computability theory is my passion
i don't really blame the authors (who aren't mathematicians or computer scientists) for getting this wrong, but it's still indicative of a lack of familiarity with the subject even at the surface level
March 9, 2026 at 10:48 AM
computability theory is my passion
sure ig take it up with computability theory Wikipedia page
September 24, 2026 at 11:35 PM
sure ig take it up with computability theory Wikipedia page
Premise A: computability
Premise B: physicalism
---------
∴ Seinfeld admits a formal representation
Premise B: physicalism
---------
∴ Seinfeld admits a formal representation
May 21, 2025 at 6:23 PM
Premise A: computability
Premise B: physicalism
---------
∴ Seinfeld admits a formal representation
Premise B: physicalism
---------
∴ Seinfeld admits a formal representation
𝗗𝘆𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹 𝘀𝘆𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗺𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝘂𝘁𝗮𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆
Another mega paper that deserves close attention.
Lots of implications, including emergence and evolution
iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1...
#complexity
Another mega paper that deserves close attention.
Lots of implications, including emergence and evolution
iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1...
#complexity
March 4, 2026 at 6:10 PM
𝗗𝘆𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹 𝘀𝘆𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗺𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝘂𝘁𝗮𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆
Another mega paper that deserves close attention.
Lots of implications, including emergence and evolution
iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1...
#complexity
Another mega paper that deserves close attention.
Lots of implications, including emergence and evolution
iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1...
#complexity
Incidentally, as a guy who writes pop sci, stuff like this is why I'm more and more attracted to deep study, as opposed to this weird world of science trivia that seems to have evolved online. Highly recommended: www.amazon.com/Annotated-Tu...
The Annotated Turing: A Guided Tour Through Alan Turing's Historic Paper on Computability and the Turing Machine: Petzold, Charles: 9780470229057: Amazon.com: Books
The Annotated Turing: A Guided Tour Through Alan Turing's Historic Paper on Computability and the Turing Machine [Petzold, Charles] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. The Annotated Turing: A Guided Tour Through Alan Turing's Historic Paper on Computability and the Turing Machine
www.amazon.com
November 12, 2024 at 4:00 PM
Incidentally, as a guy who writes pop sci, stuff like this is why I'm more and more attracted to deep study, as opposed to this weird world of science trivia that seems to have evolved online. Highly recommended: www.amazon.com/Annotated-Tu...
My impression is complexity theory doesn't become a thing again (unless you count Turing talking about computability) until, like, the 1960s?
January 30, 2025 at 5:14 PM
My impression is complexity theory doesn't become a thing again (unless you count Turing talking about computability) until, like, the 1960s?
Get it, but the word implies a computability that is not present.
September 19, 2026 at 10:11 PM
Get it, but the word implies a computability that is not present.
Hungarian mathematician Rózsa Péter was born #OTD in 1905.
She was one of the founders of Recursion Theory –– also known as Computability Theory –– along with Gödel, Church, Turing, and Post. 🧪 🧮
She was one of the founders of Recursion Theory –– also known as Computability Theory –– along with Gödel, Church, Turing, and Post. 🧪 🧮
February 18, 2026 at 5:18 PM
Hungarian mathematician Rózsa Péter was born #OTD in 1905.
She was one of the founders of Recursion Theory –– also known as Computability Theory –– along with Gödel, Church, Turing, and Post. 🧪 🧮
She was one of the founders of Recursion Theory –– also known as Computability Theory –– along with Gödel, Church, Turing, and Post. 🧪 🧮
Many philosophers & laypeople encounter the concept of computability and think it means "anything I, personally, can imagine my laptop doing"
This has at least two problems:
(1) Most don't understand how computers actually work and what they are capable of,
(2) Most people have weak imaginations
This has at least two problems:
(1) Most don't understand how computers actually work and what they are capable of,
(2) Most people have weak imaginations
March 20, 2026 at 6:52 PM
Many philosophers & laypeople encounter the concept of computability and think it means "anything I, personally, can imagine my laptop doing"
This has at least two problems:
(1) Most don't understand how computers actually work and what they are capable of,
(2) Most people have weak imaginations
This has at least two problems:
(1) Most don't understand how computers actually work and what they are capable of,
(2) Most people have weak imaginations
coming back to this site after a week of spending my time playing no man's sky and reading about computability theory is like going back to eating cheetos and oreos after a week of michelin star dining
July 23, 2024 at 7:36 PM
coming back to this site after a week of spending my time playing no man's sky and reading about computability theory is like going back to eating cheetos and oreos after a week of michelin star dining
chrome tab, blasting pornhub: “…but it’s so big, i don’t know if i’m certified for that…”
me, a luminary: “ah yes, computability”
me, a luminary: “ah yes, computability”
March 20, 2026 at 8:13 PM
chrome tab, blasting pornhub: “…but it’s so big, i don’t know if i’m certified for that…”
me, a luminary: “ah yes, computability”
me, a luminary: “ah yes, computability”
yet another motivationAI 🦋 of the day:
computability is much more about time and space than the program length
computability is much more about time and space than the program length
November 30, 2024 at 4:20 PM
yet another motivationAI 🦋 of the day:
computability is much more about time and space than the program length
computability is much more about time and space than the program length
been learning more and more about logic and computability. and the upshot is -- it's great
April 10, 2025 at 2:46 PM
been learning more and more about logic and computability. and the upshot is -- it's great
This Friday at Coffee & CAIC: @coreymaley.net will be presenting and discussing his paper on computation and computability 🧮
January 19, 2026 at 7:23 PM
This Friday at Coffee & CAIC: @coreymaley.net will be presenting and discussing his paper on computation and computability 🧮
we have a joint paper that should be (finally!) appearing in Computability soon
April 27, 2025 at 10:16 PM
we have a joint paper that should be (finally!) appearing in Computability soon
Tractability is a stronger constraint than computability.
