The Universe as a Cyclic Organized Information System. John Wheeler's World Revisited.

Abstract

This essay highlights the scientific vision of John Archibald Wheeler, a giant of 20th century physics. His ideas provided the important insight that humanity may be in the very center of disclosure and manifestation of the evolution of our universe. This on the basis of scientific reasoning derived from quantum physics rather than simple anthropocentrism or scale chauvinism. Wheeler, the Joseph Henry Professor of Physics Emeritus at Princeton University, became 96. Over a long, productive scientific life, he was known for his drive to address big, overarching questions in physics, subjects which he liked to be merged with philosophical questions about the origin of matter, information and the universe. His interests ranged far and wide and were characterized by true fearlessness. Wheeler's work was not only in gravity and nuclear physics. In the 1950s Wheeler grew increasingly intrigued by the philosophical implications of quantum physics. According to Wheeler, there was no universe until the rise of consciousness to perceive it. In fact, Wheeler was one of the first prominent physicists seriously to propose that reality might not be a wholly physical phenomenon. In some sense, Wheeler suggested, reality grows out of the act of observation, and thus consciousness itself: it is “participatory.” He also stated that information is the most fundamental building block of reality, and that the universe should be seen as a selfsynthesized information system: a self-excited circuit that is developing through a (closed loop) cycle. His cosmic variant of the delayed choice experiment led to the idea that human observers may not only determine the present, but also may influence the past. According to Wheeler, ultimate mutability is the central feature of physics, and the meaning of reality can only be established if there is a universal knowledge field, that transcends physical past, present and future.
,

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The Universe as a Cyclic Organized Information
System: John Wheeler’s World Revisited
Dirk K. F. Meijer
ABSTRACT
This essay highlights the scientific vision of John Archibald Wheeler, a giant of 20th century physics. His ideas
provided the important insight that humanity may be in the very center of disclosure and manifestation of the
evolution of our universe. This on the basis of scientific reasoning derived from quantum physics rather than
simple anthropocentrism or scale chauvinism. Wheeler, the Joseph Henry Professor of Physics Emeritus at
Princeton University, became 96. Over a long, productive scientific life, he was known for his drive to address
big, overarching questions in physics, subjects which he liked to be merged with philosophical questions about
the origin of matter, information and the universe. His interests ranged far and wide and were characterized by
true fearlessness. Wheeler's work was not only in gravity and nuclear physics. In the 1950s Wheeler grew
increasingly intrigued by the philosophical implications of quantum physics. According to Wheeler, there was no
universe until the rise of consciousness to perceive it. In fact, Wheeler was one of the first prominent physicists
seriously to propose that reality might not be a wholly physical phenomenon. In some sense, Wheeler suggested,
reality grows out of the act of observation, and thus consciousness itself: it is “participatory.” He also stated that
information is the most fundamental building block of reality, and that the universe should be seen as a self-
synthesized information system: a self-excited circuit that is developing through a (closed loop) cycle. His cosmic
variant of the delayed choice experiment led to the idea that human observers may not only determine the
present, but also may influence the past. According to Wheeler, ultimate mutability is the central feature of
physics, and the meaning of reality can only be established if there is a universal knowledge field, that
transcends physical past, present and future.
Key Words: John Wheeler, participatory universe, it from a bit, self-synthesized information system
DOI Number: 10.14704/nq.2015.13.1.798
NeuroQuantology 2015; 1:-
Introduction1
In this essay an attempt is made to provide an
interesting case study, as an example how
scientific development in the 20th century led the
famous physicist John Archibald Wheeler (1911-
2008) to extend the classical ideal of rationality
Corresponding author: D.K.F. Meijer
Address: Parklaan 17, 9724 AN, Groningen, The Netherlands.
Phone: + 0031-50-3180593
e-mail  meij6076@planet.nl
Relevant conflicts of interest/financial disclosures: The authors
declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any
commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a
potential conflict of interest.
Received: 24 November 2014; Revised: 12 December 2014;
Accepted: 12 January 2015
in which subject and object are entirely separated
and the world is supposed to exist independent of
human insight, towards a more
phenomenological stance, postulating man in the
center of disclosure and manifestation of the
world. This seems to bring teleology into the
heart of scientific explicability of the universe,
related to the questions: can physics explain its
own existence and why is physics possible at all?
John Archibald Wheeler
John Wheeler (Figure 1) made important
contributions to theoretical physics. Wheeler was
a pioneer in the theory of nuclear fission, along
with Niels Bohr and Enrico Fermi. In 1939,

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Wheeler collaborated with Bohr on the liquid drop
model of nuclear fission. Wheeler, among others,
coined the expressions: black hole, black holes are
“hairless”…, nuclear fission, geo-metro-dynamics,
unified field theory, quantum foam and the famous
“It from a Bit”.
As a very influential physicist in the time of
Einstein and Bohr, he formulated the Wheeler-De
Witt equation, Wheeler–Feynman absorber theory
and the Wheeler's delayed choice thought
experiment. For this high standard and
pioneering work, he received the Enrico Fermi
Award (1968), Franklin Medal (1969), Oersted
Medal (1983), Albert Einstein Medal (1988),
Matteucci Medal (1993) as well as the Wolf Prize
(1997). Famous students of Wheeler include
Richard Feynman, Hugh Everett, Jacob Bekenstein,
Kip Thorne, Charles Misner, Arthur Wightman,
Benjamin Schumacher and many others.
Figure 1. John Archibald Wheeler at different ages.
Wheeler realized the importance of a
creative and challenging scientific atmosphere
brought about by his students, saying that “The
real reason universities have students is to
educate professors….” And: “If you can involve
young people in an atmosphere of hope and faith,
then they will figure out how to get the answer”.
Yet, although being a modest person, he was a
real team leader and mentor, he asked his
students sharp questions, and he himself was not
afraid to challenge the consensus trough his
remarkable scientific visions that often shocked
the scientific community. He encouraged his
students to challenge well established paradigms,
with ideas like: A particle goes from one point to
another by following all possible paths, even if it
goes faster than light, or even back in time!
He specially admired his Danish colleague
Niels Bohr, and even told his excellent doctoral
student Hugh Everett (known by the many world
hypotheses in quantum physics) to rewrite a part
of his doctoral thesis, since, in first version, it was
to conflicting with Bohr’s Copenhagen
interpretation. Wheeler had a talent for
summarizing complex ideas in simple phrases.
The essence of Einstein's theory of gravity, he
said, is that: “Matter tells space how to warp, and
warped space tells matter how to move.”
He also co-wrote the influential textbook
on general relativity with his co-workers Misner
and Thorne, called “Gravitation” (Misner et al.,
1973). In this framework, he described
hypothetical ‘tunnels” in space that he framed as
“wormholes”, that, according to some physicists
(Morris et al., 1988), in principle would allow
time travel. Interestingly, Kip Thorne recently
highlighted this aspect in his book ”The Science
of Interstellar” on the WBP movie “Interstellar”,
seen as a follow-up of the earlier film ”Contact”,
with a similar astrophysical context. Wheeler’s
approach, challenging the natural scientific
attitude, was often not appreciated by physicists
who found his ideas “unpalatable in view of its
rather mystical overtones”. Such a skeptical
reaction of physicists to Wheeler’s ideas can
perhaps be understood because his ideas
represented a metaphysical extension of physics,
which main stream physicists, regretfully, do not
consider as a part of their vocation and duty.
However, seen historically and in particular in
conjunction with philosophical developments in
the 20th century, this was not an isolated attempt,
for it manifested a certain inevitability of shifting
towards a transcendental or phenomenological
appropriation of physics, with the aim to tackle
the issue of its own foundation and its common
assumptions (Nesturuk, 2009). An overview of
recent history of Wheeler’s scientific work is
provided by Misner et al. (2009).
In 1979, Wheeler spoke to the American
Association for the Advancement of Science
(AAAS), asking it to expel parapsychology, which
had been admitted ten years earlier at the
request of Margaret Mead. He called it a
pseudoscience, saying he did not oppose earnest
research into the questions, but he thought the
“air of legitimacy” of being an AAAS-affiliate
should be reserved until convincing tests of at
least a few so-called psi effects could be
demonstrated. However, his request was turned
down, and the Parapsychological Association
remained a member of the AAAS.
Wheeler developed his career in three
stages with the subjects 1) “Everything is
Wave/Particles”, 2) “Everything is Fields” and
finally 3) “Everything is Information”. With

