[Next] [Previous] [Up] [Top] [Contents]

6 Relation to other definitions of complexity

6.4 Löfgren's Interpretation and Descriptive Complexity

Löfgren [20] ascribes complexity to the two processes of interpretation and description (see figure 4). The interpretation process is the translation from the description to the system and the descriptive process is the other way around. For example the "description" could be the genotype and the "system" the phenotype. The interpretation process would correspond to the decoding of the DNA into the effective proteins that control the cell and the descriptive process the result of reproduction and selection on the information there encoded.

Figure 4: Description and interpretation processes

Löfgren then goes on to associate descriptive complexity with Kolmogorov Complexity (as in Section 6.2) and interpretational complexity with logical strength and computational complexity (Section 6.1). In order to talk about these processes he uses a base language to represent his "description", "system" and processes between them. Thus these can be seen as different "difficulties" with different interpretations of parts and overall behaviour of the same meta-system expressed in a wider language.

What is Complexity? - The philosophy of complexity per se with application to some examples in evolution - 14 JUN 95
[Next] [Previous] [Up] [Top] [Contents]

Generated with CERN WebMaker