General Computability
Source text from The Mechanical Mind by Crane
A computer is a device which processes representations in a systematic way
An algorithm is a method for calculating the value of a function
- ”effective procedures” → procedures which, if applied correctly, are entirely effective in bringing about their results (always work)
- Computable if the algorithm gives the value of a function for any argument
- Church’s thesis → anything that can be executed by a Turing machine is computable
- Conditions to be considered an algorithm
- definite next step
- finite number of steps
Turing Machine
The simplest possible device that could perform any computation no matter how complicated
Components:
- Memory:
- A long (infinitely long) tape with squares
- A device that can write/read the symbols on the tape
- Device can move tap one left or one right
- Instructions:
- Possible operations are dictated by machine’s ‘machine table’
- A set of instructions of the form ‘if the machine is in state X and reading symbol S, then do Y and move tape right/left’
Instantiating vs Computing function
- Instantiating → being an instance of/describable by a function
- Computing → employs representation of input and output
Even if a person could be modeled by a Turing machine, that would not show that thinkers are computers, rather, it would show that a thinker instantiates a function, not that it computes that function.
The computational metaphor
Source: Digital Salon with Stephen Wolfram: Building a New Kind of Science, Palladium Mag
- There is a creaking issue in universities where 70% of incoming students want to study computer science but only 5% of faculty is in computer science. What’s really going on is we want to study computer science as a proxy for the computational paradigm for everything around us
- Is there a computable for all ?
- Is there a computational simulation of a mind is sufficient for the actual presence of a mind?