About QR48 and CSCI E-2: Bits

This is a course about information for students who are not technically or mathematically oriented. It aims to explain the dramatic increase in the amount of information that is being communicated and stored, and the consequences for society of that increase in capacity.We are on the cusp of a revolution, potentially as consequential as the invention of printing or the replacement of animals by steam engines as the vehicles of transportation.The course aims to equip those who will determining policies, whether as legislators, corporate leaders, or ordinary citizens in their multiple roles, with an awareness of the choices that lie only a short time ahead of us.

Examples of questions that motivate the course are the following. How much could be known and is known about me because I use a cell phone? A TV remote? A toll booth transponder? As a society how do we balance the benefits and risks when information about individuals can be transmitted and monitored almost constantly? Can and should privacy of information be protected? Can we look to the day when Widener Library will be reduced to the volume of an iPod and issued to each Harvard student, and the library will become irrelevant except to sentimentalists? What happens to the notion of information ownership or copyright should that occur? What are the roles of the private and public sectors in controlling and disseminating information, in the US and abroad?

The course has four principal segments. The first is Information as Stuff, in which we develop the principles that enable us to think about information as a measurable commodity that can be moved from one place to another. Information is different from both data and facts, and the theory that explains how is a great achievement of mid-twntieth-century science that made possible the current information revolution. The second is Privacy. How much information about individuals can be recovered from existing databases, how can encryption technologies maintain privacy, and what should the government's interest be in protecting privacy while supporting the interests of law enforcement in gathering information about criminal activities? The third section is about Communications. How does the Internet work, how do cell phones work, does the current communications revolution resemble or differ from the deployment of the telegraph or telephone, and what further changes should we expect in the future? Are there any limits on how quickly information can be moved? The last section is about Intellectual Property. The rapid deployment of digital technology has been accompanied by major changes in patent and copyright law. What are the consequences for the creative arts and for the lives of ordinary citizens, and is an alternative regulatory structure imaginable?

See the Course Requirements for a more detailed explanation of what will happen in the course. There are no prerequisites, beyond high school algebra. There is no computer programming in this course; nor is it assumed that students have ever programmed computers.

Why This Course Has Two Numbers

Quantitative Reasoning 48 is the Harvard College course, taught to Harvard undergraduates MWF 11-12. CSCI E-2 is the course in the Harvard Extension School. CSCI E-2 is a distance learning course. Students will view the lectures (either live or as video on demand) through a password-protected web site and will turn in homework electronically.The lecture videos will also be available to students enrolled in QR48. At the end of the course they will be available for general viewing.Click here if you are interested in signing up for CSCI E-2.