Monday, August 23, 2010

Tools of Information.

Recently I heard someone saying "Saying Computer science is like calling astronomy, telescope science. Computer is just a tool, Information is what matters." Though it looks like true, it is completely not. Let's see how. At first, what is information? The definition for the word 'information' is that it is a message that's received and understood. So, there needs to be two components to make it a complete process , a message and a mind that understands the message. Some may argue that there is a sender too, but if we look around we can see minds gathering information that's not sent by anyone. If there is no sender, where does the message come from? The perceiving mind collect it from any information source. So to finalize, information has three major components: a message, a source(where the message is situated/ comes from), and a perceiving mind.

What are the roles of computers in Information science? The purpose of computers (in this context) are to reduce the work of mind. So, in the process of information gathering, which of the three components is computer? Computer stands as a part of the mind which analyses the message. That's how the message becomes an information. If that was the only role of computers, the quote in the beginning of this passage would be completely true, but sometimes computer itself is what is analysed. Then, computer is the source where information resides. That process of getting the information about computers is what is called computer science. So in conclusion, Computer science is just a part of Information science, not the other way around.

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