In 1935/1936 Kurt Gödel wrote three notebooks on the foundations of quantum mechanics, which have now been entirely transcribed for the first time. Whereas a lot of the material is rather technical in character, many of Gödel's remarks have a philosophical background and concentrate on Leibnizian monadology as well as on vitalism. Obviously influenced by the vitalistic writings of Hans Driesch and his ‘proofs’ for the existence of an entelechy in every living organism, Gödel briefly develops the idea of a computing machine which closely resembles Turing's groundbreaking conception. After introducing the notebooks on quantum mechanics, this article describes Gödel's vitalistic Weltbild and the ideas leading to the development of his computing machine. It investigates a notion of lawlike sequence which closely resembles Turing's concept of a computable number and which Gödel himself calls ‘problematic’, and compares it to the opposed concept of randomness, drawing upon the notion of program-size complexity. Finally, Gödel's machine is implemented in a dialect of the Lisp programing language.
...MoreSimilar Citations
Article
Karela, Catherine;
(2010)
Hilbert on Different Notions of Completeness: A Conceptual and Historical Analysis
(/isis/citation/CBB001220619/)
Article
D'Agostino, Salvo;
(2009)
Il ‘gatto’ di Schroedinger in una lettura del testo originale del celebre saggio
(/isis/citation/CBB314642805/)
Book
Weyl, Hermann;
Pesic, Peter;
(2009)
Mind and Nature: Selected Writings on Philosophy, Mathematics, and Physics
(/isis/citation/CBB000951953/)
Chapter
Thomas Mormann;
(2015)
From Mathematics to Quantum Mechanics – On the Conceptual Unity of Cassirer's Philosophy of Science (1907–1937)
(/isis/citation/CBB281633633/)
Book
Patrick Aidan Heelan;
(2015)
The Observable: Heisenberg's Philosophy of Quantum Mechanics
(/isis/citation/CBB732754130/)
Article
Jan Faye;
Rasmus Jaksland;
(2021)
What Bohr wanted Carnap to learn from quantum mechanics
(/isis/citation/CBB067212277/)
Book
Epperson, Michael;
(2004)
Quantum Mechanics and the Philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead
(/isis/citation/CBB000400960/)
Book
Camilleri, Kristian;
(2009)
Heisenberg and the Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics: The Physicist as Philosopher
(/isis/citation/CBB000951622/)
Article
Lacki, Jan;
(2004)
The Puzzle of Canonical Transformations in Early Quantum Mechanics
(/isis/citation/CBB000471121/)
Article
Needham, Paul;
(2014)
The Source of Chemical Bonding
(/isis/citation/CBB001320766/)
Article
Philippe Stamenkovic;
(2017)
Retour sur la philosophie de la physique quantique d’Ernst Cassirer
(/isis/citation/CBB115699306/)
Article
Maleeh, Reza;
Amani, Parisa;
(2013)
Pragmatism, Bohr, and the Copenhagen Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics
(/isis/citation/CBB001201240/)
Chapter
Michael Stöltzner;
(2013)
Did Reichenbach Anticipate Quantum Mechanical Indeterminism?
(/isis/citation/CBB406987767/)
Article
Hadzidaki, Pandora;
(2008)
The Heisenberg Microscope: A Powerful Instructional Tool for Promoting Meta-Cognitive and Meta-Scientific Thinking on Quantum Mechanics and the “Nature of Science”
(/isis/citation/CBB001032867/)
Article
Adele La Rana;
Paolo Rossi;
(2020)
The blossoming of quantum mechanics in Italy: The roots, the context and the first spreading in Italian universities (1900–1947)
(/isis/citation/CBB731364406/)
Article
Causá, Mauro;
Savin, Andreas;
Silvi, Bernard;
(2014)
Atoms and Bonds in Molecules and Chemical Explanations
(/isis/citation/CBB001321116/)
Essay Review
Jähnert, Martin;
(2012)
Revisiting the 1927 Solvay Conference and the Early Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics
(/isis/citation/CBB001566762/)
Article
Adrien Vila Valls;
(2015)
Entre causalisme et positivisme : La réception épistémologique de la mécanique quantique par les théoriciens français de la génération de l’entre-deux-guerres
(/isis/citation/CBB691093830/)
Book
Stenholm, Stig;
(2011)
The Quest for Reality: Bohr and Wittgenstein: Two Complementary Views
(/isis/citation/CBB001500296/)
Book
Heisenberg, Werner;
(1998)
Philosophie: Le manuscrit de 1942
(/isis/citation/CBB000551165/)
Revue d'Histoire des Sciences
Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part B: Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics
Science and Education
Physis: Rivista Internazionale di Storia della Scienza
Metascience: An International Review Journal for the History, Philosophy and Social Studies of Science
Be the first to comment!