Free shipping on orders over $99
Physical Computation

Physical Computation

A Mechanistic Account

by Gualtiero Piccinini
Hardback
Publication Date: 09/07/2015

Share This Book:

 
$117.23
Gualtiero Piccinini articulates and defends a mechanistic account of concrete, or physical, computation. A physical system is a computing system just in case it is a mechanism one of whose functions is to manipulate vehicles based solely on differences between different portions of the vehicles according to a rule defined over the vehicles. Physical Computation discusses previous accounts of computation and argues that the mechanistic account is better. Many kinds of computation are explicated, such as digital vs. analog, serial vs. parallel, neural network computation, program-controlled computation, and more. Piccinini argues that computation does not entail representation or information processing although information processing entails computation. Pancomputationalism, according to which every physical system is computational, is rejected. A modest version of the physical Church-Turing thesis, according to which any function that is physically computable is computable by Turing machines, is defended.
ISBN:
9780199658855
9780199658855
Category:
Philosophy
Format:
Hardback
Publication Date:
09-07-2015
Language:
English
Publisher:
Oxford University Press
Country of origin:
United Kingdom
Dimensions (mm):
234x156x27.14mm
Weight:
0.65kg

Click 'Notify Me' to get an email alert when this item becomes available

Reviews

Be the first to review Physical Computation.