system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
If possible, could someone give a layman's description of what 'information' is (in reference to the Black hole information paradox the and holographic principle)?

E.g. What information is contained within a hydrogen atom, or a water molecule or a cup of tea? Can this information be expressed by numbers or equations? Why is it said that information can't be destroyed?

(I have tried reading the wikipedia articles on these subjects and they went right over my head. If there is no easy way of explaining this and it really is something that needs several years of post-graduate study to understand, I'll accept that and occupy my mind with something else.)
gpt
In the context of the black hole information paradox, "information" basically refers to everything that's exactly conserved. For example, electric charge conservation is never violated, so the charge of a particle, or the net charge of a system, is information in this context.