Information Theory
1948 · 20th Century
Claude Shannon published 'A Mathematical Theory of Communication' in the Bell System Technical Journal, establishing the field of information theory. His groundbreaking work introduced concepts like information entropy, channel capacity, and the bit as a unit of information, providing the mathematical foundation for digital communications. Shannon's theory became essential to computing, data compression, and eventually the development of large language models.
Key Figures
Claude Shannon
Locations
Bell Labs
Topics
computingmathematicsinformation
Connected Events — 2 Connections
Transistor and Shannon information theory both developed at Bell Labs within months became twin foundations of digital electronics; transistors provided physical switching for binary information units Shannon defined Invention of the Transistor
Boolean algebra's binary true/false system provided the mathematical foundation for Shannon's information theory, where binary digits became the fundamental units for measuring and transmitting information Boolean Algebra
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