Stephen P. King (stephenk1@home.com)
Mon, 19 Apr 1999 10:57:54 -0400
Hi Guys,
For the archives:
Subject:
Frieden. Was: Fine and NOA
Date:
14 Apr 1999 00:00:00 GMT
From:
Gerben Wierda <Gerben_Wierda@RnA.nl>
Organization:
Internet mailing list
To:
Analytic Mailing List <analytic@shore.net>
Newsgroups:
fa.analytic-philosophy
References:
1
On Sun, 11 Apr 1999, P. Thonemann wrote:
>Gerben, the book by Frieden isn't in the college library yet, and too
>expensive to buy. Thanks for the tip; I won't forget it.
In case people wonder what book this is about, it is "Physics from
Fisher
Information" by Roy Frieden. Starting out from a little known
interbellum
concept of 'Fisher information', Frieden is able to derive both
classical and
modern (quantum) physical theory. The interesting thing is that "Fisher
information" is linked to the non-independent observer, or in other
words,
Frieden is able to unify the old schism between 'independent external
world'
physics like classical mechanics and relativity and 'non-independent
external
world' physics like quantum mechanics.
This book is physics, but with a possible interesting subject for
analytic
philosophers. It's at senior undergraduate level, physics-wise.
-- Gerben_Wierda@RnA.nl (Gerben Wierda) "If you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there" Paraphrased in Alice in Wonderland, originally from the Talmud."Your io is pretty std" -- Larry Wall (But it could as well have been said by Ludwig Wittgenstein) ***********
Subject: Fisher Information (I) and physics (Roy Frieden) Date: 23 Mar 1999 00:00:00 GMT From: littleock@aol.com.au (Judy Maywood) Organization: The Math Forum Newsgroups: sci.math
Aerospace Defence, Proving Ground establishments, hidden collage restricted etc etc and on the envelop edge thinker, right into SETI- a LtCol John AUCHETTL produce top work for an Australian (Oz) defence research org (DSTO???) on Fisher Information linking it to phenomenon to data space, local creation of reality by flow concepts – momentum-energy / energy to mass and the hidden world of entropy.
He never solved his problems (?), but FRIEDEN may have hit the big one, this will open up physics if he has. AUCHETTL work may be the same (sounds like). Can not wait to get my copy of FRIEDEN. Only contact I have now on AUCHETTL was praufo@aol.com.au
Judy Maywood
****************
Subject: Re: True Randomness & The Law Of Large Numbers Date: 12 Apr 1999 00:00:00 GMT From: rcktexas@ix.netcom.com (R. Knauer) Organization: Netcom Newsgroups: sci.crypt References: 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5
On 12 Apr 1999 12:46:33 -0500, hrubin@odds.stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin) wrote:
>Fisher very strongly pushed this use of point null hypotheses. >Even now, there are very few papers considering the real >problem, which is to decide if the erroneous null is useful.
Speaking of Fisher and his influence on physics, I point to a book someone mentioned earlier.
>From amazon.com:
+++++ Physics from Fisher Information : A Unification by B. Roy Frieden Hardcover (February 1999) Cambridge Univ Pr (Short); ISBN: 052163167X Reviews Book Description This book contains a development of most known physics from a unifying principle of information extremization. The principle states that when knowledge is sought by a person, the act of seeking creates for that observer the physical law that gives rise to the knowledge. For example, in making a measurement of position, the observer locally creates quantum mechanics--the physical law that gives rise to such a measurement. In this way, man creates his own local reality. For observations that do not involve time directly, the act of seeking such knowledge amounts to a game of information hoarding between the observer and nature. The payoff of the game is the law of physics in question. +++++
Unfortunately it is not available in the libraries right now.
FWIW,
Bob Knauer
"The contagious people of Washington have stood firm against diversity during this long period of increment weather." - Marion Barry, Mayor of Washington DC
*****************
Subject: Re: GODEL and INCOMPLETENESS Date: 03 Apr 1999 00:00:00 GMT From: Chris Hillman <hillman@math.washington.edu> Organization: University of Washington Newsgroups: sci.physics.relativity
On Fri, 2 Apr 1999 chaitin@watson.ibm.com wrote:
> See also my forthcoming book "The Unknowable" (Springer-Verlag), which you can > preview at http://www.umcs.maine.edu/~chaitin/unknowable
Sorry, I should have mentioned that!
I think I also forgot to mention the fact that many people prefer to use the term "algorithmic complexity" instead of "Kolmogorov complexity", since the definition most commonly used today is not quite the one proposed by Kolmogorov, and since Kolmogorov and Sinai introduced a quite different entropy (often called metric entropy) about the same time as their work on algorithmic complexity. Also, Solomonoff and Chaitin independently discovered the basic definition at about the same time (Chaitin was an undergraduate student at the time!). And, again independently and simultaneously, Martin-Lof came up with a definition of randomness which is another aspect of the same idea. So, at least five people helped initiate this field.
