PART 4:
INFORMATION,
INFORMATION THEORY AND INFORMATION TRANSFER
(01Mar97)
If we think in terms of PERCEPTION, then we are most likely to think
in terms of THINGS -- because things are what we perceive and have
mental-image pictures of stored in our memory library. The incoming
signals through the eye are processed as signals through a number of
systems before they end up as thing-images.
It is relatively certain that our "understanding" processes undergo
something quite similar, if not identical.
When we think in terms of THINGS, then we think in terms of objects,
their shapes, sizes, colors, their meaning as an IT. We also think
in terms of the distances between objects, their placement with
regard to each other.
If we think of subjects or topics, we do so by first converting them
into an IT-THING: for example, consider biology. IT is a science, as
most know whether they know anyTHING more about IT.
The most fundamental basis of most consensus realities consists of
IT-THINGS, and the most essential nomenclature utilized is set up to
identify it-things. And this is the case even regarding
philosophical abstractions, which, too, are it-things -- e.g., IT is
an abstraction whatever IT is.
The general purpose of the first organized psychical research
organizations set up during the 1880s was to witness, inspect,
identify, separate and categorize what later came to be called
"paranormal" phenomena.
But in order to proceed, the phenomena first had to be given
identifiers, and which turned the phenomena into IT-THINGS. "IT is
clairvoyance," for example. "IT is levitation," "IT is mediumship,"
"IT is thought-transference" (a term-concept later replaced by "IT
is telepathy"), and finally "IT is psychic" whatever it is.
Phenomena are not just phenomena, but different kinds of them, and
which need to be differentiated, distinguished and identified one
from another. But sometimes this differentiation doesn't work very
well if one doesn't really understand what IT is in the first place.
For example, in spite of about 100 years to do so, exceedingly great
confusions continue to persist in making differentiation between
clairvoyance and telepathy.
But generally speaking, differentiation is achieved by making an IT
out of different kinds of phenomena and then assigning a
nomenclature bit (or byte) in order to talk or write about any of
them. When this is accomplished, we can thenceforth "know" what is
being referred to because it has been rendered into an IT-IS kind of
THING.
The first essential goal of organized parapsychology (circa the
1930s) was not only to inspect ESP phenomena, but to do so only
within the parameters of recognized and approved scientific methods.
Extra-sensory perception (ESP) was an it-identifier of "perceptions"
that could not be attributed to any of the five physical senses, and
so it could be said those perceptions were external to or outside
the physical senses.
To test for the presence of ESP in given individuals or subjects,
"targets" were utilized, and there came into existence standardized
forms of targets (among them the famous Zener cards) which mostly
consisted of pictures of geometric shapes or colors. A "target" is
always an IT.
The goal of the testing was to determine if the subjects could
perceive the "targets" via senses other than the physical five.
The targets, of course, were IT-THINGS - expressed as "It is a
circle," "It is a square," or "IT (the target) is the wavy lines."
Now, in the "universe" of IT-THINK, there is only one basic way to
judge "success" - whether one perceives-sees IT or doesn't see IT.
Thus, the parapsychology ESP subjects either "got the target" or
didn't get it." Or, "hit" the target, or "missed" it.
As we shall see in later essays, the "hit-miss" paradigm that arose
in parapsychology led to some rather dreadful situations regarding
comprehension, morale and defeatism.
But nonetheless it was a perfectly logical approach within the
contexts of IT-THING-THINK, and which contexts are universal
everywhere and in all cultures.
The concepts of PERCEPTION are intimately and permanently linked to
IT-THINGS, because if you examine any of them very carefully one can
only perceive an IT. And even then, as has been reviewed in Part 3,
the IT-PERCEPTION is a mental-image reconstruction, the sum of which
is of the perceiver, and not exactly of the IT itself.
It is worth the time to review a few of the numerous definitions of
THING:
-
a separate and distinct
individual quality, fact, idea, concept or entity;
-
a material or substance of a
given kind;
-
a piece of information or news;
-
an event, deed, act or
circumstance;
-
a state of affairs in general,
or within a specific or implied sphere.
The five definitions of THING given
above can and do account for almost, but not quite, everything - and
which is why we refer to everything AS every-thing. And so our
perceptions are geared to perceive, identify, and discriminate among
THINGS - and which then emerge in conscious awareness as
reconstructed images.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with basic IT-THINK, and indeed it
permits survival on about a 90 per cent basis - except when there
are holes or gaps in it.
But IT-IS gaps can be somewhat corrected within the contexts of
consensus realities in that IT-IS perception that is consistent with
consensus reality is considered proper or successful perception,
while perception that is not is considered improper or
aberrant-undesirable - or at least non-conforming.
In general, however, any gap-difficulties along these lines are sort
of smoothed over in that the nomenclature of a given consensus
reality is the concepto-nomenclature everyone within it speaks and
writes with - and tends to think with, too.
Just outside the enormous, collective IT-THINK syndromes of our
species is a slightly different THINK format.
This "level" of thinking has to do with RELATIONSHIPS between and
among IT-THINGS.
Identifying it-things, and identifying them as it-things, only goes
so far, although that process is entirely serviceable to a certain
degree.
One can identify it-things, endlessly so, but only because they
become perceptually concrete in some form - even an idea takes on a
sort of concrete-ness if it becomes shared and approved of.
Relationships among it-things, however, are usually of a far
different matter because, in the first instance, they have to be
deduced. For example, the relationship between hydrogen atoms and
hydrogen bombs is not readily apparent, and thus had to be deduced
before it became identifiable.
This is to point up that although the arrangement of IT-THINK to
IT-THINGS is usually on a one-to-one basis, the arrangement of
IT-THINK to relationships among and between IT-THINGS is not on any
kind of one-to-one basis - excepting the most gross and familiar
samples of it.
The reason for this difficulty is that relationships between
it-things can be many and varied and include anything from the
imaginable to the unimaginable, from the boring to the fantastic.
Another difficulty arises because once IT-THINK becomes properly
installed it tends to run on automatic with the mind-boggling speed
encountered in Part 3 regarding the basic ten-step processes of
perception.
DEDUCTIVE-THINK regarding relationships, however, usually never runs
on automatic unless the deductions have themselves been pre-reduced
to common understanding, at which time those particular deductions
have taken on the clothing of IT-THINK.
Relationships of it-things to one another can be explicit or
implicit, with the explicit ones being easier to identify, this type
of thing usually being referred to as logic.
Implicit relationships, however, are identified as such because
there is very little in the way of objective or explicit cues
involved.
Thus, the deducing (detecting) of implicit relationships can escape
the deductive processes of almost everyone - with the exception of
those who somehow chance to "notice" them.
And those who DO notice them are quite likely to be attributed as
intuitives. And, indeed, if it were up to me, I'd itemize the
deduction of implicits as the basic and most broadly-shared type of
intuition's many other types. And here is a basic clue regarding
"enhancing" one's intuition - by first enhancing one's deductive
processes regarding implicit relationships.
As it is in our present consensus reality, we reinforce the
processes regarding explicit relationships, but pay very little
attention to strengthening the much more wide parameters of implicit
relationships.
One of the more recent definitions of "genius" is that a genius is
one "who sees what others cannot." Although this clearly involves a
lot of factors, the deducing of implicit relationships probably is
fundamental here - since most rely on explicit rather than on
implicit deducing.
Now to move speedily on.
The relationship, for example, between ESP and perception seems
explicit enough, and therefore seems logical -- especially when a
long line of "psychics" say "I perceive" thus and so.
They are correct in saying that they do perceive. But what they
perceive is in fact whatever has been processed through their
perception-making systems, the sum of these processes being the
perception.
And as we have seen these end products are not at all one-to-one
images. And so what they report "seeing" may or may not correspond
with the actual facts or conditions of what they have "seen" as
perceptions.
This is a situation that has not gone unrecognized in
parapsychology.
In testing for ESP, researchers encounter many more "misses" than
"hits" and the frequency of the misses has condensed into the theory
of "Psi-missing." It is thought that Psi-missing is somehow related
to "avoidance" of the "target," and as such constitutes some kind of
unidentified psychological factors.
You see, "paraPSYCHOLOGY" is, after all, majorly conceived of as a
branch of psychology -- not as a branch of perception study. And
when it was understood by the rest of science that "perceptions"
mostly consisted of "cognitive" versus physiological factors,
perception, too, began to be thought of as predominantly having a
psychological basis.
In any event, ESP and perception of IT targets are thought to go
hand-in-hand, and all explicit and implicit considerations along
these lines are shared not only in parapsychology, but throughout
science, philosophy, and in our present general consensus realities
as well.
Furthermore, the web of Psi-Perceptions is linked throughout by the
IT-making nomenclature commonly utilized.
If, then, one refers to Psi or ESP, it is automatically understood
everywhere that you are referring to special formats of perception
that have been assigned IT nomenclature: psychic, clairvoyance,
telepathy, intuition, and etc.
It is even commonly understood that "special" refers NOT to
perception per se, but to the unusual other-than-sensory ways it is
achieved -- if and when it is achieved.
Well, this "prevailing paradigm," as it should properly be termed,
has actually prevailed for about 100 years, and has been
unsuccessfully approached and tested in the light of every angle
conceivable.
The only thing that has been achieved is to document beyond any
shadow of doubt that ESP processes do exist, but whose presence by
parapsychological methodologies are found at only very low
statistical levels (which will be discussed in a later essay).
