https://hackerpaper.kaipfister.de/p/1806.08053/Collected HN comments and submissions linking this paper.enMon, 02 Nov 2026 11:16:22 GMThttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26187079urn:hackerpapers:mention:1806.08053:26187079Thu, 18 Feb 2021 23:03:56 GMT<p>Recent work in information theory has formalized the concept of semantic information, where Shannon deliberately avoided semantics, and focused purely on the information content. They define semantic information as: Information which helps an object stay away from thermodynamic equilibrium (no different from entropic noise). Information then has meaning for a receiver if it helps them stay alive. The very same message may be completely &quot;meaningless&quot; to another receiver. https://arxiv.org/abs/1806.08053 Semantic information, autonomous agency, and nonequilibrium statistical physics &gt; Shannon…</p><p><a href="https://hackerpaper.kaipfister.de/p/1806.08053/">Paper and discussion history</a>. A mention is not an endorsement.</p>cond-mat.stat-mechhttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19029897urn:hackerpapers:mention:1806.08053:19029897Tue, 29 Jan 2019 21:22:16 GMT<p>Shannon information deliberately only concerns syntactic information (information content). Other, more recent work, focuses on semantic information (information with meaning for a receiver). &gt; Shannon information theory provides various measures of so-called &quot;syntactic information&quot;, which reflect the amount of statistical correlation between systems. In contrast, the concept of &quot;semantic information&quot; refers to those correlations which carry significance or &quot;meaning&quot; for a given system. Semantic information plays an important role in many fields, including biology, cognitive science, and…</p><p><a href="https://hackerpaper.kaipfister.de/p/1806.08053/">Paper and discussion history</a>. A mention is not an endorsement.</p>cond-mat.stat-mech