Toward an Information-First View of Reality
On a classic episode of ID the Future from the vault, host Dr. John West continues his conversation with Dr. Bill Dembski as they discuss Dr. Dembski’s 2014 book Being as Communion: A Metaphysics of Information. Listen in as Dr. Dembski explains 3 central points at the heart of his book: the Tang problem, the problem of no, and transposition.
Tang, of course, is the breakfast drink that reconstitutes orange juice into something like it but not the same. Dembski compares this to materialistic thinking: “What materialism tries to do is take the world as it is, then strip it down to material particles and the interaction of those particles according to various laws of physics and chemistry, and then try to reconstitute the world…in those terms.” You end up with a pale shadow of reality, Dembski notes, that is not nearly as good as the real thing.
Dr. Dembski also discusses free will and the power of no. He recalls the famous Libetian free will experiments to critique the understanding that our free will is an illusion. He also explains how information theory can confirm free will.
Dembski closes the chat by discussing the various ways information can be embodied. A symphony on paper, for example, requires a full orchestra to fully embody the richness of its informational content. Transposition speaks to how information is housed, embodied, and given the chance to flourish in different mediums.
Dig Deeper
- Listen to Part 1 of this conversation.
- Get your own copy of Being as Communion!
- Watch Dr. Dembski explain his book in a series of short video interview clips, like this one: