The Church-Turing Thesis

Paper Summary:

This paper explains that the Church-Turing thesis holds that problems impossible to solve through any theoretical method of computation also are impossible to solve by human thought. The author points out that, if one accepts the Church-Turing thesis, one must also accept that there are questions for which answers can be shown to exist but which can never be determined or articulated. The paper relates that the Church-Turing thesis matters very much to philosophers, especially existentialists, because it reflects the increasing focus and reliance of Western thought on analytical and rational views. The author underscores that, despite decades of contention, all that has been determined with any degree of finality is that free will and the Church-Turing thesis are not compatible.

From the Paper:

"Cognitive scientists and philosophers of mind care about this because if Turing's thesis is correct, then debating the existence and non-existence of effective methods can be replaced throughout mathematics and logic by debating the existence or non-existence of Turing machine programs. The ultimate issue is validation for either philosophers of mind or for cognitive scientists, and the ultimate question is whether intelligence is exclusive to advanced forms of biological life or whether it can be replicated through artificial intelligence."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Haugeland, John. (1997). Mind Design II: Philosophy, Psychology, and Artificial Intelligence. Cambridge: MIT Press.
• Kurzweil, Raymond. (August 1992). "The Paradigms and Paradoxes of Intelligence, Part 2: The Church-Turing Thesis." Library Journal.
• McCarthy, John. (1996). "The Philosophy of Artificial Intelligence." SEP. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

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