Re: Where does information come from?

In article <1jgfg.216593$WI1.173527@pd7tw2no>, brown@xxxxxxxxxxx
says...
This question is asked of me repeatedly by a creationist promoter of ID who
had a booth at our teacher convention last February. Specifically, he asks:
Richard
You nor your truth talk buddies still haven't been able to answer my
question ? Where does information come from? If not from a designer then
where? Waiting for an answer from the scientific community.
Will
What does he mean or imply (or does he even know what he means?) when he
uses the word "information"?
Is DNA information? Is he asking for the origin of DNA? Is the question
disingenuous? If so, how do we respond?



The question is disingenuous. Take the following two strings:

1. The fast jelly snores greenly at aardvarks.

2. EGBDF

Which has more information, and why? The first uses English words
arranged in correct English grammar, but they are used in a way which
is nonsensical. The second is an apparently random string of letters.
How do we measure how much information is in each?

At first glance, it might appear intuitive that the first string
contains more information just because each individual word can be
assigned a definition and the grammar is more or less correct. But
the second string is the musical staff (assuming I got it right) so
now which contains for information? How about if it turns out the
first sentence is actually a code as well? What if the first sentence
is a code, but has been used randomly?

The fact is that no one has an objective way of measuring information,
since it depends entirely upon the context in which it is found. A
hair on your shirt isn't really all that meaningful, but if you've
been murdered it might be used to help identify your murderer. DNA
molecules might contain vast troves of "information" - but does a DNA
molecule separated from a living cell have more or less information
than a CD ROM in my computer's drive?

The bottom line is that "information" is contextual and subjective,
not an objective property of matter.

The response:

1. What do you mean by information? There can be no satisfactory
answer until you both know what you're talking about.

2. What is an example of two things with "information" and how does he
tell which has more? How is it measured?

But the second question is pointless if he doesn't even know what he
means when he says information.

.

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