So, "psychic" perceptions have been tested for from every angle
possible -- which is to say, very angle consistent with the
prevailing consensus reality hypotheses that ESP and Perception are
interrelated both explicitly and implicitly, so much so that you
can't have the one without the other.
But what if this consensus reality concept isn't complete enough? In
other words, what if it has a "gaping hole" in its interconnecting
line-up of conceptualizing -- one of those invisible gaping holes
that are not at all obvious because the apparent picture seems
complete and logical enough?
And what if what is needed to fill this hole has been around for
about fifty or more years, but has been excluded because the
prevailing concepts are considered sufficient unto themselves? And
because if the needed factors were to be included, the entire
consensus making nomenclature appropriate to Psi-Perceptions would
either explode or be useless and vacated.
This would mean that everyone has cloned the wrong stuff, so to
speak, and what they have cloned in this regard has been acting as
mental information processing viruses all along.
Ye gads! This would imply a radical reality shift - one which, in
its first instance, would big-time EMBARRASS those possessed of the
cloned viruses - not only in parapsychology, but in science and
philosophy as well, to say nothing of the consensus realities
involved.
Information
The essential definitions of the verb TO INFORM, and the noun
INFORMATION, never have been ambiguous, but quite precise and clear.
INFORM is said to have been derived from the Latin verb INFORMARE
from IN + FORMA.
However, the Latin FORMA was a noun, and even though the preposition
of IN is added to it, it still remains a noun. And nouns, of course,
refer to and are meant to identify it-things, not activities which
verbs indicate.
FORMA referred to the shape and structure of something as
distinguished from its material or constituent parts.
The preposition IN refers to inclusion of some kind, most usually a
spatial inclusion, but also inclusion in something that does not
have spatial-material form such as belief, faith, opinion or
assumption (i.e., in the faith, only in belief, in his or her
opinion or assumption, etc., and of course, IN his or her conception
or misconception.)
The key concept of FORMA refers to shape and structure, and so
INFORM refers to what has structural shape, has taken on structural
shape, or been put into structural shape.
So, technically speaking INFORM remains a noun with regard to
whatever form a form is in, becoming a verb only when referring to
an activity which puts something into shape-structure.
In English, however, IN + FORM as referring to structural shape has
been used only rarely, this meaning having early been replaced with
the concept of MESSAGES - meaning that messages convey information,
and that information is used to convey messages.
If the above seems mildly confusing, it's because it is. So don't
worry too much at this point.
You see, on the receiver's part, the actual message is what one
deduces from the words (or "signals") which the sender believed
represented the message he or she was trying to send. This "process"
takes a good deal of "encoding" on the sender's part and a good deal
of "decoding" on the receiver's part. But I digress.
Additionally, when we think of something formed we tend to think in
terms of FORM only, not that something has PUT whatever it is INTO
form or format.
I now caution each who chances to read the above to slow down, focus
a little, and notice two important factors:
-
that there is a vast and very
incompatible raw difference between messages and the structure
and shape of something; and
-
when we think of form as form, we
tend to think of it as an IT object or subject, not as something
which has been brought into or put into form by various
shape-making, structure-making processes of some kind.
In other words, something which is
formed or has achieved form is the RESULT of whatever has caused it
to take on shape-structure.
In English, then, the concept of "into form" has been dropped or
vacated, and so we tend not to think in terms of how and why
something has come into whatever form it has.
But this is somewhat typical of English nomenclature, which tends to
IT-identify end products as things in themselves, not as the result
of processes - which is to say, formative processes that have to be
structural in order to arrive at any given in-formed state.
This is best perceived not via words, but by a diagram. I'll provide
one in the context of a more refined essay further on. But anyone
can make one for themselves by diagramming how an IT does take on
form.
To help in enhancing clarity here, when we think of those superpower
faculties that result in some kind of clairvoyance, we tend to think
the images the clairvoyant "sees" ARE the clairvoyance.
I.e., he or she "sees" things that others don't, and by means
other's don't have active - hence the clairvoyant angle. We mistake
WHAT the clairvoyant sees as the clairvoyance, and fail to notice
that the informative processes which permit the seeing are the real
clairvoyance.
In other words, into-form-making PROCESSES always precede the
resulting images.
Thus, if clairvoyance is possible, the IN + FORM clairvoyance-making
processes pre-exist what they yield - for what they yield is what
the clairvoyant sees. If the processes are not active, then the
clairvoyant will not see anything.
If we compare this to perception-making processes, we know that the
perceptions are the sum result of whatever they have been processed
through. The superpower faculties apparently "work" in the same
exact way.
It is interesting, and important, to trace the ENGLISH etymologies
of INFORM and INFORMATION. The OXFORD DICTIONARY OF THE ENGLISH
LANGUAGE summarizes when and under what conditions English
nomenclature can be noted as first in use.
