dynamic, constantly changing and interacting with their environment.
Your point about genes and their dependence on environmental patterns is a perfect example of this interplay. Genes aren't blueprints in the way we often imagine them—they're more like instructions that unfold through time in response to the surrounding conditions. This makes the interaction between genes and environmental patterns a kind of active process, which aligns with your idea of information being both information and action.
Your light-cone analogy is great! It reminds me of how biological systems often anticipate future conditions based on past patterns, which seems to blur the line between information storage and active processing. I think this dynamic perspective is key to what’s missing when we think about information in biological systems, as you pointed out.
On the butterfly navigation point, I agree it’s unlikely that the genome encodes the entire route. I think you’re right that it’s more about dispositions shaped by both genetic influences and recurring environmental patterns. The genome provides a framework, and the environment fills in the details. What fascinates me most is how the butterflies still manage to end up at the same location. You’d think environmental factors might inject enough noise to derail the path — at least sometimes — but they don't. That consistency is truly remarkable.
I agree that the interplay between genes and all the layers of the environment (proteins, cells, organs, organisms, ecology, etc.) consistently producing the right adaptive result is amazing. It all seems too complex and ad hoc to work, but somehow it does. (Although I find it helps to remember that there's 4 billion years of trial and error behind it.)
Yes welcome back Suzi! The cool thing to me about genetic information is that it can not only provide instructions, but for example cell DNA effectively helps cells function as factories from which to create new cells. That it automatically instructs butterflies where to go seems like the least of the wonder to me. The lesson I take for such apparently simple instructions resulting in amazing complexity, is that our machines seem far less advanced in comparison.
I agree! The complexity that we get from these "simple" instructions is mind-blowing. It's humbling to think how far we still have to go in building systems as advanced and adaptive as biology.
Your post gives me an excuse to whip out one of my all-time favorite quotes: "We are drowning in information, but we are starved for knowledge." ~John Naisbitt
Which perhaps points out that "information" is one of those words that depends heavily on "what you mean (by 'information')." 'Data' seems to me to be merely a numeric description of something. 'Information' seems a bigger category somehow, seems to contain things not necessarily readily quantified. ('Knowledge' seems an even bigger category.) So, I think it's hard to talk about 'information' without a lot of qualification about exactly what kind is meant.
As an aside, it's axiomatic in physics that information can never be destroyed, but it's an axiom I've come to believe may not always apply. And I wonder about the converse. Can information be *created* or does this axiom imply all the information about the current state of the universe is implicit in the Big Bang? If physics ever decided information *can* be destroyed, it would solve the black hole information paradox.
I completely agree—information is one of those slippery concepts that changes meaning depending on the context. I love your distinction between data, information, and knowledge. It reminds me of the idea that information is the meaning we give to data. But the tricky part, I find, is that this definition doesn’t always align with how we use the word in practice. Even across different fields, there’s such variability in its meaning.
The idea that information can neither be created nor destroyed raises some fascinating questions, especially when we think about life. If all the information was implicit in the Big Bang, does that mean the universe is simply an elaborate unfolding of preexisting patterns? Or is something truly novel created through processes like development and evolution? And if so, what is that, if not information? These are the kinds of questions that make my head spin—in the best way possible!
Indeed. I suspect "information" is just as broadly and variously defined as "consciousness". These big 'umbrella' words are almost impossible to actually define.
A question I have regards how physical conservation laws (energy, momentum, etc) are based on symmetries (per Emmy Noether) but what symmetry might conservation of information be based on? We live in a universe where a set of primitives, plus a set of assembly rules, plus time, plus energy, gives us complex structures (humans, planets, galaxies) that seem to contain far more information than implied by the starting point. Where does all that information come from?
Where does all that information come from? Great question! Is it "new" information, or is it just the reorganisation of what was already there, following simple rules? I find questions like these so fascinating.
As do I. My inclination is to suspect that information can be created by a process. Or destroyed. At the same time, information generated in the future by a deterministic process is fully determined, so it’s a tough proposition to parse.
I took January off from the internet (and really enjoyed that), so I see I have some catching up to do now. 😮
A whole month free of the internet sounds like heaven! I might need to try that next January.
