Kurt Gödel's Anticipation of the Turing Machine: A Vitalistic Approach. Issue 3 (2nd July 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Lethen, Tim
• Is Part Of: History and philosophy of logic. Volume 41:Issue 3(2020)
• Page Start: 252
• Page End: 264
• Publication Date: 2020-07-02
• Subjects: Logic -- Periodicals; 160.905
• DOI: 10.1080/01445340.2020.1768461
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0144-5340

Abstract

Abstract : In 1935/1936 Kurt Gödel wrote three notebooks on the foundations of quantum mechanics, which have now been entirely transcribed for the first time. Whereas a lot of the material is rather technical in character, many of Gödel's remarks have a philosophical background and concentrate on Leibnizian monadology as well as on vitalism. Obviously influenced by the vitalistic writings of Hans Driesch and his 'proofs' for the existence of an entelechy in every living organism, Gödel briefly develops the idea of a computing machine which closely resembles Turing's groundbreaking conception. After introducing the notebooks on quantum mechanics, this article describes Gödel's vitalistic Weltbild and the ideas leading to the development of his computing machine. It investigates a notion of lawlike sequence which closely resembles Turing's concept of a computable number and which Gödel himself calls 'problematic', and compares it to the opposed concept of randomness, drawing upon the notion of program-size complexity. Finally, Gödel's machine is implemented in a dialect of the Lisp programing language.