Chaos of Information

Hello readers,

I know its been a while since have posted anything on here. I have been, for the lack of a better term, preoccupied. If you didn't know, I am currently located on a different parallel than my last posts. But this is besides the point. Today's topic is Shannon entropy, based from information theory.

I have had the pleasure of reading Robert J. Sawyer's book, Wake. It is a great science fiction book. If you have chance to read it, do yourself a favour and do it! In the book they talk about this phenomenon and so I decided to look into further.

As some of you may know, entropy is the the measurement in chaos or disorder. This could be either from the arrangement of molecules or other areas in which can have disorder (there isn't a standard for the chaos on your desk). There can even be dis order observed in the tossing of a coin!

A fair coin has one side heads and one side tails. If we exclude the probability of the coin to land on it's side (neither heads or tails) then the probability of the coin landing on either side is 50%, that is, there is a 50% chance of heads and 50% chance of tails. This can be broken down to a binary system, a system of 1'sand 0's. In this example, the entropy is zero, since everything is fair, there is no disorder, everything is predictable. 

As we all know, our computers transmit data via the binary system, everything you see and hear are the results of many 1's and 0's. So, Claude Shannon (1916 - 2001) proposed a theory of communication. Entropy is used as a tool to predict the next event in a chain. For example, predicting the next letter in the alphabet in a word (think Wheel of fortune with half the letters already filled in). Entropy is set at 1 - 1.5 bits per letter. That is, there is some randomness, though English follows some rules, such as 'u' comes after 'q' on most occasions, or the letter is 'e' is the most popular letter. When we look at entire words the entropy increases between 10 and 11 bits per word. That is, the predictability of the next word is significantly less than predicting the next letter in a series of letters.

This plays into information theory well because we as humans are always looking for ways to maximize space. We seem to do well, what with our chat rooms. We have broken common phrases down quite a bit. We often say ttyl (talk to you later) or brb (be right back), thus sending smaller messages. But this theory says that you cannot compress all messages. Some messages must either stay the same or get bigger in order to convey it's meaning. For example, when I have to write an essay for a liberal art course, I start off with an outline of what I will want to write about. There is no way I can compress it due to word count qualifications. Thus, not all information can be compress and must be further expanded upon.

So that is Shannon Entropy. If you want to see the predictability for yourself, you just need to read a book. Before you turn the page, predict the next word. You'll be surprised how often you are right or wrong!

Identity Crisis

*Note the writer does not fully believe in the topics of Astrology. This piece is just to clear up a few misconceptions of the news.*

If you haven't heard, last week something has happened. For all you horoscope followers, you already know. To everyone else this might shock you. The news is that your astrological Sun Sign could have changed! Scary isn't it? Are you going through an identity crisis? Don't worry, you don't have to.

Let's take a step back. You should be asking, why would my Sun Sign change? What has changed in order for my sign to change? The brief and simple answer is that there was another constellation which has prominence. But the answer is slightly more complex than you think.

As you all know the Earth has poles (Santa lives in the North Pole). There are 2 poles in actuality. There is the true magnetic north pole and the absolute positional north pole (inhabited by St. Nicholas). The magnetic North was determined to be in Ellesmere Island in 2005, progressing towards Russia 65 kilometres per year. Thus, it is still in Canada's great white north! Anyways, because of these poles, we can think of the Earth as a top, but slightly on an angle. This causes another circular motion that we do not usually think of for the Earth (besides it's daily rotation, and annual revolution around the Sun). This tilt cause our position relative to the Sun to change over the last 3000 years, when the original 12 Sun Signs were "read" in the sky. Since then another constellation, Ophiucus, has been spotted in the sky and was deemed important enough to become another Sun Sign.

So, does this change your horoscope? Not really. There are claims that this new Sun Sign will only "affect" those born in 2009 and onwards. Thus, if you are able to read this the same year of the posting, then you are the same sign as before.

Could We Be Holograms?

A recent postulate believes we are in a universe that is just a hologram. This is coming from physicist Craig Hogan.

Hogan has done his math and thinks he can prove that the universe is just one big hologram. It’s in the math, so is it true? Well, at Fermilab’s largest laser laboratory, we can figure out whether this is true or not. The measuring device is being dubbed “holometer.”

It has often been postulated that we lived in a weird universe. Ideas of how unsmooth space-time can get has been considered by many scientists such as Stephen Hawking.  Think of the universe as a digital camera. As you zoom in, it becomes increasingly pixelated. The same concept can be applied to our universe. There seemed to be “pixilation” in a German experiment that tried to measure gravitational waves.

So what is the design? It’s a lot like a classical inferometer, an apparatus that measures interference of light sources. This inferometer will be scaled a lot bigger than a classical one. The arms of the holometer are going to be 40 metres long, to increase the uncertainties of the apparatus. If the values still return to what the mathematics predict, then we are holographic!

Measuring Emotions

Hi folks,

It's been quite a while since I have posted on here. I have been terribly busy with work, SCHOOL and other duties that I have here in the big city (and other places). So let's have at it.

 Quite recently Affectiva, a group of MIT collaborators, has come out with an amazing little device. It is able to measure some emotional responses. It is called the Q Sensor. How can such a device be able to measure something subjective like emotional responses?

Well first off, it comes in wrist band form. Thus, it is constantly touching your skin. The skin has many mechanisms for many different types of emotional stressors. For example, when you are nervous, you start to secrete sweat. When one is excited or stressed, there is a slight electro-gradient that is created. This can be measured by the Q Sensor! It is the change in charges on your skin that the sensor picks up on. 

This device has many features, like being able to be hooked-up to a computer (via USB). There is a button on the device to mark times of significant events (like giving a presentation). 3-dimensional motion sensors to monitor how you move, and enough storage to keep logs for up to 4 months of events.

This is great for many Health Care professionals. Care givers can prevent stressors on their patients by monitoring the activities the Q Sensor picks up on. Preventing major stressors will help prevent some forms of cardiac arrest and other ailments. Once we know what stresses a person, we can help them calm down by doing other activities (meditation comes to mind). It can also help monitor sleeping patterns. The data can help understand when people with sleeping disorders are awakened and figure out how or why this event occurs.

This device will help with the understanding of some emotional responses. I believe these types of devices will help with  further explanations of ideas in consciousness.