It's a real puzzle how information can seem to both emerge anew and yet be predetermined in a deterministic system. There's something deeply counterintuitive about information.
I recently finished reading Whitehead's "Science and the Modern World" and he has a great expression for the problem I've had with our notion of physical information; it's a great example of misplaced concreteness. Misplaced concreteness is when we confuse our abstract ideas for tangible concrete things. This problem reaches further than information theory and I think it drives at the heart of the problem I have with physicalism (What is physical? Does anyone even know anymore?) But that's a longer discussion, so I'll leave it at that. (It's interesting that we've both been pondering the same question. I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the matter!)
I love the monarch butterfly example. It really drives home how amazing nature is, and far more subtle than the concepts we use to describe it. It also reminds me of the ship of Theseus thought experiment in that it provokes mereological questions about existence. In the case of the butterflies we initially resist saying the whole is greater (or at least different) than the sum of its parts, but that appears to be the case. An attempt to explain why that is not the case would have the character of explaining away what seems to be staring us in the face. But then we have to confront the question: what IS the whole, then? How can it have a mind of its own? How can it "know" where it's going when its parts are destroyed? Should the whole be thought of as a transcendent organism which depends on all butterflies in general but which surpasses any individual butterfly, similar to the way a storm surpasses any individual raindrop?
What's clear to me is reductionism can't adequately account for such phenomena, or at least when you try to account for it using our reductionist paradigms—in this case by claiming each butterfly somehow has a specific instructions, as well as a map of the world, 'inside' its genes—you end up with an answer that doesn't satisfy questions pertaining to the larger picture. You end up destroying the richness of the larger picture, the fluidity of the situation. In reducing the phenomenon to genes, you might be able to tell a coherent story, maybe one suitable for certain purposes, but it won't be the most plausible or satisfactory explanation of the whole situation. There's a sense that something is missing, and that something has nothing to do with our confused notions of physical information.
Could the part-whole relation of the butterflies provide a clue as to how we might better explain the full story of consciousness, better than reductive physicalism can offer?
I love that we’re thinking about similar questions—this is going to be fun! :)
The question of what is physical has indeed become slippery, especially as we dig deeper into concepts like quantum fields or information theory, which often resist mapping cleanly onto our everyday intuitions about the material world. It’s definitely a topic that deserves a deep dive (or six!).
Your analogy between the monarch butterflies and the ship of Theseus is fantastic. As you point out, what often seems missing is the “fluidity of the situation.” When we try to understand complex phenomena, we instinctively simplify them. This has often meant focusing on static snapshots while ignoring the fact that everything is always in flux. Reducing phenomena to genes or physical mechanisms can certainly provide valuable insights, but it often feels like we’re trying to flatten something inherently multidimensional. We lose the element of time and the dynamic interplay of parts within the whole. A simple, two-dimensional story might be easier to tell, but as we learn more, it becomes increasingly clear that such explanations are unsatisfactory.
As for your question about whether the part-whole relationship in monarchs might offer clues for understanding consciousness — yes, I wonder the same thing.
I’m so glad you’ve been pondering these questions, too — it’s wonderful to share thoughts with someone exploring the same terrain.
I think the answer on the genome/brain and the Monarch butterfly (BTW, I didn't see as many as typical this past year) is epigenetics.
Information in organisms arises from the reactivity of cells or clusters of cells to a chemical, electrical, magnetic, or mechanical disruption. The dissipation of the reaction restores homoeostasis and generates information in the process.
What is information and where does it come from? This is a great question and many of the responses to that question will reflect how we are individually, collectively and directly influenced by our culture.
To state it succinctly: information as such does not exist in nature; neither does steel, a motorcycle or even a blank sheet of paper. All of these things are first and foremost constructed and/or built by the "cognitive system" of our brain.
Until information is constructed, all of the sensory stimuli that the "cognitive system" of the brain experiences is nothing but background noise.
i don’t believe the monarch gene contains the information for the route, i believe it contains a heuristic for the route; evolution is good at finding shortcuts for things that when we describe them from our perspective seem more complex; human route finding also often uses heuristics; they don’t necessarily need to relate to or react to “things along the way”
there may also be mechanisms within the body of the monarch that aid navigation such as light sensors and gyroscopes; these could be used just as an airplane’s navigation system can get from one place to another without the use of way points; a navigation system geared to only very specific locations could be much simpler than even the electro-mechanical/digital systems we use today
i think the monarch puzzle is more reflection of how we perceive information than about how information is stored
Great article title, sucked me right in. While not claiming to be able to answer the question...
