Regularity

[Detlef Morgenstern]

Dear Sergio,

Let me cite your homepage (about the driving force of disagreement in 
newsgroups):
"If two people agree with each other, then their thread will extinguish 
very fast."

Here we are with some practising disagreement.

--- Sergio Navega <snavega at attglobal.net> wrote:
> First, I propose to reduce all the aspects related to 'data'
> in the universe as belonging to one of three categories:
>
> a) The totally randomic data
The 'degree of randomness' depends on the observer, his expectations, the 
hidden (built-in) knowledge in his sensorial mechanism.
Is this 'totally randomic': "100101100001110110110011"?

> b) The totally regular data
Is there an objective (observer independent) measure of regularity?

> Examples of item a) are white noise: set your radiotelescope to an
> unpopulated area of the sky (difficult to find!) and you'll listen
> to that characteristic 'sssshhhhh'.
One can code any information in a way that it will resemble white noise. 
How can you be sure, there is no hidden (coded) transmission mixed into the 
thermal noise?

> Examples of item b) are the regular signals of a rotating pulsar
> or a binary star: you have that characteristic 'rat  rat  rat'
> signal with extremely regular intervals. Again, taken in isolation
> this regularity is unable to carry any information.
At least, we learn something about the revolution speed. And that, at the 
time the pulse left the pulsar, the pulsar was still rattling, hence 
existed.

> This is also what I think explains our curiosity. We're easily
> bored by "known" circumstances. But when we listen to an unusual
> sound, or when our computer does something unexpected, or when
> someone shows us an 'yellow apple', then our attention is grabbed.
> We become 'desperate' to find a way to look at the event from a
> point of view that cancels the unexpectedness.
This is a mechanism which proved to be efficient for the evolution of the 
human species. It assists filtering the incoming information stream. But, 
in my opinion, it has nothing to do with an objective measure of 'what is 
information'.

> As a simple example, recall when you move to a new house. Usually,
> this house "clicks and squeaks" in very specific ways. During
> the first night in which you're at that house, every click will
> raise your attention. This occurs until some days latter, when
> these clicks will be "stored" in our perceptual mechanisms
> associated with regular and "explainable" things (the click
> of the wood of the door; the click of the aluminum window, etc)
> and this transforms it into a "known" pattern, unable to raise
> our attention anymore (we finally sleep unconcerned). Moreover,
> the perceptual work of deciphering future instances of these
> clicks goes from the conscious to unconscious, denoting the
> its lack of importance . Only "new" clicks will jump from
> the unconscious and "wake" the conscious mind, indicating a
> potentially important information on its way.
With 'potentially important' you describe the selection criterion: It is 
the 'value' of information in a given framework of values of the observer. 
But again - it is no observer independent measure.

Referencing our induction thread: If it all depends on the observer, can 
there be any 'objective' induction at all?

Regards,

Detlef