Where Did The Term Boolean Originate

UK PM Wants to “Stop People from Communicating” on Social Media

Since trying to figure out what David Cameron is saying is in dispute, we have decided to post a video of what David Cameron said, in full, with regards to the riots:

The relevant portion is 6:40 – 7:03. In the event the video is taken down, we also decided to offer this transcription of what Cameron said:

“Mr. Speaker, everyone watching these horrific actions will be stuck- will be struck by how they were organized via social media. Free flow of information can be used for good, but it can also be used for ill. So we are working with the police, the intelligence services, and industry to look at whether it would be right to stop people from communicating via these websites and services when we know they are plotting violence, disorder and criminality.”

The question is how would this be carried out? Would the government try and block certain individuals from accessing social media or would this be suggesting that the government intends to block out social media altogether? If that is uncertain, which possibility would be feasible?

If the government intends to block specific individuals instead, that would mean that everyone on different web services would have to be monitored. For that, there would essentially be a need for a massive amount of man power to monitor every communication on a given network. If it can be broken down to one person monitoring ten people’s communication, the number of people needed for such a task would be completely unfeasible just on wages, working space and training alone. The next logical step, in that case, would be to somehow automate the process. The only logical method to do so, that I can see, is have a system that monitors certain keywords. Such a method would be easily circumvented. For example, if the keyword being looked for is “riot”, then all people would have to do is use the word “ri0t” instead and a simple word search would not be able to find it. If there’s some Boolean involved where the word is “ri*t” (where the “*” can be anything) then the word can be changed again to “rio7″. If multiple variations are in place, then one can simply use services like upsidedowntext.com and use “ʇoıɹ”. What’s more, messages can be further encoded by other means including Morse Code where “riot” would become “.-. .. — -”. There’s really hundreds of ways to send a message in text to another party in the first place that don’t include any of these ideas. No automated process would ever be bullet proof.

Savvy Cafe Answers » Where did the term boolean originate?

Internet savvy people know that a boolean search allows users to widen or narrow their internet search by combining or excluding words by including terms such as “AND”, “NOT” and “OR” in their search criteria.   What many may not know is how the search method got such a funny sounding name.  George Boole was a 19th century mathematician in England.  He developed what he called “Boolean Logic.”   Boolean Logic allowed him to combine certain concepts and exclude others while searching databases.   Today, those wishing to perform a Boolean search can use either the word or the mathematical equivalent.  For example, you can type “AND” or “+”.     With the millions of web pages on the Internet, Boolean searches are often the easiest way to find the information you need quickly, without having to wade through hundreds of pages. 

Hi Simone,

Just to clarify “boolean” originated in the 19th century by George Boole, who created “Boolean Logic.” Basically, in regards to the internet, Boolean Logic is used by search items to group them together or exclude items from groups. So if you are looking for horses but you don’t want any searches pulled up on other farm animals, i.e. cows, the search engines would look for Horses NOT Cows. If you want to find a listing about means of travel, a search engine may use the word OR to highlight cars or trains. If you are looking about the relationship between two things such as “How many search engines use Boolean Logic,” the search would look for search engines AND “boolean logic.”

Hopefully, I haven’t confused the topic even more but a great site that really breaks down Boolean Logic into an understandable definition is this one, http://www.internettutorials.net/boolean.html . I hope that this helps in clarifying the answer to the question.

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