Turing machine

A Turing machine is a mathematical model of computation describing an abstract machine[1] that

manipulates symbols on a strip of tape according to a table of rules.[2] Despite the model's
simplicity, it is capable of implementing any computer algorithm.[3]

A physical Turing machine model constructed by

Mike Davey. A true Turing machine would have a
tape of infinite length; however, physical models can
only have a finite amount of tape.

Classes of automata

The machine operates on an infinite[4] memory tape divided into discrete cells,[5] each of which can
hold a single symbol drawn from a finite set of symbols called the alphabet of the machine. It has a
"head" that, at any point in the machine's operation, is positioned over one of these cells, and a
"state" selected from a finite set of states. At each step of its operation, the head reads the symbol
in its cell. Then, based on the symbol and the machine's own present state, the machine writes a
symbol into the same cell, and moves the head one step to the left or the right,[6] or halts the
computation. The choice of which replacement symbol to write, which direction to move the head,
and whether to halt is based on a finite table that specifies what to do for each combination of the
current state and the symbol that is read. As with a real computer program, it is possible for a Turing
machine to go into an infinite loop which will never halt.

The Turing machine was invented in 1936 by Alan Turing,[7][8] who called it an "a-machine"
(automatic machine).[9] It was Turing's doctoral advisor, Alonzo Church, who later coined the term
"Turing machine" in a review.[10] With this model, Turing was able to answer two questions in the
negative:

Does a machine exist that can determine whether any arbitrary machine on its tape is "circular"
(e.g., freezes, or fails to continue its computational task)?

Does a machine exist that can determine whether any arbitrary machine on its tape ever prints a
given symbol?[11][12]

Thus by providing a mathematical description of a very simple device capable of arbitrary

computations, he was able to prove properties of computation in general—and in particular, the
uncomputability of the Entscheidungsproblem, or 'decision problem' (whether every mathematical
statement is provable or disprovable).[13]

Turing machines proved the existence of fundamental limitations on the power of mechanical
computation.[14]

While they can express arbitrary computations, their minimalist design makes them too slow for
computation in practice: real-world computers are based on different designs that, unlike Turing
machines, use random-access memory.

Turing completeness is the ability for a computational model or a system of instructions to simulate
a Turing machine. A programming language that is Turing complete is theoretically capable of
expressing all tasks accomplishable by computers; nearly all programming languages are Turing
complete if the limitations of finite memory are ignored.

Overview

A Turing machine is an idealised model of a central processing unit (CPU) that controls all data
manipulation done by a computer, with the canonical machine using sequential memory to store
data. Typically, the sequential memory is represented as a tape of infinite length on which the
machine can perform read and write operations.

In the context of formal language theory, a Turing machine (automaton) is capable of enumerating
some arbitrary subset of valid strings of an alphabet. A set of strings which can be enumerated in
this manner is called a recursively enumerable language. The Turing machine can equivalently be
defined as a model that recognises valid input strings, rather than enumerating output strings.

Given a Turing machine M and an arbitrary string s, it is generally not possible to decide whether M
will eventually produce s. This is due to the fact that the halting problem is unsolvable, which has
major implications for the theoretical limits of computing.

The Turing machine is capable of processing an unrestricted grammar, which further implies that it
is capable of robustly evaluating first-order logic in an infinite number of ways. This is famously
demonstrated through lambda calculus.

A Turing machine that is able to simulate any other Turing machine is called a universal Turing
machine (UTM, or simply a universal machine). Another mathematical formalism, lambda calculus,
with a similar "universal" nature was introduced by Alonzo Church. Church's work intertwined with
Turing's to form the basis for the Church–Turing thesis. This thesis states that Turing machines,
lambda calculus, and other similar formalisms of computation do indeed capture the informal
notion of effective methods in logic and mathematics and thus provide a model through which one
can reason about an algorithm or "mechanical procedure" in a mathematically precise way without
being tied to any particular formalism. Studying the abstract properties of Turing machines has
yielded many insights into computer science, computability theory, and complexity theory.

Physical description

In his 1948 essay, "Intelligent Machinery", Turing wrote that his machine consists of:

...an unlimited memory capacity obtained in the form of an infinite tape marked out
into squares, on each of which a symbol could be printed. At any moment there is
one symbol in the machine; it is called the scanned symbol. The machine can alter
the scanned symbol, and its behavior is in part determined by that symbol, but the
symbols on the tape elsewhere do not affect the behavior of the machine. However,
the tape can be moved back and forth through the machine, this being one of the
elementary operations of the machine. Any symbol on the tape may therefore
eventually have an innings.[15]

— Turing 1948, p. 3[16]

Description

The Turing machine mathematically models a machine that mechanically operates on a tape. On
this tape are symbols, which the machine can read and write, one at a time, using a tape head.
Operation is fully determined by a finite set of elementary instructions such as "in state 42, if the
symbol seen is 0, write a 1; if the symbol seen is 1, change into state 17; in state 17, if the symbol
seen is 0, write a 1 and change to state 6;" etc. In the original article ("On Computable Numbers, with
an Application to the Entscheidungsproblem", see also references below), Turing imagines not a
mechanism, but a person whom he calls the "computer", who executes these deterministic
mechanical rules slavishly (or as Turing puts it, "in a desultory manner").

The head is always over a particular square of the

tape; only a finite stretch of squares is shown. The
state of the machine (q4) is shown over the square
to be processed. (Drawing after Kleene (1952) p.
375.)

Here, the internal state (q1) is shown inside the

head, and the illustration describes the tape as
being infinite and pre-filled with "0", the symbol
serving as blank. The system's full state (its
"complete configuration") consists of the internal
state, any non-blank symbols on the tape (in this
illustration "11B"), and the position of the head
relative to those symbols including blanks, i.e.
"011B". (Drawing after Minsky (1967) p. 121.)

More explicitly, a Turing machine consists of:

A tape divided into cells, one next to the other. Each cell contains a symbol from some finite
alphabet. The alphabet contains a special blank symbol (here written as '0') and one or more
other symbols. The tape is assumed to be arbitrarily extendable to the left and to the right, so that
the Turing machine is always supplied with as much tape as it needs for its computation. Cells
that have not been written before are assumed to be filled with the blank symbol. In some models
the tape has a left end marked with a special symbol; the tape extends or is indefinitely extensible
to the right.
 A head that can read and write symbols on the tape and move the tape left and right one (and only
one) cell at a time. In some models the head moves and the tape is stationary.

A state register that stores the state of the Turing machine, one of finitely many. Among these is
the special start state with which the state register is initialised. These states, writes Turing,
replace the "state of mind" a person performing computations would ordinarily be in.

A finite table[17] of instructions[18] that, given the state(qi) the machine is currently in and the
symbol(aj) it is reading on the tape (the symbol currently under the head), tells the machine to do
the following in sequence (for the 5-tuple models):
1. Either erase or write a symbol (replacing aj with aj1).

2. Move the head (which is described by dk and can have values: 'L' for one step left or 'R' for one
step right or 'N' for staying in the same place).

3. Assume the same or a new state as prescribed (go to state qi1).

In the 4-tuple models, erasing or writing a symbol (aj1) and moving the head left or right (dk) are
specified as separate instructions. The table tells the machine to (ia) erase or write a symbol or (ib)
move the head left or right, and then (ii) assume the same or a new state as prescribed, but not both
actions (ia) and (ib) in the same instruction. In some models, if there is no entry in the table for the
current combination of symbol and state, then the machine will halt; other models require all entries
to be filled.

Every part of the machine (i.e. its state, symbol-collections, and used tape at any given time) and its
actions (such as printing, erasing and tape motion) is finite, discrete and distinguishable; it is the
unlimited amount of tape and runtime that gives it an unbounded amount of storage space.

