Re: Incorrect questions and halt deciders

On 3/13/24 4:20 PM, olcott wrote:

For any program H that might determine whether programs
halt, a "pathological" program D, called with some input,
can pass its own source and its input to H and then
specifically do the opposite of what H predicts D will do.
No H can exist that handles this case.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halting_problem

Yes, but the correct answer for the question given to H exists.

 When you ask a man that has never been married:
Have you stopped beating your wife?
https://groups.google.com/g/sci.lang/c/AO5Vlupeelo/m/nxJy7N2vULwJ

Which is a different issue.

 Although there is a mapping from some men to YES/NO
there is no mapping from never married men to YES/NO
thus the question is incorrect for all unmarried men.

Invalid, because it asks about a non-existant person.
Also, because it presumes facts that are not true.

 Although there is a mapping from some TM/input pairs to YES/NO
there is no mapping from H/D to YES/NO
thus the question is incorrect for H/D
 

But the question isn't mapping H/D, it is mapping the Machine described by the input (and its input) to if it reaches a final state, which has an answer, depend on the specifics of the problem, that needed to have specifed before you could ever actually ask the question.
You are just LYING about what the question actually is.