TFNR - Immaterial forms
Material and immaterial are two particular terms, often subject to infinite misunderstandings, debates, and opinions. By material, we mean anything that has a relationship with Matter. By contrast, immaterial refers to that which has no relation to Matter.
The definition of Matter is therefore crucial. As we discussed in the previous chapter, within this System of Knowledge, everything that exists - everything we can directly or indirectly experience (observe, measure, interact with) - is considered Information. In-Form-Action: Action with a Form, the Form of Action.
In its less complex manifestations, particularly in the physical domain of Reality, we assign the term Energy to Information.
We know that matter and energy are equivalent, or rather that matter "is" an equivalent amount of energy, which we must use to produce matter, and which matter releases when it is destroyed. Matter as "frozen" Energy.
We know that Matter and Energy are equivalent - or rather, that Matter "is" an equivalent quantity of Energy. It is the Energy we require to produce matter, and the energy matter releases when destroyed, or rather "destructured". Matter can thus be understood as "frozen" Energy. The quantity and quality of Information that organizes that Matter Structure.
In particle physics, we identify two primary types of particles: material particles (fermions such as electrons, neutrinos, and quarks) and "energetic" particles (force-carriers or bosons such as gluons, W and Z bosons, photons, and the Higgs boson).
So, what is "materiality"? Where does it originate? Does it arise from the "exclusion principle," which fermions show when occupying quantum states (and possibly even the same portion of Space-time)? Could it be that materiality is, in fact, intangibility?
In the chapter on Structures of Information, we essentially identified three fundamental types of Structures: Waves, Vortices and Interactions. Waves represent the essence of Radiation (e.g., electromagnetic radiation) and the energetic Structures that constitute it. Vortices represent the essence of Matter and the material particles that form it. Additionally, there are Interactions that give rise to composite Particles - Particles increasingly complex and exotic, as observed in the Matter that constitutes us and our surroundings, or produced by cosmic rays, particle colliders, or other phenomena.
We have seen that the Structures and Interactions underlying Physical Reality can be traced back to two primary classes of Derived Entities, Processes, and Phenomena: Energy and Matter (two forms of more or less structured Information). Each can be subdivided into two subclasses - two faces of the same Reality - characterized by very different properties, even though they share a common foundation: organization of the Elementary Events and their correlation in the organization of the Elementary Field under the incessant Action of the Fundamental Force. These subclasses are identified as Dark (invisible) Structures and Ordinary (visible) Structures.
Drawing from a famous film saga, we could refer to a dark side (Dark Radiation: gravitational waves (GW) and dark matter halos, low density large extension non-particle matter (NPM)) and an ordinary side (Ordinary Radiation: electromagnetic waves (EMW) and Ordinary / hadronic Matter (PM), emitting and absorbing light / electromagnetic waves).
Is it Mass that confers intangibility? Or perhaps the Vortex-like structure is responsible? It seems plausible. In that regard, shouldn’t we consider light - consisting of electromagnetic waves or photons / bosons - as material? After all, light does not appear to be intangible. Moreover, due to the principle of complementarity, material particles (for example, electrons) can be represented as waves, and waves as particles. What a mess...
A clear conceptual stance is needed to help us distinguish between what should be defined as material and what as immaterial.
We define as material everything that is constituted by Physical Structures of Information, Waves, Vortices, and their Interactions. This includes Dark Radiation (GW) and Dark Matter (NPM), as well as light and all electromagnetic radiation and Particle Matter, along with all the interactions occurring between these forms of Energy and Matter. Furthermore, we consider Energy, both dark (Dark Energy) and directly observable forms (potential and expressed, kinetic, electric, magnetic, weak and strong nuclear energy, etc.) as material insofar as it is related to Matter.
What then can we consider immaterial in the physical domain of Reality?
Certainly, it is all Information that cannot be defined in terms of Energy and Matter as above. This refers to Physical Information of greater complexity, which does not fall within the realm of Cognitive Information (that is, the Information produced and exchanged by the Cognitive Systems of Living Beings and Automata).
We refer, in particular, to the signals transmitted by radiation - those conveying Information about temperature, chemical composition, and the physical dynamics of the material entities that produced them. A similar principle applies to the particles of cosmic radiation.
We also refer to the Information relating to the shape of astrophysical and cosmological objects, which, among other aspects, encompasses all the physical Information that is created, exchanged, transformed, or destroyed by the Physical Phenomena composing Nature - irrespective of whether an observer (a Cognitive System) is present.
And again, all Physical Information that cannot be considered cognitive, that is, Information devoid of inherent meaning, which spans Phenomena from the most elementary (e.g., a thermal gradient) to the most complex (e.g., an economic relationship within a planetary-scale human social system).
Links to the tables of contents of TFNR Paper
