Algorithmic Specified Complexity in the Game of Life

Author

Ewert, Winston ; Dembski, William ; Marks, Robert J.

Volume

45

Issue

4

fYear

2015

fDate

Apr-15

Firstpage

584

Lastpage

594

Abstract

Algorithmic specified complexity (ASC) measures the degree to which an object is meaningful. Neither fundamental Shannon nor Kolmogorov information models are equipped to do so. ASC uses performance context in an information theoretic framework to measure the degree of specified complexity in bits. To illustrate, we apply ASC to Conway´s Game of Life to differentiate patterns designed by programmers from those originating by chance. A variety of machines created by Game of Life hobbyists, as expected, exhibit high ASC thereby corroborating ASC´s efficacy.

Keywords

computational complexity; game theory; information theory; ASC; Conway Game of Life; Game of Life hobbyists; algorithmic specified complexity; complexity degree measurement; information theoretic framework; performance context; Complexity theory; Context; DVD; Encoding; Equations; Games; Mathematical model; Algorithmic specified complexity; Conway's Game of Life; Conway???s Game of Life; Kolmogorov information; Kolmogorov-Chaitin-Solomonoff information; Shannon information; cellular automata; specified complexity;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Systems, Man, and Cybernetics: Systems, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

2168-2216

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/TSMC.2014.2331917

Filename

6872591