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Advantage of binary no

system

Binary number system:

System of numbers to base two, using combinations of the

digits 1 and 0. Codes based on binary numbers are used to

represent instructions and data in all modern digital

computers, the values of the binary digits (contracted to

bits) being stored or transmitted as, for example,open/closed switches, magnetized/unmagnetized disks and

tapes, and high/low voltages in circuits.

The value of any position in a binary number increases by

powers of 2 (doubles) with each move from right to left (1, 2,

4, 8, 16, and so on). For example, 1011 in the binary number

system represents (1 8) + (0 4) + (1 2) + (1 1), whichadds up to 11 in the decimal system.

The value of any position in a normal decimal, or base-10,

number increases by powers of 10 with each move from right

to left (1, 10, 100, 1,000, 10,000, and so on). For example, the

decimal number 2,567 stands for (2 1,000) + (5 100) + (6

10) + (7 1).

Advantage:

http://encyclopedia.farlex.com/basehttp://encyclopedia.farlex.com/base

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Over the years, several prominent mathematicians have

recognized the potential of the binary system. Francis Bacon

(1561-1626) invented a "bilateral alphabet code," a binary

system that used the symbols A and B rather than 0 and 1. Inhis philosophical work, The Advancement of Learning, Bacon

used his binary system to develop ciphers and codes. These

studies laid the foundation for what was to become word

processing in the late twentieth century. The American

Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII),

adopted in 1966, accomplishes the same purpose as Bacon's

alphabet code. Bacon's discoveries were all the moreremarkable because at the time Bacon was writing, Europeans

had no information about the Chinese work on binary systems.

A German mathematician, Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz

(1646-1716), learned of the binary system from Jesuit

missionaries who had lived in China. Leibniz was quick to

recognize the advantages of the binary system over thedenary system, but he is also well known for his attempts to

transfer binary thinking to theology. He speculated that the

creation of the universe may have been based on a binary

scale, where "God, represented by the number 1, created the

Universe out of nothing, represented by 0." This widely

quoted analogy rests on an error, in that it is not strictly

correct to equate nothing with zero.The English mathematician and logician George Boole (1815-

1864) developed a system of Boolean logic that could be used

to analyze any statement that could be broken down into

binary form (for example, true/false, yes/no, male/female).

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Boole's work was ignored by mathematicians for 50 years,

until a graduate student at the Massachusetts Institute of

Technology realized that Boolean algebra could be applied to

problems of electronic circuits.