With regard to INFORM, the OXFORD identifies the primary ancient
Latin sense of INFORMARE (to give form to, shape or fashion), but
notes: "The primary sense had undergone various developments in
ancient and medieval Latin, and in French, before the word appeared
in English."
This is a clever way of saying that when INFORM came into English
usage it did not mean putting into a form.)
This appearance in English seems to have taken place during the
1300s, but seems more than anything else to have referred to
"formative principle, or formative character."
Used in this sense, the first ENGLISH uses of INFORM were probably
drawn from French rather than directly from Latin.
It is certain that the word INFORMATION is drawn from French, not
directly from Latin. Its first usage's in English, again during the
1300s, are exactly those of the French:
"The action of informing
[specifically as] forming or molding of the mind or character,
training, teaching or instructing; communicating of instructive
knowledge."
In this sense, then, from French into
English, INFORMATION referred to mind-shaping, out of which would
emerge "character" - such having been a particularly French
preoccupation ever since.
After this shift in usage-meaning, in English INFORMATION then
appears to have separated into two components, both utilizing the
same nomenclature term, INFORMATION.
The first component remained the same, almost up until the 1930s
when it began to be identified as "mind-programming."
The second component had to do with providing evidence, either for
or against someone, and usually the latter regarding criminal court
cases, heresy examinations and trials.
It would appear that "evidence" found acceptable or logical in the
light of certain consensus realities was accepted as "information" -
while "evidence" found unacceptable was rejected as something else.
INFORMATION was still being thought of in exactly this way among the
world's intelligence agencies and systems when I chanced to fall
into the government-sponsored "Psi-spy" research project at Stanford
Research Institute in 1972.
Also, during that same epoch, the then hopeful and exceedingly
well-funded realm of "scientific" futurology (now generally defunct)
also had adapted to this same concept of information, and was being
tortured by it - which is to say, adapted to the concept that
information consists only of whatever is found acceptable, or
logical within a given consensus reality.
"Consensus reality," however, was considered by futurologists to
consist of the majority opinion of "informed specialists" and/or
their vote. Since majority opinions can be wrong at least as often
as right, one does wonder how futurology every got off the ground.
However, one doesn't need to wonder why it "failed."
During the 1600s, and specifically as the result of certain
Renaissance activities, a new concept-context regarding INFORMATION
was added into this or that drift of meanings.
The earliest noted uses of this meaning occurred about 1649, and we
find the gist of this meaning more or less unchanged in WEBSTER'S of
1828, the original edition of the first American dictionary of the
English language.
In that dictionary this meaning is given as the FIRST meaning of
INFORM. And I quote:
"INFORM, verb transitive: -
Properly, to give form or shape to, but in this sense NOT USED.
[Emphasis added.]
"1. To animate; to give life to; to activate by vital powers.
"2. To instruct; to tell to; to acquaint; to communicate
knowledge to; to make known to by word or writing."
"INFORM, verb intransitive: - To give intelligence, as in: `He
might either teach in the same manner, or inform how he had been
taught.' And: "To inform against, to communicate facts by way of
accusation."
"INFORMATION:
"1. Intelligence via notice, news or advice communicated by word
or writing.
"2. Knowledge derived from reading or instruction.
"3. Knowledge derived from the senses or from the operation of
the intellectual faculties.
"4. Communication of facts for the purpose of accusation."
As of 1828, then, long gone is the
concept of IN + FORMA, as is indicated by WEBSTER'S 1828 itself -
and not reactivated until the advent of Information Theory, as will
be discussed ahead (save to mention here that information theory
cannot survive without that concept.)
In WEBSTER'S 1828, the first definition of INFORM - to animate; to
give life to; actuate [i.e., activate] by vital powers - reflects
the central hypothesis of VITALISM, which we have already
encountered.
However, the term VITAL-ISM apparently had not evolved as of 1828,
since it is not given in that same dictionary. (The concept of an
ism itself seems to have surfaced only in about the 1780s.)
However, a brief review of this topic is important - because there
are significant links between essential vitalism, information, and
activation of the superpower faculties. (An individual essay
regarding vitalism will be provided within this series of essays.)
You see, IF information (intelligence) is accurate enough, it is
broadly accepted that it can activate or vitalize activity, and
which would be akin to animating or reanimating them.
On the other hand, if information (intelligence) is cluttered with
information viruses, one would not normally expect activation.
Rather, one would anticipate de-activation, or devitalization - and
which, if it could happen, would result in all sorts of
de-evolutionary stuff.
VITALISM was crushed and beat into non-existence about 1920, at
which time the consensus realities of philosophical materialism
acquired the contexts of science proper and thenceforth prevailed.
And any science based in philosophical materialism simply has to be
an IT-MAKING science.
Prior to that, philosophical vitalism (technically in existence
roughly since about 1533 during the Renaissance) and philosophical
materialism (technically in existence since about 1845) had been
seen as sister sciences.
