This paper presents an information theoretic approach to the concept of intelligence in the computational sense. We introduce a probabilistic framework from which computation alintelligence is shown to be an entropy minimizing process at the local level. Using this new scheme, we develop a simple data driven clustering example and discuss its applications.
Recent advances in fields ranging from cosmology to computer science have hinted at a possible deep connection between intelligence and entropy maximization, but no formal physical relationship between them has yet been established. Here, we explicitly propose a first step toward such a relationship in the form of a causal generalization of entropic forces that we find can cause two defining behaviors of the human cognitive niche'' tool use and social cooperation to spontaneously emerge in simple physical systems. Our results suggest a potentially general thermodynamic model of adaptive behavior as a nonequilibrium process in open systems.