My current favorite theory is that information and intelligence comes from some cosmic radio station, and our minds and genes are just a radio receiver.
You know, I could take a radio completely apart down to the smallest pieces, and I'd never find the NPR programs that I often listen to.
The idea of our minds as receivers is an interesting one, especially since it touches on the interplay between structure and signals. It makes me wonder: would the information be something external we’re tuning into, or would the signal come from us -- how we’re wired to process the world?
Our “physical beings” and everything we interact with in this physical realm is purely data/information. LIGHT ENERGY is the only authentic part of this realm and what keeps it intact. Light and darkness have been grossly mistranslated by men of religion for all of “time”. Blessings to you and your family🙏❤️🌎
https://open.substack.com/pub/gods656j4/p/be-the-light?r=idw8q&utm_medium=ios
Blessings to you🙏🌎
Welcome back! I hope 2025 is good for you and yours. Do you have any reading recommendations for the novice on this topic? All the best, John.
Thanks, John.
I recommend The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood by James Gleick, which won the Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books 2012. It's a beautifully written overview of how the concept of information evolved, from early communication systems to Shannon’s Information Theory and its implications for understanding our world.
Things I have been reading lately:
A New Kind of Science by Stephen Wolfram. This is a hefty 1200-page book (although there are a lot of pictures). I will cover some of Wolfram's ideas next week.
J.S. Avery's Information Theory and Evolution. This is a fascinating book! It explores how information theory, particularly Shannon's work, can be applied to evolutionary biology and the emergence of complexity in living systems.
Thank you. I will read the Gleick. I admired his biography of Newton greatly. I enjoy flirting with evolutionary biology but one thing at a time and Steve Stewart-Williams has my attention presently :)
That’s the trouble with so many interests - and why I appreciate your recommendations. All the best, John.
Oh! Are you reading "The Ape that Understood the Universe"? That one is on my to read list!
I have. It’s enjoyable and manages to convey rather a lot of, rather well. It’s up there with Steve Jones in my opinion.
Ah, at last one can say that the new year has begun, and, as always, with a bang. Can you clarify something for me, though? You say the butterflies all fly to an area no larger than a square mile. Do they all go to the same area? Or do different ones go to different areas?
Happy New Year, Jack!
Great Question. I'm no butterfly expert, but I believe they tend to return to the same overwintering location as their ancestors, but different populations of monarchs migrate to different overwintering sites. The ones on the east coast will return to the same groves of trees in the mountainous regions of Mexico, where their great-great-grandparents overwintered. And those on the West Coast will return to specific coastal sites in California.
Hopefully, someone who knows more than me can confirm.
Here are links to two papers I read about butterfly migration:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30205052/
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1221701110
Thanks Suzi! Your answer, which was pretty much what I expected, sent me down the epigenetics rabbit hole, which I thought had been discredited, but which seems to be more respected than I thought. https://www.act.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0020/2380232/Epigenetics-how-experiences-influence-our-genes.pdf.
I used to visit the grove of trees where they gather in Monterey. A tiny little grove it is too! You’d have trouble finding it if you lived in Monterey and had a map. Nevermind after flying a couple of thousand miles.
Lovely little things they are.
Happy New Year Suzi. The 'additional information' comes from performing work on the data to create abstraction. That was the answer to the question I posed to you in comments last year. Genes have four bases but all the sequences confound each other which is why genetic markers for certain characteristics are difficult to isolate - their function in embryology is as a recipe for a sequence of events. To understand how certain technologies are inherent to different animals - nests/birds, dams/beavers, hives/bees, parasitic manipulation at a distance etc... I would recommend The Extended Phenotype by Richard Dawkins although in all but the earliest editions, The Selfish Gene also provides a good introduction to this concept. I am going to share this as a Note too so I can find the comment again.
Thanks, Michael! Happy New Year to you, too.
