User talk:R.e.s.


 * ( Talk page for user r.e.s. )

Welcome from Redwolf24
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Redwolf24 (Talk) 00:13, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

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 * Hi Redwolf24, and thanks for the welcome! The links are proving useful, and the phtml on your page is interesting too ;o) --r.e.s. 16:04:25, 2005-07-23 (UTC)

Help with "Turing's Proof" page
Hi, I could use some edit help with the "Turing's Proof" page, especially "proof #3". (This page is meant to be interpretive, synoptic, i.e. I don't consider it "original work"). wvbaileyWvbailey 17:17, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

Turing completeness
You reverted my copyediting of Turing completeness but did not stated why in the edit summary. So.. why? Cheers, —Ruud 21:50, 14 February 2006 (UTC)


 * P.S. you might be interested in WikiProject Computer science. —Ruud 21:52, 14 February 2006 (UTC)


 * P.P.S. I guess it was the misspelling of abstract machine. —Ruud 21:54, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

wvbailey here: I have a cc of Wang (1957) in pdf format, etc.
I have a cc of Wang (1957) A Variant to Turing's Theory of Computing Machines in pdf format. If you send me your e-mail address I will try to forward it to you. Also, I have an exerpted part of the first Davis paper. I was slightly in error -- it refers to Post-Turing programs on Turing machines. Oh well, what he calls a Post-Turing program is exactly what we think it is, excepting no STOP/HALT (!) He uses the same stop method I proposed to CMummert -- an instruction looping back to itself. I am going to try to use my copier to scan this, we'll see how that goes. If successful I could e-mail you that too. You can e-mail me at pierab@aol.com. wvbaileyWvbailey 18:56, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

new article: Wang B-machine
Hi, wvbailey here. I created a new article called Wang B-machine and a rediret-page called Wang machine B. Since you are the one who found this Wang-dude's reference, I say: edit to your heart's content! We could call it the Wang B model or Wang model B or whatever. If you want to move things around so Wang B-machine redirects to "Wang machine B" do whatever you want. I just picked B-machine because I liked the sound.

I did find a spiffy quote from Minsky (1967) page 200 that emphatically verifies your assertion that Wang was the first to model the Turing machine as a computer-like machine.

I've convinced myself that only one "conditional transfer" is necessary. That no "erase" is necessary is more remarkable. wvbaileyWvbailey 19:09, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Large numbers
Hi; I moved your comment to Talk:Large numbers. Tom Harrison Talk 13:33, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

-- Thanks for moving it where it belongs. Sorry for the mix-up. --r.e.s. 19:30, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Bijective base-k numeration
I posted this question on the talk page, but no one has answered, so I came to the original author of the page. Suppose that one changes the association of the numeral when changing sides of the decimal place, such that .A == .01 and .A9 == .001. Would this solve the problem of there being an infinite number of ways to express a number?


 * Short answer, as I see it: Yes, but the system is not bijective (e.g., still 1 = .A) and it can't represent most real numbers (e.g. irrationals). I've replied to your [original posting] in more detail.--r.e.s. 19:31, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

kolmogorov complexity
Dear R.e.s.,

I'm a math student and I'd love to ask you a quick question. I noticed your participation on the k.c. page and I'm confused:

By the definition of computable function it looks as though if there exists an algorithm for computing the function that's all "computable" means. Give me a (well formed) string X, I compare it to each of the (well formed) 255 letters (or whatever) in my symbolic alphabet and conclude it is equivalent to none of them, hence its complexity exceeds 1. I can do this until I have an expression that is equivalent to X, at which point it's complexity has been computed, can't I?

I feel like I am making a common error, but can't see it. Can you help me straighten it out? Thanks,

A.M. —Preceding unsigned comment added by MotherFunctor (talk • contribs) 09:11, 8 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes, to say a function is (total) computable is just to say there is an algorithm that computes it. But no, there can be no algorithm such as you describe, if I'm understanding you correctly. The reason is that it can't complete all the comparisons you're wanting it to do: "comparing" successive strings (programs) P to the given string X, and supposedly determining in each case if P is "equivalent" to X, i.e. whether program P returns (outputs) X. If the procedure could do all of this, then the length of the first such P it found would indeed be the desired complexity of X. (In other words, the idea is the same as ordering all programs in shortlex order, simulating the execution of each one in succession, and returning the length of the first one that outputs X.)  This idea won't work, because non-halting programs P will be encountered, preventing the procedure from halting; and this can't be overcome by some clever weeding-out of the non-halting programs, because the Halting Problem is undecidable.--r.e.s. 14:31, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

Small typo in the Post correspondence article
I corrected a small typo in Example 2 you added recently for this page


 * Good catch -- thanks. --r.e.s. (talk) 18:26, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

Computable functions
Hi. Would you mind taking a look at this section? I have sketched a proof for most real numbers being uncomputable but would like to cite a peer-reviewed source. Perhaps you know one?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computable_function#Incomputable_functions_and_unsolvable_problems

Also, I am worried about this sentence (which I did not write):

"The set of finitary functions on the natural numbers is uncountable so most are not computable."

