Re: Halting Problem is wrong two different ways

On 2024-06-05 02:22:51 +0000, Richard Damon said:

On 6/4/24 10:16 PM, olcott wrote:

On 6/4/2024 9:12 PM, John Smith wrote:

On 5/06/24 04:05, olcott wrote:

On 6/4/2024 8:48 PM, Richard Damon wrote:

But the question it asks is an OBJECTIVE question that doesn't depend on who it is asked of.
 

 When H is asked about the behavior of a Machine that is programmed
to do the opposite of whatever it says then the context that it is H
that is being asked is an inherent aspect of the meaning of this
question and cannot be correctly ignored.

 Every machine does something. It either halts, or it doesn't. If a machine halts, then it halts even if you ask someone different. If the machine halts when I ask Bob whether it halts and he says it halts, then it still halts when I ask Alice whether it halts and she says it doesn't halt. Alice is wrong. The linguistic context doesn't change the fact that it halts.

 Professor Hehner proves my same point with Carol's question.
https://www.cs.toronto.edu/~hehner/OSS.pdf
 Richard found a loophole that I fixed and told professor Hehner about:
Can Carol correctly answer “no” to this (yes/no) question?
 

 Which is just a strawman, because willful beings are different than deterministic machines.
 So, questions about future behavior of willful beings are actually considers off limits in many forms of philosophy, because they can create such contradictions.

There is also another problem with that sort of questions. Certain
braches of philosophy reagard as well posed only those question that
can be realiably answered with some method, at least later if not
immediately. So the question "Will Carol correctly answer 'no' to
this question?" is well posed: all that is needed is to observe Carol
until Carol does so or dies. But the question "Can Carol correctly
answer 'no' to this question?" is different: if Carol can but does
not answer that question then how do we find out?
--
Mikko