This is great, thank you. I have read both of your recommendations before, but it's been a while. I think it's time for a re-read.
Happy New Year Suzi!
I look forward to your explorations on information.
Somebody once said to me that "variance was where it's at in statistics." Well I think information is where it's at in science amd metaphysics. Surprise is unexplained information. Science's job is to eliminate surprise.
PS: FWIW the over-wintering Monarchs in Mexico live a lot longer - and apparently they're mostly males
Happy New Year, Malcolm!
It's interesting that you mention surprise. I've been thinking a lot about surprises lately. It seems very much related to information and prediction.
Really!? That's very interesting... I just looked it up. Apparently, the monarchs that overwinter in Mexico are part of a 'super generation' that lives up to 8 months!! Their shorter-lived summer counterparts only live about 4 weeks. That's crazy! Thanks for letting me know.
I tend to see information as causation, or maybe more precisely, patterns that are a snapshot of causal processes. The meaning of information comes from the causal light cone that converges on those patterns and its relationship to the potential future light cone that could result.
In that sense, I think our practice of separating information from action, as we do with contemporary computing devices, is more a reflection of how we think and what is easier for us to understand. But biology doesn't seem to make that distinction. Information in DNA, neurons, and synapses, isn't just passive static patterns, but actors. Of course, we could interpret that as information being the wrong paradigm to understand what's happening. But I think a more productive one is accepting that it is information, but also action. At least that's what I think today.
On the butterfly navigation routes, it doesn't seem like the butterfly's genome could or needs to have the entire route encoded. What seems more likely is the butterfly's brain has reactions and dispositions to patterns that occur on the routes, and those dispositions are side effects of the affects of their genes on patterns in the environment. From what I've read, genes depend heavily on those patterns in the surrounding environment to have their phenotypic effects. So it's not just the genes, but the repeating patterns around them (in cells, tissue, organs, the environment, etc).
Fascinating discussion Suzi, as always!
"What seems more likely is the butterfly's brain has reactions and dispositions to patterns that occur on the routes, and those dispositions are side effects of the affects of their genes on patterns in the environment." Makes sense, but this would seem to make them extremely sensitive to climate change, since anywhere in their long migration could send them in a wrong direction, I would guess.
Good point! Genes evolved across a long time span, which probably include a lot of climate variances. So I would think there's some resilience to the normal climate changes that happen across geological time frames.
Human caused climate change is probably another matter. I've read and seen in documentaries how much things like city lights and engine noise from river boats disrupt the patterns animals depend on, often in ways no one predicted ahead of time.
Happy New Year, Mike!
"A snapshot of causal processes" is such an interesting way of putting it, and I think you're onto something important. I completely agree that we often make the mistake of viewing biological systems as static when they’re inherently dynamic, constantly changing and interacting with their environment.
Your point about genes and their dependence on environmental patterns is a perfect example of this interplay. Genes aren't blueprints in the way we often imagine them—they're more like instructions that unfold through time in response to the surrounding conditions. This makes the interaction between genes and environmental patterns a kind of active process, which aligns with your idea of information being both information and action.
Your light-cone analogy is great! It reminds me of how biological systems often anticipate future conditions based on past patterns, which seems to blur the line between information storage and active processing. I think this dynamic perspective is key to what’s missing when we think about information in biological systems, as you pointed out.
On the butterfly navigation point, I agree it’s unlikely that the genome encodes the entire route. I think you’re right that it’s more about dispositions shaped by both genetic influences and recurring environmental patterns. The genome provides a framework, and the environment fills in the details. What fascinates me most is how the butterflies still manage to end up at the same location. You’d think environmental factors might inject enough noise to derail the path — at least sometimes — but they don't. That consistency is truly remarkable.
Thanks Suzi! Happy New Year!
I agree that the interplay between genes and all the layers of the environment (proteins, cells, organs, organisms, ecology, etc.) consistently producing the right adaptive result is amazing. It all seems too complex and ad hoc to work, but somehow it does. (Although I find it helps to remember that there's 4 billion years of trial and error behind it.)
