Re: Alan Turing's Halting Problem is Incorrect (FINAL PART)

From: Peter Olcott (olcott_at_worldnet.att.net)
Date: 07/10/04 

Date: Sat, 10 Jul 2004 15:01:16 GMT

> >***************************************************
> >All that is required is that the meaning of the reply be
> >kept from the counter-example program. The WillHalt()
> >Function arranges a coded reply to the human user.
> >
> >It could be as simple as one and zero. The meaning of true
> >would be assigned to either one or zero, the meaning of
> >false would be assigned to the other. Before the program
> >takes the input of the counter-example program it outputs
> >either a one or a zero to the screen. Whichever (1 or 0) is
> >output, holds the meaning of true. Whichever one it outputs
> >is generated by a hardware noise based random number
> >generator. Now the counter-example program has no way
> >to thwart the WillHalt() function, and the human user can
> >understand the result.
> >***************************************************
>
> Yes, the idea that hiding the meaning of the reply
> from the counterexample program changes something
> is awesomely stupid. For any of various reasons:
>
> There's nothing in the proof of the impossibility
> that has anything to do with the counterexample
> program knowing what the WillHalt function returns.

http://www.netaxs.com/people/nerp/automata/halting2.html
        function LoopIfHalts (M, w):
            if WillHalt (M, w) then // WillHalt() returns Boolean true
                while true do {}
            else
                return false;

It sure looks like you are wrong here. At least in this example
the counter-example program explicitly depends upon WillHalt()
returning Boolean true. If this counter-example program only
received a return value from WillHalt() that could not be
construed as either Boolean true, or Boolean false, it would
fail.

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