Formal definition

Following Hopcroft & Ullman (1979, p. 148), a (one-tape) Turing machine can be formally defined as
a 7-tuple where

is a finite, non-empty set of tape alphabet symbols;

is the blank symbol (the only symbol allowed to occur on the tape infinitely often at any
step during the computation);

is the set of input symbols, that is, the set of symbols allowed to appear in the initial
tape contents;

is a finite, non-empty set of states;

 is the initial state;

is the set of final states or accepting states. The initial tape contents is said to be
accepted by if it eventually halts in a state from .

is a partial function called the transition function, where

L is left shift, R is right shift. If is not defined on the current state and the current tape symbol,
[19]
then the machine halts; intuitively, the transition function specifies the next state transited from
the current state, which symbol to overwrite the current symbol pointed by the head, and the next
head movement.

3-state Busy Beaver. Black icons represent

location and state of head; square colors
represent 1s (orange) and 0s (white); time
progresses vertically from the top until the
HALT state at the bottom.

A variant allows "no shift", say N, as a third element of the set of directions .

The 7-tuple for the 3-state busy beaver looks like this (see more about this busy beaver at Turing
machine examples):

(states);

(tape alphabet symbols);

(blank symbol);

(input symbols);

(initial state);

(final states);

see state-table below (transition function).

Initially all tape cells are marked with .

State table for 3-state, 2-symbol busy beaver

Current state A Current state B Current state C

Tape symbol
Write symbol Move tape Next state Write symbol Move tape Next state Write symbol Move tape Next state

0 1 R B 1 L A 1 L B

1 1 L C 1 R B 1 R HALT

Additional details required to visualise or implement Turing

machines

In the words of van Emde Boas (1990), p. 6: "The set-theoretical object [his formal seven-tuple
description similar to the above] provides only partial information on how the machine will behave
and what its computations will look like."

For instance,

There will need to be many decisions on what the symbols actually look like, and a failproof way
of reading and writing symbols indefinitely.

The shift left and shift right operations may shift the tape head across the tape, but when actually
building a Turing machine it is more practical to make the tape slide back and forth under the
head instead.

The tape can be finite, and automatically extended with blanks as needed (which is closest to the
mathematical definition), but it is more common to think of it as stretching infinitely at one or
both ends and being pre-filled with blanks except on the explicitly given finite fragment the tape
head is on (this is, of course, not implementable in practice). The tape cannot be fixed in length,
 since that would not correspond to the given definition and would seriously limit the range of
computations the machine can perform to those of a linear bounded automaton if the tape was
proportional to the input size, or finite-state machine if it was strictly fixed-length.

Alternative definitions

Definitions in literature sometimes differ slightly, to make arguments or proofs easier or clearer, but
this is always done in such a way that the resulting machine has the same computational power. For
example, the set could be changed from to , where N ("None" or "No-operation")
would allow the machine to stay on the same tape cell instead of moving left or right. This would
not increase the machine's computational power.

The most common convention represents each "Turing instruction" in a "Turing table" by one of nine
5-tuples, per the convention of Turing/Davis (Turing (1936) in The Undecidable, p. 126–127 and
Davis (2000) p. 152):

(definition 1): (qi, Sj, Sk/E/N, L/R/N, qm)

( current state qi , symbol scanned Sj , print symbol Sk/erase E/none N , move_tape_one_square

left L/right R/none N , new state qm )

Other authors (Minsky (1967) p. 119, Hopcroft and Ullman (1979) p. 158, Stone (1972) p. 9) adopt a
different convention, with new state qm listed immediately after the scanned symbol Sj:

(definition 2): (qi, Sj, qm, Sk/E/N, L/R/N)

( current state qi , symbol scanned Sj , new state qm , print symbol Sk/erase E/none N ,
move_tape_one_square left L/right R/none N )

For the remainder of this article "definition 1" (the Turing/Davis convention) will be used.

