Digitized

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

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 technologies. Here, Peter J. Bentley 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 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, Bentley discusses what innovations may change our world in the future.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• Acknowledgements (p. xi)
• List of Illustrations (p. xiii)
• 000 Introduction (p. 1)
• Computers uncovered (p. 4)
• The science of computers (p. 8)
• 001 Can You Compute? (p. 13)
• Understanding the impossible (p. 16)
• Turing's unstoppable machines (p. 21)
• Turing's legacy (p. 25)
• Complexity is simple (p. 29)
• Does P = NP? (p. 34)
• Oracles and other complexities (p. 38)
• Theoretical futures (p. 41)
• 010 Disposable Computing (p. 43)
• Thinking logically (p. 45)
• Building brains (p. 49)
• Anatomy of a digital brain (p. 54)
• The end of the beginning (p. 58)
• The Law of Moore (p. 62)
• The future is many (p. 67)
• Beyond von Neumann (p. 71)
• 011 Your Life in Binary Digits (p. 74)
• Learning to program computers (p. 80)
• Climbing higher (p. 85)
• Bases for data (p. 91)
• Software crisis (p. 95)
• Virtual futures (p. 102)
• 100 Monkeys with World-Spanning Voices (p. 104)
• Diverse connections (p. 108)
• Inter-networking (p. 112)
• Addressing for success (p. 119)
• Spinning webs over networks (p. 123)
• Weaving tangled webs (p. 129)
• Webs of deceit (p. 134)
• Digital lives (p. 137)
• 101 My Computer Made Me Cry (p. 140)
• The birth of friendly computing (p. 145)
• Seeing with new eyes (p. 149)
• Photos and chicken wire (p. 153)
• Waking dreams (p. 156)
• It's not what you do but the way that you do it (p. 162)
• My pet computer (p. 168)
• Human-computer integration (p. 170)
• 110 Building Bionic Brains (p. 173)
• Teaching computers how to play (p. 175)
• The birth of intelligence (p. 179)
• The seasons of AI (p. 182)
• Intelligence from feet to head (p. 190)
• Adaptation by natural selection (p. 195)
• Learning to learn, predicting the predictors (p. 201)
• Complex futures (p. 205)
• 111 A Computer Changed My Life (p. 209)
• Computer creativity (p. 210)
• Computational biology (p. 218)
• Computer medicine (p. 225)
• Computer detectives (p. 233)
• Endnotes (p. 241)
• Bibliographic Notes (p. 263)
• Index (p. 285)

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Library Journal Review

In this engaging introduction to the development of computer science, Bentley (Why Sh*t Happens: The Science of a Really Bad Day) brings the personalities of the field's major players into the historical record. Each subdiscipline gets its own chapter that are then organized chronologically; theoretical computing, hardware, software and programming, networking and encryption, interfaces, and artificial intelligence are all explained in clear, accessible language. A final chapter details many new applications for computer science, such as its use in psychotherapy or its role in computer-generated art, which are not yet commonplace. Verdict Computer science has become so pervasive in modern life that it can seem invisible or be taken for granted; Bentley succeeds in bringing this hidden world to light. Unlike most other computer books for popular audiences, this book is neither a textbook nor a how-to manual. While Darrel Ince's The Computer: A Very Short Introduction covers similar ground, this book's focus is on historical development. Great for anyone studying computer science and readers who want the story behind the electronics they use every day.-Wade Lee, Univ. of Toledo Libs. (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

CHOICE Review

Digitized can best be described as a treatise on the history and general subject of computer science. In the beginning of the book, Bentley, a UK-based academic, journalist, and author (e.g., Digital Biology, 2001; coauthor with David Corne, Creative Evolutionary Systems, CH, Jan'02, 39-2838), offers many personal analogies and opinions, but he quickly transitions into hard facts. The author solicited a series of definitions of the term "computer science" from many professionals, and uses these definitions to show the broad nature of the subject area. The book contains both historical information and brief biographies of prominent computer scientists. This combination is important to show how computer science developed a personality and how it shaped culture. Bentley very effectively uses the history of computer science to chronologically illustrate the major concepts in a captivating way. Many students in computer science learn concepts systematically without learning what drove those discoveries. The book does not shy from complex examples in mathematics and logic. The examples are deep enough to convey a basic understanding of the principles being highlighted but short enough to prevent the reader from becoming disinterested. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Lower- and upper-division undergraduates, two-year technical program students, general readers, and professionals. S. A. Patton Delta State University