Re: JSH: Solving for a factor

Aatu Koskensilta <aatu.koskensilta@xxxxxx> writes:

Herman Jurjus <hjurjus@xxxxxxxxx> writes:

Aatu Koskensilta wrote:

Turing's seminal work in the theory of computability was certainly
very important, but was not immediately appreciated by Max Newman
who initially found it "trivial".

Do you have a reference for that?

I believe it is mentioned in Hodges's biography of Turing, which I
seem to have mislaid. To be more precise, my recollection is that Max
Newman was initially of the opinion that considering machines of such
simple nature could not possible lead to any important insight.

I have now located my copy of the Finnish translation of the
biography. Hodges writes, in my rather unfaithful translation of the
translation:

When Newman finally read Turing's manuscript in May, he found it
difficult to believe that such a simple and straightforward notion as
that of a Turing machine could lead to the solution of Hilbert's
Entscheidungsproblem. The problem had, after all, vexed many an
ingenious mind since Gödel's solution to Hilbert's other problems
five years earlier. Newman's first impression was that there must be
something wrong with the argument, and that a more sophisticated
machine could surely solve the halting problem for Turing machines,
and that the construction of such more sophisticated machines could
be indefinitely iterated.

--
Aatu Koskensilta (aatu.koskensilta@xxxxxx)

"Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen"
- Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
.

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