Content about “
Information theory
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Many of the mathematicians who gathered to celebrate the mathematics, and the 60th birthday, of Timothy Gowers.

How to (im)prove mathematics

Find out how a story starting with the simple notion of counting ends in a revolutionary new way of doing maths that uses computers to harness the power of human collaboration!

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The Abacus Medal 2022: Mark Braverman

Mark Braverman has won the Abacus Medal for developing the theory of information complexity. He told us about the role of communication in computation, and why a mathematical view can help you understand how to solve problems while sharing as little information as possible.
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What is constructor theory?

A new way of looking at the physical world promises to shed light on some of the problems physics as we know it can't deal with.
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Understanding information

Information is supremely powerful, yet it can't be described by traditional physics. Constructor theory provides a potential answer.
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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.
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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.
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Information is surprise

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?

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