What is information — the concept, types and properties of information, its transmission, processing and storage

 

One of the richest men in the history of mankind, Nathan Rothschild, claimed that whoever owns information owns the world.

What kind of thing is this, with which you can make a billion-dollar fortune and control other people's destinies?

The concept of information — what is it

The term was formed from the Latin word informatio, which translates as "explanation, representation, concept". There is another word in Latin — informare, which means "to think, to create a form, to teach, to represent."

Information is any information that is perceived by living organisms, electronic devices and other systems, about the world around them, processes, objects and phenomena.

Information is knowledge transmitted in the form of messages, notifications and signals.

An information message is a collection of information elements united by internal links.

The newspaper writes that the Russian economy is experiencing unprecedented growth. Or a colleague secretly says that salaries will be cut soon. All these are informational messages.

At the same time, the same message may contain a different amount of information, depending on who the recipient is. For example, they send us a message: 明天该公司的股票将翻倍. If we do not know the language in which the message is written, there is no information for us.But a stock exchange player from China will immediately understand — it says here that tomorrow the shares of a certain company will double in price.

In different fields of activity, the concept of information is characterized by specific features. For example, in the field of computer technology, the term has the following definition:

"information is a set of symbols and signs that makes sense and is understandable to a computer."

Such information may look like a sequence of zeros and ones: 00010001110001100011.

Types of information

1. Graphic. More than 30 thousand years ago, primitive people began to record information about their lives on the walls of caves in the form of images of mammoths, hunters, and mysterious creatures. The artist paints a picture and saves the images on canvas. Any photos, flowcharts, drawings - all this is a graphical form of information.

2. Acoustic. The world around is filled with sounds. We turn on the radio and hear the weather forecast, put headphones in our ears and enjoy any songs. One monkey shouts something to the other - they understand each other. A snake hisses at a traveler lost in the jungle: "Not a step further! I'll bite you."

3. Text. The information is encoded using letter symbols. Different peoples have their own languages and letters, so translators are more important in the history of mankind. They recode textual information from one set of characters to another without losing meaning.

This allows different cultures to interact with each other and share their experiences. With the invention of writing, humanity has the opportunity not to keep huge amounts of information in memory, passing it from mouth to mouth, from generation to generation.

Now you can write everything down on paper and be calm that nothing will be lost or forgotten. Right now you are reading this article, and your brain is absorbing textual information.

4. Numeric. When encoding information, numbers are also used, not letters. This information expresses the quantitative parameters of the objects. For example: "68, 69, 67" — the dynamics of the dollar's exchange rate against the ruble.

5. Video information is a variant of fixing and storing live images of the surrounding reality. It originated in the era of the invention of cinema and has now reached the peak of its application. We film family holidays on our phone camera, enjoy movies in cinemas, watch videos on Youtube.

6. Tactile. Imagine that you are touching snow. He is very cold and his hands are starting to ache slightly. Here are the sensations that pop up in memory — tactile information.

7. Organoleptic — obtained with the help of the senses (taste, smell, color). If we want to describe the taste of pickles, we will have to translate this information from an organoleptic form into a textual or acoustic one.

Science has not yet found ways to encode and transmit such information. Otherwise, it would be possible to experience someone else's feelings from going to a restaurant.

Information Properties

1. Reliability. A person makes a decision based on some information. If it is reliable (corresponds to reality), the decision is likely to be correct. If it is false, then it is erroneous.

Unreliable information arises as a result of deliberate distortion of reality — disinformation.

An example of disinformation is contained in a well-known joke.

A mother writes to her son in prison: "You have been imprisoned, there is no one even to dig up a vegetable garden. And I don't have the strength at all." The son replies, "Mom, don't touch anything! You'll dig up something that will add time to me." The following letter is from the mother: "The police came, they searched everything. They didn't find anything, they left very angry." My son writes: "Dear Mother, I helped you in any way I could. Plant the potatoes yourself."

Another reason for unreliability is accidental distortion. Many people played with a broken phone in childhood: Vasya told Petya, Petya told Seryozha, Seryozha told Misha. As a result, the original message changed to the exact opposite.

2. Completeness. Information is considered complete when its volume is sufficient to make the right decision. If the judge at the criminal trial hears only the side of the prosecution, then he risks passing an erroneous verdict.

3. Relevance. Information has its own expiration date — it may become outdated. If you warn people about an earthquake after it starts, such a message will be useless.

4. Objectivity. Information should reflect the realities of the surrounding world and not depend on someone's opinion or the way it is recorded. Here we are told that it is warm outside. How is "heat"?

For a resident of the Far North, the temperature is -10 degrees — very hot. And for a student from Africa, it is a terrible frost. Such a message contains a subjective assessment. But the notice "it will be 15 degrees Celsius at night" is objective.

5. Accuracy. The closer the information is to reality, the more accurate it is. Let's take two statements: "the salary will be within this week" and "you will receive the money tomorrow before 17:00." The second is significantly more accurate than the first.

6. Value or usefulness. This parameter depends on the needs and interests of the recipient of the information. When we download the program code into the computer, it will execute this program. If we print it out on a piece of paper and read it to the child before going to bed instead of a fairy tale, nothing good will come of it.

Data transmission is the physical transfer of information in the form of signals from one point to another over a communication channel for the purpose of subsequent processing.

For information to be useful, it must be transmitted and accepted.

Let's take an example: you need to call a friend and invite him to a birthday party. The source of information (this is you) is the object that creates the transmitted message. You say: "Vasya, come to my birthday party!" The microphone in the handset picks up sound vibrations and converts them into electrical signals.

These signals are sent to Vasya via a communication channel. And there, the information message is exposed to external influences — noise and interference, which can lead to distortion. Vasya does not understand: "Where, where should I go? Repeat, I can't hear, everything is hissing."

The higher the interference level, the more difficult it is to transmit the signal. Various measures are used to protect the information signal from external influences:

- they shield the communication lines;

- they increase the sensitivity and selectivity of the receiving device;

- they provide redundancy – an extra code that can be used "for spare parts" if the main one is damaged or distorted.

On the other subscriber's side, the reverse process takes place – the received electrical signals are converted into sound waves. They fly out of the speaker of the phone and fall directly into Vasya's ear.

Processing and storage of information

Our epoch is characterized by a unique phenomenon called the "information explosion". There is a sharp increase in the volume of information on a global scale.

The information flow increases by 30% every year, involving even young children in their processes, who almost from birth use phones and tablets.

Information accumulates over time. Human consciousness is no longer capable of processing such volumes. Here computers come to the rescue, which take over the functions of processing and storing information.

Processing is a process in which the content or form of presentation of information is changed.

For example, a director takes a ready-made script and makes a movie. It changes its shape from text to visual.

Storing information is writing it to storage devices for subsequent processing.