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regard to the latter he asked the intriguing
question: are life, mind and intelligence
byproducts of the fabric of reality or are the
rather central to it. He based this consideration
on the utterly strange aspect of quantum physics:
by observation, quantum superpositions collapse
to a single material position or, in other words:
no phenomenon is real until it is an observed
phenomenon. Wheeler thereby evidently became
an early advocate of the “Participatory Anthropic
Principle” as primarily put forward by Brandon
Carter (1983) and later by Robert Dicke (1961),
indicating that the laws of physics are fine-tuned
to permit the existence of life (see for a review of
anthropic factors, Ross, 1989). Later various
variants of the anthropic principle were
proposed, which have been refined and modified
much over the years.
On the basis of the downward causation
aspect of his “delayed choice thought
experiment” in the double slit wave/particle set
up, he even suggested that intelligent species not
only participate in creating the here and now, but
also the far away and long ago. Although some
considered this at that time as pure speculation,
later he obtained clear support for this idea from
famous cosmologists such as Stephen Hawking,
(1988), Fred Hoyle (1988) and Andrei Linde
(2003) of Stanford University.
The latter stated that the universe and the
observer seem to exist as a pair, and that he could
not imagine a consistent theory of the universe
that ignores intelligence and consciousness.
However, in their book “The Cosmological
Anthropic Principle”, physicists John Barrow and
Frank Tipler (1988) claim that the “must” is not
just a fact based on observation in our universe,
but rather a fundamental requirement for any
universe to exist. They based this final argument
largely on quantum physics and the Participatory
Anthropic Principle (PAP) proposed by John
Wheeler.
Nesturuk (2009) argued: “The alleged
purposiveness of the universe brings us to the
question of its subject: who is that intentional
agent for whom the universe has a purpose? It is
not difficult to see that the idea of the Divine
subjectivity enters the scheme of things at a
different level: the Participatory AP in this case
becomes similar to that version of the Strong AP
which postulates that the universe must have
human agencies as its product at a certain stage
of its development”. This analysis thus unfolds
the most important and metaphysical point to be
made on Wheeler’s ideas, namely the mystery
and precarious status of human agents as
observers-participants, in what concerns the
origin of their purposive actions, in turn feeding
back to the foundation of the universal
knowledge of the universe.
John Wheeler indeed firmly believed that
we live in a very interactive universe, implying
that humans and probably other intelligence
species function as observers. They thereby
influence the universe at the most fundamental
level and actively participate in the fabric of
reality and evolution of the universe. He also
proposed that the universe is a self-synthesized
information system (Wheeler, 1990), dealing with
the question how the universe was assembled and
how it operates now and will operate in the future.
The key to understanding the universe, according
to John Wheeler was to simulate a role of an
external observer, who is able to observe the
universe as an integrated whole rather than a
machine build out of parts. This implies the role of
an observer who perceives a functional system,
without exactly knowing its constituting parts,
that is, as a thought experiment. Wheeler insisted
that the overall connecting principle of the system
should be information, being even more
fundamental than matter and energy, as treated in
the next section.
Information as Fundamental:
It from a Bit
Wheeler considered information as a fundamental
building block of reality, along with matter and
energy (Figure 2).
In stating this, he implied physical
information, which is different from the term
information as we use it in daily practice: the
word information, evidently, is rather a container
term that represents many different modalities,
ranging from information constituting a physical
parameter, to the daily transmission of the news
in human culture (Meijer, 2012, 2013a). Wheeler
also was convinced that information is more
fundamental than matter and energy: he
postulated that matter and energy can not only be
expressed in terms of information, but that digital
information must precede the material world:
framed in his famous thesis: “It from a Bit”. With
this aphorism, Wheeler argued that anything
physical object, any it, ultimately derives its very
existence entirely from discrete information-

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theoretic answers to yes or no quantum binary
choices: Bits. In this spirit, many theorists now
give ontological primacy to information (Zeilinger,
2000; Vedral, 2010; Davies and Gregersen, 2010).
Physical information is particularly known from
the description of nature at its micro-level and
from computer science as binary units (bits and
Qbits). Yet, it is also essential in understanding the
evolution of macrostructures in the Universe
(Davies and Gregersen, 2010). The interactions of
subatomic waves/particles subsequent to the Big
Bang created information on their relative
position, momentum, spin and polarization that
can be stored within these units (Seife, 2006). This
creates a relational dynamic network of quantum
information, also enabled intelligent search and
selection processes in nature, aiming at a future
path potentially through a process of backward
causation (Davies, 2004).
Figure 2. The fundamental building blocks of Nature: the
triad of energy/matter/information and their mutual relation
and transitions (from Meijer, 2013a).
In this respect, evolution can be
conceptualized as a continuous measurement and
creation of basic information that is subsequently
compressed and stored within the system itself. It
follows that a collective memory of nature (Figure
3) is a prerequisite for the creation of life and
further evolution of intelligence (Meijer, 2014a).
According to David Bohm, this universal
consciousness takes the form of a general
quantum field that stores information, penetrating
all known structures, being continuously engaged
in bidirectional communication with non-living
and living material (Bohm, 1980; Levin, 2011;
Meijer, 2012). A potential bidirectional flow of
information in the scheme of Bohm was discussed
by Holland (1994) and mathematically derived by
Sutherland (2006).
Figure 3. Schematic representation of the circular model of
the history of our information universe, with its central
knowledge field or universal consciousness (in black), leading
to complementary evolution of the material and mental
aspects of reality, finally producing human and machine
intelligence that provide the final technology for rebirth of
the universe (Figure taken from Meijer, 2012).
Current information theory implies that
information can both be described as an entropic
element in which the impact of information is
inversely related to the probability that it will
occur, versus the concept that information reflects
the certainty of a message and is directly related
to its probability and meaning. This dual aspect of
information reflects the perspectives of sender
and receiver in the transmission process (Meijer,
2013a, 2014a). It is shown that basic information
is largely hidden from us, due to observation-
induced perturbation of this intrinsic information.
Information is transferred to the brain through
specifically tailored sensory organs that
accommodate complex patterns of wave activity,
that subsequently are converted to neural
activities in a cyclic workspace of the nervous
system (Meijer and Korf, 2013; Meijer, 2014a) and
recently reviewed in Meijer and Raggett, 2014b).
It has been hypothesized indeed that a maximal
integration of clearly differentiated, active
information (information leading to action),
produces consciousness (Tononi, 2008). Zeilinger
(2005) explains:
“It turns out that very naturally the referent of
quantum physics is not reality per se but, as
Niels Bohr said, it is ‘what can be said about the
world’, or in modern words, it is information.
Thus, if information is the most fundamental
notion in quantum physics, a very natural
understanding of phenomena like quantum de-

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coherence or quantum teleportation emerges.
And quantum entanglement is then nothing else
than the property of subsystems of a composed
quantum systems to carry information jointly,
independent of space and time; and the
randomness of individual quantum events is a
consequence of the finiteness of information.
The quantum is then a reflection of the fact that
all we can do is make statements about the
world, expressed in a discrete number of bits.
The universe is participatory at least in the sense
that the experimentalist by choosing the
measurement apparatus, defines out of a set of
mutually complementary observables which
possible property of a system can manifest itself
as reality and the randomness of individual
events stems from the finiteness of information”.
Hans Christian von Bayer (2001) writes:
“Zeilinger thinks that before we can truly
understand quantum theory, it must be
connected in some way to what we know and
feel, and states “an elementary system carries
one bit of information”. It therefore contains the
fact that the world is quantized. To the
question, “Why does the world appear to be
quantized?” Zeilinger replied, “Because
information about the world is quantized.
Physicists call the building blocks of their
planned quantum computers “Qbits”. A Qbit is
simply an elementary system such as an
electron spin. Because a qubit can be in a
superposition of 1 and 0, it must hold not only
classical information, but some more elusive
quantum kind of information too. Therefore,
many practitioners feel that ordinary
information theory must be contained in
quantum information theory.”
Is Wheeler’s reasoning actually self-
consistent? Wheeler argued that all reality arises
from the posing of yes/no questions. Yet, his
restriction to yes/no question ascribes only
rational numbers to what he considered reality.
This may indicate a sort of dichotomy. On the
other hand, he needs the trichotomy (smaller,
equal to, or larger than) of real numbers as to
arrive at complete sets of vector spaces and in
particular singularities. Yes/no as a binary choice
should be extended to “yes or no as well as yes
and no”: the Qbit.
Barbour (2011) adds: A ‘bit’ is merely
part of the huge interconnected
phenomenological world that we call the
universe and interpret by science; it has no
meaning separated from that complex. Just
because the overall conditions of the universe
enable us to observe them in carefully prepared
experiments, dots on screens are no proof that at
root the world consists of immaterial single-digit
information. For we have no evidence that the
dots could exist in the absence of the world and
its special properties: “bit from it”.
In a similar vein, Foschini (2013) argued:
there is a physical, engineering, material aspect of
information, but it is only one part of a more
complex problem. It is now clear that the
knowledge of the material aspect only is not
sufficient to understand the problem of
information. It is the human being that, by
assigning a meaning and creating a tongue with
the signs so obtained, creates it from bit. How this
happen has to do with the human mind and its
conscious and unconscious structures
instrumented with the gift of language. Of note,
recently a new information paradigm has been
proposed encompassing a new integral science of
information on a physical and metaphysical basis:
it seems easier to describe matter and energy in
terms of information than vice versa. This implies
that information could be used as a common
language across scientific disciplines (Vedral,
2010; Davies and Gregersen, 2010).
David Bohm (1987) like Wheeler, put
consciousness in a wide perspective, stating that
consciousness in the form of a universal
information/knowledge field can be seen as a
creative force in the physical universe, which can
influence the generation of complexity in all
domains. This was related by him to a supposed
implicate order functioning as a holographic
steering system for all the material elements that
form the Universe (t’Hooft, 2001). The concept of
a holographic cosmic consciousness /intelligence
was later on further elaborated by Germine
(2007), Di Biase (2009), Kak (2009), Katafos
(2011), Levin (2011), and Görnitz (2012), among
many others. The information carried by a
quantum hologram encodes the complete event
history of the object with respect to its three
dimensional environment. It evolves over time to
provide an encoded non-local record of the
'experience' of the object in the four dimensional
space/time of the object as to its journey in
space/time and the quantum states visited.
Bekenstein (2003) and later, Verlinde (2011)
made clear that the information content of each
object (from atoms to black holes), can be seen as
projected in Bits on a virtual screen surrounding
the particular object. The purpose of this huge
information field in the universe is to provide

