From Between Epiphany and Apophany Towards Objectivization of Understanding

Understanding sits at the intersection of two strands of human exploration of reality; in other words, it can be, and usually is, viewed in two dimensions. The first of these dimensions concerns the sharing of meaning in the context of communication (typically based on the use of a language or some form of symbolic system established as convention agreed by some human community), and the other concerns the seeking of unity between experience and existence. The former is usually considered a subject to logical analysis, associated with a higher level of abstraction, and analytic in its character, i.e., universal (unique for all types of inquiry), invented method, conditioned as necessary by the human cognitive mechanisms, and reflecting not reality, but its representation in human inquiry; the latter, subject to ever evolving consecutively discovered and/or improved methods, without any claims for their necessity or finality, but with at least tentative universality based on collective (interpersonal or observer invariant) testability and validation, is usually explored in terms of cause-effect relationships, consistent with but transcending logical ones.  

One of the objectives of this work is to eliminate the separation of these two dimensions, but it can be achieved only within a sufficiently general conceptual framework allowing for unified inquiry into relations between objects of different ontological status. In this paper, such a framework is provided by a concept of information that transcends the borders of the contexts in which the terms meaning, intention, experience, symbolic representation, truth, and existence are usually used. Once understanding receives a more uniform and, at the same time, more general theoretical formulation in terms of information, it is possible to answer many open questions leading to everlasting controversies. In my earlier publications, I addressed with the methods of a general concept of information the issue of meaning and intentionality, with linguistic semantics replaced by semantics of information (more specifically, the so-called reverse semantics) [1-3]. In my recent publication [4], these methods were applied to relegate the concept of cause-effect relations to a secondary role of symmetry-breaking, habitual interpretation of the ontologically primary symmetry-invariant concept of interaction.

In the present work, the same formalism for information allows for resolving the dual character of experience that can be examined in two complementary perspectives: phenomenal/subjective and noumenal/objective. This distinction can be described in terms of information in a unifying manner with the use of the concept of symmetry as a reflection of differences in invariance of the structural and selective manifestations of information with respect to symmetry transformations (e.g., diachronic/dynamic transformations of observers vs. synchronic/ transitions between observers) [5].

This work, based on the results from the earlier publications, provides a theoretical and rather highly formalized framework that clarifies the puzzling relationship between the mechanisms of subjective and objective information. However, its effectiveness can be seen without entering the technical details of the formalism in a resolution of a famous case of David Chalmers’ “hard problem of consciousness.” Its challenge has been discussed for decades. How can we describe the experience, for instance, of a tomato with its perceived/experienced color, texture, and taste, in terms of the cognitive mechanisms? Can I claim that my experience of this tomato is the same as or different from yours?

Its resolution comes with the observation that the problem seems hard because it rests on the false assumption that a person's experience is invariant under both synchronic and diachronic transformations (transitions between different observers at the same time and between temporally differentiated states for the same observer). What is assumed but experimentally falsified is that the transition from short-term to long-term memory (memory stabilization) is a simple recording of information that can be reversed during retrieval when needed. The reversed process is not retrieval but a new construction with altered results. The content of long-term memory is not reinstated in short-term memory but reconstructed and frequently reconfigured [6-7]. This means that subjective information is not invariant under temporal transformations and cannot be a subject of study using methods that require temporal invariance. My experience of a tomato at this moment cannot be compared with yours, for the same reason as it cannot be compared with my experience of the same tomato yesterday, or even an hour ago. On the other hand, the objective (in the sense of accessible to all observers) cognitive mechanisms of perception are described in terms of temporal invariance. The description of mechanisms that change (not mechanisms of change!), i.e., that are not temporally invariant (in any definite way), is useless, as by the very definition they would lose their objective character. Objectivization of subjective information requires a methodology bridging different levels of information abstraction with their respective forms of invariance [8].

The explanation of the relationship between subjective and objective experience is extended in this work to the question about the relationship between subjective and objective understanding, which are conceptualized as embeddings of informational structures of reality in the informational structures of the inquiring system (e.g., human brain) in analogy to reverse semantics of information. The transition from the former towards the latter requires the recognition of the presence and the roles of epiphany and apophany, as manifestations of a uniform cognitive mechanism serving as a heuristic tool for the process leading to objectivization of understanding, achieved with methodological tools of theoretical study, mathematical modeling, and corresponding empirical methodology.   

References

1. Schroeder, M.J. From Philosophy to Theory of Information. Int. J. Inf. Theory Appl. 2011, 18, 56–68.

2. Schroeder, M.J. Semantics of Information: Meaning and Truth as Relationships Between Information Carriers. In Proceedings of IACAP 2011, Aarhus University, 4–6 July 2011; Ess, C., Hagengruber, R., Eds.; Monsenstein und Vannerdat Wiss.: Münster, Germany, 2011; pp. 120–123.

3. Schroeder, M.J. Theoretical Unification of the Fractured Aspects of Information. In Understanding Information and Its Role as a Tool: In Memory of Mark Burgin (in 2 Parts); Schroeder, M.J., Hofkirchner, W., Eds.; World Scientific: Singapore, 2025; Chapter 6; pp. 131–183. 

4. Schroeder, M.J. Triadic Relationship of Intelligence, Information, and Complexity. Philosophies 2026, 11, 107. https://doi.org/10.3390/philosophies11040107 

5. Schroeder, M.J. Concept of Symmetry in Closure Spaces as a Tool for Naturalization of Information. In Algebraic System, Logic, Language and Computer Science; Horiuchi, K., Ed.; RIMS Kôkyûroku: Kyoto, Japan; Research Institute for Mathematical Sciences, Kyoto University: Kyoto, Japan, 2016; No. 2008; pp. 29–36. Available online: www.kurims.kyoto-u.ac.jp/~kyodo/kokyuroku/contents/pdf/2008-04.pdf (accessed on 31 March 2026).

6. Baddeley, A. Working Memory: Theories, Models, and Controversies. Annu. Rev. Psychol. 2012.63:1–29; doi: 10.1146/annurev-psych-120710-100422

7. Josselyn, S.A., Tonegawa, S. Memory engrams: Recalling the past and imagining the future. Science 367, eaaw4325 (2020). DOI: 10.1126/science.aaw4325

Schroeder, M.J. Reduction of Information Complexity by Abstraction: Venn Gates and a Set Theoretic Logarithmic Operation. To appear in Fazekas, S.Z., Sin'ya, R. Algebras, Logic and Related Areas in Computer Science, RIMS Kôkyûroku: Kyoto, Japan; Research Institute for Mathematical Sciences, Kyoto University: Kyoto, Japan; pp.31.