Free «Information Assignment» Essay Sample

Communication plays an integral part in a number of spheres in attempts to realize coordination of different facets. In achieving effective communication, there is need to consider an array of central aspects that will influence the overall effectiveness attained. In line with this, the paper will attempt to opine certain components in communication that are key in achieving the overall effectiveness. The channels involved will be closely elucidated in accordance with the book An Introduction to Information Theory: Symbols, Signals & Noise.

An Introduction to Information Theory: Symbols, Signals & Noise is a book written by John Robinson Pierce. The book touches upon information as the central component of communication. It introduces the subject by defining information as any object or activity that communicates an idea. The author also describes information theory as the accepted means of communication among individuals (Shortliffe & Cimino, 2014).

The author claims that information may be contained in many communication channels such as computers, mobile phones and in written form as well (Henderson, 2009). It focuses on information as an item that contains knowledge, opinions, ideas, experiences, wishes, orders, emotions, feelings, moods, and errors of an individual. The author claims that people should learn a few examples of mathematical formulae of communication to minimize problems encountered in communication (Shortliffe & Cimino, 2014).

The book mentions Aristotle as a physician who made a significant contribution to the development of information. He claimed that information must be transferred from one place to another for a complete communication to take place. He mentioned motion as one aspect of communication. Information should undergo a particular type of movement to facilitate communication. The action of the information is mainly determined by the affection, the place and the magnitude in which communication is made. The book mainly focuses on symbols, signals, and noise as the main categories of information. These three aspects pass information in different ways. There must be a channel, through which information is passed on these aspects of communication (Kling, Rosenbaum, & Sawyer, 2005).

The commonly used channels include air, computers, television, and even water. The book also mentioned an electrical theory known as network theory. The theory deals with electrical properties used in communications devices such as computers. The network theory focuses on the electrical behavior of any physical structure used in the transmission of information (Reilly, 2003). These approaches review that information contains physical, mechanical, and electrical characteristics that need to be studied in deep strengths.

Mathematical principles that define information are the primary concern of this book. The author described that complete information needs to incorporate mathematical concepts for full communication. Computers compose information by assigning numbers of any collection of ideas and concepts. It involves some aspects of addition, subtraction, multiplication of division of numbers to make a complete sentence structure (Shortliffe & Cimino, 2014).

Information is, therefore, an arithmetic mathematical and physical phenomenon that encompasses many physical entities of constructing an idea. The theory of information was developed by Claude E. Shannon (Reilly, 2003). He managed to find fundamental limits on production and transmission of information signals. The signal processing operations described in this book include compressing data, storing, and communicating data. It is widespread information that involves statistical inference, natural language processing, cryptography, and quantum computing, as well as data analysis (Shortliffe & Cimino, 2014). The main areas of concern in this book are mathematics, statistics, computer science, physics, neurobiology, and electrical engineering. The theory attained multiple objectives such as the invention of the compact disc, the feasibility of the mobile phones and development of the internet for communication purposes. Information theory also participates in the linguistic development and the process of human perception (Shortliffe & Cimino, 2014).

The book went further explaining a communication theory used in the formulation of information. The formulated knowledge is used in passing information from one generation to another. Communication theory is claimed to provide a universal measure of the amount of information in terms of choice and uncertainty in communication (Pierce, 1980). The theory explains the bit of information that can be sent with time to enhance a perfect or imperfect communication. It informs people how to measure the rate at which information is transferred from the source to the receiver. The theory addresses the method of encoding information from the source through a selected channel as well as minimizing challenges of information transmission (Shortliffe & Cimino, 2014). The electrical circuit is mentioned as one way of encoding information. It is useful in connection with the written and spoken language, the electrical and mechanical transmission of messages. It helps in describing the behavior of the machines used in communication, as well as the people participating in communication processes (Kling, Rosenbaum, & Sawyer, 2005).

Shannon made a significant contribution to the development of the Mathematical theory of communication. The theory claimed that the fact of a communication theorem depended on the validity of the information encoded. Communication theory also argues that information is best displayed by using theorem and proof of an idea (Pierce, 1980). The receiver and the source of information should take a period of concentration to compose a genuine communication.

The theory cannot be applied to all problems that can be solved using the word communication and information. It deals with certain aspects of communication that can be associated and organized in a significant and beneficial way. According to this theory, all the natural phenomena can be united through information (Shortliffe & Cimino, 2014).

