Why Information, Not Matter, May Be the True Foundation of Reality – Rethinking Reality Through Physics, Information, and Consciousness
TALLMADGE, OH, UNITED STATES, February 17, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ — It From Us: An Information-First Framework and the Purpose of Consciousness
By Ryan Kralik
Kindle Release: February 20, 2026
Hardcover & Trade Paperback: March 1, 2026
For more than a century, physics has steadily shifted away from the idea that solid matter is the bedrock of reality. At the deepest levels, what once appeared to be particles are described mathematically as probabilities, fields, and informational states. Black hole thermodynamics equates entropy with information. Biology encodes life digitally. Computing has reshaped how we model physical systems.
Yet public discussion still treats “matter” as fundamental.
In It From Us: An Information-First Framework and the Purpose of Consciousness, writer and researcher Ryan Kralik argues that modern science has quietly accumulated evidence for a different starting point: information is more fundamental than matter. Matter, in this view, is what stable information looks like. Consciousness is how that information becomes organized and meaningful within complex systems.
Rather than proposing new physics or speculative metaphysics, the book synthesizes established research across disciplines. Drawing from information theory, thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, evolutionary biology, and cognitive science, It From Us reframes long-standing scientific puzzles through a single lens: coherence.
Across physical, biological, and cultural systems, patterns persist when they maintain informational coherence. When coherence degrades, systems dissolve. This principle, Kralik argues, scales from quantum systems to organisms to civilizations.
The book addresses several unresolved tensions in contemporary science:
Why quantum events are described probabilistically until measurement
Why entropy is mathematically tied to information
Why biological systems rely on digital-style encoding
Why subjective experience remains difficult to reduce to neural mechanics alone
Why human cultures function as long-term information storage systems
Instead of reducing consciousness to chemistry or elevating it to mysticism, It From Us positions it as an emergent feature of complex informational systems — lawful, constrained, and continuous with physics rather than opposed to it.
Importantly, the book argues that this reframing could not have emerged in earlier eras. Before the 20th century, “information” was not a measurable scientific concept. Only with the rise of modern computing, communication theory, and systems science did information become quantifiable and physically meaningful. The result is a gradual but profound shift: physics increasingly describes reality in informational terms, even when the language of matter remains dominant.
Kralik’s approach does not reject established science. Instead, it asks whether a change in foundational framing can reduce fragmentation across fields that are often treated separately — physics, biology, consciousness research, and cultural evolution.
In pre-order on Amazon, It From Us debuted at #1 in Physics and #1 in Cosmology subcategories, while also charting in Philosophy and Religion categories — reflecting cross-disciplinary reader interest in big-picture questions about reality and meaning.
Ryan Kralik is a writer and communications strategist with more than twenty-five years of experience in media, marketing, and narrative development. For over two decades, his research has explored how developments in physics, biology, and cultural systems converge on shared structural patterns. He has written for Ancient Origins, Greek Reporter, and Aperture Magazine, and has appeared on programs including Neon Galactic and The Grimerica Show discussing the evolution of scientific worldviews and the role of narrative in shaping human understanding.
Clear and accessible to general readers, It From Us is aimed at those interested in foundational questions: What is reality made of? Why does consciousness exist in a lawful universe? And has modern science already moved closer to an answer than we recognize?
If information is primary, then the divide between matter and meaning may be narrower than we think.
For interviews, review copies, or additional information https://itfromus.com/
It From Us
It From Us
+1 216-456-1322
itfromus.book@gmail.com
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