Entropy and Indias Billionaires - I

Ever wondered if your name has something to do with how rich you are? Take a look at the following alphabetical list that I prepared from the recently published Forbes 2013 Billionaires, see Refs. [1-7].

8 7 6
7 6 5 5 5 5 4 4 3 3 3

5
4 3 2 1 0

M A J K P R G S B D N C H L O V
Figure 1: Alphabetical listing of Indias Billionaires (horizontal axis) with frequency of last names (plotted on vertical axis, number of times the letter appears in the list). Only 16 of the 26 English alphabets are represented. India has a total of 55 billionaires, with an average net worth of $3.52 B and a combined net worth of $193.6 B, see also Refs. [8-10]. Mukesh Ambani, of Reliance Industries, with a fortune of $21.5B and worldwide rank of 22, heads the list, followed by steel baron Lakshmi Mittal, with a fortune of $16.5 B, and Wipros Azim Premji with a fortune of $11.2 B, see Refs. [8,9], also click here.

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The top three Indian billionaires, see images below extracted from Ref. [1], have last names beginning with the letters A, M, and P. Now look at the bar graph in Figure 1.

Figure 2: The top five Indian billionaires, with their Forbes rankings, from the 2013 Forbes Billionaires. The last names begin with A, M, P, S, and R. http://www.forbes.com/billionaires/#page:1_sort:0_direction:asc_search:_filt er:All%20industries_filter:India_filter:All%20states Seven billionaires (headed by Lakshmi Mittal) had last names that begin with the letter M, followed by six billionaires (headed by Mukesh Ambani) with last names that begin with the letter A. The next most frequent were letters J, K. P, and R each claiming five billionaires, G and S followed with four billionaires each, B, D and N got three each and C,H, L, O, and V got one each. Out of 26 letters of the English alphabet only 16 are represented here. Indian born Yusuff Ali, who heads the Dubai based Lulu group and Ranjan Pai of Manipal Education and Medical Group made their debut on this Forbes list. Notice again that the last names begin with the letters A and P, among the
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most frequent in Figure 1. But, the A s win when it comes to the combined net worth, thanks to Mukesh Ambani and his (much poorer as they say) younger brother Anil, who is ranked 233 in the Forbes list, see Figure 3. He is the next A in the list and comes after the first ten Indian billionaires: A, M, P, S, R, B, J, M, N, S and then A. Only M is repeated in the top 10 and the name if the same Mittal, Lakshmi Mittal and then Sunil Mittal and family. (I should really be looking my good friend Mittal from my college days. )

