Stephen Mann: 'We should get rid of the distinction between Shannon information and semantic information' (Pre-submission)
Biologists use the word "information" a lot. In particular, they use it to describe communication, whether between animals, plants, cells or microbes. Philosophers are interested in this usage, and have traditionally distinguished two concepts called Shannon information and semantic information. However, recently some philosophers (and biologists) have objected that this is a bad distinction. I agree. In this talk I will tell you what the distinction is, and offer new arguments to the effect that it hinders our understanding of biological communication.