Example: state table for the 3-state 2-symbol busy beaver reduced to 5-tuples

Current state Scanned symbol Print symbol Move tape Final (i.e. next) state 5-tuples

A 0 1 R B (A, 0, 1, R, B)

A 1 1 L C (A, 1, 1, L, C)

B 0 1 L A (B, 0, 1, L, A)

B 1 1 R B (B, 1, 1, R, B)

C 0 1 L B (C, 0, 1, L, B)

C 1 1 N H (C, 1, 1, N, H)

In the following table, Turing's original model allowed only the first three lines that he called N1, N2,
N3 (cf. Turing in The Undecidable, p. 126). He allowed for erasure of the "scanned square" by naming
a 0th symbol S0 = "erase" or "blank", etc. However, he did not allow for non-printing, so every
instruction-line includes "print symbol Sk" or "erase" (cf. footnote 12 in Post (1947), The Undecidable,
p. 300). The abbreviations are Turing's (The Undecidable, p. 119). Subsequent to Turing's original
paper in 1936–1937, machine-models have allowed all nine possible types of five-tuples:

Current m- Final m-
Tape Print- Tape- 5-tuple
configuration configuration 5-tuple 4-tuple
symbol operation motion comments
(Turing state) (Turing state)

(qi, Sj, Sk, "Blank" = S0,

N1 qi Sj Print(Sk) Left L qm
L, qm) 1=S1, Etc.

(qi, Sj, Sk, "Blank" = S0,

N2 qi Sj Print(Sk) Right R qm
R, qm) 1=S1, Etc.

(qi, Sj, Sk, "Blank" = S0, (qi, Sj, Sk,

N3 qi Sj Print(Sk) None N qm
N, qm) 1=S1, Etc. qm )

(qi, Sj, N, L, (qi, Sj, L,

4 qi Sj None N Left L qm
qm ) qm )

(qi, Sj, N, (qi, Sj, R,

5 qi Sj None N Right R qm
R, qm) qm )

(qi, Sj, N, (qi, Sj, N,

6 qi Sj None N None N qm Direct "jump"
N, qm) qm )

(qi, Sj, E, L,
7 qi Sj Erase Left L qm
qm )

(qi, Sj, E, R,
8 qi Sj Erase Right R qm
qm )

(qi, Sj, E, N, (qi, Sj, E,

9 qi Sj Erase None N qm
qm ) qm )

Any Turing table (list of instructions) can be constructed from the above nine 5-tuples. For technical
reasons, the three non-printing or "N" instructions (4, 5, 6) can usually be dispensed with. For
examples see Turing machine examples.

Less frequently the use of 4-tuples are encountered: these represent a further atomization of the
Turing instructions (cf. Post (1947), Boolos & Jeffrey (1974, 1999), Davis-Sigal-Weyuker (1994));
also see more at Post–Turing machine.
The "state"

The word "state" used in context of Turing machines can be a source of confusion, as it can mean
two things. Most commentators after Turing have used "state" to mean the name/designator of the
current instruction to be performed—i.e. the contents of the state register. But Turing (1936) made a
strong distinction between a record of what he called the machine's "m-configuration", and the
machine's (or person's) "state of progress" through the computation—the current state of the total
system. What Turing called "the state formula" includes both the current instruction and all the
symbols on the tape:

Thus the state of progress of the computation at any stage is completely determined
by the note of instructions and the symbols on the tape. That is, the state of the
system may be described by a single expression (sequence of symbols) consisting of
the symbols on the tape followed by Δ (which is supposed to not to appear
elsewhere) and then by the note of instructions. This expression is called the "state
formula".

— The Undecidable, pp. 139–140, emphasis added

Earlier in his paper Turing carried this even further: he gives an example where he placed a symbol
of the current "m-configuration"—the instruction's label—beneath the scanned square, together with
all the symbols on the tape (The Undecidable, p. 121); this he calls "the complete configuration" (The
Undecidable, p. 118). To print the "complete configuration" on one line, he places the state-label/m-
configuration to the left of the scanned symbol.

