Hello again! Unless this is the first post you’re seeing, then hello for the first time! Welcome!
Since there are an absurd amount of inventions and concepts that have developed throughout human history, I though it could be fun to name a few and talk about whether they’re a digital thing or an analog thing. This is following up on my post about what makes something digital in the first place.
Remember, what makes something digital is its resistance to change. Digital concepts, objects, and processes are things with a fixed number of possibilities. And most importantly, these digital things are resistant to noise. Noise is at its essence, unwanted change. Think of static on your TV or in a walkie-talkie or a radio. That is a type of noise. Or think of a aging painting with fading colors. This too is noise. Change that alters the product or the experience. A digital representation of something, or a digital item or concept will retain its meaning despite the noise, or it will be able to remove the noise to show you a clean, unaltered item.
Now that we have the recap out of the way, let’s jump into some STUFF!
Let’s begin with Cuneiform. This wonderful writing here dates back to the good old days, roughly 3400 BCE. Just a few years before our youngest members of Congress were born. It was the first real system of writing, and was invented in Ancient Mesopotamia.
Is cuneiform digital or analog? Made your guess?
It is ANALOG. Let me tell you why.
Cuneiform is different than a regular written language. In its original state, cuneiform etchings were based off of sounds. The “writing” is less spelling something and more describing how it’s pronounced, or how it sounds in a daily experience. This is pretty open to interpretation to whoever is writing it, so it can’t have the fixed possibilities that a digital medium requires.
Next, let’s have a look at this. This painting is one that I’d bet you’ve seen before many times.
The Mona Lisa. Painted by Leonardo da Vinci in the early 1500s. One of the Renaissance’s most iconic works. It is an oil painting on canvas.
Do you think the Mona Lisa is digital or analog? Give it a second of thought.
It is ANALOG. Let me tell you why.
Since the Mona Lisa is an oil painting, if you were to copy it and reproduce it today, it would be impossible to do it EXACTLY the was it was originially done. The painting has aged and the colors have faded or changed. Even if you were able to restore the work to its original state, you wouldn’t be able to mix the paints into the exact same colors, or mimic the brushstrokes to create a 1:1 exact copy of the painting. Not even after a million attempts. The painting is not reproducible.
Now let’s have a look at something more modern. This is a CD. A compact disc. It stores information. In this case, it stores music!
Other forms of storing music such as a record or a cassette are analog. What do you think a CD is?
It is DIGITAL. Let me tell you why.
A CD stores information as zeroes and ones! This binary code is represented on the disc as microscopic pits on the disc. These pits (1s) and the spaces between them (0s) are read by a laser in the CD player which is sent to a computer to play your music. This format is reproducable (you can copy a CD flawlessly) and resistant to noise. The disc won’t deacy on its own and lose/distort information. Though I wouldn’t advise it, the back surface of a CD can be scratched and retain its function. Scratch it too much and it will stop working though, so be careful!
I hope these examples were helpful and informative about figuring out if things are digital or analog! There are a lot of inventions out there, and every single one of them will fall into one of these categories. Pick a few of your favorites and give it a shot!