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shaping information to its internal systems of
parts: indeed elementary particles somehow
“communicate” instantly over vast distances
enabling an entangled web of information that
registers data on a cosmic scale (Zizzi, 2006).
Wheeler postulated that if we are willing
to keep our minds open to these different
theories, a different way of thinking is required,
and from this an entirely new picture of the
cosmos, (a new scientific paradigm), may emerge.
He proposed to define ‘information’ as a
fundamental aspect of reality that even may have
preceded matter and energy: information is
“everything there is, including matter and
energy”. He evidently, perceived information as
the universal substance from which everything
else is made.
Wheeler’s attempt to derive all of physical
theory from a simple “atom of information”,
resembles that of his contemporary Friedrich
Von Weizcäcker (Wheeler was mentored by Bohr
and Weizcäcker by Heisenberg). Von Weizcäcker,
(see the review in 2006), called this a quantized
binary alternative “ur-alternative”. Although
Wheeler considered time as a derivative of
information units, Weizcäcker, rather, considered
time as fundamental. For both was information a
primordial building substance and a quantitative
measure of form in the sense that form
represents the substance in the stream of events.
The latter reminds us of the actual occasions and
experiences of Whitehead (see Keeton, 2004).
They both reached the perspective that
information is the common basis underlying both
matter and mind. Wolfgang Pauli called this
concept earlier “neutral with respect to psycho-
physical distinction. The relation between
classical and quantum physics was more recently
described as a dynamic layering process: the
classical limit transforms a quantum theoretical
description into a classical one and a process of
quantization converts classical physics onto
quantum physics. Quantum theory can be
characterized as the “physics of relations”: the
whole is more than the sum of the parts (Görnitz,
2012).
Thus Wheeler’s ‘bit’ may, instead of
something that belongs to our perceptions as the
result of yes/no questions, represents registered
information in nature that can be seen as basic
physical parameter that is created by the
interaction of particles (Seife, 2006). An ‘it’ is
something like a particle whose existence we
produce from a set and pattern of bits that fully
describes the particle, as in teleportation
experiments (Zeilinger, 2000). Consideration of
everything involved in the selection process, in
which the choice and organization of bits plays an
important role, raises the question whether
Wheeler’s contention that every ‘it’ derives its
very existence from bits can be isolated from a
guiding principle, such as have been proposed by
David Bohm in his implicate order.
Scaling the Universe:
Where are we Humans?
Wheeler developed his own transcendental
argument basing himself in both Einstein’s theory
of relativity and quantum mechanics that,
according to him, changed the vision of the
human position in the universe by making human
beings co-creators of physical reality in a very
non trivial sense. “The brain is small, the universe
is large”. In brief, are life and mind irrelevant to
the structure of the universe, or are they central
to it?” (Wheeler, 1988; 1994). This question did
not arise from a sort of anthropocentric scale
chauvinism, nor out of radical reductionism, in
the sense that large scale phenomena must be
consistent with knowledge of smaller scales. It
had much more to do with Wheelers
interpretation of the observer effect in quantum
physics: that consciousness seems to have a
distinct action on the choice of wave/particle
state, situated on the most fundamental level of
nature, and thereby, in his idea on the whole
manifestation of reality: although the human
brain is small it provides an intellect that seems
to serve as an interface for our brain to universal
dimensions.
Indeed the size of the brain, which is
responsible for mental articulation of the whole
universe, is quite small compared with the spatial
size of the visible universe: obviously, the actual
infinity of the universe is attempted to be
articulated from an infinitely small part of its
formation. Still, the articulation of microscopic
realities of particles and fields, as well as huge
astronomical formations is possible by this organ
through the powers of observation,
conceptualization, and intuition. In fact through
its insight humanity is co-present in all points of
what it observes in the universe, or imagines:
there exists no source of knowledge outside the
human endeavor.
But, how come that we are here anyway?

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How come all the extraordinary unlikely
coincidences needed for the creation of life and
intelligence have come together to create us?
Wheeler argued that this perfect fit is unlikely to
be a mere accident, and that mankind and the
potential other modalities of intelligence in the
universe played and will play an essential role in
the evolution of the universe. And this,
remarkably, even in retrospect with regard to the
millions of years of evolution before human
existence (Nesturuk, 2013).
The size of a human being seems to be in the
center of all possible sizes of the universe (Figure
4) and this was in fact the position that the
Wheeler proposed for humans as observers and
participators in the becoming of the universe. The
largest size that humans can observe is the cosmic
horizon (1026 and the smallest size that was
inferred is the Planck length (10-35), about 60
orders of magnitude difference. Living creatures,
in general, have to be large enough to contain that
number of atoms that can provide the chemical
and biological complexity to convert energy into
materials, so that they can survive and replicate
(Primack, 2006).
Figure 4. The dimensions of the Universe from extremely
small (right part) to unthinkable large (left part), with
humans seemingly in the middle.
It is important to realize that at each level
of the scheme of Figure 4, the well-known forces
of nature play a role, but that the extent of this can
be very different. A special position in this respect
takes gravity that on grand scale of galaxies
controls the motion of matter. In the ongoing
expansion of the universe it tends to pull matter
together against the opposing effect of dark
energy/matter and thereby provides local
stability. It is gravity that that holds the solar
system together and created the conditions that
enabled the continuous evolvement of complexity
and thereby of intelligent life forms (Hoyle, 1988).
Gravity is a weak force at the level of atoms, but
interestingly at very small scales it again becomes
a major force due to the fact that distances
between objects become extremely small.
Consequently, gravity seems to links the largest
and smallest sizes and it is no wonder that current
physics tries to unify nature laws via the so called
string theory that could in principle reconcile
quantum theory and relativity,( see also Figure
11). Such a vibrating matrix, called quantum foam
by Wheeler in 1985, may provide the force field
that is the very basis of reality.
According to modern quantum physics the
vacuum, which evolution has tempted us to regard
as an empty background, is in reality a highly
structured, responsive and dynamic medium.
Because of the uncertainty principle the ‘vacuum’
contains virtual particles that can, like the
molecules in an insulator, arrange themselves to
partially screen an inserted charge. If that
happens, the charge one measures at smaller
distances, inside the screening cloud, or
equivalently in higher energy processes, will
effectively increase. The opposite behavior, anti-
screening or asymptotic freedom, though less
familiar, is also possible. In either case, the value
of the charge, or coupling strength, is not an
absolute concept, but depends on how it is
measured (Wilczek, 1999).
It is suggestive that the Planck scale
emerges here. To appreciate why, we must
consider extending the notion of the relativity of
charge to gravity. The sorts of charges, strong,
weak or electromagnetic, to which the interactions
of the Standard Model of particle physics respond,
change only logarithmically with distance, owing
to subtle quantum mechanical effects. But gravity
responds to energy directly, so that it runs linearly
with energy (or inverse distance) scale. From its
much inferior strength at accessible energies,
gravity ascends to equality with the other
interactions at roughly the Planck scale. Thus we
discover that all the coupling strengths become
equal simultaneously: all of the basic forces arise
from a common source, that we will converge on a
unique set of basic equations for physics, and
many physicists believe that such equations will
emerge from investigations into superstrings.

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Figure 5. Various models of the universe that have been
proposed (modified from Davies, 2007).
Wheeler was always very interested in why
the universe exists anyway: how did the universe
develop to its present state and why did it happen
in this way? Would these unknown factors also
determine the far fate of this “self-synthesized”
system and are the underlying physical laws and
their intrinsic numerical constants a given recipe,
or are they somehow malleable through a giant
feedback, fed by billions of observations that
induce decisions at multiple scales? It is fair to say
in this respect, that John Wheeler never found an
answer to the question why the universe was
created so, although he clearly contributed to find
a solution how it was created. Paul Davies (2007)
listed a number of potential models for
comprehending the universe, at least as we know
it. Albeit, this spectrum of very different
modalities (Figure 5) demonstrate how far we are
away from more definite answers.
As reviewed by Kuhn (2007), the universe
seems self-creating, self-directing and self-
explaining and the manifestation of conscious
beings somehow animated a kind of backward
causation in order to select from hidden laws and
countless numerical values to actualize a world
that was consistent with the evolution of life and
mind. The latter may eventually become one, in
order to engineer the universe own self-
awareness. How is it that we humans have such
farsighted understanding after only a few
thousand years of self-consciousness, only a few
hundred years of effective science and just a few
decades of cosmological observation? This
represented a major scientific quest for John
Wheeler, as treated shortly in the next section.
A Self-synthesized Information System
Wheeler proposed to model the universe as a
self-synthesized information system (Figure 6). A
self-synthesized information system is defined as
a system that creates, operates and maintains
itself from within, through a dynamic kinetic
equilibrium that requires energy. Yet, apart from
the required raw materials it needs assembly
instructions in order to, not only, create its parts
but also to assemble those parts into a single
system that maintains itself (Walker, 2013). In
this framework, Wheeler added an essential
element, by defining a so called participatory
universe that requires human beings or other
forms of intelligence as an essential and integral
part in order to enable its evolution.
Correspondingly, the diagram of the closed-
circuit universe in Figure 6, is not just an
accomplishment of physics, it is a mental
accomplishment which is contingent upon
intelligence, which is, through embodiment, a
part of the diagram and, at the same time,
something outside of it. In other words Wheeler’s
diagram presupposes for its own existence the
presence of intelligence which creates this
diagram: humanity appears in it as the centre of
disclosure and manifestation. The physical
genesis depicted in this diagram requires a
reflecting consciousness which has propensities
which do not simply follow from the chain of
physical causations.
From a philosophical point of view there is a
gap in Wheeler’s reasoning on the universe as an
emergent meaning circuit, for there is no
explanation as to why the intelligent observers,
who reveal the intelligibility of the entire
universe, are possible at all. In other words, why
the universe entails the transcendental
conditions of its own explicability! (Nesturuk,
2013).
As put forward by Walker (2013), all
information systems require hardware and
software. A self- synthesizing system not only
creates its own hardware, it must at the same
time also create its own software as a steadily
growing picture of the total construction (Figure
3 and 5). It goes without saying that for an
optimal build-up the system would require an
internal communication modality on the basis of
a continuous supply of energy. The programming
software would have to fully penetrate the
hardware systems in order to enroll the basic
blueprint. Communications in this universe
would have to operate faster than its moving

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parts including the updating of the programming
software. In fact, the entire system could be
conceived as a living system that is exposed to
entropic and neg-entropic forces, continuously
fed by free energy. Taking into account the huge
dimension of the observable universe, it is clear
that light as a communication instrument only
can serve to connect the distant parts of the
whole over very long stretches of time (billions of
light years) and that a much more rapid
communication means is required to fulfill this
prerequisite.
How can we envision its internal structure
on the basis of energy, matter and information
and what properties are required for an
integrative communication system that steers its
evolution? Only if the system’s hardware exhibits
an intrinsic information modality such an
operation can be realized. The wave/particle
duality provides this condition: it enables the
creation and updating of the supposed software
by photons. Yet, going back to the unthinkable
size of the universe, as stated above, apart from
light as a local message system, another non-local
communication modality must play a role: one
that is not limited to the speed of light.
Figure 6. World seen as a self-synthesizing cycling system of
existences. Physics provide light, sound and pressure as tools
to probe and communicate. It also gives chemistry and
biology, generating intelligent observers and participants that
ask questions and select answers that in turn lead to
knowledge, phase changes, perturbation of fields and thus
new physics (modified from Wheeler, 1986).
Here we touch upon a central feature of
our quantum physical universe: the feature of
entanglement that allows instantaneous
correlations of information, not restricted by the
speed of light. This crucial attribute of all matter
becomes even more powerful if it operates within
a holographic geometric setting (Bekenstein,
2003; Linde, 2003), since this implies that every
part of this entire holographic structure is
reflected in its smaller parts. In-formation can, in
this manner penetrate all parts of this giant
structure on the basis of an ultra rapid connective
system. Thus the living universe may not only
contain a time-dependent internal light-mediated
nervous system but also a supercausal time-
independent (non-local) communication system
that informs the whole of the changes induced in
its parts.
In principle 6 different mechanisms, may
provide ultra-rapid/ information transfer and/or
enable instantaneous contacts at large distances,
on the basis of current literature:
 Quantum entanglement, the spooky action
at a distance of Einstein, with its apparent
instantaneous character, cannot really
transmit information, but may connect
(correlate) elements of the universe at a
speed of at least 4 orders of magnitude of
the speed of light (Yin et al., 2013).
 Propagation of gravity fields. Van
Flanderen (1998), in an intensively
debated paper, estimated the speed of
gravity to be at least 10 billion times the
maximal speed of light
 Flow of tachyon particles, also forming
tachyon fields, is supposed in physics to
occur at superluminal speed, far exceeding
the speed of light and according to
Einstein could be instrumental to
communicate backwards in time (Benford
et al., 1970)
 Time reversed flow of antimatter (Vannini
and DiCorpo, 2011), proposed, on the
basis of the Klein-Gordon equation, that
negative mass (antiparticles) travel at
speeds much higher than the speed of light
and in a reversed time modality.
 Casimir effects in the vacuum, within
wormholes. This phenomenon may be
analogous to quantum tunneling and may
allow photons to travel at speeds far
exceeding the speed of light (Visser et al.,
2002).
 The Holographic principle as applied to the
whole universe, in which each part of the
universe implicitly contains information of
the whole (Bekenstein, 2003).
The underlying source of the hardware’s

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motion may have its basis in kinetic energy,
entropic forces, gravity and dark energy/matter.
Yet, the seemingly fine-tuned character of these
phenomena point to the existence of a sort of
program that could be seen as integrated software
acting within the whole system. Descriptions of
nature on the macro scale (relativity theories) and
micro-scale (quantum mechanical) at first sight
appear to be mutually incompatible. However,
Wheeler (1988) suggested these two theories
could also indicate evidence for a single, combined
system: our universe to a self-synthesized
information system on the basis of a connecting
principle: information! (Walker, 2013).
As stated above, almost everything about
our universe can be envisioned as an information
system, just like the present internet is for
mankind on our planet. Our seemingly material
universe thus encompasses a mental
(informational) element (Henry, 2005) and
implicitly may require the two abovementioned
physical theories to model its creation, evolution
and death.
Information as the Universal Substance: the
Water Metaphor
This “Information Field of Intelligence”, in
Wheeler’s view has to be aware of everything that
takes place in the universe and functions as an
invisible mirror, acting as a medium that reflects
back every experience, action, sensation, thought,
feeling, emotion, and intentions to its source of
origin (Walker, 2013). This quantum field was
experimentally demonstrated and represents a
large part of the entire energy of the universe. It is
also called the zero-point energy field, since
elementary particles and their anti-particle
counterparts pop in and out of existence even at
zero absolute temperature. Due to its potential to
interact with all matter, it provides a dynamic self-
reflecting field for storage and integration of
knowledge. As mentioned above, it does so by
entertaining a bidirectional holographic relation
with all there is, meaning that, as in the hologram,
each part reflect the information of the whole
picture.
So how does the universe transform this single
substance information into energy, matter, light,
intelligence and consciousness? The cycling
transport of water on our planet may provide an
adequate analogy. This single substance can
indeed be divided into five separate categories of
glaciers, rivers, clouds, precipitation (rain/snow)
and humidity (Figure 7).
Figure 7. Left: The circular movement of water on our planet
(left) as a life- conferring element. Right: The water cycling on
our planet as a metaphor for information cycling in the
universe. Yellow components indicate hardware parts, blue
software part and red the connecting principle or source field
(modified from Walker, 2013). The relation between
universal consciousness and intelligence is bidirectional.
Wheeler conceived that the universe uses
information in much the same way. Matter, Light,
Energy, Intelligence, and Consciousness look and
act differently, possess unique properties and
characteristics, travel at different speeds, and yet
are also made from the same underlying
substance: information. Together they form an
integral system in which water is transformed into
these different categories by modalities of energy:
heat, wind, and pressure as a metaphor for a
circular flow of information.
Indeed, the metaphor “life is a river” have
been used by many artists and scientists in
relation to flow of information:
o one never stands in the same river: the
dynamic character of information flow,
o increased rates of water flow in river
rapids and cascades as a products of space
constraints of the
o environment: compression of information,
o rivers can form spectacular waterfalls:
high impact of information through unique
local conditions,
o water as essential component of life
organisms: information is a fundamental
element of life systems (so called neg-
entropy).
o rivers finally end up in oceans: information
is collected as in a global internet
o sea waves are formed by interaction of
wind, soil and water: information in

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complex wave form is
o created by superposition, entanglement and
fluctuation within quantum fields
o water is evaporated to water vapor in
expense of heat/energy, yet regardless of
the extent of diffusion the total water
amount remains constant: information is
distributed and handled by energy-using
devices, but according to the supposed law
of preservation of information, it remains
constant in amount.
o water vapor is condensed to drops of rain,
diffuse information is converted to
messages, memes and news,
o rain and precipitation is dropped through
gravity: information is collected and
interpreted by
o integrating coherent information (thereby
creating consciousness)
o -rain water is stored in the form of ice in
glaciers (neg-entropy): information is
stored as coherent
o quantum waves in a universal knowledge
domain: the zero-point quantum field (see
Figure 3).
It follows that the required information
matrix of the universe should have an ultra-rapid
circulatory element to provide optimal
information exchange and feed- back.
Consciousness, that is required to collect,
interprets and compresses the information to
coherent messages, is created within this cycling
integrating process. This may also explain why the
universe is so incredibly fine-tuned to create life:
to transform information into intelligence and
conscious beings. This may guarantee that the
Universe through us can increasingly observe and
reflect on itself and in addition by scientific
compression of information, for instance into
natural laws, can ultimately create the
technological expertise to create a next version of
its mortal structure, (see also final sections). In
this way the universe can be viewed upon as a life
system: it maintains itself through the collection
and creation of useful information (ecosystem)
and finally may enable also its own reproduction
(Vaas, 2004; Vidal, 2013).
In this respect the universe obviously
requires life as a fundamental entity and
inhabitable planets to function as a cradle for life.
A recent analysis of the so called Keppler data,
showed that at least 10 percent of all stars may
have a planet of Earth-size or larger in a close
orbit (see report of Harvard). If only 1 % of stars
have just one Earth-size or larger planet at a
proper distance from their sun, it means that there
are at least one billion or more of them are
manifest in our galaxy alone. It is entirely possible
therefore that raw materials, values, and settings
throughout the universe, are surprisingly similar
and in entangled conditions. Our universe may be
full of life and we need direct our attention to the
manner in which living organisms transform
information into intelligence.
A living organism is a unique self-
supporting system that can only survive through
its internal information set and collecting useful
information from the environment. One
distinction with non-living complex systems is
that any self-generated behavior originating from
within its system must be preceded by one or
more decisions created within that system itself. A
second distinction is that a living thing possesses
an internal sense of separation between its
physical and functional boundaries (Figure 10)
and the environment (Walker, 2013). Each cell
contains, apart from its plasma membrane,
multiple functional organelles and at least
100.000 functional proteins, parts that operate in
an amazing concerted action. How became all of
this extreme complexity about? The particular
guided assembly of the first replicating cells is
unlikely to be a random process and it may rather
be explained by an accelerated quantum search of
a variety of life-sustaining structures in Nature
(Davies, 2003; 2007, Meijer, 2013b). Taking into
account that the human body has more than 50
trillion cells, that each embodies a wealth of
information on its environment and internal
functional structure, and realizing the number of
humans on our planet, it follows that information
transfer from and to the universal knowledge
field, only of human intelligence, is beyond
measure.
The Purpose of Human Existence:
Observation and Participation
As mentioned above, John Wheeler hypothesized
that we live in a participatory universe: the
universe created human beings to help creating
the universe. This implies that not only we depend
upon the universe but that the universe also
depends upon us: an enlightenment experience,
that can be described as an individual’s ‘oneness’

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experience with the universe as a whole. Such a
perception of oneness can indeed be seen as a
multi-layered experience. Two of the levels are
always described as being unique to the
individual: body/physical and mind/mental. The
other two levels of existence are always described
as being universal: a realm of intelligence and/or
knowledge and a realm of consciousness and/or
awareness ranging from the micro- to the macro-
scale (Figure 6), that may directly correlate with
the hardware and software systems of a self-
synthesized information system.
This model of the universe as a self-
synthesized information system also sheds new
light on the part of the universe that somehow has
gone “missing” to us human observers. The
material world we know only represents 4% of
the total mass/energy of the universe. The rest is
unknown with regard to its composition: we call it
Dark Energy and Dark Matter that appears to
oppose the force of gravity and pushes our
universe to even larger dimensions. Intelligence
and consciousness are stored within the fabric of
space itself (Seife, 2006).
Wheeler’s Delayed Choice Experiment and its
Cosmic Variant
Wheeler was intrigued by the famous double slit
experiment. Rhodes (2003) elegantly explains the
original double slit experiment: the results of
Young's double slit experiment seemed to settle
the question of the nature of light in a convincing
fashion. The best explanation for the stripes of
light, as shown on the back screen in Figure 8, was
that they were the result of two symmetrical
waves overlapping and interfering, which
produced the stripes along the cross-section of the
interference pattern at the back screen. However
by detecting particles at the slits (observing it by a
suitable detection instrument), we completely
change the result at the back wall: the wave
interference pattern immediately disappears and
is replaced by the simple (clumped) particle
pattern. This phenomenon is referred to as “the
measurement effect.” However what is crucial: the
difference is whether we know. The difference is
whether we choose to have the information
available!
Wheeler asked himself what would
happen if the decision to close one of the two slit
interference system would be made after the
particles had already passed through the two slits,
at that time being on their way to the projection
screen: would the interference pattern still
disappear? To his surprise the time-symmetric
equations clearly indicated that this should be the
case. But how would these particles “know” that
they would be exposed to a single slit earlier or in
other words how could they look back in time? In
other words: an event that we suppose has taken
place in the past (impingement of the electron on
the detector) will turn out to be correlated to a
choice that we make in the present. It turns out
indeed that the difference is whether the analysis
of the results at the back wall is conducted when
information about the electrons' positions at the
slits is available, or not.
Figure 8. The two slit experiment, first carried out with
multiple photons or electrons and later with the single
particles, invariably showing a clear wave interference
pattern on the screen (right) or, alternatively, a clumped
particle pattern. The latter occurs if the particles are
somehow detected at the two slits and these observations are
analyzed/interpreted.
Recently, this wave form of particles was
directly experimentally demonstrated, indicating
that the wave function is physical and does not
just indicate a probability distribution (Pusey,
2012) The wave world, that we humans cannot
observe directly, is present in a reality domain
that allows the presence of wave/particles at the
same time, later on called wave particle duality!
Note that waves propagate endlessly in time, so
that waves, in contrast to the “frozen” particle
state, have a future aspect!
Later laboratory experiments in various
groups unequivocally demonstrated this delayed
choice phenomenon (see for the many references,
Gaasbeek, 2011 and Jacques et al., 2006). Jacques
et al (2006) stated: “Our realization of Wheeler’s
delayed choice Gedankenexperiment
demonstrates beyond any doubt that the
behavior of the photon in the interferometer
depends on the choice of the observable which is
measured, even when that choice is made at a

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position and a time such that it is separated from
the entrance of the photon in the interferometer
by a space-like interval. In Wheeler’s words, since
no signal traveling at a velocity less than that of
light can connect these two events, “we have a
strange inversion of the normal order of time.
We, now, by moving the mirror in or out have an
unavoidable effect on what we have a right to say
about the already past history of that photon”.
Once more, we find that Nature behaves in
agreement with the predictions of quantum
mechanics, even in surprising situations where a
tension with Relativity seems to appear.
Yet, as discussed by Gaasbeek (2011), the
delayed choice postulate may be debatable, since
one should clearly distinguish between backward
causation and backward correlation. This author
rather prefers correlation since, as Wheeler made
clear himself, “photons do not have a physical
form until the moment they are measured”,
implying that a normal time ordering in a
quantum domain does not apply. The citation
above of Wheeler was also cited in the current
Wikipedia text on “Wheelers delayed choice
experiment”, with the suggestion that Wheeler
himself opposed the delayed choice concept
perse.
However this seems close to a rewriting of
scientific history (a rather peculiar form of
backward causation!), since overseeing Wheeler’s
work, it is clear that he was utterly sure about the
scientific value of his credo. Of note, it was
recently stated that only if faster than light
communication would be possible, photons can
behave either definitely as a wave or definitely as
a particle (Ma et al., 2013), again pointing to the
inherent tension with the theory of Relativity.
However, no one should be surprised by the
different outcomes of Quantum mechanics and
Relativity operations. Anyway, John Wheeler
concluded that backward causation, in which a
future state determines a present wave collapse,
must operate here and that quantum information
should be situated in a 4-dimensional domain in
which past, present and future are manifest at the
same time.
The Cosmic Variant of the Delayed Choice
Experiment
John Wheeler even constructed a model of the
delayed quantum choice on the cosmic scale: if
conscious observers inspect the ultimate barriers
of our universe by telescope, a site where we can
still detect events of the big bang, being the
supposed birth of our universe 13.5 million years
ago, galaxies could function as “gravity lenses”,
bending the ancient light as photons into a giant
two slit system (Figure 9).
Tim Folger (2002) writes about the
cosmological model in Discover magazine:
“Wheeler's hunch is that the universe is built like
an enormous feedback loop, a loop in which we
contribute to the ongoing creation of not just the
present and the future but the past as well.
Imagine, he says, a quasar — a very luminous and
very remote young galaxy. Now imagine that there
are two other large galaxies between Earth and
the quasar. The gravity from massive objects like
galaxies can bend light, just as conventional glass
lenses do. In Wheeler's experiment the two huge
galaxies substitute for the pair of slits; the quasar
is the light source. Just as in the two-slit
experiment, light — photons — from the quasar
can follow two different paths, past one galaxy or
the other. Suppose that on Earth, some
astronomers decide to observe the quasars. In this
case a telescope plays the role of the photon
detector in the two-slit experiment.”
Figure 9. Cosmological variant with the principle of
backward causation in which the universe observes itself in
retrospect (above, left). The principle of backward causation
is depicted below left and the universe observing its origin in
a backward fashion through human observation (above,
right) can also be pictured within a block universe context
(below, right)
If the astronomers point a telescope in the
direction of one of the two intervening galaxies,
they will see photons from the quasar that was
deflected by that galaxy; they would get the same
result by looking at the other galaxy. But the
astronomers could also mimic the second part of
the two-slit experiment. By carefully arranging

