Waubonsee Community College

Digitized, the science of computers and how it shapes our world, Peter J. Bentley

eng

Includes bibliographical references (pages 263-283) and index

illustrations

index present

non fiction

Digitized

bibliography

752069056

Peter J. Bentley

the science of computers and how it shapes our world

In this book the author tells the story of computer science, explaining how and why computers were invented, how they work, looking at real-world examples of computers in use, and considering what will happen in the future. There's a hidden science that affects every part of your life. You are fluent in its terminology of email, WiFi, social networking, and encryption. You use its results when you make a telephone call, access the Internet, use any factory-produced product, or travel in any modern car. The discipline is so new that some prefer to call it a branch of engineering or mathematics. But it is so powerful and world-changing that you would be hard-pressed to find a single human being on the planet unaffected by its achievements. The science of computers enables the supply and creation of power, food, water, medicine, transport, money, communication, entertainment, and most goods in shops. It has transformed societies with the Internet, the digitization of information, mobile phone networks and GPS (Global Positioning System) technologies. Here, the author explores how this young discipline grew from its theoretical conception by pioneers such as Turing, through its growth spurts in the Internet, its difficult adolescent stage where the promises of Artificial Intelligence (AI) were never achieved and dot-com bubble burst, to its current stage as a (semi)mature field, now capable of remarkable achievements. Charting the successes and failures of computer science through the years, he discusses what innovations may change our world in the future

Computers uncovered -- The science of computers -- Can you compute? -- Understanding the impossible -- Turing's unstoppable machines -- Turing's legacy -- Complexity is simple -- Does P = NP? -- Oracles and other complexities -- Theoretical futures -- Disposable computing --Thinking logically -- Building brains -- Anatomy of a digital brain -- The end of the beginning -- The law of Moore -- The future is many -- Beyond von Neumann -- Your life in binary digits -- Learning to program computers -- Climbing higher -- Bases for data -- Software crisis -- Virtual futures -- Monkeys with world-spanning voices -- Diverse connections -- Inter-networking -- Addressing for success -- Spinning webs over networks -- Weaving tangled webs -- Webs of deceit -- Digital lives -- My computer made me cry -- The birth of friendly computing -- Seeing with new eyes -- Photos and chicken wire -- Waking dreams -- It's not what you do but the way that you do it -- My pet computer -- Human computer integration -- Building bionic brains -- Teaching computers how to play -- The birth of intelligence -- The seasons of AI -- Intelligence from feet to head -- Adaptation by natural selection -- Learning to learn, predicting the predictors -- Complex futures -- A computer changed my life -- Computer creativity -- Computational biology -- Computer medicine -- Computer detectives

Science of computers and how it shapes our world