The advocates of the two philosophical orientations were soon
antagonistic to each other. An enormous conflict, now quite
forgotten, ensued, lasted for about eighty years, with the
materialists being the ultimate victors. Vitalism was snuffed in
academia, and references to it were deleted from consensus reality
sources which then prevailed as logical and rational.
In spite of all the philosophical imbroglios that are brought forth
to explain the victory, the actual reason is quite simple.
By 1920, the material sciences had demonstrated they could produce
products of enormous, even fabulous economic value. The vitalism
sciences did not produce much of economic meaning. Funding therefore
went to the material sciences. End of that story.
There were two essential definitions regarding vitalistic
principles, to which a number of other concepts were derived. Be
sure that I am not digressing or drifting here.
1. That the functions of a living
organism are due to a vital principle distinct from
physical-chemical forces;
2. That the processes of life are not explicable by the laws of
physics and chemistry alone - and that life is in some part
self-determining and self-informing.
Please read self-informing as IN + FORM,
meaning self-making into form.
For conceptual clarity, any use of the term VITAL within vitalism's
contexts should immediately be replaced with ANIMATING - at least to
discriminate between animate and inanimate conditions.
In the end, all of the nomenclature that might be associable to
vitalism and/or its two essential concepts was stringently, and with
something akin to a vengeance, expunged from modernist consensus
reality-making literature. Any even glancing reference to those
terms was enough to occasion loss of professional standing,
potential funding, and etc.
Thus, cutting-edge scientists have to walk gingerly, and talk around
such concepts if and when they chance to encounter any possibility
of their real existence.
In any event, this brief review of the etymological history of
INFORM and INFORMATION indicates that only one concept of them
prevails, the concept that information is what one reads and learns
from.
We can note, too, that two important concepts have more or less
fallen into disuse and oblivion: IN + FORMA, and INFORM as it
relates to animating principles.
And it is in this consensus reality condition that information
theory arose.
Information Theory
So, what IS information theory?
And why might it be of fundamental importance with regard to
activating (vitalizing) the superpower faculties?
Most sources dealing with information theory are somewhat or
completely inaccessible (unintelligible) to those who haven't
developed the mental information processing grids or nomenclature to
deal with it.
However, THE NEW COLUMBIA ENCYCLOPEDIA (1975) has a rather neat
rendering, at least as regards the early developmental hypotheses.
The theory is indicated as a mathematical one, principally
formulated as of 1948 by the American scientist Claude E. Shannon,
to explain aspects and problem of information and communication
("communication" later being thought of as information-transfer,
especially in the psychoenergetic research of the former USSR.)
The entry in the encyclopedia is worth quoting in its entirety, and
I'll do this first.
I caution you not to get confused if you don't understand parts or
all of it.
After quoting it, I'll lift out the signal, easy to conceptualize,
part and clarify it with respect to opening new cognitive channels
toward activating the superpowers.
I never recommend anything, but sometimes I "suggest." If you have
any desire at all to approach an activation of any of the
superpowers, I suggest you pay serious attention to the quoted
materials below, even to the point of memorizing them (i.e.,
installing them quite firmly in your memory library.)
One preliminary note, though. Shannon et. al. seized upon the term
ENTROPY and included it in the discursive part of the theory. This
is a term properly belonging to thermodynamics, and has otherwise
since been defined in a number of different ways. In information
theory it means "noise," and so I'll replace "entropy" with noise,
indicating that I did so.
Synopsis of the 1948 Information Theory
"In this theory, the term
INFORMATION is used in a special sense; it a measure of the
freedom of choice with which a message is selected from the set
of all possible messages.
"Information is thus distinct from meaning, since it is entirely
possible for a string of nonsense words and a meaningful
sentence to be equivalent with respect to information content.
"Numerically, information is measured [via the theory] in BITS
(short for binary digit; see Binary System.)
"One bit is equivalent to the choice between two equally likely
choices. For example, if we know that a coin is to be tossed but
are unable to see it as it falls, a message telling whether the
coin came up heads or tails gives us one bit of information.
"When there are several equally
likely choices, the number of bits is equal to the logarithm of
the number of choices taken to the base two. For example, if a
message specifies one of sixteen equally likely choices, it is
said to contain four bits of information.
"When the various choices are not equally possible, the
situation is more complex.
"Interestingly, the mathematical expression for information
content closely resembles the expression for ENTROPY in
thermodynamics. The greater the information in a message, the
lower its randomness, or `noisiness,' and hence the smaller its
entropy [i.e., the smaller its noise content.]
"Often, because of constraints such as grammar [language, and
the way it is expressed], a source does not use its full range
of choice. A source that uses just 70% of its freedom of choice
would be said to have a relative noise ratio [entropy] of 0.7.
