Date: Thu, 15 Nov 2001 18:28:39 -0500 (EST)
From: Tom O'Donnell
Subject: Books on reserve in RC library

Hello all,

Here are some of the books I put on reserve at the RC library -- more books and articles to follow soon. Look over the article (number 7 here). You will see now Chaitin's talk closely parallels the theme of our course. This theme too would make a good topic.

1) "The Fabric of Reality", David Deutsch

(He argues that the "many worlds" interpretation of quantum mechanics is necessary in order to make breakthroughs in quantum computing. He argues strenuously against the logical positivist and instrumentalist positions in physics in a manner which may parallel Godel's positions.)

2) "Feynman Lectures on Computation", Richard Feynman, Hey and Allen Editors. [I'm using this one over the weekend. I'll put it on reserve later]

3) "Hilbert", Reid

4) "The Bit and the Pendulum: From Quantum Computing to M Theory--The New Physics of Information", Tom Siegfried

5) "The New Renaissance: Computers and the Next Level of Civilization", Douglas S. Robertson

6) "History of Computing: The Encyclopedia of the People and Machines That Made Computer History, Mark Greenia (CD ROM)

7) "A Century of Controversy Over the Foundations of Mathematics", Gregory Chaitin (Article) in "Complexity", 2000 John Wiley and Sons, Inc. Vol. 5. No. 5.

(This talk by Chaitin parallels the themes of our course and of [Davis, 2000] closely. He is an important contemporary researcher and it might be interesting to examine his views. There are other articles by him for a general audience.)

8) "Godel's Proof", by Nagel and Neumann

(This is a detailed explanation of Godel's proof by a mathematician and a writer for "Scientific American". It is not an easy read, but it REALLY captures many of the important concepts and the flavor of his proof, as well as its significance. In this case, and perhaps with Deutsch's book [number 1 on the list], it might be best to get a group of two or three students who want to dissect it together [or part of it] and write some sort of joint paper and give a joint presentation for their final project. So, if you are interested, talk to me about your ideas and see if there are one or two people to work with.)

More soon!
Tom

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