The Information

A History, a Theory, a Flood

v3.1
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  • 3.9 (16 ratings) ·
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Last edited by MARC Bot
December 16, 2022 | History

The Information

A History, a Theory, a Flood

v3.1
  • 3.9 (16 ratings) ·
  • 59 Want to read
  • 1 Currently reading
  • 23 Have read

From the invention of scripts and alphabets to the long misunderstood "talking drums" of Africa, James Gleick tells the story of information technologies that changed the very nature of human consciousness. He also provides portraits of the key figures contributing to the inexorable development of our modern understanding of information, including Charles Babbage, Ada Byron, Samuel Morse, Alan Turing, and Claude Shannon.

Publish Date
Language
English
Pages
416

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Previews available in: English

Edition Availability
Cover of: The Information
The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood
2011, Knopf Doubleday Pub. Group
electronic resource : in English - v3.1
Cover of: The Information
The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood
2011, Pantheon Books
in English

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Book Details


Table of Contents

Drums that talk
Persistence of the word
Two wordbooks
To throw the powers of thought into wheel-work
A nervous system for the Earth
New wires, new logic
Information theory
The informational turn
Entropy and its demons
Life's own code
Into the meme pool
The sense of randomness
Information is physical
After the flood
New news every day.

Edition Notes

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

Published in
New York
Copyright Date
2011

Classifications

Dewey Decimal Class
020.9
Library of Congress
Z665 .G547 2011eb, Z665 .G547 2011

The Physical Object

Format
[electronic resource] :
Pagination
1 online resource (416 p.) :
Number of pages
416

ID Numbers

Open Library
OL25570591M
Internet Archive
informationhisto00libg
ISBN 10
0307379574
ISBN 13
9780307379573
OCLC/WorldCat
707742879, 868832462

Work Description

The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood begins with the tale of colonial European explorers and their fascination with African talking drums and their observed use to send complex and widely understood messages back and forth between villages far apart, and over even longer distances by relay. The book then covers informational implications of technologies from drum signaling to the long distance telephone.

Starting with symbolic written language, The Information examines the history of intellectual insights central to the development of information theory, detailing key figures responsible such as Claude Shannon, Charles Babbage, Ada Byron, Samuel Morse, Alan Turing, Stephen Hawking, Richard Dawkins and John Archibald Wheeler.

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History

Download catalog record: RDF / JSON / OPDS | Wikipedia citation
December 16, 2022 Edited by MARC Bot import existing book
April 26, 2021 Edited by Brittany Bunk Edited without comment.
April 26, 2021 Edited by Brittany Bunk Added new cover
May 17, 2020 Edited by CoverBot Added new cover
July 30, 2014 Created by ImportBot Imported from Internet Archive item record