$40.0 $35.0 $30.0 $25.0 $20.0 $15.0 $10.0 $5.0 $0.0 M A J K P R G S B D N C H L O V

Figure 3: The alphabetical listing (horizontal axis) of the combined net worth (vertical axis) of the Indian billionaires in the 2013 Forbes list. The As now win, thanks to Mukesh Ambani with his fortune of $21.5B. Take a look at the bolded and crossed out letters here. ABCD EF GH I JKLMNOP Q RS TU V WXYZ . If you are last name that begins with E or F you are not very likely to find yourself on this list, although it appears that L has a small chance (1 out of 55 in 2013). Sometime in future, Laxmanan might just pop up in the billionaires list. You never know. There is a small, but
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finite, probability. Better than a last name with T or U. Even V very popular with the names in the South, involving various additions to the basic Venkat seems to have a good chance. Well and good. What has this got to do with entropy? Remember permutations and combinations from your elementary statistics classes? Nowadays, they even teach this in high school, or even middle school math. If you are new to this, try the top three of Refs. [11-19] that I have given here. The number of permutations of n things is n! . This is the first thing we learn. Now, take the three letters A, M, and P which make the list of the most frequent last names in our billionaires list. The three letters can appear in many different ways in a list: AMP, APM, MAP, MPA, PAM, and PMA. For the first place we can choose any one of the three letters A, M, or P. This gives us two choices for the second place and only one choice for the third place. That is how the list of six was prepared; total ways is 3! = 3 x 2 x 1 = 6. The permutations of n things taken r at time is nPr = n!/(n r)! and the combinations of n things taken r at a time is nCr = n!/r! (n r)!. The order in which the letters appears (or names appear) matter in a permutation. Order does not matter in a combination. Hence, the number of combinations is always less than the number of permutations. By the way, the so-called combination lock is really a permutation lock since the order in which the numbers 0 to 9 appear is important. There are a total of 10! Permutations, which is a huge number, 10! = 3,628,800 or about 3.63 million. If you forget the combination you really are out of luck if you have to guess each one. But, in practice, you do have a clue and are going to try different choices from a finite number of choices. Now, we are dealing with permutations of n things taken r at a time, not n! . Cheers! If you made it this far, you know what Max Planck knew when he tried to apply these essentially simple ideas and took the first steps to develop what we now call quantum physics, in his revolutionary December 1900 paper, see
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Refs. [20-25]. As historians of science like to point out, see Kragh [23] and Gearhat [24], Planck was not a statistician and detested the statistical arguments introduced into physics, first by James Clerk Maxwell and later by Boltzmann, see Longairs treatise, Ref. [26]. Very briefly, following Boltzmanns 1877 treatment (see [24]), Planck gives the following expression for entropy of a system consisting of N particles. SN = k ln + S0 where giving, = (N + P 1)! /(N 1)! P! (N + P)N+P /NN PP SN = k { (N + P) ln (N + P) N ln N - P ln P } ..(1) ..(2) ..(3)

Equation 1 is the basic definition of entropy. The symbol S is used for entropy with subscript N denoting the number of particles in the system. The entropy is proportional to the logarithm of and k is the proportionality constant which depends on the units used for measurements. S0 is the nonzero value of entropy even in the theoretical limit of = 1. The expression for is given in equation 2. Notice that this expression looks like our formula for the number of combinations of n things taken r at a time. For very large integers, factorials can be eliminated using what is known as Stirlings approximation, given as the second approximate equality. After some algebraic manipulations involving rules of logarithms, Planck arrives at equation 3, which revolutionized physics. Instead of N particles which exhibit the property called entropy, we can make the case that the same expression applies to the system of N billionaires of interest to us here. We will continue this discussion in Part II.

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My Facebook Post on April 4, 2013

Vj Laxmanan Check out if your last name could appear here.

Here's more proof. Our local billionaire, who is right her Farmington Hills, Michigan, is named Manoj Bhargava and "B" appears on the list with 3 members. In some lists, billionaires of Indian heritage, who live in other parts of the world, are included (don't know why, but there seems to be universal interest in such counting). I have not yet prepared such a list (from the Forbes list). But, here "B" just went up from 3 to 4 times in the frequency graph. See also http://www.scribd.com/doc/133762538/Entropy-and-the-ForbesBillionaires

Reference List
1. The Worlds Billionaires, The Richest People on the Planet 2013, by Lusia Kroll and Kerry A. Dolan, March 4, 2013, http://www.forbes.com/billionaires/ 2. Inside the 2013 Billionaires List: Facts and Figures, by Luisa Kroll, March 4, 2013, http://www.forbes.com/sites/luisakroll/2013/03/04/inside-the-2013billionaires-list-facts-and-figures/ 3. The Worlds Richest Billionaires, by Luisa Kroll and Kerry A Dolan, March 4, 2013, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/04/worldsrichest-billionaires-forbes_n_2793636.html 4. Mapping the Wealth of the Words Billionaires, by Luisa Kroll, http://www.forbes.com/sites/luisakroll/2013/03/09/mapping-thePage | 6

wealth-of-the-worlds-billionaires/ The Infographic provided here maps the

number of billionaires N by country; created by Bob Mansfield and David Lada, March 9, 2013. This is integrated with the combined net worth (UN) data from Ref. [4] for the analysis presented here.

