English

Foundations of algorithmic thermodynamics

Statistical Mechanics 2024-12-03 v4 Information Theory math.IT

Abstract

G\'acs' coarse-grained algorithmic entropy leverages universal computation to quantify the information content of any given physical state. Unlike the Boltzmann and Gibbs-Shannon entropies, it requires no prior commitment to macrovariables or probabilistic ensembles, rendering it applicable to settings arbitrarily far from equilibrium. For measure-preserving dynamical systems equipped with a Markovian coarse-graining, we prove a number of fluctuation inequalities. These include algorithmic versions of Jarzynski's equality, Landauer's principle, and the second law of thermodynamics. In general, the algorithmic entropy determines a system's actual capacity to do work from an individual state, whereas the Gibbs-Shannon entropy only gives the mean capacity to do work from a state ensemble that is known a priori.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2308.06927,
  title  = {Foundations of algorithmic thermodynamics},
  author = {Aram Ebtekar and Marcus Hutter},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2308.06927},
  year   = {2024}
}

Comments

43 pages, LaTeX; accepted journal version

R2 v1 2026-06-28T11:54:49.932Z