 The theory of information channels, channel theory, emerged from  situation semantics  (see the entry), with the latter being motivated by the observation that meaning depends on systematic regularities in the world, and that such regularities are a necessary condition on our grasping any meanings at all (Barwise 1993). Jon Barwise and John Perry (1983) appealed to this observation in order to justify and motivate a naturalistic theory of meaning. Early work in situation theory concentrated on situations themselves, thought of best as partial worlds in modal parlance. Importantly, situation theory itself dealt with the formal side of things in terms of set theory as opposed to modally, although as we will see below, modal interpretations have come to dominate.