The Mereology of Potentiality (Thursday - Week 3, TT19)

The notion of information is widely used in virtually any scientific context and in ordinary life. Although communication channels, encryption, etc. are well studied, the metaphysical status of information remains obscure. Measures of complexity and randomness have gathered some attention in the philosophy of science starting from Dennett (1991). Those approaches suffer for a lack of clarity with respect to the mind-independent existence of patterns (idealism charge) and the pragmatic aspects of patterns selection (relativism charge) and special status of the observer (Copenhagen charge). My intention here is to use tools developed in contemporary metaphysics to address these charges. My strategy is to try following the intuitive thought that information is something available to us and other entities, and use powers to account for this availability.

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