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Strategies & Market Trends : 2026 TeoTwawKi ... 2032 Darkest Interregnum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: elmatador who wrote (84928)	12/22/2011 12:49:09 AM
From: Joseph Silent	1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 218168

The "information" content of an object is simply the smallest bit-string that completely describes that object. That is, if a smaller description is possible, then you have excess bits, and that excess is not information. This is Kolmogorov's definition (oops! socialism! socialism! malfeasance!). That, now, is a technical definition, and it has a precise use which is invaluable in engineering communication systems (as Elmat knows), but is not much help with the term information in the colloquial sense. That is a big struggle at present. For example, what is the information content of a newspaper? Tossing verbiage around without so much as a "throw grammar a kiss" and "make sexy eyes at semantics" can give the appearance of "information" at work. Often, it isn't. How to tell? While the human mind can decide correctly, approximately, (with high probability) without information theory, automation cannot. That dilemma is exactly what the modern world is facing when they try to take Shannon into the new century. How much information does something contain? To answer this question we need a better handle on what information means than the binary-string based definitions of Kolmogorov and Shannon. Will we have success? Who knows? So far, the going has been rough. Good night all. /J