Is your mate actually a computer? Would you pass the “Turing test”?

This year marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of famed British mathematician Alan Turing (23 June 1912 – 7 June 1954). The outline of his remarkable life and sad ending has by now become fairly well known. Turing laid numerous foundation stones of modern computing, ranging from the deepest mathematical nature of computing (using what are now called Turing machines he provided the modern approach to incompleteness and undecidability) to specific issues of practical design; he also contributed to mathematical biology (morphology) and much else. At the same time, he played a key role in the British government’s breaking

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April 27th, 2012 | Category: Essays | Comments are closed

Book Review: “Why Beliefs Matter: Reflections on the Nature of Science”

In his book Why Beliefs Matter: Reflections on the Nature of science, noted British mathematician E. Brian Davies surveys the sweeping landscape of modern philosophy of science and mathematics, with considerable skill and numerous thoughtful insights. Its closest analogue would be John Barrow’s 1992 book Pi in the Sky: Counting, Thinking and Being.

Davies is certainly qualified to write this book. He has published works in spectral theory, operator theory, quantum mechanics, and the philosophy of science. He served as the President of the London Mathematical Society from 2008-2009.

Some of Davies’ most intriguing comments relate to the nature of

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April 23rd, 2012 | Category: Book Reviews | Comments are closed

Numbers to note (#1): Treasury report on TARP program

The present bloggers have instituted a new category of brief postings under the rubric of “Numbers to note.” These are items that we see posted in news media or other sources with particularly interesting data of one type or another relating to either current events or to developments in science and/or technology. In many cases the notable numbers belie previous or current political bombast.

Our first posting comes from a very interesting set of charts just released by the U.S. Treasury entitled “The Financial Crisis Response in Charts”. This is chock-full of intriguing data on the recent financial crash of

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April 15th, 2012 | Category: News | Comments are closed