A variant of this is seen in Kleene (1952) where Kleene shows how to write the Gödel number of a
machine's "situation": he places the "m-configuration" symbol q4 over the scanned square in roughly
the center of the 6 non-blank squares on the tape (see the Turing-tape figure in this article) and puts
it to the right of the scanned square. But Kleene refers to "q4" itself as "the machine state" (Kleene,
p. 374–375). Hopcroft and Ullman call this composite the "instantaneous description" and follow
the Turing convention of putting the "current state" (instruction-label, m-configuration) to the left of
the scanned symbol (p. 149), that is, the instantaneous description is the composite of non-blank
symbols to the left, state of the machine, the current symbol scanned by the head, and the non-
blank symbols to the right.

Example: total state of 3-state 2-symbol busy beaver after 3 "moves" (taken from example "run" in the
figure below):

1A1
This means: after three moves the tape has ... 000110000 ... on it, the head is scanning the right-
most 1, and the state is A. Blanks (in this case represented by "0"s) can be part of the total state as
shown here: B01; the tape has a single 1 on it, but the head is scanning the 0 ("blank") to its left and
the state is B.

"State" in the context of Turing machines should be clarified as to which is being described: the
current instruction, or the list of symbols on the tape together with the current instruction, or the list
of symbols on the tape together with the current instruction placed to the left of the scanned
symbol or to the right of the scanned symbol.

Turing's biographer Andrew Hodges (1983: 107) has noted and discussed this confusion.

"State" diagrams

The table for the 3-state busy beaver ("P" = print/write a "1")

Tape
Current state A Current state B Current state C
symbol

Write Move Next Write Move Next Write Move Next

symbol tape state symbol tape state symbol tape state

0 P R B P L A P L B

1 P L C P R B P R HALT

The "3-state busy beaver" Turing machine in a finite-state representation. Each circle
represents a "state" of the table—an "m-configuration" or "instruction". "Direction" of a
state transition is shown by an arrow. The label (e.g. 0/P,R) near the outgoing state (at
the "tail" of the arrow) specifies the scanned symbol that causes a particular transition
(e.g. 0) followed by a slash /, followed by the subsequent "behaviors" of the machine,
e.g. "P print" then move tape "R right". No general accepted format exists. The
convention shown is after McClusky (1965), Booth (1967), Hill, and Peterson (1974).

To the right: the above table as expressed as a "state transition" diagram.

Usually large tables are better left as tables (Booth, p. 74). They are more readily simulated by
computer in tabular form (Booth, p. 74). However, certain concepts—e.g. machines with "reset"
states and machines with repeating patterns (cf. Hill and Peterson p. 244ff)—can be more readily
seen when viewed as a drawing.

Whether a drawing represents an improvement on its table must be decided by the reader for the
particular context.

The evolution of the busy beaver's computation starts at the top and proceeds to the
bottom.

The reader should again be cautioned that such diagrams represent a snapshot of their table frozen
in time, not the course ("trajectory") of a computation through time and space. While every time the
busy beaver machine "runs" it will always follow the same state-trajectory, this is not true for the
"copy" machine that can be provided with variable input "parameters".

The diagram "progress of the computation" shows the three-state busy beaver's "state" (instruction)
progress through its computation from start to finish. On the far right is the Turing "complete
configuration" (Kleene "situation", Hopcroft–Ullman "instantaneous description") at each step. If the
machine were to be stopped and cleared to blank both the "state register" and entire tape, these
"configurations" could be used to rekindle a computation anywhere in its progress (cf. Turing (1936)
The Undecidable, pp. 139–140).

Equivalent models

Many machines that might be thought to have more computational capability than a simple
universal Turing machine can be shown to have no more power (Hopcroft and Ullman p. 159, cf.
Minsky (1967)). They might compute faster, perhaps, or use less memory, or their instruction set
might be smaller, but they cannot compute more powerfully (i.e. more mathematical functions).
(The Church–Turing thesis hypothesises this to be true for any kind of machine: that anything that
can be "computed" can be computed by some Turing machine.)

