AIC Seminar Series

I will first discuss the extent to which various information-theoretic concepts, such as complexity, randomness, and entropy, can be regarded as "objective" properties. Then I will show that thinking of entropy as a kind of contextual property allows us to resolve the paradox of Maxwell's demon, a long-lived phantasm from the 19th centurty whose behavior is supposed to bring about a violation of the second law of thermodynamics.

Steve Weinstein is presently a Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in philosophy and physics at Dartmouth College. He obtained his Ph.D. in philosophy from Northwestern University in 1998 with a dissertation on the problem of time in quantum gravity. He was a postdoctoral fellow in philosophy and physics at the University of British Columbia from 1998-99, and a visiting assistant professor in philosophy at Princeton from 1999-2001.

Please arrive at least 10 minutes early as you will need to sign in by following instructions by the lobby phone at Building E (or call Wilma Lenz at 650 859 4904, or Eunice Tseng at 650 859 2799). SRI is located at 333 Ravenswood Avenue in Menlo Park. Visitors may park in the parking lots off Fourth Street. Detailed directions to SRI, as well as maps, are available from the Visiting AIC web page. There are two entrances to SRI International located on Ravenswood Ave. Please check the Building E entrance signage.

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