# A Dialogue Concerning the Essence and Role of Information in the World System
## 2 The Dialogue
**J**: In the illustrative thermostat example above, we have said that the notions of _difference_, _error_, and _information_ can be equivalent in some situations. In the information theory of the communication process, a syntactic process, what is transmitted are a series of 0s and 1s. These 0s and 1s are certainly differences and can be characterized as syntactic information. So, in any communication process, such as a telegraph or a digital telephone, syntactic information in the guise of differences allows messages to be composed by humans/machines, coded, and optimally transmitted as communication signals, which are received, denoised, decoded, and interpreted by humans/machines. On a more fundamental basis, humans have access to their environment primarily by way of their five major senses: sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste. Concentrating on our sense of hearing, we find that it comes about as a result of air pressure variations (differences) that impinge on our eardrums and that we learn to interpret in an info-autopoietic process. Similar arguments can be made concerning the other senses. However, what is most noteworthy is that if humans are sensorially deprived, it is tantamount to torture. Sometimes, after a short period of time, individuals feel unease and even experience hallucinations [43]. What this might show is that our senses expect differences in order to function effectively[PERSON] Of course, this is part of the process of interactivity with the environment, and it exists in the normal course of living and becoming who we are. **M**: I can agree that variations can be treated as differences but it is strange to understand symbols such as zeroes and ones as differences. **J**: As you know, [PERSON] created the possibility of digital communication, which involves the use of syntactic information represented by a series of zeros and ones[PERSON] Syntactic information is nothing more than the coding of language, images, sound, etc., which humans can recognize in terms of 0 and 1 (binary digits) that allow messages to be composed by humans or machines, coded, and optimally transmitted as communication signals that are received, denoised, decoded, and interpreted by humans or machines. So indeed, the symbols 0 and 1 express a difference, so that these digitalization communication processes can take place. Now, I will answer your fifth question as to whether people create or produce information from nothing or from something else. The process of information creation or production clearly needs to be specified. An organism may be considered, for the most part, as a collection of reflex-actions, i.e., involuntary and nearly instantaneous movements in response to a stimulus. An important assumption here is that reflex-actions are [PERSON] behavior. For example, a reflex-action such as blinking in humans ontogenically is made possible by neural pathways called reflex arcs, which can act on an impulse before that impulse reaches the brain, implying a response to a stimulus that phylogenetically relies on anticipatory ontogenic-derived behavior. If such reflex-actions did not exist, the human organismwould not operate as intended. That is, phylogenetic behavior can be considered the first layer of homeorhesis. Figure 2 shows a feedback simulation of the organism-in-its-environment (O/E) depicting cyclic self-referenced reflex-action operations to keep homeorhetic trajectories. This figure is drawn with similar elements as those of Figure 1, so to make possible an eventual comparison as to its functioning. This depiction seeks to follow that of [PERSON] and [PERSON] relating to autopoietic unity [21]. Note that the ORGANISM enclosing line has two arrows on opposite sides denoting a counterclockwise sense. This symbolizes the metabolism of the organism. Additionally, there are two arrows going in opposite directions, to the sides of the organism, to denote the structural coupling of the organism with its environment.