In the spring of 1989, at the Santa Fe Institute, Wheeler presented a paper introducing his concept of “Its from Bits.” “It from Bit,” Wheeler wrote, “symbolizes the idea that every item of the physical world has at bottom—at a very deep bottom, in most instances—an immaterial source and explanation; that what we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes-no questions . . . ; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and this is a participatory universe.”
