Absolute judgment, Immediate memory

on Page 239: "... In his groundbreaking paper, "The Magical Number Seven," Miller synthesized the results of these studies of "absolute judgment" in a way that was to have great importance both for him and for Simon. Absolute judgment refers to the ability to distinguish among one-dimensional sensory stimuli, for instance, how someone can identify a sound via differences in pitch or volume , but not both. In the experiments on absolute judgment that Miller summarized , "the observer is considered to be a communication channel." ... ..."

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on Page 240:

"... Miller, however, quickly shows that this Pythagorean insight is misleading. He describes the distinction as follows: "Absolute judgment is limited by the amount of information [measured in bits]. Immediate memory is limited by the number of items. In order to capture this distinction in somewhat picturesque terms, I have fallen into the custom of distinguishing between bits of information and chunks of information. .. ..."