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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What were the two essential elements of Shannon's simple communication model?
(a) Grid and network.
(b) Circuit and grid.
(c) A transmitter and a receiver.
(d) Two relay switches.

2. Who wrote the work known as the Principia Mathematica?
(a) Bertrand Russell and Alfred North Whitehead.
(b) Galileo and Copernicus.
(c) Edwin Hubble and Isaac Newton.
(d) Aristotle and Epecruis.

3. Who was the sixth editor of the Oxford English Dictionary?
(a) Thomas Edison.
(b) John Simpson.
(c) Mark Twain.
(d) Lord Byron.

4. Gleick presents his intention to trace the growth of both the concept of information and information itself by identifying what key elements?
(a) The people and thinking that contributed to it.
(b) Nation and type of governance.
(c) Society and culture.
(d) Origin and reliability of sources.

5. Why were there so many message errors with the early telegraph?
(a) Political unrest.
(b) Untrained workers.
(c) Poor weather conditions.
(d) Passing the messages between too many operators.

6. What were the benefits of the early logarithm tables?
(a) Eliminated calculations.
(b) Cut down on errors and allowed for quicker calculations.
(c) Provided solutions.
(d) Made work easier.

7. Prior to the electric telegraph, an invention by the same name was created by Claude Chappe and his brothers during what conflict?
(a) The Spanish-American War.
(b) The French Revolution.
(c) World War I.
(d) The Russian Revolution.

8. How was the telephone superior to the telegraph?
(a) It was less expensive.
(b) It was the preferred means of communications by government.
(c) Ease of use, no need for encoding of the message, and its availability.
(d) Anyone could use a phone.

9. Why did Lovelace publish her mathematical arguments anonymously?
(a) She wasn't sure her arguments were correct.
(b) She didn't want to appear more intelligent than Babbage.
(c) Women were not expected to engage in scientific or academic efforts.
(d) She didn't want to embarrass her father.

10. The invention of what technology would make Shannon's theory of a computing machine practical?
(a) Circuit.
(b) Transistor.
(c) Grid.
(d) Network.

11. What was the main form of communication in the late 1940s?
(a) Special couriers.
(b) The telephone.
(c) The telegraph.
(d) Letters.

12. Shannon proposed a solution for overcoming extra noise in his communication model that mimicked what early communicators?
(a) Early telephone developers.
(b) African drummers.
(c) Telegraph operators.
(d) The French telegraph inventors.

13. In the prologue to "The Information", what year does Gleick identify as a crucial year in the history of information and computing?
(a) 1961.
(b) 1932.
(c) 1955.
(d) 1948.

14. What was Claude Shannon fascinated with?
(a) Cryptograms.
(b) Computing.
(c) Communications.
(d) Electronics.

15. How were phonetic sounds represented in language?
(a) By characters.
(b) By images.
(c) By codes.
(d) By numbers.

Short Answer Questions

1. What was the intent of the Principia Mathematica?

2. Shannon showed that it was theoretically possible to overcome any amount of signal noise by what action?

3. What was the small device intended to replace bulky vacuum tubes perfected by Bell Laboratories called?

4. How was the machine created by Charles Babbage received?

5. What did a young mathematician named Kurt Gödel conclude about conflicting statements?

(see the answer keys)

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