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mirrors, they could make photons arriving from
the routes around both galaxies strike a piece of
photographic film simultaneously. Alternating
light and dark bands would appear on the film,
identical to the pattern found when photons
passed through the two slits. The quasar could be
very distant from Earth, with light so faint that its
photons hit the piece of film only one at a time.
But the results of the experiment wouldn't change.
The striped pattern would still show up, meaning
that a lone photon not observed by the telescope
traveled both paths toward Earth, even if those
paths were separated by many light-years. By the
time the astronomers decide which measurement
to make, the photon could have already journeyed
for billions of years, long before life appeared on
Earth.
In 1984 physicists at the University of
Maryland set up a tabletop version of the delayed-
choice scenario. Using a light source and an
arrangement of mirrors to provide a number of
possible photon routes, the physicists were able to
show that the paths the photons took were not
fixed until the physicists made their
measurements, even though those measurements
were made after the photons had already left the
light source and begun their circuit through the
course of mirrors.
At every moment, in Wheeler's view, the
entire universe is filled with such events, where
the possible outcomes of countless interactions
become real, where the infinite variety inherent in
quantum mechanics manifests as a physical
cosmos. And we see only a tiny portion of that
cosmos. Wheeler suspects that most of the
universe consists of huge clouds of uncertainty
that have not yet interacted either with a
conscious observer or even with some lump of
inanimate matter. He sees the universe as a vast
arena containing realms where the past is not yet
fixed. The delayed choice of intelligent observers
on earth or elsewhere in our galaxy and/or distant
galaxies would than collapse primordial wave
functions and thereby fix certain natural constants
in the laws of nature into values that finally would
enable the evolution of life in the universe and
thus the creation of conscious and participatory
observers.
Although the cosmic variant, rightfully, can
be seen as speculative, the delayed choice and
time symmetric (backward causation) aspects
(Aharonov, 2010), may shed a light on the very
evolution of first life: the blue print model for the
first living and replicating cell, (and its irreducible
complexity) may not be found in its past, but more
likely was derived from its future! Such a quantum
feed-back mechanism was earlier proposed by
Paul Davies (2004) and Stuart Kauffman (2012)
the latter is known from his work on self-
aggregation processes in the evolution of life
forms.
The Wheeler–Feynman Absorber Theory and
Backward Causation
The Wheeler–Feynman absorber theory (also
called the Wheeler–Feynman time-symmetric
theory) is an interpretation of electrodynamics
derived from the assumption that the solutions of
the electromagnetic field equations must be
invariant under time-reversal symmetry, as the
field equations themselves. Indeed, Wheeler
concluded there is no apparent reason for the
time-reversal symmetry breaking which singles
out a preferential time direction, that is which
makes a distinction between past and future.
Feynman and Wheeler considered that all
the charged particles (emitters) present in our
universe, and assumed all of them to generate
time-reversal symmetric waves. It means that the
radiation emitted by each particle is completely
absorbed by all other particles present in the
universe. The resulting wave appears to have a
preferred time direction, because it respects
causality. However, this is only an illusion. Indeed
it is always possible to reverse the time direction
by simply exchanging the labels emitter and
absorber. Thus, according to Wheeler, the
apparently preferred time direction results from
the arbitrary labeling. One of the major results of
the absorber theory is the elegant and clear
interpretation of the electromagnetic radiation
process. A charged particle which experiences
acceleration is known to emit electromagnetic
waves, i.e., to lose energy.
Yet, the time-symmetric interpretation of
the electromagnetic waves appears to be in
contrast with the experimental evidence that time
flows in a given direction and, thus, that the T-
symmetry is broken in our world. It is commonly
believed, however, that this symmetry breaking
appears only in the thermo-dynamical limit (see,
for example, the arrow of time). Wheeler himself
accepted that the expansion of the universe is not
time symmetric in the thermodynamic limit. This
however does not imply that the T-symmetry
must be broken also at the microscopic level.

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Later, this theory likely formed the basis for the so
called “Transactional Interpretation of Quantum
Mechanics” by John Cramer. Cramer stated that:
“Nature, in a very subtle way, may be engaging in
backwards-in-time handshaking. The transaction
between retarded waves, coming from the past
and advanced waves, coming from the future,
gives birth to a quantum entity with dual
properties of the wave/particle. Thus the wave
property is a consequence of the interference
between retarded and advanced waves, and the
particle property is a consequence of the point in
space where the transaction takes place”.
Consequently, the transactional
interpretation requires that waves can really
travel backwards in time. This assertion seems
counterintuitive, as we are accustomed to the fact
that causes precede effects. It is important to
underline however that, unlike other
interpretations of QM, the transactional
interpretation takes into account special relativity
theory which describes time as a dimension of
space, as mentioned earlier. Of note, the
completed transaction erases all advanced effects,
so that no direct advanced wave signaling is
possible: The future can affect the past only very
indirectly, by offering possibilities for
transactions” (Cramer, 1988).
Aharonov (2010) proposed a new
framework called time-symmetric quantum
mechanics. Generally the protocol included three
steps: a “pre-selection” measurement carried out
on a group of particles; an intermediate
measurement; and a final, “post-selection” step, in
which researchers picked out a subset of those
particles on which to perform a third, related
measurement. To find evidence of backward
causality, (information flowing from the future to
the past), the effects of, and so called, weak
measurements were studied. Aharonov and
Vaidman (1990) assigned to a quantum function
at a given time two wave functions, one evolving
from the past to the present and another evolving
from the future toward the past. The so called
weak value of a quantum variable is the physical
property between preselected and post-selected
measurements in which the time interval is
symmetric under time reversal. Usual (strong)
measurements would immediately collapse the
wave functions in superposition to a definite state.
Yet, repeated post-selection weak measurement of
the weak type however clearly changed the pre-
selection state, revealing a time-backward aspect
of non-locality.
Thus, according to Aharonov, it appears that
the universe might have a destiny that interacts
with the past, in order to bring the present into
view, clearly supporting the ideas of John Wheeler
of potential backward causation. As mentioned
above, according to Wheeler’s and Feynman’s
electrodynamics, emitters coincide with retarded
fields, which propagate into the future, while
absorbers coincide with advanced fields, which
propagate backward in time. This time-symmetric
model leads to predictions identical with those of
conventional electrodynamics. For this reason it is
impossible to distinguish between time symmetric
results and conventional results (Wheeler and
Feynman, 1949).
Chris King (2014) strongly favors the
transactional interpretation of EPR type non-local
quantum correlations. As mentioned above, in the
transactional interpretation of non-local events,
when a measurement is made on an entangled
particle, it sends a photon back in time to when it
and the other entangled particle were emitted,
and then forward in time to the second entangled
particle. Thus the net time taken to send the
quantum information about the measurement of
the first particle is zero, and the effect of
measurement on the second particle appears to
be instantaneous, despite the spatial gap between
them. Thus backward travel in time, which looks
like a rather exotic feature, is allowed by the laws
of physics as embodied in both the Maxwell and
Schrodinger equations. King stated that “the
transactional interpretation of non-locality can be
combined with quantum computing to give a
space-time anticipating system and that this may
be even basic to the way the brain works. Since
the photon is its own anti-particle, a negative
energy photon traveling backwards in time, is
precisely a positive energy one traveling
forwards. Weak quantum measurement changes
the wave function slightly mid-flight between
emission and absorption, and hence before the
particle meets, the future absorber involved in
eventual detection. A small change is induced in
the wave function, e.g. by slightly altering its
polarization along a given axis (Kocsis et al.,
2011). This cannot be used to deduce the state of
a given wave-particle at the time of measurement
because the wave function is only slightly
perturbed, and is not collapsed or absorbed, as in
strong measurement, but one can build up a
prediction statistically over many repeated
quanta of the conditions at the point of weak

