RE: [FIS] General remark

  _____

From: fis-bounces@listas.unizar.es [mailto:fis-bounces@listas.unizar.es] On
Behalf Of Igor Rojdestvenski
Sent: Saturday, October 28, 2006 9:18 AM
To: fis@listas.unizar.es
Subject: Re: [FIS] General remark

We cannot consider a concept as a variable. Simply because a concept is not
measured in bits, grams, joules, etc. And a variable always is.
 
We may, instead, associate variables with a concept, these variables
describing certain measurable aspects of a concept. Similarly to the concept
of matter, the variables for which represent mass, density, structural
parameters, etc, etc.
 
This is the key point, in my opinion. Information is a concept. And what we
call information in Shannon's definition is, in fact, a variable associated
with the concept of information. One of many possible variables.
 
Igor
 

Yes, the same concept can differently be operationalized. However, in the
case of information we should not confuse two concepts: Shannon-type
information and meaningful information. The Chinese language has two
different expressions for these two concepts:

Both words contain two char-acters . The above one, 'sjin sji', corresponds
to the mathe-matical definition of informa-tion as uncertainty. The sec-ond,
'tsjin bao,' means infor-mation but also intelligence. In other words, it
means infor-mation which informs us, and which is thus considered
meaningful.

The first concept can be operationalized as Shannon-type information. The
second perhaps as Brillouin's "negentropy". "Meaningful information" assumes
a system for which the information can have meaning. One can also call this
"observed information", that is, the information is "observed" by the
receiving system. Shannon-type information remains expected information
content (of a message).

 
It seems to me that operational definitions thoroughly solve the conceptual
confusion.
 
With best wishes,
 
 
Loet
  _____

Loet Leydesdorff
Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)
Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam
Tel.: +31-20- 525 6598; fax: +31-20- 525 3681
 <mailto:loet@leydesdorff.net> loet@leydesdorff.net ;
<http://www.leydesdorff.net/> http://www.leydesdorff.net/

 
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