Yes welcome back Suzi! The cool thing to me about genetic information is that it can not only provide instructions, but for example cell DNA effectively helps cells function as factories from which to create new cells. That it automatically instructs butterflies where to go seems like the least of the wonder to me. The lesson I take for such apparently simple instructions resulting in amazing complexity, is that our machines seem far less advanced in comparison.
Happy New Year, Eric!
I agree! The complexity that we get from these "simple" instructions is mind-blowing. It's humbling to think how far we still have to go in building systems as advanced and adaptive as biology.
I wonder if there is some connection between today's topic and fractals?
Great connection! Both genetic processes and fractals involve relatively simple rules that can give us incredible complexity.
Your post gives me an excuse to whip out one of my all-time favorite quotes: "We are drowning in information, but we are starved for knowledge." ~John Naisbitt
Which perhaps points out that "information" is one of those words that depends heavily on "what you mean (by 'information')." 'Data' seems to me to be merely a numeric description of something. 'Information' seems a bigger category somehow, seems to contain things not necessarily readily quantified. ('Knowledge' seems an even bigger category.) So, I think it's hard to talk about 'information' without a lot of qualification about exactly what kind is meant.
As an aside, it's axiomatic in physics that information can never be destroyed, but it's an axiom I've come to believe may not always apply. And I wonder about the converse. Can information be *created* or does this axiom imply all the information about the current state of the universe is implicit in the Big Bang? If physics ever decided information *can* be destroyed, it would solve the black hole information paradox.
Fantastic quote!
I completely agree—information is one of those slippery concepts that changes meaning depending on the context. I love your distinction between data, information, and knowledge. It reminds me of the idea that information is the meaning we give to data. But the tricky part, I find, is that this definition doesn’t always align with how we use the word in practice. Even across different fields, there’s such variability in its meaning.
The idea that information can neither be created nor destroyed raises some fascinating questions, especially when we think about life. If all the information was implicit in the Big Bang, does that mean the universe is simply an elaborate unfolding of preexisting patterns? Or is something truly novel created through processes like development and evolution? And if so, what is that, if not information? These are the kinds of questions that make my head spin—in the best way possible!
Indeed. I suspect "information" is just as broadly and variously defined as "consciousness". These big 'umbrella' words are almost impossible to actually define.
A question I have regards how physical conservation laws (energy, momentum, etc) are based on symmetries (per Emmy Noether) but what symmetry might conservation of information be based on? We live in a universe where a set of primitives, plus a set of assembly rules, plus time, plus energy, gives us complex structures (humans, planets, galaxies) that seem to contain far more information than implied by the starting point. Where does all that information come from?
Where does all that information come from? Great question! Is it "new" information, or is it just the reorganisation of what was already there, following simple rules? I find questions like these so fascinating.
As do I. My inclination is to suspect that information can be created by a process. Or destroyed. At the same time, information generated in the future by a deterministic process is fully determined, so it’s a tough proposition to parse.
I took January off from the internet (and really enjoyed that), so I see I have some catching up to do now. 😮
A whole month free of the internet sounds like heaven! I might need to try that next January.
It's a real puzzle how information can seem to both emerge anew and yet be predetermined in a deterministic system. There's something deeply counterintuitive about information.
Indeed, it was heaven. I highly recommend it!
I'm curious how many times the word "mind" was used. Also, was the phrase "cognitive system of the brain" every used in your discourse.
A new year, new questions; you can expect compelling questions coming from this old hippie.
Great question!
"Mind" = 307 times
"cognitive system of the brain" = 0 times
I love compelling questions! Looking forward to them :)
Great questions, Suzi!
I recently finished reading Whitehead's "Science and the Modern World" and he has a great expression for the problem I've had with our notion of physical information; it's a great example of misplaced concreteness. Misplaced concreteness is when we confuse our abstract ideas for tangible concrete things. This problem reaches further than information theory and I think it drives at the heart of the problem I have with physicalism (What is physical? Does anyone even know anymore?) But that's a longer discussion, so I'll leave it at that. (It's interesting that we've both been pondering the same question. I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the matter!)
