Moscow, Russia

Systems Analysis, Control Theory, and Information Processing

Language: English Studies in English
Subject area: engineering and engineering trades
University website: www.hse.ru
4 years
Analysis
Analysis is the process of breaking a complex topic or substance into smaller parts in order to gain a better understanding of it. The technique has been applied in the study of mathematics and logic since before Aristotle (384–322 B.C.), though analysis as a formal concept is a relatively recent development.
Information
Information is any entity or form that provides the answer to a question of some kind or resolves uncertainty. It is thus related to data and knowledge, as data represents values attributed to parameters, and knowledge signifies understanding of real things or abstract concepts. As it regards data, the information's existence is not necessarily coupled to an observer (it exists beyond an event horizon, for example), while in the case of knowledge, the information requires a cognitive observer.
Theory
A theory is a contemplative and rational type of abstract or generalizing thinking, or the results of such thinking. Depending on the context, the results might, for example, include generalized explanations of how nature works. The word has its roots in ancient Greek, but in modern use it has taken on several related meanings.
Information
There's no going back, and there's no hiding the information. So let everyone have it.
Andrew Kantor, as quoted in The Transparent Society, by David Brin, p. 1. Perseus Books Group, 1998.
Information
Wisdom is dead. Long live information.
Mason Cooley (1927-2002), American academic and aphorist. City Aphorisms (1984).
Theory
It is clear that the arm of criticism cannot replace the criticism of arms. Material force can only be overthrown by material force, but theory itself becomes a material force when it has seized the masses. Theory is capable of seizing the masses when it demonstrates ad hominem, and it demonstrates ad hominem as soon as it becomes radical. To be radical is to grasp things by the root. But for man the root is man himself. What proves beyond doubt the radicalism of German theory, and thus its practical energy, is that it begins from the resolute positive abolition of religion. The criticism of religion ends with the doctrine that man is the supreme being for man. It ends, therefore, with the categorical imperative to overthrow all those conditions in which man is an abased, enslaved, abandoned, contemptible being—conditions which can hardly be better described than in the exclamation of a Frenchman on the occasion of a proposed tax upon dogs: 'Wretched dogs! They want to treat you like men!'
Karl Marx, Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right (1843)
Thanks to a recent EU-funded study, geological chemists now understand how tectonic plates and convection in the mantle are connected.
Privacy Policy