Thread: Complexity

Originally Posted by Xaqaria

It is a good start, but I don't think your first post is specific enough. How do you judge the entropy of an impressionist painting, for instance; let alone compare it to the entropy of a skyscraper or a single celled organism?

How do you know the usual definition of entropy, that is, the one with logs and a Boltzmann constant, wouldn't work for a painting? It isn't obvious that it shouldn't work. You haven't proven that a direct computation of entropy wouldn't work.

It makes sense that it might work. For example, a painting showing human figures has less colour variation than random paint splatters, which means more orderly molecular structure, which means lower entropy. So you can't just rule out a pure entropy calculation.

Originally Posted by drewmandan

How do you know the usual definition of entropy, that is, the one with logs and a Boltzmann constant, wouldn't work for a painting? It isn't obvious that it shouldn't work. You haven't proven that a direct computation of entropy wouldn't work.

It makes sense that it might work. For example, a painting showing human figures has less colour variation than random paint splatters, which means more orderly molecular structure, which means lower entropy. So you can't just rule out a pure entropy calculation.

Is color composition the only way to judge a painting? There's layering, contrast, stroke density, effectiveness and degree of emotional response; not to mention the physical composition of the pigments and canvas used. Is raw sienna more complex than burnt sienna since burnt sienna is partially broken down, or is burnt sienna more complex because it required a longer process to make?

Originally Posted by Xaqaria

Is color composition the only way to judge a painting? There's layering, contrast, stroke density, effectiveness and degree of emotional response; not to mention the physical composition of the pigments and canvas used. Is raw sienna more complex than burnt sienna since burnt sienna is partially broken down, or is burnt sienna more complex because it required a longer process to make?

Ok, so here's a slight modification to my idea: Calculate complexity as 1/exp(dS), where dS is the total change in entropy required to produce the object, from the beginning of the universe to completion. The exp is in there to account for the fact that we want negative change in entropy to give large complexity, and positive change in entropy to give small complexity. Check the numbers, it works.

Or completelly ignore me, that's cool...*sadface*

Originally Posted by xXSomeGuyXx

Or completelly ignore me, that's cool...*sadface*

Your pyramid of rocks has less entropy than one big rock, so that's included in my idea.

Yey!

Originally Posted by drewmandan

Ok, so here's a slight modification to my idea: Calculate complexity as 1/exp(dS), where dS is the total change in entropy required to produce the object, from the beginning of the universe to completion. The exp is in there to account for the fact that we want negative change in entropy to give large complexity, and positive change in entropy to give small complexity. Check the numbers, it works.

I think this is getting better, but what we really need is something that works for existing states. How can one really judge the changes something has gone through from the beginning of the universe? Its impossible. Do you think its possible to look at two structures as they are in the moment without knowing their history and judge which is more complex?