You are equating equations, Maxwell's equations, with the electromagnetic field. This is a folly akin to equating an image created in Photoshop _with_ Photoshop

You are equating equations, Maxwell's equations, with the electromagnetic field. This is a folly akin to equating an image created in Photoshop _with_ Photoshop itself. The wavefunction of the universe is the state of it, and all conscious observers _ever_ do, is measure states. Interaction is all there is, just relationships. The state is isomorphic to the reality. The only difference is the reality has some process running on it, to advance the arrow of time. This is not confusing the map for the territory. Every physicist you ask will tell you that a particle is the matrix it is represented by. Now, we may not have those matrixes fully complete or accurate, but the backing of reality IS information. And no, information and numbers do not have to have a reality onto themselves - they are just the medium of comparison, otherwise any description is impossible. All descriptions that humans use are metaphors based on past experience.