Related papers: The Past and the Future in the Present
This paper explains why internal and external validity cannot be simultaneously maximised. It introduces "evidential states" to represent the information available for causal inference and shows that routine study operations (restriction,…
Maximum-entropy distributions are shown to appear in the probability calculus as approximations of a model by exchangeability or a model by sufficiency, the former model being preferable. The implications of this fact are discussed,…
This paper describes prediction methods for the number of future events from a population of units associated with an on-going time-to-event process. Examples include the prediction of warranty returns and the prediction of the number of…
A recently explored interesting quantity in AdS/CFT, dubbed 'residual entropy', characterizes the amount of collective ignorance associated with either boundary observers restricted to finite time duration, or bulk observers who lack access…
The information entropy budget and the rate of information transfer between variables is studied in the context of a nonlinear reduced-order atmospheric model. The key ingredients of the dynamics are present in this model, namely the…
Transfer entropy provides a general tool for analyzing the magnitudes and directions---but not the \emph{kinds}---of information transfer in a system. We extend transfer entropy in two complementary ways. First, we distinguish…
Causal inference is perhaps one of the most fundamental concepts in science, beginning originally from the works of some of the ancient philosophers, through today, but also weaved strongly in current work from statisticians, machine…
We propose a novel tensor-based formalism for inferring causal structures from time series. An information theoretical analysis of transfer entropy, shows that transfer entropy results from transmission of information over a set of…
One of the goals of probabilistic inference is to decide whether an empirically observed distribution is compatible with a candidate Bayesian network. However, Bayesian networks with hidden variables give rise to highly non-trivial…
The use of historical estimates in current studies is common in a wide variety of application areas. Nevertheless, despite their routine use the uncertainty associated with historical estimates is rarely properly accounted for in the…
Here we deconstruct, and then in a reasoned way reconstruct, the concept of "entropy of a system," paying particular attention to where the randomness may be coming from. We start with the core concept of entropy as a COUNT associated with…
Interpreting partial information collected from systems subject to noise is a key problem across scientific disciplines. Theoretical frameworks often focus on the dynamics of variables that result from coarse-graining the internal states of…
We note that the observable part of universe at a certain time t_P is necessarily limited, when there is a beginning of universe. We argue that an appropriate spacetime region associated with an observer from tI to t_P is the causal diamond…
This paper addresses the problem of inferring circulation of information between multiple stochastic processes. We discuss two possible frameworks in which the problem can be studied: directed information theory and Granger causality. The…
An information theory description of finite systems explicitly evolving in time is presented for classical as well as quantum mechanics. We impose a variational principle on the Shannon entropy at a given time while the constraints are set…
Causality plays a central role in understanding interactions between variables in complex systems. These systems often exhibit state-dependent causal relationships, where both the strength and direction of causality vary with the value of…
In this paper, we analyze the relationship between entropy and information in the context of the mixing process of two identical ideal gases. We will argue that entropy has a special information-based feature that is enfolded in the…
Forecasting accuracy is bounded by the information available about the future. This paper makes that statement precise using information-theoretic tools. Under logarithmic loss, the expected performance of any probabilistic forecast…
We argue that (1) our perception of time through change and (2) the gap between reality and our observation of it are at the heart of both quantum mechanics and the dynamical mechanism of physical systems. We suggest that the origin of…
Historical sciences like evolutionary biology reconstruct past events by using the traces that the past has bequeathed to the present. The Markov Chain Convergence Theorem and the Data Processing Inequality describe how the mutual…