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Main Authors: Bergstra, Jan A, Tucker, John V
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/2502.07148
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author Bergstra, Jan A
Tucker, John V
author_facet Bergstra, Jan A
Tucker, John V
contents A common meadow is an enrichment of a field with a partial division operation that is made total by assuming that division by zero takes the a default value, a special element $\bot$ adjoined to the field. To a common meadow of real numbers we add a binary logarithm $\log_2(-)$, which we also assume to be total with $\log_2(p) = \bot$ for $p \leq 0$. With these and other auxiliary operations, such as a sign function, we form algebras over which entropy and cross entropy can be defined for probability mass functions on a finite sample space by algebraic formulae that are simple terms built from the operations of the algebras and without case distinctions or conventions to avoid partiality. The discuss the advantages of algebras based on common meadows, whose theory is established, and alternate methods to define entropy and other information measures completely for all arguments using single terms.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2502_07148
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Expressing entropy and cross-entropy in expansions of common meadows
Bergstra, Jan A
Tucker, John V
Information Theory
A common meadow is an enrichment of a field with a partial division operation that is made total by assuming that division by zero takes the a default value, a special element $\bot$ adjoined to the field. To a common meadow of real numbers we add a binary logarithm $\log_2(-)$, which we also assume to be total with $\log_2(p) = \bot$ for $p \leq 0$. With these and other auxiliary operations, such as a sign function, we form algebras over which entropy and cross entropy can be defined for probability mass functions on a finite sample space by algebraic formulae that are simple terms built from the operations of the algebras and without case distinctions or conventions to avoid partiality. The discuss the advantages of algebras based on common meadows, whose theory is established, and alternate methods to define entropy and other information measures completely for all arguments using single terms.
title Expressing entropy and cross-entropy in expansions of common meadows
topic Information Theory
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2502.07148