Communication theory claims that there is a need for understanding all mathematical theorems adopted in communication. These hypotheses include the logical technique of formulating ideas that are taken by computers. Therefore, all persons should try to understand some scientific skills applied in communication as well as mathematical theorems of communication (Kling, Rosenbaum, & Sawyer, 2005).

The author of this book proclaimed the significance of scientific ideas in understanding concepts. The history of the information discussed in this book helps in describing how concepts were formulated before the discovery of information. Entropy is a communication term used in the definition to understand the information contained within the message produced by the source (Kling, 2005). Under these communication criteria, the entropy of communication tends to vary with the type of the message produced by all sources.

Twenty-six letters of the alphabetic are the origin of information. Formulation of information also includes a combination of the ten counting numbers in the formulation of information. A combination of dots and dashes is also a significant part of information. A combination of these dots and dashes increases the speed of formulation of communication texts by fifteen percent (Kling, Rosenbaum, & Sawyer, 2005). The use of telegraphy developed in 1843 helps in increasing the efficiency through which information is transmitted. Fourier’s contribution is one of the significant attempts made in the development of information transmission process (Reilly, 2003). He discovered a mathematical function that best describes the process of communication (Kling, Rosenbaum, & Sawyer, 2005).

He described transmission of information in terms of a sin wave. A crime wave is used to describe the flow of current in a closed circuit. The height of the curve depends on the strength of the current or voltage (Reilly, 2003). Information transmission also involves a similarly transmit ion curve. The transmission curve of the data depends on the strength of the message derived from the source (Pierce, 1980). The theory shows that information contains a wave characteristic. Fourier made an analysis of various components that are necessary to make it easier to study the process of transmission of signals that provides information. He also observed that most of the communication signals that he used were linear in nature (Kling, Rosenbaum, & Sawyer, 2005).

Mathematical models of information offer good chances of transmission of ideas from one person to another. The author of the book claims that all communication made all people must contain some economic gain. The process of formulating and composing a message depends on their level of financial gain achievable (Pierce, 1980).

Shannon stressed the encoding theory as a significant application of information theory. The author divided encoding theory into two main subdivisions. These divisions were source encoding and channel encoding approach (Henderson, 2009). It quantifies the number of bits of information required to give a description of a data. Source encoding comprises of the two data compression methods. These include the lossless data compression and the lossy data compression (Pierce, 1980). The lossless data compression claims that data must be fully constructed for a meaningful interpretation. The lossy data compression allocates the number of information bits required to reconstruct a data. The rate- distortion theory is a part of this theory (Shortliffe & Cimino, 2014). An error correction function is performed by the error correction contained in the channel coding for transmitting the data efficiently and faithfully in a noisy channel. A justification of these divisions of the coding theory is done by the information transmission theorems described in this paper.

The writer of the book under discussion mentioned the orbits of the planet and the performance of networks as primary examples of idealized deterministic systems that contained the character traits of the performance of the machines. Astronomers offered a claim that they were able to compute positions that the planet would occupy some years to come. Individual people are said to be determinists by this book. They are claimed to engage in activities that give them an economic gain (Reilly, 2003). 

The book provides more concepts on informatics. It describes the structure, algorithm, behavior and how different natural and artificial systems of an individual convey information. Chapter three of this book regarded the source of messages as an ergodic origin of symbols. These symbols include letters and words. In English, there is a continuous flow of sentences used in communication. There must be a sequence of sentence arrangement for communication to take place. The book tries to illustrate a statistical property of the sequence of inscription of words (Pierce, 1980). Materials resembling English citations can also be formulated for making choices among letters and words. In speech, one sets down a test as well as deciding what to be said after that text. The mind of a person is also prepared for information to be communicated first then followed by others. In most cases, information that is thought to carry the target point is transmitted first (Reilly, 2003). Less important information is provided at the end of the context as a reinforcement of the message already delivered.

The book ends by stating that the entropy of information contains an equation if the symbols are not equally probable. The authors also claimed that all information theoretic concepts use cryptography and cryptanalysis (Henderson, 2009). These concepts help in gathering and analyzing data obtained from the research or an observation. The data obtained is used to make conclusions about the fact of a situation.