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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What did the study of thermodynamics not state about the movement of energy?
(a) That it traveled in one direction.
(b) That it traveled in random directions with no pattern.
(c) That it traveled in many directions.
(d) That it was dynamic.

2. A psychologist named George Miller noticed that people seem to be able to easily remember up to how many items at a time?
(a) Seven.
(b) Five.
(c) Ten.
(d) Twelve.

3. What did Chaitin determine about most numbers?
(a) That they are not computable.
(b) That they are computable.
(c) That they can be compressed to manageable entities.
(d) That they have complex alogarithms.

4. What did Seth Lloyd, a quantum engineer at MIT, base his estimates on the universe on?
(a) The speed of light and the age of the universe.
(b) The speed of light.
(c) The age of the universe.
(d) The volume and capacity of the universe.

5. What did Chaitin propose using to express a computable number into another form?
(a) By using advanced calculus.
(b) By using the Turing machine.
(c) By using complex calculations.
(d) By using algebra,

Short Answer Questions

1. Schrodinger and others theorized that genes had what role in life?

2. Shannon used the term entropy to have what meaning in reference to a message?

3. What can the amount of information in a message be expressed in?

4. Chaotic looking numbers may have simplistic algorithms but why are many difficult to determine?

5. What is the most probable state for an arrangement of molecules in a system?

Short Essay Questions

1. What was mathematician Gregory Chatin's concept on entropy?

2. What makes a number "computable?"

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

4. What did IBM research Charle Bennet write about "information" in the 1980s?

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

6. What fundamental problem is inherent in the observation of quantum particles?

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

8. What comparison does the author make to the famous library at Alexandria?

9. What did psychologist George Miller discover about a person's ability to remember?

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

(see the answer keys)

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