The redundancy of such a source is defined as 100% minus the
relative entropy, or, in this case, 30% [meaning 30%
message-signal adulterated by 70% noise].
"The redundancy of English is about 50%; i.e., about half of the
elements used in writing or speaking are freely chosen, and the
rest are required by the structure of the language.
"A message proceeds along some channel from the source to the
receiver. Information theory defines for any given channel a
limiting capacity or rate at which it can carry information,
expressed in bits per second.
"In general, it is necessary to process, or encode, information
from a source before transmitting it through a given channel.
"For example, a human voice must be encoded before it can be
transmitted by radio.
"An important theorem of information theory states that if a
source with a given entropy feeds information to a channel with
a given capacity, and if the noise in the source is less than
the channel capacity, a code exists for which the frequency of
errors may be reduced as low as desired.
"If the channel capacity is less than the noise source, no such
code exists.
"The theory further shows that noise, or random disturbance of
the channel, creates uncertainty as to the correspondence
between the received signal and the signal transmitted.
"The average uncertainty in the message when the signal is known
is called the equivocation.
"It is shown that the net effect of noise is to reduce the
information capacity of the channel. However, redundancy in a
message, as distinguished from redundancy in a source, makes it
more likely that the message can be reconstituted at the
receiver without error.
"For example, if something is already known as a certainty, then
all messages about it give no information and are 100%
redundant, and the information is thus immune to any
disturbances of the channel.
"Using various mathematical means, Shannon was able to define
channel capacity for continuous signals, such a music and
speech.
"While the theory is not specific in all respects, it proves the
existence of optimum coding schemes without showing how to find
them. For example, it succeeds remarkably in outlining the
engineering requirements of communication systems and the
limitations of such systems."
SEE C. E. Shannon and Warren Weaver, THE
MATHEMATICAL THEORY OF COMMUNICATION (1949).
Formats of (or regarding) Information
When we begin to think of
what information IS, most of us probably will think it is what we
hear or read in some kind of printed or visual format. We think this
because this concept "dwells" in consensus realities as such, and we
have cloned it quite nicely. And from any number of aspects that
concept is serviceable - as far as it goes.
But. By the time "information" reaches a spoken, printed or visual
format, it is an end-product of the processes which have organized
and produced it in those formats.
Nonetheless, this end-product can act as a "source" of information
and we can more or less duplicate it in our own heads.
"Duplicate," of course, means reproduce or copy it into our own
heads, the ostensible goal being to understand it. In this sense,
then, the information we in-put into our heads has been CONVEYED by
the spoken, printed or visual format.
After the in-put, however, the "conveyance" of the information
continues getting into our heads by being filtered through the
mental information processing grids of the recipient. The grids are
extensions of the memory library earlier referred to.
In THIS processes, the "information" will ultimately reach steps 8
and 9 of the perceptual processes. Meaning that the "information"
that finally comes out as understanding will be the sum of the
in-put plus whatever the in-put gets filtered through in the case of
each individual.
If matches to the in-put "information content" are found in the
memory library, THEN a kind of duplication can take place. The
duplication is called "understanding."
But if matches are not found, then the information content probably
will be routed through the nearest similarity in the memory library.
In this case, we are now one-step or more removed from duplication
(and removed from "complete understanding.")
If no matches are found, then the recipient of the in-put
information content will "draw a blank" - for example, regarding
twelve types of snow, camels, telepathy or clairvoyance.
In other words, INFORMATION is what we understand, even if only in a
partial way. If the in-put does not result in "understanding," then
it is NOT information.
Information Transfer
The whole of the above, and
its obvious problem areas, is what some information theorists refer
to as the information transfer process.
One of the central concepts of information theory is that all
information is available all of the time.
Some of the theorists mitigate this all-inclusive concept by saying
that information sources are everywhere.
Others opine that information can be drawn from everything and
anything.
In the sense of all of the above, the EXISTENCE of information is
not in question. What is problematical, in big-time ways, is the
TRANSFER of it into a system wherein it can be duplicated,
misduplicated, or blanked out.
In the sense of the human, the prevailing consensus reality concepts
usually hold that the "system" being referred to is "the mind" and
its mental information processes.
"The mind," however, when spoken of this way is applicable as a
generality to every human specimen, and which is good enough for a
theory.
In matters of actual PERFORMANCE, though, the "individual mind"
should be substituted for the all-inclusive generality - because
even if information does exist everywhere, it is the individual mind
that produces duplication, misduplication, or the blanking out, and
which in turn result in understanding, misunderstanding, or nothing
at all.
Please note that the term PERFORMANCE has been emphasized above
because it is entirely relevant toward activating the superpowers,
"activating" having to do with performance. And here I foreshadow a
topic that will require at least two essays among those several more
to come.
Information Signals
Information transfers via
speech, print or in visual formats, actually contain two MODES or
MODULATIONS of information content.
