What is Information?

How do you define information, and how does that definition overlap or differ with how others might define it? In this video, we look at some definitions Inside (and outside) of Information Science to see if we can develop a nice, one-size-fits-all definition for everyone.

#InformationScience #CookieMonster #DIKW

Guest-starring:

Jabril (SEFD Science):

Works Cited:

Losee, R. M., & SpringerLink ebooks - Computer Science. (2012). Information from processes: About the nature of information creation, use, and representation (1;2012; ed.). New York;Heidelberg;: Springer-Verlag. doi:10.1007/978-3-642-31190-1

Cookie Monster Clip is used for education purposes under Fair Use laws, owned by Sesame Workshop.

If you have some spare cash, consider donating to your local library! If you want to help me make videos though, I'll never turn down a few bucks:

This video was shot and recorded on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Musqueam people.

Music: "Lola" performed by the United States Marine Band, in the public domain.

[markmunro]

HI! I liked your video. Here is my proposed definition. - Information is the variously organized data, that is the operand, of a decision making process, which has consequence in a larger context.

[ApocalypseCatLibrarian]

Thanks, Peter. As always, this is great content. Thanks for taking the time and for bringing us Cookie Monster's unlimited wisdom.

[seanehle]

As a scientist, I get a kind of vertigo-like feeling when peering at over the edge of a baseless foundation when contemplating the question,
"What possible, irrefutable means can there be to distinguish information from misinformation?"
The whole process of science is just a guess to an answer to that question.
I'm clearly biased in favor of the quality of this guess, but it is a guess. At the end of the day, and all of science is just an experiment to see if this guess answers that question.
And that's the spiral of thinking I peer off into.

[MetaphysicalAxiom]

Good stuff. thx again. This economically impoverished autodidact is very glad there are those like yourself that pass the baton in the relay race of knowledge. I will pay that forward.

[Jabrils]

"find meaning according to context" wow. this ideal should be more widespread period.

[LordBitememan]

Information is when I hear something and say "Wow, I didn't know that. That was interesting." Something isn't information when you tell me something you thought was interesting and my first reaction is "I really didn't need to know that."

[monicazimmerman]

My undergrad is in Educational Studies. I also studied some developmental psychology. I'm looking at information with linguistics and logic as a foundation, I believe that information is communicated through semantics. People are responsible for conveying information. Computers and machines also do that job too. Without people, computers and machines wouldn't be able to convey information.

[JohnStephenWeck]

Information is the structure of the universe. When you communicate, you are moving bits of structure between memory systems. Our minds are actually made of software (information stored in a memory system, like the cortex). So our minds are really made of pure structure (which is separate from the hardware structure, like atoms and brains). Using software you can build entire alternate universes (like game-worlds, or the matrix movie). bye ;)

[MetaphysicalAxiom]

added to LIS playlist and shared on social media else where. thx so much for this.

[Athenas_Realm_System]

I am a neuroinformatician however on a personal basis I subscribe to the definition physicist who are proponents of "digital physics" which thinks of the universe in terms of a natural or artificial computer process and define all distinction between things whether noise, misinformation, or something correct, they believe information can't be destroyed which lead to stuff like the holographic principal to deal with the information paradox with prevous models of blackholes and that information is elementary even more so than energy and particles which are just manifestation of distinction. I view this definition of information as the root definition and all definitions are steming from this root and are defined within the lens of context.

[SorbetCitron]

I went to a murder party in a library. I always felt I could find the information I was searching for during my studies (except periodics), here I was with my symptoms, surrounded by first years finding every codes and cyphers for the murder party.

Meanwhile, I was searching the trashcans (I actually found the plans the organisators had thrown away).

It made me feel inadequate and I have almost not gone in a library in 8 years.

Murder indeed.

[hxhdfjifzirstc]

Suppose you collected data for years or decades on rainfall, and catalogued it based on day of the week. Then you could analyze that data and find out what the rainiest day of the week is.

You could make a little graph, and it would be backed up by carefully researched statistical data. The weatherman could use the graph to tell everybody when to bring an umbrella with them.

I guess there's many ways to consider what is information and what is not... this is just my favorite angle. Don't get too caught up in the weather, folks.

[tekeek]

Excellent presentation. As that quote goes "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?" then one could say "A book about Tree types with no one around to read it, is not information or is it?". Information is only information if someone needs or wants to understand when, where, who, and how!

[shan]

people from different backgrounds (scientist, merchants, artists etc.) process data according to their potential and knowledge where the information derived from the data varies from each other depending upon where it comes from respectively and that info is circulated around the world. so can that be the reason of how misinformation, difference in opinions are created ?

[mowastudios]

Thank You for this. Your work is helping me in my MLIS path.

[erickhaynie]

Talented presentation—great vid.

“Find meaning according to context” sounds like phenomenology. But does information exist beyond its medium? Surely it does, as information has causal impact in the material world. But where does information exist? Only in our consciousness? But if so, how is it causally impactful in the material world?

[annefranciachavez]

Thank you for this. I am from the Philippines and I got my Bachelor of Library and Information Science degree last year during pandemy. Hopefully will be able to start MLIS soon. ♡

[olympiavictoria]

Thank you for this video! Greetings from Norway😊

[chad]

How do you spell the last name of this Robert fella? Losey? Lowsy? Losi? And do you have the name of the paper of his that you referenced?

[johnramirez]

Great video! I have been trying to understand many things in life. Information seems to be the key. Information is the agreed upon translation of data decoded. .. at least in my perspective. Information is a language and languages are how we interpret life as i understand it. There are lots of was to understand what i percieve as reality. I think reality is the most important thing i/we want to achieve threw living. We do that threw understanding . Threw our understanding of mathamatics whiich is the language of classical science is one way. So im thinking that all the ways we have developed to understand reality are all variations of reality explained. Or at least our attempts understand what life is. I know i jumped back and forth between i and we and our but i did so because i wanted to convey that knowledge or language or reality holds no reason to exist unless shared. It is what makes us human and not a rock. Although a rock hold information that makes it a rock it is not human. Let me know what you think about my comments please....if you would., could or can. I have to go stare off into space now my brain just melted.