Dear Loet, Thank you for your comments and questions. We accept your suggestion about the maximum informational content since our formulation can also be understood as the informational potential and not all options have to be taken in a given action. Nevertheless, it is our intention to consider two (initial) dimensions in acting: Decisions that open a new set of options are different from the number of options in each level in our characterization. Further, we also noticed that the complexity of acts relates to a dignity that we scaled taken the human body as a reference point. This is a third dimension. Finally in terms of collective actions (fourth dimension), we have to say that our approach in the paper is very tentative. So far we only intend to quantify collective independent actions. We have be particularly careful with the term "social" (and maybe we didn’t…). We appreciate your comments because they open new lines of inquiry and also point to potential incongruences.
Regards, Luis de Marcos Ortega Dpto Ciencias de la Computación Computer Science Department Universidad de Alcalá University of Alcalá http://www.uah.es/pdi/luis_demarcos “Education, n. That which discloses to the wise and disguises from the foolish their lack of understanding.” Ambrose G. Bierce. From: Fis [mailto:fis-boun...@listas.unizar.es] On Behalf Of Loet Leydesdorff Sent: miércoles, 29 de julio de 2015 17:41 To: fis@listas.unizar.es Subject: Re: [Fis] Information Foundation of the Act--F.Flores & L.deMarcos Dear colleagues, I read your paper with interest. Since my interest is “information”, I focused on this concept. 1. If I correctly understand, you define information as the 2-log of the number of options. I would be inclined to call this the maximum information content of an act, using H(max) = 2log(N); in which N is the number of options. You do so too at the top of p. 29 (line 1). You organize this under the subtitle “Obervation of information”, whereas I would be inclined to consider this as the specification. An observation of the number of options used in an act would lead to a number lower than the “pure information value”, since not all options are always used. 2. If the information value is equal to the logarithm of the number of options, the concept of information only serves analytically as a transformation rule for expressing the number of options in bits. The two (N of options and n of bits) are coupled to each other in terms of the logarithmic transformation. 3. At several places, one parameter is not logarithmically transformed while others are. For example, at the bottom of p. 25, the 106 people are whole-number counted in the multiplication under Presentation 19. One could argue that who of the one million people acts, adds another dimension to the possible combinations, and should therefore also be brought under the logarithm. Are options exclusively individual, and never social? 4. Is the computational rule in this formula correct given that log(a*b) = log(a) + log(b). You compute 16 bits * log(10); but 16 bits is also the result of taking a logarithm. (The 16 bits represent the number of options of a human body.) Should not you compute the 2log([2^16] * 10)? Or alternatively (16 + log(10))? 5. On p. 28, you move from the conversation of information in isolated systems (line 11) to “the rule of the conversation of information for multiple acts”. But human agency is not an isolated system, in my opinion. We are coupled through our communications which generate non-linear loops. For example, one can expect the other to entertain expectations about oneself like one entertains expectations about the other (Parsons; Luhmann). In sum, the argument that action is only bodily and in relation to artifacts (as isolated systems) seems questionable to me. Or is this your “materialistic” assumption (p. 1: “Matter is potentiality;” …). Why would not the potentiality of matter contain a plurality (multiplication?) of options? It may be difficult to communicate given different starting points. Please, correct me if I misunderstood you. Best, Loet
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