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Wolfram's 2,3 Turing Machine Is Universal!
Rik702 writes "Wolframscience.com have announced that an undergraduate from Birmingham, UK has proved Wolfram's 2,3 Turing Machine is universal." You can read a pdf of the proof as well as some related coverage.
Clarification:
Wolfram's claim in NKS that he had discovered some fundamentally new way to approach science that couldn't be handled by existing peer review processes was hogwash. Others had done that kind of thing long before, and little in NKS helped advance the state of the art.
Wolfram's proof in NKS that his Rule 110 cellular automaton was a Universal Turing Machine, was not hogwash. (That UTM was different from the one described in the story, obviously.)
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
Sometimes the changes in Science come from just thinking about things differently. Whether Stephen is arrogant or not is irrelevant to the ideas or claims being evaluated. I doubt anything is invented in a vacuum, but rather a product of all the little discoveries and thoughts finally coalescing into something tangible.
The main point here is that we are reaching limits in machine technology, and jumping to a different scale will require a new way of thinking about what we've already learned.
Let me recommend three books: "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions" by Kuhn, "Bionics" by Salsburg, and "How Inventions Begin" by Leinhard. Three different thinkers; three different descriptions of the progress of technology.
I have heard a number of criticisms on NKS, but most of the critics I've met have not actually read the book. (OK, it's a big book... I've found the same problems with people criticizing "Science and Sanity" by Korzybski, "Synergetics" by Fuller, and "Democracy in America" by de Tocqueville.) If you are going to criticize a book, please read it and understand it first.
Recently William Gibson mentioned the problems with writing Science Fiction due to the unpredictability of the future and rapid technological change. As our technology becomes more abstract, more materials will be "intelligent" in new ways. For instance, imagine concrete with the intelligence to repair itself when a pothole is in imminent probability of forming. This type of "Turing Machine" computational ability at the molecular level may be the key to inventing this product.
"The mind works quicker than you think!"
Lots of nitpicking of the solution and Wolfram and such have been posted. Let the nitpickers contribute!
It takes a push from various people, and communication and conflicts of opinions to wind up exciting someone to sit down and solve some excruciating problem.
I don't care whether it is math, mechanics, biology or physics, someone has to do the HARD work, and Wolfram contributed in his own promotional way, and Alex Smith solved the SOB of the smallest Turing problem, with a significant set of input from the judging panel requesting addtional work.
A community of interested people wound up involved in getting an advanced solution. Then others said "but what good is it in requiring an infinite memory/tape". Similar things were said about past inventions, until other inventors figured out how to make the prior/first invention practical.
I love math, but am not a mathemetician, so I have to contribute with the mundane discoveries and designs I do in my arena of medical product design, and they too will live on beyond me.
The complainers should leave something that outlives them. That is what makes for a great society.