This article critiques the entrenched view in modern physics that information is a fundamental physical entity. It traces the history of this misconception: from Shannon’s mathematical communication theory (1948), where information was merely a measure of reduced uncertainty, through Landauer’s engineering principle (1961) on heat dissipation during bit erasure, to the metaphysical slogan “information is physical” (1991) and Wheeler’s “It from Bit” thesis (1989). The analysis shows how a technical result was transformed into an ontological claim, adopted by both researchers and popularizers. Sharp counter‑examples are given: the analogy with killing a person (a social phenomenon physically implemented but not reducible to physics) and the dependence of the “quantum of information” on ambient temperature, which would be absurd for a fundamental constant. Drawing on the work of Alicki (2014) and Lairez (2024), the article demonstrates that information has no physical properties (mass, energy, charge), and that all fundamental theories can be formulated without any mention of information. The “information paradox of the collapsar (so‑called ‘black hole’)” is shown to be a pseudo‑problem arising from the confusion of epistemic and ontological categories. A strict separation of disciplines is proposed: physics studies natural objects (matter, fields, space‑time), while informatiology studies signs and messages. This methodological article calls for an end to the “snowball” of erroneous conclusions that divert resources from genuine physical problems. Keywords: information, physics, methodology of science, collapsar, information paradox.
Alexander Yourievitch Kotelnikov (Sun,) studied this question.