The Being Less Wrong Podcast

Predictability, Pizza, and Probability: My Journey Into Entropy


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The article "Predictability, Pizza, and Probability: My Journey Into Entropy" explores the concept of Shannon entropy, which measures unpredictability or uncertainty within a system, distinct from the thermodynamic meaning. The author uses the example of their daily lunch choices to illustrate how probability alone describes individual outcomes, while entropy provides a single number quantifying the overall uncertainty of all potential outcomes. The piece then discusses the applications of entropy across fields like biomedical science, machine learning, and signal processing, highlighting how it helps understand variability and detect patterns in complex data, such as physiological signals or model predictions. The author concludes by emphasizing that entropy is a powerful tool for assessing how much we don't know about a system, a concept they intend to apply to understanding glucose variability in metabolic health.



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The Being Less Wrong PodcastBy Ahmad Ismat Kathrada