Методические указания по английскому языку для студентов I курса всех факультетов. Часть 2. Богданова Н.А - 79 стр.

directly from other living beings, from mass media, from electronic data banks and
from all sorts of observable phenomena in the surrounding environment. A person
using such facts and opinions generates more information, some of which is
communicated to others during discourse1, by instructions, in letters and
documents, end through other media. Information organized according to some
logical relationships is referred to as a body of knowledge2 to be acquired by
systematic exposure or study. Application of knowledge (or skills) yields expertise,
and additional analytical or experiential insights are said to constitute instances of
wisdom. Use of the term "information" is not restricted exclusively to its
communication via Natural language. Information is also registered and
communicated through art and by facial expressions and gestures. Moreover, every
living entity is endowed with information in the form of a genetic code. These
information phenomena permeate the physical and mental world.
      Interest in information phenomena has increased dramatically in the 20-th
century, and today they are the objects of study in number of disciplines, including
philosophy, physics, biology, linguistics, information and computer science,
electronic and communication engineering, management science, and the social
sciences. On the commercial side, the information service industry has become one
of the newer industries worldwide. Almost all other industries - manufacturing and
service- are increasingly concerned with information and its handling. The
different, though often overlapping, viewpoints and phenomena of these fields lead
to different (and sometimes conflicting), concepts and "definitions" of information.
       Preoccupation3 with information and knowledge as an individual
organizational, and societal resource is stronger today than at any other time in
history. The volume of books printed in l6-th century Europe is estimated to have
doubled approximately every seven years. Interestingly, the same growth rate has
been calculated for global scientific and technical literature in the 20-th century and
for business documents in the United States in the 1980-s. If these estimates ore
reasonably correct, the growth of recorded information is a historical phenomenon,
not peculiar to modern times. The present, however, has several new dimensions4
relative to the information resource: modern information systems collect and
generate information automatically, they provide rapid access to the corpora of
information, and they manipulate information with previously unattainable
versatility and efficiency.
  1
      discourse – беседа; лекция; доклад
  2
      a body of knowledge – совокупность знаний