Download PDF Information A Very Short Introduction Luciano Floridi Books

Product details Paperback 160 pages Publisher Oxford University Press; 1 edition (March 26, 2010) Language English ISBN-10 0199551375

Information A Very Short Introduction Luciano Floridi Books Reviews

• Although I consider this a worthwhile book, it is spoilt by many typographical errors.
  For someone without a mathematical background, the errors might cause confusion, putting them completely off the text.
  I would appreciate receiving a corrected version of the book. Please remember, there may be more typographical mistakes.
  Here are 17 I found
  1. Chapter 1, page 6, location 233 “1 exabyte corresponds to 1018 bytes”. An exabyte is 2^60 bytes, which is about 10^18 bytes.
  2. Chapter 2, page 28, location 528 “byte (by eigh £)” Is the word “eight” intended?
  3. Chapter 2, page 28, location 528 “256 (28) characters.” The number 28 should be 28.
  4. Chapter 2, page 28, location 530 “128 (27) characters.” The number 28 should be 27.
  5. Chapter 2, page 33, location 589 “a and 6”. Should be “a and b”.
  6. Chapter 2, page 33, location 600 “battery (6) being flat (G).” “(6)” should be “(b)”.
  7. Chapter 3, page 40, location 685 “when [275e] once it is written”. What should “[275e]” be?
  8. Chapter 3, page 41, location 701 “In the AS system”.”AS” should be “AB”.
  9. Chapter 4, page 50, location 813. I think the term “[DBF]” and subsequent occurrences should be “[DEF]”.
  10. Chapter 4, page 56, location 916. “2) P-+ S” should be “2) P-> S”.
  11. Chapter 5, page 67, location 1056. In “23, where 2 is the number of states and 3 the number of coins.”, “23” should be “23”.
  12. Chapter 5, page 67, location 1056. In “all 23 states simultaneously”, “23” should be “23”.
  13. Chapter 5, page 67, location 1056. In “containing 2n possible states”, “2n” should be “2n”.
  14. Chapter 6, page 81, location 1230. Should “Merries” be “Memes”?
  15. Chapter 7, page 100, location 1487. Should “PG4)” be “P(4)”?
  16. Chapter 7, page 102, location 1503. The following occurrences of “P(B\AC)” should be “P(B/AC)”.
  17. Chapter 8, page 112, location 1653. In “fomg/ information”, should “fomg” be “inforg”?
  
  For the record, I've communicated these errors to Professor Floridi
• I decided to explore the Information Age with 3 books. Since I hoped that Professor Floridi's book would provide foundational knowledge, it was first. The next two will be Adam Segal's "The Hacked World Order" and Thomas Davenport's and Julia Kirby's "Only Humans Need Apply." I will review these books as I finish them.
  
  Professor Floridi explores information in its various forms - largely digital, but also analogue, quantum, genetic, biological systems, economic (with a brief exposure to game theory) and the ethics of information. Claude Shannon plays an early, and important, role in the development of the mathematical theory of communication. But, if you experience an involuntary cautionary response to the word "math," don't worry, the book doesn't contain much of it. I wish that the book included a little more of the math underlying Claude Shannon's theory of communication, but perhaps Professor Floridi realized that this would be too much for a reader such as me.
  
  The book provides a useful overview of the field. Some of the observations will seem self-evident and little more than common sense. Some I had not encountered before such as "information minus meaning equals data" or said another way "data plus meaning equals information." What algorithms or models that one uses to impose meaning on data is left to the reader.
  
  Igave the book 4 stars and not 5 because of his approach to the ethics of information. Some of the ethics arise from law, which seemed relatively unremarkable. However, he also make the claim that information embodied, for example, in paintings or the environment seem to have ethical rights. The Professor and I could find common ground in agreeing that defacing the Mona Lisa or dumping harmful chemicals into streams and rivers is a very bad idea. I am not sure that I am ready to go as far as he does in extending the concept of independent ethical rights.
  
  The book served the purpose that I described above. Much of the book visited areas with which I had prior familiarity and some of it explored new territory. I occasionally had to review portions of the book to draw out its meaning. It provided a useful foundation for my investigation of the current status of the Information Age. I recommend it.
• In this concise package, Luciano Floridi successfully introduces reader to various aspects important for the Philosophy of Information.
  
  After Copernicus, Darwin, Freud shifted our paradigms about how we see our place in the larger scheme of universe and life, starting with Turing, an understanding of “interconnected informational organisms in a global environment ultimately made of information” may be driving a similar shift that author calls “the fourth revolution”.
  
  Besides giving a useful map and definitions to navigate (e.g. various classifications and aggregations levels taking data to knowledge), little book covers foundational topics in briefly to make it enjoyable read even for someone familiar with one or more aspects of Information. After briefly introducing topics like mathematical theory communication (Shannon), semantic information, and concepts from thermodynamics, book goes over domain-specific issues (biology, economics).
  
  As a contrast to the ideas in this book, although a bit too harsh in my opinion, one should look at Searle’s criticism of Floridi’s approach, done in a review of Floridi’s another book “The Fourth Revolution”. This book covers a great deal more than some things that Searle has criticized; it’s an awesome introduction to several facets of a major theme of our times.