It requires that an algorithm runs in a reasonable amount of time, using reasonable amounts of resources.
This informal idea can be formalized in different ways.
The classical formalisation is polynomial-time computability (class P).
4/🧵
It requires that an algorithm runs in a reasonable amount of time, using reasonable amounts of resources.
This informal idea can be formalized in different ways.
The classical formalisation is polynomial-time computability (class P).
4/🧵
August 1, 2026 at 10:29 PM
Tractability is a stronger constraint than computability.
It requires that an algorithm runs in a reasonable amount of time, using reasonable amounts of resources.
This informal idea can be formalized in different ways.
The classical formalisation is polynomial-time computability (class P).
4/🧵
It requires that an algorithm runs in a reasonable amount of time, using reasonable amounts of resources.
This informal idea can be formalized in different ways.
The classical formalisation is polynomial-time computability (class P).
4/🧵
They finally realized it, lol. Why did it take them so long? This can be demonstrated with some rather simple proofs, based on results from computability theory known at least since the 1950s.
September 19, 2025 at 8:18 PM
They finally realized it, lol. Why did it take them so long? This can be demonstrated with some rather simple proofs, based on results from computability theory known at least since the 1950s.
Very interesting thread computability & tractability...
Going to do a thread, using some of my own (incl. older) work, to clear up some of these relevant concepts.
Hope it helps builds conceptual hygiene and immunity to hyped claims about “AI” capabilities.
1/🧵
Hope it helps builds conceptual hygiene and immunity to hyped claims about “AI” capabilities.
1/🧵
In my work, as in theoretical computer science, we distinguish between (exact) algorithms, heuristics (no guarantees), and approximation algorithm (approx. guarantees)
Clear distinctions is relevant in many contexts, for instance this one in cognitive science link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Clear distinctions is relevant in many contexts, for instance this one in cognitive science link.springer.com/article/10.1...
August 1, 2026 at 11:13 PM
Very interesting thread computability & tractability...
Larry Moss is making a website/book for teaching computability. It comes with some Jupyter notebooks and python code for demonstrating some ideas. It looks neat.
lmoss.github.io/index.html
lmoss.github.io/index.html
Invitation to Computability — Invitation to Computability
lmoss.github.io
October 9, 2025 at 8:44 PM
Larry Moss is making a website/book for teaching computability. It comes with some Jupyter notebooks and python code for demonstrating some ideas. It looks neat.
lmoss.github.io/index.html
lmoss.github.io/index.html
2/
Turing had a unique impact on the history of computer science, artificial intelligence, developmental biology (he explored the relationship between computers and nature), and the mathematical theory of computability.
He provided a formalisation of the concepts of algorithm and computation with
Turing had a unique impact on the history of computer science, artificial intelligence, developmental biology (he explored the relationship between computers and nature), and the mathematical theory of computability.
He provided a formalisation of the concepts of algorithm and computation with
June 7, 2025 at 10:23 AM
2/
Turing had a unique impact on the history of computer science, artificial intelligence, developmental biology (he explored the relationship between computers and nature), and the mathematical theory of computability.
He provided a formalisation of the concepts of algorithm and computation with
Turing had a unique impact on the history of computer science, artificial intelligence, developmental biology (he explored the relationship between computers and nature), and the mathematical theory of computability.
He provided a formalisation of the concepts of algorithm and computation with
Yeah, it's quite literally the halting problem.
You'd think somebody in one of these companies has studied computability theory.
You'd think somebody in one of these companies has studied computability theory.
February 17, 2026 at 10:25 PM
Yeah, it's quite literally the halting problem.
You'd think somebody in one of these companies has studied computability theory.
You'd think somebody in one of these companies has studied computability theory.
just remembered the guy who tried to argue with me that LLMs transcend computability theory by not being constrained to produce correct answers. genuinely a new field of philosophy happening among people who refuse to read books
May 27, 2025 at 9:06 PM
just remembered the guy who tried to argue with me that LLMs transcend computability theory by not being constrained to produce correct answers. genuinely a new field of philosophy happening among people who refuse to read books
But the philosophical seam between theoretical computer science and cognitive science seems to have been welded to computability/complexity theory as it applies to (deterministic/terminating/non-interactive/global clock based) batch processing. This has dire cosequences in both sides.
August 14, 2026 at 6:26 AM
But the philosophical seam between theoretical computer science and cognitive science seems to have been welded to computability/complexity theory as it applies to (deterministic/terminating/non-interactive/global clock based) batch processing. This has dire cosequences in both sides.
I'm kind hoping for a mysticism of computability theory and algorithmic information theory
Way more sensible at least than the quantum stuff, I feel like they picked the field to mysticize
Way more sensible at least than the quantum stuff, I feel like they picked the field to mysticize
February 12, 2026 at 8:12 PM
I'm kind hoping for a mysticism of computability theory and algorithmic information theory
Way more sensible at least than the quantum stuff, I feel like they picked the field to mysticize
Way more sensible at least than the quantum stuff, I feel like they picked the field to mysticize