Skip to main content
Log in

Reflections on Gödel's and Gandy's Reflections on Turing's Thesis

  • Published:
Minds and Machines Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

We sketch the historical and conceptual context of Turing's analysis of algorithmic or mechanical computation. We then discuss two responses to that analysis, by Gödel and by Gandy, both of which raise, though in very different ways. The possibility of computation procedures that cannot be reduced to the basic procedures into which Turing decomposed computation. Along the way, we touch on some of Cleland's views.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Ackermaun, W. (1928), 'On Hilbert's Construction of the Real Number', in Van Heijenoort (1967), pp. 493–507.

  • Church, A. (1936a), 'A note on the Entscheidungsproblem', Journal of Symbolic Logic 1, pp. 40–41, pp. 101–102.

    Google Scholar 

  • Church, A. (1936b), 'An Unsolvable Problem of Elementary Number Theory', American Journal of Mathematics 58, pp. 345–363.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cleland, C. (1993), 'Is the Church-Turing Thesis True', Minds and Machines 3, pp. 283–312.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cleland, C. (1995), 'Effective Procedures and Computable Functions', Minds and Machines 5, pp. 9–23.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cleland, C. (2001), 'Recipes, Algorithms, and Programs', Minds and Machines 11, pp. 219–237.

    Google Scholar 

  • Davis, M. (ed.) (1965), The Undecidable, Hewlett, NY: Raven Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gandy, R. (1978), 'Church's Thesis and principles for mechanisms', in K. J. Barwise, H. J. Keisler, and K. Kunen, eds., The Kleene Symposium, Vol. 101 of Studies in Logic and Foundations of Mathematics, New York: North-Holland, pp. 123–148.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gandy, R. (1988), 'The Confluence of Ideas in 1936', in R. Herken, ed., The Universal Turing Machine: A Half-Century Survey, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 55–111.

    Google Scholar 

  • Godel, K. (1931), 'On Formally Undecidable Propositions of Principia Mathematica and Related Systems', in Van Heijenoort (1967), pp. 596–616.

  • Godel, K. (1958), 'Uber eine bisher noch nicht benutze Erweiterung des finites Standpunktes', Dialectica 12, pp. 280–287. Also published in Volmune II of Kurt Godel: Collected Works, Oxford University Press, 1990, S. Feferman et al., eds., pp. 240–251, with commentary by A. S. Troelstra,pp. 217–241. A later version of an authorized translation (1972), On an extemsion of finitary mathematics which has not yet been used, is reproduced in pp. 271–280.

    Google Scholar 

  • et al., eds., pp. 369–371.

    Google Scholar 

  • Godel, K. (1990a), 'Remarks Before the Princeton Bicentenial Conference on Problems in Mathematics', in S. Feferman, J. J. W. Dawson, S. C. Kleene, C. H. Moore, R. M. Solovay, and J. van Heijenoort, eds., Kurt Godel: Collected Works, Vol. II, New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 150–153. With introductory material by Charles Parsons, pp. 144–150.

    Google Scholar 

  • Godel, K. (1990b), 'Some Remarks on the Undecidability Results', in S. Feferman, J. J.W. Dawson, S. C. Kleene, G. H. Moore, R. lvi. Solovay, and J. van Heijenoort, eds., Kurt Godel: Collected Works, Vol. II, New York: Oxford University Press. With introductory material by Judson Webb.

    Google Scholar 

  • Godel, K. (1995), 'Some Basic Theorems on the Foundations of Mathematics and Their Implications', in S. Feferman, J. J. W. Dawson, W. Goldfarb, C. Parsons, and R. N. Solovay, eds., Kurt Godel: Collected Works, Vol. III, New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 304–323. With introductory material by C. Boolos, pp. 290–304.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hilbert, D. (1904), 'On the Foundations of Logic and Arithmetic', in Van Heijenoort (1967), pp. 129–138.

  • Hilbert, D. (1927), 'The Foundations of Mathematics', in van Heijenoort (1967), pp. 464–479.

  • Minsky, M. (1967), Computation: Finite and Infinite Machines, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.

    Google Scholar 

  • Penrose, R. (1989), The Emperor's New Mind, London: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rogers, H. (1967), Theory of Recursive Functions and Effective Computability, Series in Higher Mathematics, New York: McGraw-Hill.

    Google Scholar 

  • Scott, D. (1967), 'Some Definitional Suggestions for Automata Theory', Journal of Computer and System Sciences 1, pp. 187–212.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sieg, W. (1994), 'Mechanical Procedures and Mathematical Experience', in A. George, ed., Mathematics and Mind, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Turing, A. (1936), 'On Computable Numbers With an Application to the Entscheidungsproblem', Proc. London Math. Soc. 42, pp. 230–265. Corrections ibid. 43 (1937), pp. 544–546. Also published in Davis (1965), pp. 155–222.

    Google Scholar 

  • Turing, A. (1986), 'Report on the Automatic Computing Engine', in B. Carpenter and R. W. Doran, eds., A.M. Turing's ACE Report of 1946 and Other Paper's, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 106–124.

    Google Scholar 

  • van Heijenoort, J., ed. (1967), From Frege to Godel: A Sourcebook in Mathematical Logic, 1879– 1931, Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wang, H. (1974), From Mathematics to Philosophy, International Library of Philosophy and Scientific Method, New York: Humanities Press. See especially pp. 324–326 and notes there to.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Israel, D. Reflections on Gödel's and Gandy's Reflections on Turing's Thesis. Minds and Machines 12, 181–201 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1015634729532

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1015634729532

Navigation