Where is the information stored?

[watchamadoodle]

What is the property of something that makes it an emergent thing?

My understanding is that the properties themselves are emergent. The simplest example I've read is the difference between a pile of steel rods and connecting nuts-and-bolts, and a tiger cage. Arranging the pile as a tiger cage imparts to it the property of 'containment,' something it didn't have as a jumbled pile.

Certain specific complex arrangements of matter give rise to emergent properties.

That sounds like the correct definition of "emergent" to me. I was using the world "emergent" without a clear understanding, so it probably made my post confusing.

To try to rephrase the question:

We think of computation as the result of the underlying machinery. The abstraction of computation is only governed by physical laws because the underlying machinery is governed by physical laws. Any minimum limit to the heat produced by a computation is due to the quantum mechanical limits of the underlying machinery.

Maybe we have it reversed and thought/computation/information is the underlying basis of mass/energy/...? Maybe the universal mind transcends the universe body? Maybe that explains supernatural phenomena?

(Woooooooooo )