“It from Bit” and Quantum Mechanics

Matthew Chalmers

Matthew Leifer

Roger Schlafly

Abstract: There is no way to reduce physics to information theory. Matter is not just empty space with isolated bits of information. The quantum is not digital data, logic, probability, or information. There is a long history of trying to understand the ethereal mysteries of quantum mechanics by reduction to discrete information, as if the universe were a giant ghostly digital computer without the hardware. These attempts have failed, and should be seen as evasions of the central truths of quantum mechanics. In short, there is no it from bit. Submitted to the FQXi.org 2013 Essay Contest answering: “It from Bit or Bit from It?” Author Bio: Roger Schlafly has a BSE from Princeton U, and a PhD in Mathematics from U California Berkeley, under I. Singer. He blogs at DarkBuzz.com.

Владислав Михайлович Грицевич

In 1989, John Wheeler proposed the concept of "It from Bit," according to which physical reality arises from information. However, the mechanism of this transition remained undescribed. In this work, we propose such a mechanism: information becomes matter through the activation of a cell in discrete space upon interaction. Space is modeled as a hexagonal lattice, where each cell can exist in two states: information (0) and matter (1). The 0→1 transition occurs through physical interaction. The observer is a source of interaction, not consciousness. The model explains the observer effect, gravity, dark matter, and quantum uncertainty, providing "It from Bit" with the missing physical mechanism.

George Jaroszkiewicz