Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- 0 Introduction
- 1 What is Fisher information?
- 2 Fisher information in a vector world
- 3 Extreme physical information
- 4 Derivation of relativistic quantum mechanics
- 5 Classical electrodynamics
- 6 The Einstein field equation of general relativity
- 7 Classical statistical physics
- 8 Power spectral 1 / ƒ noise
- 9 Physical constants and the 1/x probability law
- 10 Constrained-likelihood quantum measurement theory
- 11 Research topics
- 12 EPI and entangled realities: the EPR–Bohm experiment
- 13 Econophysics, with Raymond J. Hawkins
- 14 Growth and transport processes
- 15 Cancer growth, with Robert A. Gatenby
- 16 Summing up
- Appendix A Solutions common to entropy and Fisher I-extremization
- Appendix B Cramer–Rao inequalities for vector data
- Appendix C Cramer–Rao inequality for an imaginary parameter
- Appendix D EPI derivations of Schrödinger wave equation, Newtonian mechanics, and classical virial theorem
- Appendix E Factorization of the Klein–Gordon information
- Appendix F Evaluation of certain integrals
- Appendix G Schrödinger wave equation as a non-relativistic limit
- Appendix H Non-uniqueness of potential A for finite boundaries
- Appendix I Four-dimensional normalization
- Appendix J Transfer matrix method
- Appendix K Numerov method
- References
- Index
0 - Introduction
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 February 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- 0 Introduction
- 1 What is Fisher information?
- 2 Fisher information in a vector world
- 3 Extreme physical information
- 4 Derivation of relativistic quantum mechanics
- 5 Classical electrodynamics
- 6 The Einstein field equation of general relativity
- 7 Classical statistical physics
- 8 Power spectral 1 / ƒ noise
- 9 Physical constants and the 1/x probability law
- 10 Constrained-likelihood quantum measurement theory
- 11 Research topics
- 12 EPI and entangled realities: the EPR–Bohm experiment
- 13 Econophysics, with Raymond J. Hawkins
- 14 Growth and transport processes
- 15 Cancer growth, with Robert A. Gatenby
- 16 Summing up
- Appendix A Solutions common to entropy and Fisher I-extremization
- Appendix B Cramer–Rao inequalities for vector data
- Appendix C Cramer–Rao inequality for an imaginary parameter
- Appendix D EPI derivations of Schrödinger wave equation, Newtonian mechanics, and classical virial theorem
- Appendix E Factorization of the Klein–Gordon information
- Appendix F Evaluation of certain integrals
- Appendix G Schrödinger wave equation as a non-relativistic limit
- Appendix H Non-uniqueness of potential A for finite boundaries
- Appendix I Four-dimensional normalization
- Appendix J Transfer matrix method
- Appendix K Numerov method
- References
- Index
Summary
Aims of the book
The primary aim of this book is to develop a theory of measurement that incorporates the observer into the phenomenon under measurement. By this theory, the observer becomes both a collector of data and an activator of the phenomenon that gives rise to the data. These ideas have probably been best stated by J. A. Wheeler (1990; 1994):
All things physical are information-theoretic in origin and this is a participatory universe … Observer participancy gives rise to information; and information gives rise to physics.
The measurement theory that will be presented is largely, in fact, a quantification of these ideas. However, the reader might be surprised to find that the “information” that is used is not the usual Shannon or Boltzmann entropy measures, but one that is relatively unknown to physicists, that of R. A. Fisher.
The measurement theory is simply a description of how Fisher information flows from a physical source effect to a data space. It therefore applies to all scenarios where quantitative data from repeatable experiments may be collected. This describes measurement scenarios of physics but, also, of science in general. The theory of measurement is found to define an analytical procedure for deriving all laws of science. The approach is called EPI, for “extreme physical information.”
The secondary aim of the book is to show, by example, that most existing laws of science fit within the EPI framework. That is, they can be derived by its use. (Many can of course be derived by other approaches, but, apparently, no other single approach can derive all of them.) In this way the EPI approach unifies science under an umbrella of measurement and information.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Science from Fisher InformationA Unification, pp. 1 - 22Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2004