[time 340] Re: [time 338] Re: [time 335] Re: [time 331] Re: [time 327] Re: [time 326] Re:[time 325] Re: Fisherinformation andrelativity


Hitoshi Kitada (hitoshi@kitada.com)
Fri, 21 May 1999 19:58:20 +0900


Dear Matti,

The problem of negativity you proposed means, I think, that I and J have
lost the meaning of information at the stage when Frieden changed in page 64
his axiom from the I-theorem to his axioms 1 - 3 which are almost equivalent
to the principle of the least action. The reason for this is that after this
alteration of his standpoint, I is independent of time t, which means that I
is independent of the observer's time or any other time, thus is not an
information in any sense that can be obtained by an actual observer who has
his own time.

What Frieden actually does after page 64 is to present the way how the
action integral which suits the actual situation can be constructed from the
I that has the quadratic form wrt q'(x) and J which should be equal to I at
least idealistically. Frieden gives this quadratic nature of I an
information theoretic explanation before page 64, but the explanation is no
more than a metaphor, as there is no logical connection between the parts
before and after the page. In this sense, the quadratic nature of I wrt
q'(x) is one of his implicit axioms, and he does not give it any
justification but a metaphoric reasons. His approach cannot be called an
information theoretic one in any rigorous sense.

The contribution of Frieden if any is that he gave a _pragmatic_ method of
deriving the action integral, that has been constructed by virtue of each
researcher's insight into the phenomenon which he studies. However, the
quadratic nature of I is the axiom which is adopted by any researcher and is
not a contribution of Frieden. Thus his contribution resides only in the
complicated procedure of deriving J from I by using several physical
considerations in addition to his axioms 2 and 3 that cannot be called
beautiful, especially in classical problems.

The recent science becomes a kind of novels. It might be said Frieden's book
is a novel in the sense mentioned above as well as in the point that he
writes the book that way. Indeed the book may well be called a nursery tale
for the modern people who have.been injured by the modern mechanical view of
the world.

Best wishes,
Hitoshi



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