List by Author: Marianne Freiberger

How does quantum computing work?
Here's a brief introduction to the possible future of computing.
Police and thieves
Using maths to simulate the behaviour of criminals.
Police and thieves continued
Crimes and earthquakes
How the maths that is used to predict earthquakes can help fight gang crime.
Another way of voting
Should we let go of the "one person, one vote" principle?
Mindless searching
cells
How stupid systems can use clever ways of finding things.
Maths in a minute: Local connectivity
How crinkly is crinkly?
Why we want proof
What are mathematical proofs, why do we need them and what can they say about sheep?
Information: Baby steps
If I tell you that it's Monday today, then you know it's not any of the other six days of the week. Perhaps the information content of my statement should be measured in terms of the number of all the other possibilities it excludes? Back in the 1920s this consideration led to a very simple formula to measure information.
Information is sophistication
Kolmogorov complexity gives a high value to strings of symbols that are essentially random. But isn't randomness essentially meaningless? Should a measure of information assign a low value to it? The concept of sophistication addresses this question.
Information is surprise
aliens

If I tell you something you already know, then that's not very informative. So perhaps information should be measured in terms of unexpectedness, or surprise?
Information is complexity
There are many ways of saying the same thing — you can use many words, or few. Perhaps information should be measured in terms of the shortest way of expressing it? In the 1960s this idea led to a measure of information called Kolmogorov complexity.