The Mootaz Machine

[Cecil]

I thought that maybe this should go in Humor, but I figured it's probably best suited here.

So we learned about oracles (essentially a "magic" computer than can tell you the answer to a problem (even "unsolvable" ones like the halting problem) in one step) in CS class yesterday. I did some googling after class and came across the Mootaz Machine.

It's a Turing Machine (computer) than has an infinite number of oracles attached to it, one for every conceivable problem.

Thm 1: For the Mootaz Machine, P = NP = O(1).
Proof: For any input string, just ask the corresponding oracle.

Thm 2: Every language is decidable.
Proof: Simply ask the corresponding oracle.

Thm 3: You can find the corresponding oracle in O(1) time.
Proof: Just ask the main oracle which oracle to ask. :D

I like this idea! How long until we can buy one commercially? ;)

[epepke]

Originally posted by Cecil
I like this idea! How long until we can buy one commercially? ;)

Intel will offer one, but there won't be any compilers for it, except for a Pentium emulation mode. Microsoft will produce a native operating system, and the machine will find and execute all possible bugs at once. It will immediately be adopted by every company but will be used as a space heater.

Apple will offer one, and it will work, but everyone will say "Uh, huh, you luser, I can build a 'puter a lot cheaper."

Telephone companies will offer one. It will reduce the time it takes to make a call to the time it took with a 1960 touchtone phone.

People working on Linux will adopt it, and it will demonstrate that, even by executing all possible ways of interpreting a .doc file, none of them make the fonts work.

[Matabiri]

Originally posted by Cecil
Thm 2: Every language is decidable.
Proof: Simply ask the corresponding oracle.

Is this like the bit in Dirk Gently where he reduces a potentially unsolvable logic puzzle to a mere potentially untranslatable linguistic one?

[Oleron]

Originally posted by Matabiri


Is this like the bit in Dirk Gently where he reduces a potentially unsolvable logic puzzle to a mere potentially untranslatable linguistic one?

Yes it is.
(according to my electric monk)