Information in statistical physics
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Publication:640234
DOI10.1016/J.SHPSB.2005.02.001zbMATH Open1222.82016arXivcond-mat/0501322OpenAlexW2007873004MaRDI QIDQ640234FDOQ640234
Authors: Roger Balian 
Publication date: 17 October 2011
Published in: Studies in History and Philosophy of Science. Part B. Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics (Search for Journal in Brave)
Abstract: We review with a tutorial scope the information theory foundations of quantum statistical physics. Only a small proportion of the variables that characterize a system at the microscopic scale can be controlled, for both practical and theoretical reasons, and a probabilistic description involving the observers is required. The criterion of maximum von Neumann entropy is then used for making reasonable inferences. It means that no spurious information is introduced besides the known data. Its outcomes can be given a direct justification based on the principle of indifference of Laplace. We introduce the concept of relevant entropy associated with some set of relevant variables; it characterizes the information that is missing at the microscopic level when only these variables are known. For equilibrium problems, the relevant variables are the conserved ones, and the Second Law is recovered as a second step of the inference process. For non-equilibrium problems, the increase of the relevant entropy expresses an irretrievable loss of information from the relevant variables towards the irrelevant ones. Two examples illustrate the flexibility of the choice of relevant variables and the multiplicity of the associated entropies: the thermodynamic entropy (satisfying the Clausius-Duhem inequality) and the Boltzmann entropy (satisfying the H-theorem). The identification of entropy with missing information is also supported by the paradox of Maxwell's demon. Spin-echo experiments show that irreversibility itself is not an absolute concept: use of hidden information may overcome the arrow of time.
Full work available at URL: https://arxiv.org/abs/cond-mat/0501322
Recommendations
Information theory (general) (94A15) Measures of information, entropy (94A17) Foundations of equilibrium statistical mechanics (82B03)
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Cited In (20)
- Statistical Physics and Information Theory
- On Gibbs states of mechanical systems with symmetries
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- Macroscopic time evolution and MaxEnt inference for closed systems with Hamiltonian dynamics
- Title not available (Why is that?)
- Emergence of jumps in quantum trajectories via homogenization
- In defense of Gibbs and the traditional definition of the entropy of distinguishable particles
- The entropy-based quantum metric
- Information entropy in problems of classical and quantum statistical mechanics
- Shannon entropy: a rigorous notion at the crossroads between probability, information theory, dynamical systems and statistical physics
- Extensive generalization of statistical mechanics based on incomplete information theory
- Understanding quantum measurement from the solution of dynamical models
- Jean-Louis Koszul and the elementary structures of information geometry
- Information dynamics of a particle in a magnetic field
- Information-probabilistic description of the universe
- On informational statistical thermodynamics
- Informational branching universe
- Title not available (Why is that?)
- Information vs. entropy vs. probability
- Algorithmic information and simplicity in statistical physics
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