when we describe black holes as “swallowing information”, or decoherence as “carrying away information on a quantum system”. In summary, the physical universe does not “obey” physical laws—it is *us the observers* who “make” the laws based on systematic observations (ultimately, specific changes in our brains—see section 3), of the changes left in our instruments by their exposure to environmental events. And it is us who are able to devise a mathematical framework that entices us to *imagine* (see section 3) processes like “black holes being an information-processing and -erasing system”, or “an electron being at two different places at the same time”.

Further examples are found in the association between entropy and information, which arises from the particular way *we* scientists describe, analyze and manipulate nature, for instance, by counting molecules in a pre-parceled phase space; coarse-graining (averaging over preconceived domains); looking for regularities vs. disorder; quantifying fluctuations; extracting mechanical work based on observed patterns in the system; or mentally tagging molecules according to their initial states. In this latter context, let us discuss a concrete example, which also will be helpful later in a discussion of information in the quantum domain. We turn to Gibbs’ paradox (for details 