A Turing machine is equivalent to a single-stack pushdown automaton (PDA) that has been made
more flexible and concise by relaxing the last-in-first-out (LIFO) requirement of its stack. In addition,
a Turing machine is also equivalent to a two-stack PDA with standard LIFO semantics, by using one
stack to model the tape left of the head and the other stack for the tape to the right.

At the other extreme, some very simple models turn out to be Turing-equivalent, i.e. to have the
same computational power as the Turing machine model.

Common equivalent models are the multi-tape Turing machine, multi-track Turing machine,
machines with input and output, and the non-deterministic Turing machine (NDTM) as opposed to
the deterministic Turing machine (DTM) for which the action table has at most one entry for each
combination of symbol and state.

Read-only, right-moving Turing machines are equivalent to DFAs (as well as NFAs by conversion
using the NFA to DFA conversion algorithm).

For practical and didactic intentions, the equivalent register machine can be used as a usual
assembly programming language.

A relevant question is whether or not the computation model represented by concrete programming
languages is Turing equivalent. While the computation of a real computer is based on finite states
and thus not capable to simulate a Turing machine, programming languages themselves do not
necessarily have this limitation. Kirner et al., 2009 have shown that among the general-purpose
programming languages some are Turing complete while others are not. For example, ANSI C is not
Turing complete, as all instantiations of ANSI C (different instantiations are possible as the standard
deliberately leaves certain behaviour undefined for legacy reasons) imply a finite-space memory.
This is because the size of memory reference data types, called pointers, is accessible inside the
language. However, other programming languages like Pascal do not have this feature, which allows
them to be Turing complete in principle. It is just Turing complete in principle, as memory allocation
in a programming language is allowed to fail, which means the programming language can be
Turing complete when ignoring failed memory allocations, but the compiled programs executable
on a real computer cannot.
Choice c-machines, oracle o-machines

Early in his paper (1936) Turing makes a distinction between an "automatic machine"—its "motion ...
completely determined by the configuration" and a "choice machine":

...whose motion is only partially determined by the configuration ... When such a
machine reaches one of these ambiguous configurations, it cannot go on until some
arbitrary choice has been made by an external operator. This would be the case if
we were using machines to deal with axiomatic systems.

— The Undecidable, p. 118

Turing (1936) does not elaborate further except in a footnote in which he describes how to use an a-
machine to "find all the provable formulae of the [Hilbert] calculus" rather than use a choice
machine. He "suppose[s] that the choices are always between two possibilities 0 and 1. Each proof
will then be determined by a sequence of choices i1, i2, ..., in (i1 = 0 or 1, i2 = 0 or 1, ..., in = 0 or 1), and
hence the number 2n + i12n-1 + i22n-2 + ... +in completely determines the proof. The automatic
machine carries out successively proof 1, proof 2, proof 3, ..." (Footnote ‡, The Undecidable, p. 138)

This is indeed the technique by which a deterministic (i.e., a-) Turing machine can be used to mimic
the action of a nondeterministic Turing machine; Turing solved the matter in a footnote and appears
to dismiss it from further consideration.

An oracle machine or o-machine is a Turing a-machine that pauses its computation at state "o"
while, to complete its calculation, it "awaits the decision" of "the oracle"—an entity unspecified by
Turing "apart from saying that it cannot be a machine" (Turing (1939), The Undecidable, p. 166–168).

Universal Turing machines

An implementation of a Turing machine

As Turing wrote in The Undecidable, p. 128 (italics added):

It is possible to invent a single machine which can be used to compute any

computable sequence. If this machine U is supplied with the tape on the beginning
of which is written the string of quintuples separated by semicolons of some
computing machine M, then U will compute the same sequence as M.

This finding is now taken for granted, but at the time (1936) it was considered astonishing. The
model of computation that Turing called his "universal machine"—"U" for short—is considered by
some (cf. Davis (2000)) to have been the fundamental theoretical breakthrough that led to the
notion of the stored-program computer.