I'm not sure how to show that. Is this assumed to be equivalent to the powerset of the natural numbers? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Awaterl (talk • contribs) 00:37, 13 December 2008 (UTC)


 * My first reaction is that the content of that section ("Incomputable functions and unsolvable problems") has gone pretty far off-topic, and should be focussed on material more along the lines of this section (but stated more concisely for the undecidable/incomputable case).


 * I don't think it's the right place to discuss the fact that "most" reals and "most" finitary functions N^j -> N^k are not computable. For that purpose, in my opinion, it would be best to simply have a paragraph in the section "Characteristics of computable functions", to the effect that
 * (i) the set of computable functions is countable because a function is computable iff it is computed by some program in a Turing-complete language, and the set of such programs is necessarily countable (since each one is representable by a finite string of symbols from a finite alphabet &mdash; the set of such strings being countable because they can be listed in alphabetical (shortlex) order); on the other hand,
 * (ii) the set of all functions of the kind N^j -> N^k is uncountable, because the set of functions N -> N (infinite sequences of nonnegative integers) is uncountable. The latter point follows from the fact that the set of functions N -> {0,1} (infinite binary sequences) is already uncountable, as famously proved by Cantor's diagonal argument.  (The latter link also discusses the connection between real numbers and infinite binary sequences, which has to be handled with some care.)


 * That's just my 2cents; however, I don't foresee making any of those revisions myself in the near future.


 * --r.e.s. (talk) 23:29, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Green Paper
Hey res, send me an email if you're interested in a copy of the Green paper. Cheers, — sligocki (talk) 04:46, 18 November 2009 (UTC)


 * Thanks very much -- I have sent you an email. — r.e.s. 12:54, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Copyedits and math format
Thanks for the copyedits on the Goodstein function, it reads much more nicely. I noticed that you have been converting html functions (like S and Σ in Busy beaver) into TeX and forcing TeX to render as images for some very small expressions (as in Goodstein function). I have to say that I disagree. I think that html tends to fit into the sentence structure for most inline math better than TeX and that not all TeX needs to be rendered as an image (it usually looks better on my computer when it is rendered as text). I agree with forcing images on some lists for consistent formatting and when the math is not inline, but not always. Does the html not render well on your system? or is there another reason you prefer the image? (In a perfect world, I'd like to have all math entered as LaTeX and rendered as html ... maybe some day.) Cheers, — sligocki (talk) 22:17, 8 December 2009 (UTC)


 * The purpose of my forcing PNG rendering for various math items is to make the rendering for "most viewers" consistent throughout an article. This consistency is browser-dependent, and I'm thinking that however we do the formatting, it should not make an article visually ugly when viewed in any of the most-popular browsers.  The issue concerns browsers like MS Internet Explorer (which is a very popular browser, whether we happen to like it or not). If we want the (presumably very many) viewers who use MSIE to see a visually consistent presentation, then some forcing of png images seems necessary. To get an idea of this, just view the present Goodstein function article using MSIE — the math rendering is inconsistent, mixing html and PNG in the tables as well as in the text portions. I thought that my edits were solving some the "consistent rendering" problem for MSIE-like browsers, while having only relatively insignificant effects for the others.  In other words, I'm trying to find a happy compromise for the various most-popular browsers. — r.e.s. 16:10, 9 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Ah, I didn't realize there were problems with IE rendering. I'm afraid that I can't check how the article renders in IE (they haven't ported it to Linux yet :). However, I have no intention to snub IE users. My only concern is a sort of over-zealous conversion of minor math into PNGs which would make the formatting for the rest of us not so good. The folks at Manual of Style (mathematics) discourage using PNGs inline and without knowing what IE rendering looks like, I'd generally agree. So, if this is something you think is important, it'd probably be worth bringing it up there, so that future editors know as well. Cheers, — sligocki (talk) 19:21, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

