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    This document discusses Turing machines and provides examples. It begins by describing Turing machine architecture as consisting of an unlimited tape, tape reader/writer, and state table. It then provides examples of Turing machines that double a binary number, check the remainder of a number divided by 2, and check the remainder of a number divided by 3. It also discusses Turing machine simulators and the busy beaver problem of finding a Turing machine that takes the most steps before halting based on its number of states.

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    Concepts and some example of turing machine

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    Turing machine

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    This document discusses Turing machines and provides examples. It begins by describing Turing machine architecture as consisting of an unlimited tape, tape reader/writer, and state table. It then provides examples of Turing machines that double a binary number, check the remainder of a number divided by 2, and check the remainder of a number divided by 3. It also discusses Turing machine simulators and the busy beaver problem of finding a Turing machine that takes the most steps before halting based on its number of states.

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    31 views10 pages

    Turing Machines: Robin Whitty

    Uploaded by

    pankajsharma cea
    This document discusses Turing machines and provides examples. It begins by describing Turing machine architecture as consisting of an unlimited tape, tape reader/writer, and state table. It then provides examples of Turing machines that double a binary number, check the remainder of a number divided by 2, and check the remainder of a number divided by 3. It also discusses Turing machine simulators and the busy beaver problem of finding a Turing machine that takes the most steps before halting based on its number of states.

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    of 10

    Turing Machines

    Robin Whitty

    London South Bank University

    Touring Turing, Rewley House, July 2012

    Robin Whitty Turing Machines


    Turing Machine Architecture
    Unlimited tape plus tape reader/writer plus state table

    equivalent to:

    automaton plus 2 stacks

    Robin Whitty Turing Machines


    State tables

    Rules for read/writehead = state table

    Rule format:
    <current state>, <symbol read>, <symbol written>, <head movement>, <new state>

    Robin Whitty Turing Machines


    Example 1
    A machine for doubling a number (written in binary) with the tape
    head starting and ending at the most significant digit:

    State 0: Reading through the binary digits from left to right


    State 1: Reading through the binary digits from right to left
    State H: Halt
    Robin Whitty Turing Machines
    Example 2
    A machine for checking the remainder of a number (in binary) on
    division by 2 and halting with the tape head reading the remainder:

    State 0: Reading first digit


    State 1: Scanning zeros
    State 0: Scanning ones
    State H: Halt (∗ means no head movement)

    Robin Whitty Turing Machines


    Example 3

    A machine for checking the remainder of a number (in binary) on


    division by 3 and halting with the tape head reading the remainder.
    Recall the automaton that checked for divisibility by 3:

    This becomes the state table of our Turing machine (with modifications):

    This time the states are


    not easy to name!
    Exercise: see if you can
    think of suggestive names.

    Robin Whitty Turing Machines


    Example 3 continued
    Recall the annotation of the finite automaton which found the value
    of the number (but was not part of the actual machine):

    We incorporate the annotation instructions into our remainder


    machine:

    Robin Whitty Turing Machines


    Turing machine simulators

    There are many web-based simulators in which you can try out your
    designs:

    morphett.info/turing/turing.html

    Robin Whitty Turing Machines


    The Busy Beaver
    Suppose we are given a positive integer n. Let us look for a Turing
    machine which
    1. has exactly n states plus a Halt state;
    2. reads and writes just blanks and 1’s on its tape;
    3. starts with a tape in which every cell is blank.
    Among the possible machines, chose a machine which halts but which
    takes the greatest number of steps before halting. This is called an
    n-state busy beaver.

    A 4-state busy beaver. It halts in 107 steps


    Robin Whitty Turing Machines
    The Busy Beaver Function
    Define the function S(n) to be the number of steps taken by an
    n-state busy beaver.
    The function S(n) is noncomputable.
    Proof. Suppose we can compute S(n) for every positive integer n.
    Let M be any Turing machine with n states. We will test if it halts:
    run M for S(n) steps; if M has halted then answer ‘Yes’; if M has
    not yet halted then it never can since S(n) is the greatest number
    of steps an n-state Turing machine can take. So output ‘No’. So
    the halting problem is solved, which is impossible. We conclude
    that S(n) is noncomputable.
    In fact the sequence S(1), S(2), S(3), . . . grows faster than any
    computable sequence! Because if S(n) never exceeds some
    computable sequence T (n), say, then we can replace S with T in the
    above proof.
    So sooner or later S(n), n = 1, 2, 3, . . . overtakes the sequence
    10
    10, 1010 , 1010 , . . ., or any monster sequence you can construct!
    Robin Whitty Turing Machines

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