Turing's paper ... contains, in essence, the invention of the modern computer and
some of the programming techniques that accompanied it.

— Minsky (1967), p. 104

In terms of computational complexity, a multi-tape universal Turing machine need only be slower by
logarithmic factor compared to the machines it simulates. This result was obtained in 1966 by F. C.
Hennie and R. E. Stearns. (Arora and Barak, 2009, theorem 1.9)

Comparison with real machines

A Turing machine realization using Lego

pieces

Turing machines are more powerful than some other kinds of automata, such as finite-state
machines and pushdown automata. According to the Church–Turing thesis, they are as powerful as
real machines, and are able to execute any operation that a real program can. What is neglected in
this statement is that, because a real machine can only have a finite number of configurations, it is
nothing but a finite-state machine, whereas a Turing machine has an unlimited amount of storage
space available for its computations.
There are a number of ways to explain why Turing machines are useful models of real computers:

Anything a real computer can compute, a Turing machine can also compute. For example: "A
Turing machine can simulate any type of subroutine found in programming languages, including
recursive procedures and any of the known parameter-passing mechanisms" (Hopcroft and
Ullman p. 157). A large enough FSA can also model any real computer, disregarding IO. Thus, a
statement about the limitations of Turing machines will also apply to real computers.

The difference lies only with the ability of a Turing machine to manipulate an unbounded amount
of data. However, given a finite amount of time, a Turing machine (like a real machine) can only
manipulate a finite amount of data.

Like a Turing machine, a real machine can have its storage space enlarged as needed, by
acquiring more disks or other storage media.

Descriptions of real machine programs using simpler abstract models are often much more
complex than descriptions using Turing machines. For example, a Turing machine describing an
algorithm may have a few hundred states, while the equivalent deterministic finite automaton
(DFA) on a given real machine has quadrillions. This makes the DFA representation infeasible to
analyze.

Turing machines describe algorithms independent of how much memory they use. There is a limit
to the memory possessed by any current machine, but this limit can rise arbitrarily in time. Turing
machines allow us to make statements about algorithms which will (theoretically) hold forever,
regardless of advances in conventional computing machine architecture.

Algorithms running on Turing-equivalent abstract machines can have arbitrary-precision data

types available and never have to deal with unexpected conditions (including, but not limited to,
running out of memory).

Another Turing machine realization

Limitations

Computational complexity theory

A limitation of Turing machines is that they do not model the strengths of a particular arrangement
well. For instance, modern stored-program computers are actually instances of a more specific form
of abstract machine known as the random-access stored-program machine or RASP machine
model. Like the universal Turing machine, the RASP stores its "program" in "memory" external to its
finite-state machine's "instructions". Unlike the universal Turing machine, the RASP has an infinite
number of distinguishable, numbered but unbounded "registers"—memory "cells" that can contain
any integer (cf. Elgot and Robinson (1964), Hartmanis (1971), and in particular Cook-Rechow
(1973); references at random-access machine). The RASP's finite-state machine is equipped with
the capability for indirect addressing (e.g., the contents of one register can be used as an address to
specify another register); thus the RASP's "program" can address any register in the register-
sequence. The upshot of this distinction is that there are computational optimizations that can be
performed based on the memory indices, which are not possible in a general Turing machine; thus
when Turing machines are used as the basis for bounding running times, a "false lower bound" can
be proven on certain algorithms' running times (due to the false simplifying assumption of a Turing
machine). An example of this is binary search, an algorithm that can be shown to perform more
quickly when using the RASP model of computation rather than the Turing machine model.

Interaction

In the early days of computing, computer use was typically limited to batch processing, i.e., non-
interactive tasks, each producing output data from given input data. Computability theory, which
studies computability of functions from inputs to outputs, and for which Turing machines were
invented, reflects this practice.

Since the 1970s, interactive use of computers became much more common. In principle, it is
possible to model this by having an external agent read from the tape and write to it at the same
time as a Turing machine, but this rarely matches how interaction actually happens; therefore, when
describing interactivity, alternatives such as I/O automata are usually preferred.

