Rethinking Quantum Information: Constraint, Coherence, and Configuration

Information has become a central concept in contemporary physics, especially in quantum theory. From quantum computation to black hole thermodynamics, the language of information underwrites the search for unifying principles. Yet the term itself remains ambiguous: is information a substance, a measure, a property, a process?

Classical physics treats information as a quantifiable reduction of uncertainty: a system has a definite state, and information is what we lack about it. In quantum physics, the situation is subtler. The state itself may be indeterminate, and “information” seems to occupy a space between ontology and epistemology — sometimes objective, sometimes observer-dependent, sometimes both.

In a relational ontology, this ambiguity is unnecessary. Information is not an entity or a quantity stored in things. It is a construal of constraint — a measure of how a system's internal tensions delimit the space of possible actualisations. Information is not what a system “contains,” but how it is structured for transformation.

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1. Information as Relational Constraint

• In this model, information is not a token passed between systems, but a measure of coherence under constraint,

• It quantifies how a system constrains itself — how its internal relations pattern the field of potential outcomes,

• There is no “amount” of information in a particle — there is only the degree of differentiation a configuration permits under a given construal.

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2. No Carriers, No Containers

• Classical and quantum information theories alike often rely on the metaphor of information-as-substance — something that can be encoded, stored, transmitted, and decoded,

• But a relational view sees no containers and no carriers: there are only relational fields resolving under shifting conditions,

• “Transmission of information” is not movement, but coherent transformation across subsystems under shared constraint.

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3. Measurement as Interpretive Resolution

• A quantum measurement is not the extraction of pre-existing information from a system,

• It is the resolution of tension: the system and apparatus co-constraining each other to produce a new configuration of coherence,

• What we call “gaining information” is in fact punctualising a relational field — producing new differential structure under new constraints.

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4. Entropy as Potential, Not Disorder

• Information entropy, in relational terms, is not a measure of randomness or ignorance,

• It is a measure of openness — the extent to which potential remains unresolved within a given configuration,

• High entropy does not signal chaos; it signals greater relational flexibility, more available paths to coherence.

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5. Quantum Information and Relational Dynamics

• Quantum information theory shows that entanglement, superposition, and coherence can be harnessed in computation and communication,

• But from a relational standpoint, this is not because particles “store” more bits,

• It is because relational systems can support more nuanced and distributed constraints, allowing new kinds of transformational grammar.

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Closing

Information, in a relational ontology, is not a substance, not a message, not a commodity. It is the differential structure of constrained possibility — a signature of how a system is disposed to resolve itself under the tensions that define it. It measures coherence, not content; transformability, not transmissibility.

In the next post, we will explore symmetry and invariance — how physics encodes conserved quantities and transformation rules, and how a relational perspective reframes these as patterns in the grammar of affordance rather than properties of objects.