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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. Entropy is the physical equivalent of what state?

2. A psychologist named George Miller noticed that people seem to be able to easily remember up to how many items at a time?

3. What was Rolf Landauer's opinion of John von Neumann's theory on the energy cost of information?

4. What is the advantage of using quantum particles in the place of bits?

5. How are memes replicated?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the normal state of molecules in a system? Describe that arrangement.

2. What makes a number "computable?"

3. How did Gregory Chaitin characterize random numbers?

4. What was zoologist's Richard Dawkins' theory on DNA?

5. What was the "Library of Babel" that was described in a story by Jorge Luis Borges?

6. What was the original meaning of the term "entropy"?

7. What are "memes" as first proposed by Richard Dawkins in "The Selfish Gene"?

8. When was the existence of DNA discovered and by whom?

9. The connection of information with entropy and the physical realm was important to what physics discipline?

10. What was John von Neumann's theory on energy cost and how did Rolf Landauer disprove that concept?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

What is a random number? What makes a number computable? What were Gregory Chaitin's conclusions about the complexity of numbers?

Essay Topic 2

What kind of "telegraph" was invented by two French brothers and how did it function. What was the downside of this invention? Why was human error a factor in this process?

Essay Topic 3

What are some of the highlights of Claude Shannon's work on what he termed "information theory"? How did Shannon come to the conclusion that information needed to be separated into "bits" for the most effective transfer of information?

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This section contains 652 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample