Complexity measurement based on information theory and kolmogorov complexity

Artif Life. 2015 Spring;21(2):205-24. doi: 10.1162/ARTL_a_00157. Epub 2015 Jan 26.

Abstract

In the past decades many definitions of complexity have been proposed. Most of these definitions are based either on Shannon's information theory or on Kolmogorov complexity; these two are often compared, but very few studies integrate the two ideas. In this article we introduce a new measure of complexity that builds on both of these theories. As a demonstration of the concept, the technique is applied to elementary cellular automata and simulations of the self-organization of porphyrin molecules.

Keywords: Complex systems; cellular automata; measures of complexity; molecular computation; open-ended evolution.