Claude Shannon

The Father of Information Theory1916–2001

Camden Ogier CSCE 221 Fall 2014

Early Life

• Son of Claude Shannon Sr. and Mabel Shannon.• Father was businessman and a judge for a short

while. Mother was a language teacher and principle.

• Grew up in Gaylord, Michigan and went to the high school where his mother worked.

• As a child he admired Thomas Edison and eventually learned he was a distant cousin.

Education

• Graduated in 1936 from the University of Michigan with bachelor’s degrees in electrical engineering and mathematics.

• 1937: Received master’s degree in electrical engineering at MIT.

• 1940: Received Ph.D. in philosophy at MIT.

1937 Master’s Thesis

• Written at 21 years old.• Declared by Howard Gardner as “possibly the most

important, and also the most famous, master's thesis of the century“

• Proved that the arrangement of relays could be represented using Boolean algebra.

• Proved relays can be used to solve Boolean algebra problems.

• Thesis became foundation for practical digital circuits.

World War II Research

• Worked in cryptography at Bell Labs and met Alan Turing.

• Also worked on fire-control systems.• Proved that the cryptographic one-time pad is

unbreakable.

One-Time Pad

• Key is truly random• Key is at least as long as the message• No part of any key is ever reused• Key is kept completely secret (duh)

Unbreakable If:

Shannon’s Mouse

• Created mechanical mouse that searched maze for a target.

• The mouse remembers the layout of any part of the maze it has visited before.

• If placed in an unfamiliar location, the mouse searches for one that is familiar.

Inventions and Hobbies

• Juggling• Unicycling• Chess• Rocket powered flying disk• Motorized pogo stick• Flame throwing trumpet• Enjoyed going to Las Vegas and card counting

on weekends with his wife and Ed Thorp.

The “Ultimate Machine”

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kt3csIz3hEk

Sources

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude_Shannon• http://

www.nyu.edu/pages/linguistics/courses/v610003/shan.html

• http://www.bell-labs.com/news/2001/february/26/1.html