English

Is the entropy Sq extensive or nonextensive?

Statistical Mechanics 2017-08-23 v1

Abstract

The cornerstones of Boltzmann-Gibbs and nonextensive statistical mechanics respectively are the entropies SBGki=1WpilnpiS_{BG} \equiv -k \sum_{i=1}^W p_i \ln p_i and Sqk(1i=1Wpiq)/(q1)(qR;S1=SBG)S_{q}\equiv k (1-\sum_{i=1}^Wp_i^{q})/(q-1) (q\in{\mathbb R} ; S_1=S_{BG}). Through them we revisit the concept of additivity, and illustrate the (not always clearly perceived) fact that (thermodynamical) extensivity has a well defined sense {\it only} if we specify the composition law that is being assumed for the subsystems (say AA and BB). If the composition law is {\it not} explicitly indicated, it is {\it tacitly} assumed that AA and BB are {\it statistically independent}. In this case, it immediately follows that SBG(A+B)=SBG(A)+SBG(B)S_{BG}(A+B)= S_{BG}(A)+S_{BG}(B), hence extensive, whereas Sq(A+B)/k=[Sq(A)/k]+[Sq(B)/k]+(1q)[Sq(A)/k][Sq(B)/k]S_q(A+B)/k=[S_q(A)/k]+[S_q(B)/k]+(1-q)[S_q(A)/k][S_q(B)/k], hence nonextensive for q1q \ne 1. In the present paper we illustrate the remarkable changes that occur when AA and BB are {\it specially correlated}. Indeed, we show that, in such case, Sq(A+B)=Sq(A)+Sq(B)S_q(A+B)=S_q(A)+S_q(B) for the appropriate value of qq (hence extensive), whereas SBG(A+B)SBG(A)+SBG(B)S_{BG}(A+B) \ne S_{BG}(A)+S_{BG}(B) (hence nonextensive).

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.cond-mat/0409631,
  title  = {Is the entropy Sq extensive or nonextensive?},
  author = {Constantino Tsallis},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/0409631},
  year   = {2017}
}

Comments

To appear in the Proceedings of the 31st Workshop of the International School of Solid State Physics ``Complexity, Metastability and Nonextensivity", held at the Ettore Majorana Foundation and Centre for Scientific Culture, Erice (Sicily) in 20-26 July 2004, eds. C. Beck, A. Rapisarda and C. Tsallis (World Scientific, Singapore, 2005). 10 pages including 1 figure

R2 v1 2026-07-22T11:08:18.531Z