mirrormundo

We (I at leat) use to think of information as data that one needs to achieve something, for instance to increase knowledge. So in this view there is no objective 'free-floating' information: there has to be a need, a question first. That is, there has to be someone / something to interpret the information. For example: "at 2 pm" is not information, unless I want to know when the bus to X leaves. Also, a piece of text (book) only contains information if there is someone to read it; a book on a shelf is just ink and paper, until someone opens it and starts to read. So in my view information is relational and perspectival; presupposes a relation to an observer who wants to know about what he/she is investigating. But in physics the idea developed (since Maxwell, Boltzmann, Leó Szilárd, Turing, Landauer, Hawking, 't Hooft, Verlinde, Susskind) that information is something real, like matter / energy and time / space. Information then is not about meaning, but about 'difference', about being not the same, and about unexpectedness (inprobability). So a particle / thing / system is different from other thing in it's specific characteristics in comparison to all other things. >> http://youtu.be/NsbZT9bJ1s4?t=8m45s It is a vital idea in contemparary physics, also relating to other subjects like complexity, self-organization, emergence, evolution, etc. My question is: how can that be objectively quantisized? What counts as information? An answer to the question: "has it been observed by the hubble-telescope?" would count for one bit of information (yes/no) But that's probaly not a legitimate question. Well, what is then? Who asks the questions? What decides what the information is? Obviously it's immanent in the thing itself... But then again not physically located in the same place, according to Susskind. I can't get my head around it. Anyone???

Is S.J. Gould's punctuated equilibrium really at odds with adaptationism / gradualism? Environmental changes (climate, geology) can lead to ecological changes like (mass) extinction, and or adaptive advantages for mutations that had been not advantageous before. These ecological changes in population-numbers and new succesful mutations influence / disturb the balaces in the eco-system, giving other mutations in other species a chance, leading to a snowball effect. In other words: if a mutation becomes an adaptive succes (for whatever reason), this can give rise to a chain reaction throughout the eco-system, resulting in a changing environment giving opportunities for yet other mutations, or am I wrong? So in that case we have regular darwinism behaving like saltationism. So evolution doesn't always have the same pace, as is acknowledged by most / all adaptationists / gradualists. What then is the dispute between Gould/Lewontin etc. and Dawkins etc? Or am I missing the point by failing to understand saltationism?

Found it! "Hunter fungi prey on tiny protozoa and worm-like creatures called nematodes. Some produce a sticky substance on their hyphae, which then act like flypaper, trapping passing prey. A species called Arthrobotrys dactyloides sets snares made out of loops formed by its hyphae. When a nematode comes into contact with the loops, the movement triggers the fungal cells to swell with fluid, constricting the loop like a noose around the hapless nematode. Other hyphae then grow toward the trapped prey, eventually punching through its body where they begin absorbing its fluids."

The information on which this question is based might not be totally correct... I'm looking for the name of a tropic fungus (or plant?) that lives high up in trees (as I remember correctly) and as a result doesn't get enough chlorine (or phosphorus, or fluorine), so it makes a noose to trap tiny worms and feeds on them. Anyone?