Re: [Fis] Information and communication

On Tue, 1 Jun 2004, Loet Leydesdorff wrote:

> Perhaps, the negative value of the mutual information in three
> dimensions (Aleks's configuragional information) can be considered as an
> effect of a fourth (hitherto) latent dimension operating and thus
> reducing the uncertainty in the three dimensions interacting mutually. I
> am not sure about this, but I would like to hear Aleks's (and perhaps
> Bob's) ideas about such an approach.

Michel & Loet:

I am a big proponent of information theory in higher dimensions, but I
don't always remain with the overall indices. In particular, I suggest
looking at the individual components of the higher dimensional indices to
see what is going on. For example, Dan Baird and I were able to look at
the components of a 5-dimensional ecosystem distribution (predator- prey-
space- time -chemical element) and were able to show that the rate
limiting "bottlenecks" in the ecodynamics were signaled by the largest
component in any given direction. See:

Ulanowicz, R.E. and D. Baird. 1999. Nutrient controls on ecosystem
dynamics: The Chesapeake mesohaline community. J. Mar. Sys. 19:159-172.

Cheers,
Bob

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Robert E. Ulanowicz | Tel: (410) 326-7266
Chesapeake Biological Laboratory | FAX: (410) 326-7378
P.O. Box 38 | Email <ulan@cbl.umces.edu>
1 Williams Street | Web <http://www.cbl.umces.edu/~ulan>
Solomons, MD 20688-0038 |
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Received on Tue Jun 1 17:19:10 2004