But to get at this, it must FIRST be comprehended that the words of
speech or writing/print the images, charts, etc., of the visual
formats are NOT the information content itself, but merely symbols
and signs for it.
In this sense, the symbols and signs are the OBJECTIVE "carriers" of
the information content - which is to say that they are SIGNALS that
will stimulate duplication of the content simply because the
receivers associate MEANING to the signals - IF the meanings of the
signals are shared in common.
If the meanings are not shared among the recipients, then the
signals will be "inaccessible" to all those who do not.
And here is one of the most apparent bases for language and its
concepto-nomenclature - to establish a shared and sharable basis for
the sending and receiving of information content.
This is to say that pre-set meanings are encoded into nomenclature
and images, and the consensus reality learning networks transfer the
encoded meanings into the memory storage of their citizens so that
there can be a mutual basis of information transfer and exchange. An
intrasocial collective or group is thus formatted regarding transfer
of information within it.
The best pre-set words or images to effect this information transfer
unity are those that have precise meanings encoded into them, since
the meaning-information-content can be "recognized" most easily.
Any increasing permutations of meanings regarding a given
information transfer signal tend to decrease the cohesion of the
unity within the collective, and tend to permit distortions of
meaning within individuals.
One would therefore think that precise and exact meanings for
signals would be stringently established by social consensus
necessity. And indeed this IS the case where an absolute need to do
so is apparent, the "need" being intimately related to performance,
and especially where it is found to be dangerous not to be precise.
For example, no one becomes an electrician based only on the general
consensus reality that electricity lights up bulbs and turns the
toaster on.
A suitable and precise nomenclature has to be evolved and become
shared among potential electricians - or else they can get fried all
too easily. Airline pilots can not become one simply because
airplanes fly. Arctic people cannot deal with snow simply if it is
snow, and Arab Bedouins will be out-maneuvered in the economics of
the camel market if they think a camel is a camel.
However, within any given social unity where there is no perceived
absolute need to INCREASE nomenclature, that kind of effort is not
usually undertaken - because the average citizen within the unity,
and with regard to average performance within it, can function quite
well via a lesser rather than an increase in signal-carrying
nomenclature.
And, to begin with, the so-called average citizen probably won't
ever "acquire" a nomenclature in terms of quantity that extends
beyond his or her recognized need to do so, or beyond what it takes
to fit into the consensus reality they desire to fit into (or,
sometimes, are trapped within.)
So the average citizen within any given consensus reality had no
explicit or necessary need to add more specific nomenclature; but
there is also a need not to have too little, either.
The way this is apparently resolved is to establish a number of
IT-IDENTIFIERS that do not require much further break-apart into
it-TYPES, into increasing refinement of comprehensions of types of
something, and which would require the increase of nomenclature.
In this way, then, people who do not need to use different types of
snow for survival can be content with snow as something that falls
in winter and needs to be shoveled when it interferes with traffic
or might crush the roof in. So, among such people, SNOW is snow. It
is a perfectly good information signal, and the need for any
increasingly refined differentiation beyond that probably has to do
only with amounts of it.
So, among such people "SNOW" is a "clean" and "clear" signal
regarding information transfer, whereas among the Arctic peoples
barely fifty years ago it would have been as "noisy" as Times Square
at New Year's Eve.
In much the same way, people who don't realize that different types
of clairvoyance exist will not have any need to identify them -
meaning that the single use of this one nomenclature signal is
perceived by them to be sufficient.
But not to anyone who wants to learn how to be clairvoyant. The best
instructors of clairvoyance I am familiar with have to begin, as
they do, by breaking the single concept apart, at least into
"aspects" of clairvoyance.
So, here we now approach the concept of "clear" and "noisy" signals,
this concept revolving around whether or not the carrier (word or
image) of a signal is a precise, thus a clean one, or whether it
induces noise into the signal load.
And it is at this point that the essential problems of information
transfer integrate with the basic information theory offered up by
Shannon in 1948, the basic problem regarding information transfer OF
ANY KIND having to do with the ratio between "signal" and "noise."
Please note that in preparation for this series of essays, an
earlier essay dealing exclusively with the SIGNAL-TO-NOISE RATIO has
been available in this database for several months. That essay can
now be appended to this series' essays as Part 4A.
Information Noise
As stipulated within
information theory by Shannon, a message (information content)
proceeds along some channel from the source to the receiver.
In line with our interests, information is in-put via some kind of
"channel" to the receiver, who then out-put it in terms of
information encoded into concept-nomenclature for further
information transfer.
But the in-put itself is an information transfer from "a source"
wherever or whatever it might consist of.
We are thus dealing with TWO information transfers:
(a) the in-put transfer, and
(b) the out-put transfer.
Between (a) and (b), however, is "a
channel," and after (b) is concluded another "channel" is necessary
to further accomplish an information transfer.
