It From Bit

“Wheeler (1911-2008) is a legendary figure in physics. He worked with Niels Bohr to explain nuclear fission, worked on the hydrogen bomb at Los Alamos, and taught many eminent physicists including Richard Feynman, Kip Thorne and Hugh Everett. He was the father of modern general relativity, was key in developing our understanding of black holes and, indeed, popularised the term ‘black hole’ (after it was suggested to him by an audience member at a conference) and coined many others, including ‘worm hole’ and ‘quantum foam.’

Wheeler categorised his long and productive life in physics into three periods: ‘Everything is Particles’, ‘Everything is Fields’, and ‘Everything is Information’ … The driving idea behind the third period was spurred by his contemplation of the age-old question: ‘How come existence?’ And his answer, first published in a brilliantly written (and very entertaining) paper in 1989, was it from bit:

It from bit symbolises the idea that every item of the physical world has at bottom — at a very deep bottom, in most instances — an immaterial source and explanation; that what we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes-no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and this is a participatory universe.”

This is interesting not for the inevitable gnostic “we live in a simulation” arguments, but for the symmetries with Pythagorean realism and Deutsch and Marletto’s constructor theory.