5. Forbes Billionaires Asia-Pacific Map, by Ricardo Geromel, April 1, 2013 http://www.forbes.com/sites/ricardogeromel/2013/04/01/forbesbillionaires-asia-pacific-map/ Provides combined net worth data for each country. 6. Average Billionaire Net Worth by Country: Full list, by Edwin Durgy, March 13, 2013, Provides average net worth data for all 64 countries http://www.forbes.com/sites/edwindurgy/2013/03/13/averagebillionaire-net-worth-by-country-full-list/ 7. Forbes Billionaires, Special Issue, March 23, 2013, Profiles of the Top 20 Billionaires on pages 86 to 89. 8. Mukesh Ambani wealthiest Indian in Forbes list, by Tony Tharakan, March 4, 2013, Reuters, http://in.reuters.com/article/2013/03/04/forbes-mukesh-ambani-indiaidINDEE9230AL20130304 9. Forbes rankings: India has 55 billionaires, by Team VCCC, March 4, 2013, http://www.vccircle.com/news/finance/2013/03/04/forbesrankings-india-has-55-billionaires 10. Richest Indian on Forbes billionaires list, This is the 2012 list and some rankings have changed, with Lakshmi Mittal losing the top spot to Mukesh Ambani http://www.ndtv.com/photos/business/richest-indians-onforbes-billionaires-list-9329 11. Easy Permutations and Combinations, http://betterexplained.com/articles/easy-permutations-andcombinations/ 12. Permutations and Combinations, by David M. Lane, http://onlinestatbook.com/2/probability/permutations.html 13. Permutations and Combinations, Topics in Pre-calculus, http://www.themathpage.com/aprecalc/permutationscombinations.htm#principle, also http://www.themathpage.com/aprecalc/permutations-combinations.htm

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14. Stats: Counting Techniques, Good discussion of Plancks equation 1. http://people.richland.edu/james/lecture/m170/ch04-not.html In the word, STATISTICS, there are N = 10 letters, S = 3, T = 3, A = 1, I = 2, C = 1 and the total permutations is 10! /3! 3! 2! 1! = 50,400. 15. CLAST, Statistics and Probability, http://www.fgcu.edu/CAA/lessons/CLASTps6counting_files/frame.htm 16. Permutations with repeats, Advanced Concepts,
http://www.mathwarehouse.com/probability/permutations-repeated-items.php

17. Combination, Permutations and Elementary Probability, http://web.cs.du.edu/~aarias/permutation-combination.pdf 18. Combinations and Permutations, see combination lock example here http://www.mathsisfun.com/combinatorics/combinationspermutations.html A bit more advanced examples. 19. Permutation, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permutation 20. Max Planck: The Quantum Hypothesis, in Great Experiments in Physics,
Edited by Morris H. Shamos, Dover Publications (1959), pp. 301-314. English translation of the original paper by Max Planck with brief explanatory notes by Shamos.

21. Great Experiment in Physics: Firsthand Accounts from Galileo to ... - Page 367 books.google.com/books?isbn=0486253465 Morris H. Shamos 1959 - Preview - More editions Firsthand Accounts from Galileo to Einstein Morris H. Shamos ... See quantum hypothesis; Planck, Max radiation, Maxwell's principle of, 185; density of, 306, 307; nature of, 216-217; rectilinear propagation of, 216 radioactivity, and atomic ...

http://books.google.com/books?id=NwkXXyXmQdcC&pg=PA367&dq=plan ck+shamos+quantum+hypothesis&hl=en&sa=X&ei=2HVcUbfTGaC0QGl9YCQBg&ved=0CDEQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=planck%20shamos% 20quantum%20hypothesis&f=false (The original text of Plancks December 1900 paper may be found by clicking on the link given here.)