So we can think in terms of the in-put channel and the out-put
channel, the in-put channel having to do with reception of the
information, the out-put one having to do with what we call
"communication."
In the human sense of all of this, the out-put transfer (the
"communicating") must first be encoded into concepto-nomenclature
that can be transferred to others simply because their mental
information processing equipment is already encoded to receive and
duplicate it.
All of this seems clear enough, doesn't it.
However, there is one serious glitch. You see, the in-put transfer
ALSO has to be processed INTO the same mental information processing
equipment in order that it CAN be "received."
If that mental information processing equipment (which now has to do
DOUBLE duty regarding in-put AND out-put) is not pre-formatted with
some exactness regarding both quantity and quality of the in-put,
then the "channel capacity" will be LESS than it needs to transfer
the full information load into the receiver system.
If this is the case, then the out-put transfer will be only a
partial one, or perhaps hardly anything at all. If it would be the
case that the in-put and out-put channel cannot MATCH any of the
signal, then the signal will disappear into the blanked out thing.
In basic information theory, anything that hampers, distorts,
confuses, obliterates the signal is referred to as "noise."
In this sense, if the noise "in" the channel is less than the
signal, then a code exists (or can be established) for which the
frequency of errors (noise) may be reduced as low as desired.
If the "noise" in the channel is greater than the signal, then the
signal may not be identified; it can still exist in the channel,
although so embedded in the noise that it cannot register, be picked
up, or identified.
In the sense we are interested, the human sense, it turns out that
human mental information processes ending up in "perception" can
produce not only signal-laden but noise-laden conceptualizations and
mental image pictures with hardly any way to discriminate which is
which.
Where Does Information Processing Noise
Come From?
In answer to this question,
the daring among us will assume that the noise originates in our own
heads - and which is usually the case.
But a deeper inspection of noise sources reveals that what's in our
heads and which contributes to the noise may not be innately present
to begin with.
A better part of the noise sources in our mental information
processes is ACQUIRED - usually by the enculturization processes
that make us fit in our given consensus realities.
This understanding is rather broadly accepted in some echelons of
human inquiry, especially if the consensus reality social processes
drift into mind-programming rather than overall efficient education.
But there is another far more powerful, but far more LESS obvious,
noise source, and it is one we all adapt to in order to learn to
communicate.
Language itself.
As Shannon pointed up in his information theory (and much to the
shock of many at the time) that one is "constrained" to utilize
language - and with language comes the concepto-nomenclature that
becomes lodged, by necessity, into our memory library.
I'll paraphrase how Shannon put it.
Regarding English, some fifty per cent of the concept-nomenclature
we lean upon is required by the structure [and familiar usage] of
the language. The other 50 per cent is open to free choice of
concepts and nomenclature.
Shannon's implication was that if the language-determined part was
inhabited with noise-making redundancies, then any adaptation to the
language would induce these into mental information processes of ALL
those who utilized it.
So, you see, we are not at each individual level "guilty" of faulty
information processing - at least 50 per cent of the time.
But whatever their source, even the 50 per cent presence of
noise-making viruses can easily decrease or prevent performance ever
activating.
As it turns out, although noise-making redundancies can be
identified in every area of human endeavor, some are more prone to a
larger percentage than others, especially those that have become
adapted to ambiguity. Dare I mention politics and over-bloated
administrations? Or the present conditions of the "fine" arts? Or
the parameters of "love," "hate," "sex?" Of course, I'll not mention
the realms of "psychic phenomena" - since everyone knows what they
are.
In any event, it might be said that where over-simplification and
ambiguity prevail, so too do noise-making redundancies - all of
which bury the signal within the noise, no matter how fashionable is
the noise.
It's somewhat worth mentioning, generally speaking anyway, an area
of human endeavor thickly populated with noise-making redundancies
tends to be "volcanic" in nature. Such areas can exist peacefully
within their own parameters, stabilized by their own consensus
realities. But if intruded upon, or if THEY intrude upon, things
begin to heat up.
The topics of information and information transfers will be picked
up again in additional essays.
It is now desirable to devote Part 5 to a correlation of what has
been discussed in Parts 1 - 4.
In Part 6, we'll discuss not only the noise-making redundancies
embedded and perpetuated within ambiguities, but their utterly
destructive viral effect on clean, clear "signals." Ambiguous
concepts induce structure-lessness, hence they wreck any
signal-awareness of STRUCTURE, and without knowledge of the
structure of anything very little else can ever be known about it.
As we shall see in subsequent essays, STRUCTURE is the IN + FORM, or
the format, of something - and as such is what needs to be worked
with or within, not against.
In any event, any real attempt to activate any of the superpowers
must encompass the reality that signal-to-noise ratios are
intimately involved. Thus, the presence in any system of
disinformation or misinformation can act as if it is infected with
viruses.
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