Busy beaver
Nice work on reworking the opening section of busy beaver. It reads much more smoothly now, thanks! — sligocki (talk) 14:09, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

copies of pertainent pages of Boolos & Jeffrey and Morales-Bueno
I bit the bullet and went to the library and got pdfs of the pertainent 2 chapters of B & J and then the Morales-Bueno article. Haven't purused them yet. I did verify that the two chapters of B & J are identical in the 1972, 1980 and 1989 editions. If you want cc's let me know at pierab@aol.com. BillWvbailey (talk) 16:57, 18 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Done. Thank you! — r.e.s. (talk) 18:24, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Complete Hereditary Representation
In the article Knuth's up-arrow notation, you added a numeration system that gave the "complete hereditary representation" of an integer, and attributed it to Goodstein. Is there any chance you still have the name of the book / article you got it from? I would very much like to read it. Either way, thanks for putting it on the article at all. :)

Freiberg, Let's talk!, contribs 01:27, 3 September 2011 (UTC)


 * The source is


 * R. L. Goodstein (Dec. 1947). "Transfinite Ordinals in Recursive Number Theory". Journal of Symbolic Logic 12 (4): 123–129. doi:10.2307/2266486


 * I believe Goodstein described this in other publications as well. I'll try to add at least the above citation to the article shortly.
 * — r.e.s. (talk) 04:30, 3 September 2011 (UTC)


 * Thank you very much. That article is behind a pay wall, but won't be in a few weeks when I start college.  This is very helpful.


 * --Freiberg, Let's talk!, contribs 13:23, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Shaw and "Creative [R]Evolution"
Here are some reliable sources to use in fixing this:

Shaw's actual will: ["creative evolution" search], ["creative revolution" search (no match)]. Text copywalled by Google.

NYTimes [correction], 5 days after typo. Text paywalled by NYTimes.

NYTimes correction, [quoted in full]. "11/29/50   An error of transmission in a dispatch from London led to an error in an editorial on this page last Saturday commenting on a passage from the will of George Bernard Shaw. Shaw wrote: "My religious convictions and sci­entific views cannot at present be more specifically defined than as those of a believer in creative evolution." The final word came through the ether as "revolution" instead of the "evolution" made famous in the preface to Back to Methuselah and elsewhere".

Independent [citation] from will in Manchester Guardian Weekly, six months later.

Independent [citation] from will in Shaw-dedicated scholarly annual, citing in turn Holroyd's biography.

[Blog entry] making fun of this, with open citation to Time error, NYTimes repeated error, and NYTimes correction. Only Time is outside paywall, and if they issued a correction, no one has spotted it yet.

Bottom line, the centrality of "Creative Evolution" to Shaw's religious view is obvious to any reader of Back to Methuselah; the "revolution" version is clearly nonsense. I can understand how, in this circumstance, a person can say (as I do), "not a Wikipedian, not my problem", OR (as I'd like you to do) "WP:RRULE, or WP:IAR, or WP:COMMON, or something, trumps WP:NOR}} here; let's figure out how to creatively rewrite to use these sources the anonymous poster supplied to get to the right answer" OR, perhaps, "no way around [[WP:NOR here, a Time Magazine typo is invincible under these rules, so I guess I quit." I honestly can't see how anyone with a conscience could take the fourth box in this truth table: "WP:NOR forces me to defend this silly mistake, and I cheerfully go on doing my duty on these terms."  But I'm willing to watch and learn, if that's the direction you need to go.  As a recruitment tool for "not a Wikipedian", I have to say this sort of thing is just splendid.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.81.149.135 (talk) 03:51, 7 October 2013 (UTC)


 * It seems I've really put my foot in it. Unfortunately, when I just now "undid" my initial uninformed edit, I probably further erred in commenting that Time had later corrected the cited article (in spite of your mention that they've apparently not done so). Gad! I'm going to step aside at this point so someone more capable can improve matters. Thank you for your efforts. — r.e.s. (talk) 12:47, 7 October 2013 (UTC)


 * Don't be discouraged! The article text got to the right place; anyone who cares about the submit comment will track it back to my earlier remarks on the article Talk page, and understand what happened. Thank you in turn, for responding constructively to my somewhat snarky WP:NOR baiting.  I've seen enough reverts of incontrovertibly "right" edits for hairsplitting and perverse wikilawyer reasons (see Chimborazo/Huascarán debate for a typical example) that I jumped on you at the initial edit, probably with more force than you deserved.  Sorry, and carry on!  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.81.149.135 (talk) 16:22, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

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