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measurement, once post-selection data is
assembled after absorption.
Within cells, quantum information may be
transferred via vibratory proteins or through
ions such as Ca2+ that can be in a coherent state
in de-coherence shielded Ca-channel proteins
(Meijer, 2014 a), see Figure 10.
Figure 10. Fabric of the first cell through integration of
information, as steered by basic quantum mechanisms (left
above). De-coherence shielded Ca-ions in Ca- channel
proteins may function as quantum information sensitive
vibratory units (inset above right). Ca2+ ions influence a
spectrum of intracellular regulatory processes (Meijer,
2014a).
Weak quantum measurements (WQM)
have been used to elucidate the trajectories of the
wave function during its passage through a two-
slit interference apparatus (Kocsis et al., 2011),
and to determine all aspects of the complex
waveform of the wave function (Hosten, 2008;
Lundeen et al., 2009). WQM provides a potential
way that the brain might use its brain waves and
phase coherence to evoke entangled (coherent)
states that carry quantum encrypted information
about immediate future states of experience as
well as immediately past states, in an expanded
envelope - the quantum present. It is this
coordinated state that corresponds to subjective
experience of the present moment, encoded
through the parallel feature envelope of the
cerebral cortex, including the areas associated
with consciousness. Effectively the brain is a
massively parallel ensemble of wave excitations
reverberating with one another, through
couplings of varying strength in which excitations
are emitted, modulated and absorbed.
Interpreted in terms of quantum excitations, the
ongoing conscious brain state could be a
reverberating system of massively parallel weak
quantum measurements of its ongoing state.
Intriguingly, continued weak quantum
measurement, rather than provoking
decoherence tends to preserve entanglement
because the ordered nature of the weak quantum
measurements reduces the disordered nature of
the environment (Hosten, 2008; Lundeen et al.,
2009). Massively parallel weak quantum
measurements in the brain might thus function to
maintain the ongoing entanglement”.
As mentioned above: a great puzzle in
physics has been how to reconcile Einstein's
theory of general relativity with quantum
mechanics. General relativity remains the main
theory for describing gravity, and is extremely
accurate for with large objects (stars and planets,
etc.). Quantum mechanics, on the other hand, is
our main theory for dealing with microscopic
objects, and the other three fundamental forces
which act at the atomic scale. General relativity
describes space as being a smooth surface, but
quantum mechanics reveals a discontinuous
microscopic world with constant fluctuations and
activity. So, each of these theories is accurate in
its own right but they describe the nature of
space and matter so differently that it has proven
highly problematic to combine the theories into a
single unified theory.
The Concept of Time and the Wheeler-DeWitt
Equation
There's something remarkable about the Wheeler-
DeWitt equation: the rate of change of the state of
the universe with respect to time is zero. The
universe is not changing with time! As Andrei
Linde explains: “The notion of evolution is not
applicable to the universe as a whole since there is
no external observer with respect to the universe,
and there is no external clock that does not belong
to the universe” (Linde, 2003). Therefore, the
Wheeler-DeWitt equation agrees with the
analysis of the nature of time of Einstein and
Minkowski, because it suggests a block universe
model in which all of time is laid-out (just as the
space dimension is laid-out), and all times are
equally real: there is no special “now”, no
distinction between past and future. In fact, in this
framework “past” and “present” do not exist - the
movement of time is considered to be just an
illusion of human perception. Essentially, this
means that the whole space-time “cone”, exists as
an unchanging structure. It is true that there is a
time dimension defined within the universe. And
for an observer within the universe, objects

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appear to change with respect to this time axis.
However, this apparent flow of time, according to
Einstein, is just an illusion of human perception
due to the asymmetry of the time dimension. As
there is no clock outside the universe, there is no
“external” time axis, and the external view of the
entire universe structure can therefore never
change with respect to that non-existent external
time axis. This lack of temporal change in the
entire universe structure has the following
implications.
As stated by Thomas (2010) consequently,
the “Big Bang” does not really represent the “start”
of the universe. Remember, all times are equally
real in the block universe - there is nothing special
about time at the “Big Bang”. As all times are
equally real, the final state of the universe is just
as real as the initial state. So the so-called “initial”
Big Bang tells us nothing more about the existence
of the universe than the “final” state does. While it
is true that to an observer within the universe, the
Big Bang might appear like the start of the
universe, this is revealed to be an illusion of
human perception caused by the psychological
arrow of time.
Another striking conclusion is that the
universe did not “emerge from nothing”. It is
meaningless to talk of the “start” of the universe,
or the “emergence of the universe from nothing”,
or any other term which implies change of the
entire block universe structure over time. The
entire space-time block is laid out as one
unchanging structure. Here's a quote from
Stephen Hawking's book “A Brief History of Time”:
“If the universe is really completely self-contained,
having no boundary or edge, it would have neither
beginning nor end: it would simply be” (Hawking,
1988). This means that any theory which attempts
to explain the existence of the universe, solely in
terms of events which happened at the Big Bang,
would appear to be clearly wrong. This also
includes any theory which suggests the reason for
the existence of the universe is because the
universe “emerged from nothing” (so-called ex
nihilo solutions)”.
The Hidden Dimensions of Space-time
As treated above, Wheeler’s model of the universe
as a self-synthesized information system requires
a deep layered communication system in order to
enable a continuous exchange of information that
is updating the integral state of the system. Yet, a
universe that is somehow fine-tuned for the
creation of life is not enough: rather the entire
environment that houses intelligent life forms
should be monitored. A universe containing only
four dimensions does not provide the necessary
conditions for this. For an adequate steering of
this huge and complex process one needs an
orchestrated knowledge system that can instantly
receive and broadcast essential information in
order to maintain the necessary conditions for
survival and further elaboration of the living
universe. Recent studies (Smythies, 2003; Carter,
2014) indicate that for this purpose more than
four space-time dimensions are very likely
required: at least two extra imaginary dimensions
must be part of the total structure.
Wheeler devised the concept of quantum
foam: a field of virtual particles popping in and out
of existence in space, and considered it as the
foundation of fabric of the universe (Wheeler,
1985). A larger set of dimensions provides a richer
decision-making environment which benefits the
universe by increasing the size and complexity of
its information matrix more rapidly. Such
perceivable dimensions must exist everywhere,
and at all times and be perceivable by the
decision-making (i.e. mental) apparatus of living
and intelligent organisms. Thereby they become
observers and at the same time participators in
the evolution of the whole. This means that they
must be composed of the smallest possible
‘constituents’ available to the universe, and can be
linked together into three-dimensional ‘sheet-like’
screens upon which they can be displayed and
perceived by the living thing. What we need is a
theory that would require the necessity of these
extra dimensions and would account for the five
separate, but related information fields, composed
of a single, underlying substance.
In fact, the challenges of string theory help
confirm this model of our universe as a self-
synthesized information system; conversely, this
model represents the overarching theory that
string theorists have been seeking: M-Theory. The
five separate, but related string theories may
match various information fields, including the
manner in which they transmute into each other
(Figure 11, inset right above). Theoretical
physicists were troubled by the existence of five
separate string theories. A possible solution for
this dilemma was suggested at the beginning of
what is called the second superstring revolution in
the 1990s, which suggests that the five string
theories might be different limits of a single

