On information theory, his specialty.
Information
What has information theory to say about talking to spiders?
There’s a way we can do that, provided the spider has anything to say. One of the presentations at the American Chemical Society’s Spring 2021 meeting featured an algorithm that makes music from the analysis of spiders’ webs.
James Tour tackles the origin of information
Also known as the information enigma re the origin of life.
Gregory Chaitin asks, if the universe is information, not matter, does that help explain consciousness?
Chaitin: The normal view if you dabble in metaphysics is that the universe is made from mathematics. That’s a Pythagorean idea, that God is a mathematician. And I prefer to say God is a … a computer programmer or a programmer.
C. Elegans (roundworm) perceives color without eyes
At The Scientist: The new results show that the worms are “actually comparing ratios of wavelengths, and using that information to make decisions,” he says. “And that, I think, was completely surprising and unexpected.” …
How do giant slime molds remember things without a brain or nervous system?
Is it fair to say that not all life forms need a brain or a nervous system but all must have some method of managing (immaterial) information?
Rob Sheldon weighs in on the fundamental building blocks of nature – particles, fields, or …
Sheldon: It is curious that the author of this Aeon article has frozen Wheeler at his second stage, neglecting to mention his final conclusion.
Origin of Life: A review of Paul Davies’ Demon in the Machine
Fernandez: Throughout Demon, Davies injects comments always in support of the Materialistic Darwinist position.
The computer revolution did not show that information could be produced from nothing
Computer engineer Robert J. Marks and colleagues demonstrated that there is still no such thing as a free lunch where information is concerned.
Does communication between predator and prey shape evolution?
Fascinating info about snakes’ warning signals but the author ends up defending dumb Darwinism which, increasingly, complicates explanations. One must come up with a Darwinian explanation for things instead of just reporting and learning from them. Or asking what the information probability is, for this type of change.
How is information present in life?
Marks: For example, if I burn a book to ashes and scatter the ashes around, have I destroyed information? Does it make a difference if there’s another copy of the book?
Sabine Hossenfelder: The black hole information problem is not solvable
Hossenfelder: Today I comment on the recent claim that the black hole information loss problem is “near its end” and explain why this is nonsense.
At Forbes: Hawking’s black hole paradox is NOT solved
Ethan Siegel looks at the limitations: But we’re still a long way away from determining exactly where that information goes, and how it gets out of a black hole. Theorists disagree over the validity and soundness of many of the methods that are currently being employed to do these calculations, and no one has even a theoretical prediction for how this information should be encoded by an evaporating black hole, much less how to measure it.
Jonathan Bartlett: Elon Musk inadvertently tumbles to a big problem in origin of life theory
Bartlett: Indeed, whatever the difficulty of creating life in the lab, making individual prototypes is not nearly as problematic as making “the machine that makes the machine,” which all reproducing living cells can do. That is, the ability of an organism to reproduce is at least an order of magnitude harder that the ability of an organism to just live.
Steve Meyer on James Tour’s podcast
“In this interview, Dr. James Tour and Dr. Stephen Meyer discuss science and faith, while getting into the details on the discovery of complex, sequence specific information required for life’s function and origin, and the required fine-tuned laboratory that we call our universe that must exist in order for assembly to occur.” People are taking reality seriously? What next, we wonder?