The philosophy of information (PI) is a branch of

philosophy Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

that studies topics relevant to information processing, representational system and consciousness, cognitive science,

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, information, and automation. Computer science spans Theoretical computer science, theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, and information theory) to Applied science, ...

, information science and

information technology Information technology (IT) is a set of related fields within information and communications technology (ICT), that encompass computer systems, software, programming languages, data processing, data and information processing, and storage. Inf ...

. It includes: # the critical investigation of the conceptual nature and basic principles of information, including its dynamics, utilisation and sciences # the elaboration and application of information-theoretic and computational methodologies to philosophical problems.

History

The philosophy of information (PI) has evolved from the

philosophy of artificial intelligence The philosophy of artificial intelligence is a branch of the philosophy of mind and the philosophy of computer science that explores artificial intelligence and its implications for knowledge and understanding of intelligence, ethics, conscious ...

, logic of information, cybernetics, social theory,

ethics Ethics is the philosophy, philosophical study of Morality, moral phenomena. Also called moral philosophy, it investigates Normativity, normative questions about what people ought to do or which behavior is morally right. Its main branches inclu ...

and the study of language and information.

Logic of information

The logic of information, also known as the ''logical theory of information'', considers the information content of logical signs and expressions along the lines initially developed by Charles Sanders Peirce.

Study of language and information

Later contributions to the field were made by Fred Dretske, Jon Barwise, Brian Cantwell Smith, and others. The Center for the Study of Language and Information (CSLI) was founded at Stanford University in 1983 by philosophers, computer scientists, linguists, and psychologists, under the direction of John Perry and Jon Barwise.

P.I.

More recently this field has become known as the philosophy of information. The expression was coined in the 1990s by Luciano Floridi, who has published prolifically in this area with the intention of elaborating a unified and coherent, conceptual frame for the whole subject.

Definitions of "information"

The concept ''information'' has been defined by several theorists. Charles S. Peirce's theory of information was embedded in his wider theory of symbolic communication he called the ''semiotic'', now a major part of

semiotics Semiotics ( ) is the systematic study of sign processes and the communication of meaning. In semiotics, a sign is defined as anything that communicates intentional and unintentional meaning or feelings to the sign's interpreter. Semiosis is a ...

. For Peirce, information integrates the aspects of signs and expressions separately covered by the concepts of denotation and extension, on the one hand, and by connotation and comprehension on the other. Donald M. MacKay says that information is a distinction that makes a difference. According to Luciano Floridi, four kinds of mutually compatible phenomena are commonly referred to as "information": * Information about something (e.g. a train timetable) * Information as something (e.g. DNA, or fingerprints) * Information for something (e.g. algorithms or instructions) * Information in something (e.g. a pattern or a constraint).

Philosophical directions

Computing and philosophy

Recent creative advances and efforts in

computing Computing is any goal-oriented activity requiring, benefiting from, or creating computer, computing machinery. It includes the study and experimentation of algorithmic processes, and the development of both computer hardware, hardware and softw ...

, such as

semantic web The Semantic Web, sometimes known as Web 3.0, is an extension of the World Wide Web through standards set by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). The goal of the Semantic Web is to make Internet data machine-readable. To enable the encoding o ...

, ontology engineering, knowledge engineering, and modern

artificial intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is the capability of computer, computational systems to perform tasks typically associated with human intelligence, such as learning, reasoning, problem-solving, perception, and decision-making. It is a field of re ...

provide

with fertile ideas, new and evolving subject matters, methodologies, and models for philosophical inquiry. While

brings new opportunities and challenges to traditional philosophical studies, and changes the ways philosophers understand foundational concepts in philosophy, further major progress in

would only be feasible when philosophy provides sound foundations for areas such as bioinformatics, software engineering, knowledge engineering, and ontologies. Classical topics in philosophy, namely,

mind The mind is that which thinks, feels, perceives, imagines, remembers, and wills. It covers the totality of mental phenomena, including both conscious processes, through which an individual is aware of external and internal circumstances ...

consciousness Consciousness, at its simplest, is awareness of a state or object, either internal to oneself or in one's external environment. However, its nature has led to millennia of analyses, explanations, and debate among philosophers, scientists, an ...

experience Experience refers to Consciousness, conscious events in general, more specifically to perceptions, or to the practical knowledge and familiarity that is produced by these processes. Understood as a conscious event in the widest sense, experience i ...

, reasoning,

knowledge Knowledge is an Declarative knowledge, awareness of facts, a Knowledge by acquaintance, familiarity with individuals and situations, or a Procedural knowledge, practical skill. Knowledge of facts, also called propositional knowledge, is oft ...

truth Truth or verity is the Property (philosophy), property of being in accord with fact or reality.Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionarytruth, 2005 In everyday language, it is typically ascribed to things that aim to represent reality or otherwise cor ...

morality Morality () is the categorization of intentions, Decision-making, decisions and Social actions, actions into those that are ''proper'', or ''right'', and those that are ''improper'', or ''wrong''. Morality can be a body of standards or principle ...

and

creativity Creativity is the ability to form novel and valuable Idea, ideas or works using one's imagination. Products of creativity may be intangible (e.g. an idea, scientific theory, Literature, literary work, musical composition, or joke), or a physica ...

are rapidly becoming common concerns and foci of investigation in

, e.g., in areas such as agent computing, software agents, and intelligent mobile agent technologies. According to Luciano Floridi "Luciano Floridi
''Open Problems in the Philosophy of Information''
''Metaphilosophy'' 35.4, 554-582. Revised version of ''The Herbert A. Simon Lecture on Computing and Philosophy'' given at Carnegie Mellon University in 2001, wit

/ref> one can think of several ways for applying computational methods towards philosophical matters: # Conceptual experiments in silico: As an innovative extension of an ancient tradition of thought experiment, a trend has begun in philosophy to apply computational modeling schemes to questions in logic,

epistemology Epistemology is the branch of philosophy that examines the nature, origin, and limits of knowledge. Also called "the theory of knowledge", it explores different types of knowledge, such as propositional knowledge about facts, practical knowle ...

, philosophy of science, philosophy of biology, philosophy of mind, and so on. # Pancomputationalism: On this view, computational and informational concepts are considered to be so powerful that given the right level of abstraction, anything in the world could be modeled and represented as a computational system, and any process could be simulated computationally. Then, however, pancomputationalists have the hard task of providing credible answers to the following two questions: ## how can one avoid blurring all differences among systems? ## what would it mean for the system under investigation not to be an informational system (or a computational system, if computation is the same as information processing)?

Notes

External links

* *
IEG site
the Oxford University research group on the philosophy of information. *It from bit and fit from bit. On the origin and impact of information in the average evolution - from bit to atom and ecosystem. Information philosophy which covers not only the physics of information, but also how life forms originate and from there evolve to become more and more complex, including evolution of genes and memes, into the complex memetics from organisations and multinational corporations and a " global brain", (Yves Decadt, 2000). Book published in Dutch with English paper summary in The Information Philosopher, http://www.informationphilosopher.com/solutions/scientists/decadt/ * Luciano Floridi,
Where are we in the philosophy of information?
University of Bergen,

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

. Podcast dated 21.06.06. {{Authority control Inf Philosophy of artificial intelligence Knowledge representation