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22. A Brief biography of Max Planck, http://cosweb1.fau.edu/~jordanrg/bios/Planck/Planck_bio.htm 23. Max Planck: The Reluctant Revolutionary, by Helge Kragh, Physics World, December 2000, pp. 31-35, http://www.math.lsa.umich.edu/~krasny/math156_article_planck.pdf 24. Planck, the Quantum and Historians, Phys. In Perspective, 4 (2002), pp. 170-215. by Clayton A. Gearhart, http://employees.csbsju.edu/cgearhart/pubs/PQH.pdf see discussion of Boltzmanns definition of entropy starting page 181, equations 5 and 6 on page 182, the expressions given here and Boltzmanns example of now entropy arises. Also, see equation 7 on page 186 for total number of complexions, equations 8 and 9 on page 188 and page 202. 25. One Hundred Years of Quantum Physics, by Daniel Kleppner and Roman Jackiw, http://www.4physics.com/phy_demo/QM_Article/article.html 26. Theoretical concepts in physics, by M. S. Longair, Cambridge University Press (1984). http://www.amazon.com/Theoretical-Concepts-PhysicsAlternative-Reasoning/dp/052152878X Chapters 9 to 15 (case studies IV and V) and also chapters under Case Study II (Maxwell equations and electromagnetism) are highly recommended and cover the Planck and Einstein laws which are actually founded upon Maxwells work.

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About the author V. Laxmanan, Sc. D.

The author obtained his Bachelors degree (B. E.) in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Poona and his Masters degree (M. E.), also in Mechanical Engineering, from the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, followed by a Masters (S. M.) and Doctoral (Sc. D.) degrees in Materials Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA. He then spent his entire professional career at leading US research institutions (MIT, Allied Chemical Corporate R & D, now part of Honeywell, NASA, Case Western Reserve University (CWRU), and General Motors Research and Development Center in Warren, MI). He holds four patents in materials processing, has co-authored two books and published several scientific papers in leading peer-reviewed international journals. His expertise includes developing simple mathematical models to explain the behavior of complex systems. While at NASA and CWRU, he was responsible for developing material processing experiments to be performed aboard the space shuttle and developed a simple mathematical model to explain the growth Christmas-tree, or snowflake, like structures (called dendrites) widely observed in many types of liquid-to-solid phase transformations (e.g., freezing of all commercial metals and alloys, freezing of water, and, yes, production of snowflakes!). This led to a simple model to explain the growth of dendritic structures in both the groundbased experiments and in the space shuttle experiments. More recently, he has been interested in the analysis of the large volumes of data from financial and economic systems and has developed what may be called the Quantum Business Model (QBM). This extends (to financial and economic systems) the mathematical arguments used by Max Planck to develop quantum physics using the analogy Energy = Money, i.e., energy in physics is like money in economics. Einstein applied Plancks ideas to describe the photoelectric effect (by treating light as being composed of particles called photons, each with the fixed quantum of energy conceived by Planck). The mathematical law deduced by Planck, referred to here as the generalized power-exponential law, might
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actually have many applications far beyond blackbody radiation studies where it was first conceived. Einsteins photoelectric law is a simple linear law and was deduced from Plancks non-linear law for describing blackbody radiation. It appears that financial and economic systems can be modeled using a similar approach. Finance, business, economics and management sciences now essentially seem to operate like astronomy and physics before the advent of Kepler and Newton. Finally, during my professional career, I also twice had the opportunity and great honor to make presentations to two Nobel laureates: first at NASA to Prof. Robert Schrieffer (1972 Physics Nobel Prize), who was the Chairman of the Schrieffer Committee appointed to review NASAs space flight experiments (following the loss of the space shuttle Challenger on January 28, 1986) and second at GM Research Labs to Prof. Robert Solow (1987 Nobel Prize in economics), who was Chairman of Corporate Research Review Committee, appointed by GM corporate management.

Cover page of AirTran 2000 Annual Report

Can you see that plane flying above the tall tree tops that make a nearly perfect circle? It requires a great deal of imagination to see and to photograph it.

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