Large deviations and the Boltzmann entropy formula

Abstract

In the last decades the theory of large deviations has become a main tool in statistical mechanics especially in the study of non--equilibrium. In a rational reconstruction of the story one must recognize the ideal connection and debt of some recent work, to discussions taking place at the beginning of the twentieth century. The famous equation $S=k\ln W$ usually attributed to Boltzmann, actually written in this final form by Planck on his route to the quantum hypothesis, was interpreted by Einstein as a large deviation formula. This interpretation, on which he based his theory of thermodynamic equilibrium fluctuations, has been a source of inspiration in recent developments of non--equilibrium statistical mechanics. In this paper we briefly illustrate this aspect.