From: richard@biblewheel.com
Date: Thu Jul 31 2003 - 18:03:04 EDT
> Richard wrote in small part:
>
> To which Glen replied:
>
> > Tell me exactly what you think would constitute a measure of
> intelligent
> > design? What are the units intelligent design is measured in? How
> many
> > bubnogs constitute intelligent design?
>
>
> The first candidate seems to be Bits, the Units of Information Theory.
> And
> again, I must request that you reign in your disrepectful language.
>
> Sorry, Richard, this won't do. This involves Shannon's theory where a
> page of random numbers contains more information than a page from a
> textbook. The proof of this is that the text can be compressed, and the
> random sequence can't be. Since there is no theoretical measure of the
> content of standard text, "bubnogs" is as relevant a measure as any
> other.
> Dave
>
>
Thanks Dave. That's why I said "candidate." I wasn't asserting that it had
to be Bits. But I think your agument is based on a fundamental
misunderstanding of Information Theory.
Its been a while since I thought about it in detail (20 years), but if I
recall correctly, the idea of compressibility comes from the idea of
algorythimic information - i.e. how many bits are required to specify a
configuration. Computer programs are used as the most direct example - e.g.
the number of bits in the shortest program required to create a certain
output is the measure of the information in the output. Thus, *normal*
language, being highly redudant, can be compressed a lot, whereas each
element in a list of random numbers needs to be specified.
The fact is that a string a random digits does contain a lot of
information - namely the order of the digits! Therefore, I don't see how you
have proved anything.
Off the top of my head, I would guess that there is an IT theorem that shows
the absolute limit of information in any string is equivalent to the
information in a "random" sequence of integers, since that corresponds to
maximal specification.
I think the problem you have understanding this is the accidental reading of
"meaningless" into the idea of "random." The word random here is not being
used that way. "Random" in the IT sense seems to mean something like
"non-algorythmic."
Here's an easy way to understand this. Suppose we mapped each word of
English onto a number. A sentence would then correspond to a sequence of
numbers. Except for certain patterns that would arise from grammar, the
sequence with lots of *information* would be totally *random*
algorythmically. The alternative, of course, is some idiot just repeated the
same thing over and over ... in that case the sequence would be perfectly
predictable.
Odd as it may seem, "random" in this context means "requiring specification"
hence "information."
Richard Amiel McGough
Discover the sevenfold symmetric perfection of the Holy Bible at
http://www.BibleWheel.com
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