# Inferring degree of nonextensivity for generalized entropies

## Abstract

The purpose of this note is to argue that degree of nonextensivity as given by the Tsallis distribution obtained from maximum entropy principle has a different origin than the nonextensivity inferred from pseudo-additive property of Tsallis entropy.

PACS: 05.20.-y, 05.30.-d   
Keywords: Generalized Tsallis Statistics

Tsallis’ nonextensive formalism of statistical mechanics has been designed to treat those systems which cannot be treated within Boltzmann-Gibbs formalism owing to the presence of long-range interactions, spatio-temporal complexity, fractal dynamics and so on. However, compared to the successful number of applications of this formalism, there are relatively fewer papers which clarify the theoretical foundations of the formalism . In this regard, it is important to seek clear guidelines to propose any valid forms for generalized statistical mechanics . One such basis for generlizing Shannon entropy to $`q`$-entropies (including Tsallis entropy) seems to be provided by the connection of Tsallis formalism with $`q`$-calculus or quantum groups. In this paper, we will utilize a general form of Tsallis entropy motivated by this connection and argue that the degree of nonextensivity as manifested by the maximum entropy principle has a different origin than the nonextensivity that is apparent in the pseudo-additive property of Tsallis entropy.

It was proposed in  that Tsallis entropy generally written as

$$S_q^T=\frac{1_{i=1}^W(p_i)^q}{q1},$$
(1)   
may be given by

$$S_q^T=\underset{i=1}{\overset{W}{}}[a_i]p_i,$$
(2)   
where

$$[a_i]=\frac{q^{a_i}1}{q1},$$
(3)   
and

$$a_i=\frac{q1}{\mathrm{ln}q}\mathrm{ln}p_i.$$
(4)   
In other words, the generalized bit-number can be written as Jackson’s $`q`$-number. It was also argued that Eq. (4) is a tranformation which connects non-commutative differential calculus to $`q`$-calculus. Although this makes Tsallis entropy related to $`q`$-calculus, yet there is no justification from $`q`$-theoretic arguments as to why the variable $`a_i`$ should depend on same $`q`$ parameter as the $`q`$-number $`[a_i]`$. It may well be that Tsallis entropy is a special case of an entropy function where the $`q`$ in Eq. (4) coincides with the parameter $`q`$ of Eq. (3). Motivated by this, we propose to work with the entropy $`S_q=_{i=1}^W[a_i]p_i`$, where from now $`a_i`$ is given by

$$a_i=\frac{r1}{\mathrm{ln}r}\mathrm{ln}p_i$$
(5)   
Note that $`r>0`$. To see the role of parameter $`r`$, we maximize $`S_q`$ under the generalized energy constraint

$$\underset{i}{}\epsilon _i(q^{a_i}p_i)=U_q,$$
(6)   
where $`a_i`$ is given by Eq. (5). Note that for $`r=q`$, the above constraint is equivalnet to $`_i\epsilon _ip_i^q=U_q`$, which has been used earlier for the case of standard Tsallis entropy . Now we study the variation of the function

$$\mathrm{\Phi }=S_q\alpha \underset{i}{}p_i\beta \underset{i}{}\epsilon _i(q^{a_i}p_i).$$
(7)   
The probability distribution obtained by Lagrange multiplier method is given by

$$p_i=\frac{\{1(1q)\beta \epsilon _i\}^{\frac{\mathrm{ln}r}{(1r)\mathrm{ln}q}}}{Z_{q,r}},$$
(8)   
where $`Z_{q,r}`$ is the partition function obtained from normalization condition for $`p_i`$. Note that $`q>0`$, which is also significant for concavity of entropy. From Eq. (8), we see that when $`r=q`$, we get the usual Tsallis distribution

$$p_i=\frac{\{1(1q)\beta \epsilon _i\}^{1/(1q)}}{Z_q},$$
(9)   
Thus the exponent $`1/(1q)`$ above actually arises from the $`a_i`$ part (Eq. (5)) of the definition of Tsallis entropy and not from the parameter of $`q`$-number (Eq. (3)). In fact, it is equally legitimate to work with more general form  for $`a_i`$ given by

$$a_i=\frac{r1}{\mathrm{ln}q}\mathrm{ln}p_i.$$
(10)   
Then the exponent of generalized distribution (Eq. (8)) is $`1/(1r)`$.

Secondly, the pseudo-additive property of entropy $`S_q=_i[a_i]p_i`$, where $`a_i`$ may depend either on $`r`$ or $`q`$,

$$S_q(I+II)=S_q(I)+S_q(II)+(1q)S_q(I)S_q(II),$$
(11)   
follows directly from the $`q`$-additivity of $`q`$-numbers . This leads us to state that the degree of nonextensivity follows from different premises in the case of maximum entropy principle and pseudo-additive property of Tsallis entropy, respectively.