do you have a heuristic/cheat for telling the difference between a simplification and a compression of an idea?
Conversation
Replying to
I’d say the way we tend to use the terms, simplifications are lossy compressions. JPEG as opposed to Lempel-Ziv.
1
Replying to
Are lossless compressions possible? Or is it like translation, where “something” is always lost regardless of the rigor of the translator?
1
Replying to
Depends on the idea, but sure lossless compressions are literally, mathematically possible. That’s how the zip utilities on your computer work after all. In human comprehension, compression needs to also be understandable.

