Impossible Mission: Entropy Maximization with Escort Averages

Abstract: It has recently been a common practice to maximize the deformed entropies through the escort averaging scheme. However, whatever averaging procedure is employed, one should recover the ordinary Shannon maximization results in the appropriate limit of the deformation parameter e.g. $q\to 1$ for the Tsallis and R\'enyi entropies. Otherwise, the very meaning of a consistent generalization becomes at stake. Using only this equivalence, we show that any deformed entropy expression, maximized with the escort averaged constraints, yields that the Shannon entropy $S$ is equal to the logarithm of the ordinary canonical partition function i.e. $S = \ln(Z_S )$ instead of the correct thermodynamic relation $S = \beta U + \ln(Z_S )$. Therefore, we conclude that the use of the escort averaging procedure should be avoided for any deformed entropies, since it cannot even yield the well-known thermodynamic relations of the ordinary canonical formalism.