Although computation and the science of physical systems would appear to be unrelated, there are a number of ways in which computational and physical concepts can be brought together in ways that illuminate both. This volume examines fundamental questions which connect scholars from both disciplines: is the universe a computer? Can a universal computing machine simulate every physical process? What is the source of the computational power of quantum computers? Are computational approaches to solving physical problems and paradoxes always fruitful? Contributors from multiple perspectives reflecting the diversity of thought regarding these interconnections address many of the most important developments and debates within this exciting area of research. Both a reference to the state of the art and a valuable and accessible entry to interdisciplinary work, the volume will interest researchers and students working in physics, computer science, and philosophy of science and mathematics.
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Offers an accessible yet cutting-edge tour of the many conceptual interconnections between physics and computer science.
List of figures; List of tables; Preface; Introduction Michael E.
Cuffaro and Samuel C. Fletcher; Part I. The Computability of Physical Systems
and Physical Systems as Computers:
1. Ontic pancomputationalism Gualtiero
Piccinini and Neal G. Anderson;
2. Zuse's thesis, Gandy's thesis, and
Penrose's thesis B. Jack Copeland, Oron Shagrir and Mark Sprevak;
3. Church's
thesis, Turing's limits, and Deutsch's principle Rossella Lupacchini; Part
II. The Implementation of Computation in Physical Systems:
4. How to make
orthogonal positions parallel: revisiting the quantum parallelism thesis
Armond Duwell;
5. How is there a physics of information? On characterizing
physical evolution as information processing Owen J. E. Maroney and
Christopher G. Timpson;
6. Abstraction/representation theory and the natural
science of computation Dominic Horsman, Viv Kendon and Susan Stepney; Part
III. Physical Perspectives on Computer Science:
7. Physics-like models of
computation Klaus Sutner;
8. Feasible computation: methodological
contributions from computational science Robert H. C. Moir;
9. Relativistic
computation Hajnal Andréka, Judit X. Madarász, István Németi, Péter Németi
and Gergely Székely; Part IV. Computational Perspectives on Physical Theory:
10. Intension in the physics of computation: lessons from the debate about
Landauer's principle James Ladyman;
11. Maxwell's demon does not compute John
D. Norton;
12. Quantum theory as a principle theory: insights from an
information-theoretic reconstruction Adam Koberinski and Markus P. Müller;
Bibliography; Index.
Michael E. Cuffaro is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow of the Rotman Institute of Philosophy at the University of Western Ontario and an external member of the Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München. Samuel C. Fletcher is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, a resident fellow of the Minnesota Center for Philosophy of Science, and an external member of the Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München.