I love the monarch butterfly example. It really drives home how amazing nature is, and far more subtle than the concepts we use to describe it. It also reminds me of the ship of Theseus thought experiment in that it provokes mereological questions about existence. In the case of the butterflies we initially resist saying the whole is greater (or at least different) than the sum of its parts, but that appears to be the case. An attempt to explain why that is not the case would have the character of explaining away what seems to be staring us in the face. But then we have to confront the question: what IS the whole, then? How can it have a mind of its own? How can it "know" where it's going when its parts are destroyed? Should the whole be thought of as a transcendent organism which depends on all butterflies in general but which surpasses any individual butterfly, similar to the way a storm surpasses any individual raindrop?
What's clear to me is reductionism can't adequately account for such phenomena, or at least when you try to account for it using our reductionist paradigms—in this case by claiming each butterfly somehow has a specific instructions, as well as a map of the world, 'inside' its genes—you end up with an answer that doesn't satisfy questions pertaining to the larger picture. You end up destroying the richness of the larger picture, the fluidity of the situation. In reducing the phenomenon to genes, you might be able to tell a coherent story, maybe one suitable for certain purposes, but it won't be the most plausible or satisfactory explanation of the whole situation. There's a sense that something is missing, and that something has nothing to do with our confused notions of physical information.
Could the part-whole relation of the butterflies provide a clue as to how we might better explain the full story of consciousness, better than reductive physicalism can offer?
I love that we’re thinking about similar questions—this is going to be fun! :)
The question of what is physical has indeed become slippery, especially as we dig deeper into concepts like quantum fields or information theory, which often resist mapping cleanly onto our everyday intuitions about the material world. It’s definitely a topic that deserves a deep dive (or six!).
Your analogy between the monarch butterflies and the ship of Theseus is fantastic. As you point out, what often seems missing is the “fluidity of the situation.” When we try to understand complex phenomena, we instinctively simplify them. This has often meant focusing on static snapshots while ignoring the fact that everything is always in flux. Reducing phenomena to genes or physical mechanisms can certainly provide valuable insights, but it often feels like we’re trying to flatten something inherently multidimensional. We lose the element of time and the dynamic interplay of parts within the whole. A simple, two-dimensional story might be easier to tell, but as we learn more, it becomes increasingly clear that such explanations are unsatisfactory.
As for your question about whether the part-whole relationship in monarchs might offer clues for understanding consciousness — yes, I wonder the same thing.
I’m so glad you’ve been pondering these questions, too — it’s wonderful to share thoughts with someone exploring the same terrain.
I think the answer on the genome/brain and the Monarch butterfly (BTW, I didn't see as many as typical this past year) is epigenetics.
Information in organisms arises from the reactivity of cells or clusters of cells to a chemical, electrical, magnetic, or mechanical disruption. The dissipation of the reaction restores homoeostasis and generates information in the process.
What is information and where does it come from? This is a great question and many of the responses to that question will reflect how we are individually, collectively and directly influenced by our culture.
To state it succinctly: information as such does not exist in nature; neither does steel, a motorcycle or even a blank sheet of paper. All of these things are first and foremost constructed and/or built by the "cognitive system" of our brain.
Until information is constructed, all of the sensory stimuli that the "cognitive system" of the brain experiences is nothing but background noise.
i don’t believe the monarch gene contains the information for the route, i believe it contains a heuristic for the route; evolution is good at finding shortcuts for things that when we describe them from our perspective seem more complex; human route finding also often uses heuristics; they don’t necessarily need to relate to or react to “things along the way”
there may also be mechanisms within the body of the monarch that aid navigation such as light sensors and gyroscopes; these could be used just as an airplane’s navigation system can get from one place to another without the use of way points; a navigation system geared to only very specific locations could be much simpler than even the electro-mechanical/digital systems we use today
i think the monarch puzzle is more reflection of how we perceive information than about how information is stored
Great article title, sucked me right in. While not claiming to be able to answer the question...
My current favorite theory is that information and intelligence comes from some cosmic radio station, and our minds and genes are just a radio receiver.
You know, I could take a radio completely apart down to the smallest pieces, and I'd never find the NPR programs that I often listen to.
The idea of our minds as receivers is an interesting one, especially since it touches on the interplay between structure and signals. It makes me wonder: would the information be something external we’re tuning into, or would the signal come from us -- how we’re wired to process the world?