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underlying theory, called M-theory (Figure 11).
Figure 11. The String/M-theory: electrons and quarks, as
parts of the atoms of a crystal, are vibration modalities of
strings (A), three dimensional string membranes (B) and
curled-up space dimensions (C).
Interactions between vibrating strings,
involve the splitting apart and joining together of
string loops. But the microscopic frenzy dictated
by the uncertainty principle implies that
string/anti-string pairs (two strings executing
opposite vibrational patterns) can momentarily
erupt into existence, borrowing energy from the
universe, so long as they annihilate one another
with sufficient haste, thereby repaying the energy
loan. Such pairs of strings, which live on
borrowed energy and hence must shortly
recombine into a single loop, are known as virtual
string pairs. And even though it is only
momentary, the transient presence of these
additional virtual string pairs affects the detailed
properties of the interaction” (see also Green,
2000; 2004). An alternative for a string matrix is
the hypothesis of spin networks as the
connecting principle at the Planck level (Smolin,
2004; Rovelli, 2003)
The Ultimate Fate of our Universe:
its Death and Rebirth
Wheeler sincerely believed that science will
ultimately be able to provide an explanation of the
origins of human intelligence in the future
(Wheeler, 1994). This corresponds to his implicit
desire to treat both intelligence as well as the
intelligible image of the universe as emergent
properties. He fully believed that finally physics
would find an answer to how and why we are
here. He envisioned this as genesis by observer
ship.
Wheeler represented the universe as a self-
excited circuit that is as developing through a
cycle (closed loop) which excludes reference to
any preexistent foundation outside this circuit.
The sense of physical reality is not a pre-given
compendium of laws and facts. It originates in the
constitution of this reality, through formation of
meaning of the universe by communication in the
network of observers. Wheeler thought that the
observer participates in choosing now the
physical laws for the entire past and future
history. He coined this vision “law without” law,
(Wheeler, 1983). He wrote: “if the views that we
are exploring here are correct, one principle,
observer participancy, is able to build everything.
The present expansion of the universe from the
time of its inception up to a certain point is
maintained until the system has had enough time
to mature and create enough sentient beings that
the conversion of information into software
reaches a tipping point. It then may reverse from a
state of deceleration to acceleration and in the
shrinking phase, information will be condensed
and compressed in order to create the conditions
for rebirth of the entire Universe”. The question is
which role mankind and its successors as well as
other intelligent species will play in the latter
process. Wheeler developed a model, not only
taking into account the particular future, but
interestingly also the past of the Universe.
Yet, if Wheeler claims that the observers
bring the universe into being, including its space,
time, etc. (Wheeler, 1990), then one can
reasonably ask: where do human observers do
this from, if there is no preexistent space and
time? One can conjecture that human beings
belong to “something” which is beyond and prior
to space and time and which, at the same time,
contains in itself the potentiality of being
explicated in terms of space and time. Then the
process of constitution of the universe in
Wheeler’s participatory scheme reveals itself.
That is: the universe itself becomes no more than
an event related to the history of humanity, a
flash of the universe’s self-consciousness as
depicted in Wheeler’s writings by a diagram of
the human eye emerging in the bold letter U
(symbolizing the universe) which itself is the
formation of this eye (see Figure 9, from Wheeler,
1994). Representations of such a unity: in an
image of the so called Uroboros: symbolizing the
interconnectedness of physical entities at
different spatial scales of the universe (Primack,
2006). The way to perceive the university is to

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constantly look from one perspective of scale to
another. In the end, all scales may be unified in a
Grand Unified Theory (Gut). The serpent
swallowing its own tail represents the current
hope that gravity can link the largest and smallest
sizes in a final theory.
Both the becoming and future of the
Universe can therefore be viewed as an unfolding
of primordial information provided by a cycling
universe (Linde, 2003; Steinhardt, 2007; Penrose,
2010), delivering a recipe from a previous
version of the present Universe. Bekenstein,
2003, a former student of Wheeler, and more
recently Verlinde (2011) confirmed his idea that
atoms and their constituting elementary particles
can intrinsically store basic and physical
information in the form of spin, polarization and
momentum and that this information can being
seen as stored in bits or Qbits through
holographic projection on a virtual screen. This
model applies both to the micro- (elementary
particles/atoms) and macro-(black holes) levels.
The principle of the hologram was also employed
by Mitchell and Staritz (2011) in relation to
individual and universal consciousness.
Figure 12. The sequential epochs in the evolution of our
universe, also depicting the very far future of a “living”
Universe (see text right in the middle), in a cyclic rebound
universe model (top left) in which the universe takes care of
its own reproduction (after Kurzweil , 2005).
Barrow and Tipler (1988) developed a
dynamic model of the universe which will
guarantee the possibility of indefinite
information processing, which, according to
Tipler must imply the persistence of life in the
universe. This led Wheeler to an intuition that
such a representation of the universe can be seen
a mental accomplishment. This may even reach to
the far future of the universe and even to its
potential rebirth. Trans-humanists project that
our “mind children”, as very advanced, hybrid,
(cyborg) machines, will ultimately travel to the
boundaries of the universe, not restricted by the
current limitations of the human body, and will
eventually collect all the information about the
universe and its total past history. As long as the
universe does not die in a heating process, the
universe will be gradually populated, and will
finally become saturated with information (see
Tipler, 1995; Kurzweil, 2005; and epoch 6,
depicted in Figure 12).
However physics foretells that our
world will not be everlasting…This is because
our Universe is finally doomed to a heat death (by
final contraction of the Universe) or,
alternatively, destined for a cold death (by a
further rapid expansion of the Universe). Vidal
(2012) and Vaas (2006) postulate a programmed
transfer of the total, condensed, information of
the dying universe into an adjacent new “baby
universe” may enable such a recreation process.
It is assumed in this theory that our descendents
and/or other advanced forms of intelligence will
master the physics of black holes or wormholes,
seen as giant portals to other universes. These
giant cosmological structures could be
manipulated to pass the required information as
a recipe for the birth of a new version of our
universe (an engineered Big Bang)! Thus our
successors, in the far future, may give a new start
to our universe in a kind of circular evolutionary
process (see for circular universe models also
Gott, 1997; Steinhardt, 2008; Penrose, 2012;
Vidal, 2012).
The universe seems to be isomorphic to a
mathematical structure (Stoica, 2013), as was
also proposed by Lloyd (2006) and Tegmark
(2008). It seems based on natural law with their
empirical constants that may not have a real
constant value in the evolution of the Universe.
But Wheeler's philosophy law without law goes
far beyond the idea of a mechanism of random
mutations of the constants. He viewed the law as
being created, or perhaps chosen from infinity of
alternatives, by the very observation process. The
bit not only determines the (past) it of the
universe, but also the laws. Anyway, it seems very
plausible that there may be a (possibly infinite)
collection of propositions which contains all the
truths about the universe. In this case, we have a
theory (of everything).
In this sense the Universe at micro- and
macroscales can be viewed upon as a dynamic

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flow of information at each level of organization.
The projections of Gott (1997), Penrose (2010),
Steinhart and Turok (2007), and many other
scientist that have theorized on cyclic models of
the Universe, can also be interpreted to mean
that our own reconstructed Big Bang, that is often
seen as the real start of the present cosmos, is
rather a reflection of information transfer from a
previous version of our Universe. However, will
each cosmic cycle encompass identical
information, so that all of us will be reproduced,
or will each rebirth also contain novel
information and innovations, leading to ever
growing complexity and intelligence of cosmic
life?
Final Conclusions
According to nature-for physicists, as constituted
through questions and answers, which it itself is a
mental accomplishment, one should treat
Wheeler’s genesis of meaning as an ever-going
mental completion of the concept of nature,
(Nesturuk, 2013). The meaning of reality can only
be established if there is a field with some trans-
empirical features, which transcend physical past,
present and future (Wheeler, 1983), an aspect
later on highlighted by Laszlo (2007). The more
radical, metaphysically oriented conclusion of
Wheeler is that the overall reality, that is the
totality of the world, is constituted through the
interaction between the inarticulate “out there”
with humans and perhaps other intelligent
agencies who create the network of questions
and answers directed to and received from what
they intend to call “reality”. Wheeler indeed
represented the universe as a self-excited circuit
that is as developing through a cycle (closed
loop) which excludes reference to any preexistent
foundation outside this circuit (Wheeler, 1988).
In fact, he stressed the point that this so called
“evolution” cannot be seriously treated as related
to the objective pole in the universe, that is as a
physical or biological evolution, devoid of the
human insight.
Wheeler could never stop teaching nor
stop learning. During one of his visits, he ran into
a young physicist who briefed him his “new
cosmological theory”, postulating that the
universe is riddled with knot-like spatial
“defects.” I can't believe space is that crummy,
Wheeler declared! Noting the young physicist's
somewhat perplexed expression, Wheeler
touches his arm and says: “To hate is to study, to
study is to understand, to understand is to
appreciate, to appreciate is to love. So maybe I'll
end up loving your theory….
It stands to reason: John Wheeler’s vision
that the fabric of reality may finally be
understood and mankind even may ultimately
perceive the ground of its own existence, was
probably correct. This final perception may even
turn out to be surprisingly transparent, beautiful,
and compelling. At that time, albeit in the far
future, we may also uncover the purpose of
human existence, and fully see personal
responsibility for our planet and the entire
cosmos in a different light (Figure 12). To know
that all of us have a role to play in the universe,
should matter to each and every one of us and
motivate us to take our personal responsibility.
When we become real participants, we may truly
make our world, and the universe as a whole, a
better place for ourselves and all that is living.
Ultimately we may even understand our own
position in this grand design, as Wheeler
formulated splendidly:
“Someday we’ll understand the whole thing
as one single marvelous vision that will seem
so overwhelmingly simple and beautiful that
we may say to each other: 'Oh, how could we
have been so stupid for so long? How could it
have been otherwise!” Wheeler (2002).

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