Negentropy
concept
In information theory and statistics, negative entropy is used as a measure of distance to normality. It is also known as negentropy or syntropy. It is a counter-construct to entropy.
Etymology
The concept and phrase "negative entropy" was introduced by Erwin Schrödinger in his 1944 book What is Life?. Later, the French physicist Léon Brillouin shortened the phrase to néguentropie (transl. negentropy). In 1974, Albert Szent-Györgyi proposed replacing the term negentropy with syntropy (Greek, 'together with change'). That term may have originated in the 1940s with the Italian mathematician Luigi Fantappiè, who tried to construct a unified theory of biology and physics. Buckminster Fuller tried to popularize this usage, but negentropy remains common.
In a note to What is Life?, Schrödinger explained his use of this phrase:
... if I had been catering for them [physicists] alone I should have let the discussion turn on free energy instead.
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This entry incorporates text from “Negentropy” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.