1 Appeared in: Biology and Philosophy (2013) 28: 141–144. PENULTIMATE DRAFT On the ‘transmission sense of information’ Ulrich E. Stegmann; University of Aberdeen, U.K. Philosophers of biology tend to believe that biological information is not adequately captured by Shannon’s mathematical theory of communication. In their recent paper, Bergstrom and Rosvall (2011a) object to this trend and propose a ‘transmission view of information’, which is intended to retain and employ Shannon’s insights. In their response to commentaries (Godfrey-Smith, 2011; Maclaurin, 2011; Shea, 2011), Bergstrom and Rosvall offer the following formulation of the transmission view: [TMV]: “An object X conveys information if the function of X is to reduce, by virtue of its combinatorial properties, uncertainty on the part of an agent who observes X” (Bergstrom & Rosvall, 2011b, p. 198, this is the refined version, in which ‘combinatorial’ properties replace the ‘sequential’ properties of the original version) Bergstrom and Rosvall often write about genes or DNA, observing that “[in] biology genetic transmission occurs vertically (from parent to offspring to grandoffspring). It is upon this axis that the transmission sense of information focuses” (Bergstrom & Rosvall, 2011a, legend to fig. 2, p. 165). Framing the transmission view around genes and intergenerational relations suggests that its primary target are the genetic (and non-genetic) factors of inheritance. Yet Bergstrom and Rosvall’s wider goal appears to be that the transmission view should apply to all kinds of biological information. For instance, TMV makes no explicit reference to inheritance factors, referring generically to “an object X” instead. Furthermore, Bergstrom and Rosvall (2011a) hope that by focusing on intergenerational transmission, they “can make sense of a large fraction of the use of information language in biology” (p. 165). Bergstrom and Rosvall also emphasise, in their response to commentaries, that we should think of the transmission view as a diagnostic tool rather than an account of (a certain kind of) information. The view is intended to determine the presence of information by offering a set of criteria for identifying information carriers, while bracketing potentially thorny issues about its content. Both these points are summarised in the