information theory and psychology

I have read a good deal more about information theory and psychology than I can or care to remember. Much of it was a mere association of new terms with old and vague ideas. Presumably the hope was that a stirring in of new terms would clarify the old ideas by a sort of sympathetic magic.

From: John R. Piece’s 1961 An introduction to information theory: symbols, signals and noise. Plus ça change.

Pierce’s book is really quite wonderful and contains lots of chatty asides and examples, such as:

Gottlob Burmann, a German poet who lived from 1737 to 1805, wrote 130 poems, including a total of 20,000 words, without once using the letter R. Further, during the last seventeen years of his life, Burmann even omitted the letter from his daily conversation.