Here is the full citation to the article I mentioned:
Martin Davis, "What is a Computation?", in Mathematics Today, ed. by Lynn Arthur Steen, Basic, 1978.
I really like this essay--- it is really one of the best expositions I've -ever- read! Martin Davis, who is well known for his work on Hilbert's 10th problem, starts with Turing-Post languages and ends up with a brief discussion of Chaitin's Theorem. The article assumes no prerequisites to speak of. (Btw, another article in the same book is the absolute best brief sketch of gtr I know of, by Roger Penrose! Too bad this book is [apparently] out of print, since it contains several more gems.)
Chaitin's books are also very readable. I think the expository articles listed on my page
http://www.math.washington.edu/~hillman/Entropy/algor.html
also give a good introduction. At a slightly more technical level, the article by Uspensky cited in one of my own expository papers on entropy is also very good, particularly in terms of explaining some of the differences between various different formulations of the theory. Another think I like about Uspensky's paper is the careful attention paid to "conditional algorithmic complexity".
There's a textbook by Li & Vitanyi and a more recent book on something else which has very nice explanation of how Chaitin's ideas, in particular, relate to Goedel's incompleteness theorem, but right now unfortunately I can't remember anything more about this book, arghgh!
Finally, there is a monograph by Uspensky which gives even more detail.
Last but not least, there are a number of very recent preprints on the LANL server which should be of interest to anyone intrigued by these ideas. To name just two:
Cs.LG/9901014 Minimum Description Length Induction, Bayesianism, and Kolmogorov Complexity Paul Vitanyi (CWI and University of Amsterdam), Ming Li (University of Waterloo)
math.CO/9902043 The expected size of Heilbronn's triangles Tao Jiang (McMaster U), Ming Li (U Waterloo), Paul Vitanyi (CWI and U Amsterdam)
You can also look for a paper by Christian Calude (University of Auckland) titled (approximately) "Unsolved Problems in Algorithmic Complexity". Speaking of which, there was also a recent discussion on sci.physics.research of the ideas of Roy Frieden, which employ Fisher information. I suspect that the Minimum Description Length introduced by Li and Vitanyi (similar formulations have been introduced by others, I think) might be more suitable, although making the neccessary connection might require some new ideas.
Chris Hillman
***********
Subject: Re: Randomness based consciousness?. (Was: Re: *** Where Does The Randomness Come From ?!? *** ) Date: 25 Mar 1999 00:00:00 GMT From: rcktexas@ix.netcom.com (R. Knauer) Organization: Netcom Newsgroups: sci.skeptic, sci.philosophy.meta, sci.crypt, sci.psychology.theory, alt.hypnosis, sci.logic References: 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5
On Fri, 26 Mar 1999 01:34:34 +0700, Igor Podlesny <igor@nocem.da.ru> wrote:
>If the world is built on random base how do we control anything?
Because some things are ordered, even though they are random. You are confusing complexity with true randomness.
For example, the run of 10 straight zeros is one of the possible sequences of flipping a coin 10 times. It has the same chance of occuring as all the other ( (2^10) - 1 ) sequences. Therefore the process that generated it, namely the flipping of a fair coin, is random, even though the sequence of all zeros is highly regular.
Since regular sequences are economical in terms of algorithmic complexity, they are preferred by nature. The planets obey Newton's Laws because Newton's Laws are an expression of the economy of the planetary motion we see.
There is a theory called Fisher Information which goes even farther than that. The book "Physics from Fisher Information : A Unification" by B. Roy Frieden hasn't hit the libraries quite yet since it was just published in February 1999. The theory claims is based on the "principle of information extremization". This is the blurb from amazon.com:
+++++ The principle states that when knowledge is sought by a person, the act of seeking creates for that observer the physical law that gives rise to the knowledge. For example, in making a measurement of position, the observer locally creates quantum mechanics--the physical law that gives rise to such a measurement. In this way, man creates his own local reality. For observations that do not involve time directly, the act of seeking such knowledge amounts to a game of information hoarding between the observer and nature. The payoff of the game is the law of physics in question. +++++
At first glance that sounds a lot like the tenents of Phenomenology, but I am going to reserve judgement until I read the book.
>If such property as random belongs to the whole thing it belongs to >its parts and vice versa.
So?
>and nobody knows whether our world is built on randomness.
Quantum Mechanics tells us that the physical world is most defintitely built on randomness. If you can come up with a system to replace QM, then by all means let us know about it.
After nearly a century of the brightest minds trying to find a hidden variable theory to replace QM, they have come up emptyhanded.
I leave you with this quote:
+++++ "If you want to build a robust universe, one that will never go wrong, then you dosn't want to build it like a clock, for the smallest bit of grit will cause it to go awry. However, if things at the base are utterly random, nothing can make them more disordered. Complete randomness at the heart of things is the most stable situation imaginable - a divinely clever way to build a universe." -- Heinz Pagels +++++
Bob Knauer
"Outside of the killings, Washington D.C. has one of the lowest crime rates in the country". -- Marion Barry, Mayor of Washington D.C.
***********
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