Comparison with the arithmetic model of computation

The arithmetic model of computation differs from the Turing model in two aspects:[20]: 32

In the arithmetic model, every real number requires a single memory cell, whereas in the Turing
model the storage size of a real number depends on the number of bits required to represent it.

In the arithmetic model, every basic arithmetic operation on real numbers (addition, subtraction,
multiplication and division) can be done in a single step, whereas in the Turing model the run-time
of each arithmetic operation depends on the length of the operands.

Some algorithms run in polynomial time in one model but not in the other one. For example:
 The Euclidean algorithm runs in polynomial time in the Turing model, but not in the arithmetic
model.

The algorithm that reads n numbers and then computes by repeated squaring runs in
polynomial time in the Arithmetic model, but not in the Turing model. This is because the number
of bits required to represent the outcome is exponential in the input size.

However, if an algorithm runs in polynomial time in the arithmetic model, and in addition, the binary
length of all involved numbers is polynomial in the length of the input, then it is always polynomial-
time in the Turing model. Such an algorithm is said to run in strongly polynomial time.

History

Historical background: computational machinery

Robin Gandy (1919–1995)—a student of Alan Turing (1912–1954), and his lifelong friend—traces
the lineage of the notion of "calculating machine" back to Charles Babbage (circa 1834) and actually
proposes "Babbage's Thesis":

That the whole of development and operations of analysis are now capable of being
executed by machinery.

— (italics in Babbage as cited by Gandy, p. 54)

Gandy's analysis of Babbage's analytical engine describes the following five operations (cf. p. 52–
53):

1. The arithmetic functions +, −, ×, where − indicates "proper" subtraction: x − y = 0 if y ≥ x.

2. Any sequence of operations is an operation.

3. Iteration of an operation (repeating n times an operation P).

4. Conditional iteration (repeating n times an operation P conditional on the "success" of test T).

5. Conditional transfer (i.e., conditional "goto").

Gandy states that "the functions which can be calculated by (1), (2), and (4) are precisely those
which are Turing computable." (p. 53). He cites other proposals for "universal calculating machines"
including those of Percy Ludgate (1909), Leonardo Torres Quevedo (1914),[21][22] Maurice d'Ocagne
(1922), Louis Couffignal (1933), Vannevar Bush (1936), Howard Aiken (1937). However:
 … the emphasis is on programming a fixed iterable sequence of arithmetical
operations. The fundamental importance of conditional iteration and conditional
transfer for a general theory of calculating machines is not recognized…

— Gandy p. 55

The Entscheidungsproblem (the "decision problem"): Hilbert's tenth question of

1900

With regard to Hilbert's problems posed by the famous mathematician David Hilbert in 1900, an
aspect of problem #10 had been floating about for almost 30 years before it was framed precisely.
Hilbert's original expression for No. 10 is as follows:

10. Determination of the solvability of a Diophantine equation. Given a Diophantine

equation with any number of unknown quantities and with rational integral
coefficients: To devise a process according to which it can be determined in a finite
number of operations whether the equation is solvable in rational integers. The
Entscheidungsproblem [decision problem for first-order logic] is solved when we
know a procedure that allows for any given logical expression to decide by finitely
many operations its validity or satisfiability ... The Entscheidungsproblem must be
considered the main problem of mathematical logic.

— quoted, with this translation and the original German, in Dershowitz

and Gurevich, 2008

By 1922, this notion of "Entscheidungsproblem" had developed a bit, and H. Behmann stated that

... most general form of the Entscheidungsproblem [is] as follows:

A quite definite generally applicable prescription is required

which will allow one to decide in a finite number of steps the
truth or falsity of a given purely logical assertion ...

— Gandy p. 57, quoting Behmann

Behmann remarks that ... the general problem is equivalent to the problem of
deciding which mathematical propositions are true.

— ibid.