COMMENT ⊗   VALID 00002 PAGES
C REC  PAGE   DESCRIPTION
C00001 00001
C00002 00002	Ideas and notes on conversations
C00012 ENDMK
C⊗;
Ideas and notes on conversations

1983 March 11

1. People concerned with concurrent programs prove fairness about
their programs.  Is it possible to include statements in the
program demanding fairness and leave it to the compiler to say
how this is to be accomplished?

2. Conversation with Les Lamport
Interval logic by Richard Schwartz and Michael Melliar-Smith.

Pierre Wolper on generating synchronization from temporal logic
specs.  Alan Emerson student of Ed Clark.

*Quantum 1988 Aug 5

Quantum mechanics on a graph.
We have a particle moving on a graph.
What's the momentum operator?  Remember the theorem that the
quantum mechanical commutation relation cannot be satisfied by
finite matrices.  What about some other kind of finite system?
We can try the condition that the derivatives of the wave
function moving into a vertex sum to zero.  However, there
may be other forms of dynamics that simply moving in a scalar
potential.  Is there a vertex condition, e.g. a linear relation
among the wave function (assumed continuous at the vertex)
and its derivatives.  I'm doubtful about a relation involving
the current as the main relation, because of the conjugates.
It should be a consequence of the main relation.  What would
a vector potential reduce to in this case?

*CAI - 1988 Aug 5
For CAI.  Besides the student and the teacher, there are other
simulated students with knowledge and personalities.  The real
student develops competitive (and possible co-operative) relations
with the simulated students.  The theory is that he will be
encouraged to learn by the possibility of beating them.  Since we
don't care about the self-esteem of a simulated student, we can
optimize the reinforcement of the real student.
Some aspects of this should be patentable.

*Elephant - 1988 Aug 7
Slogan: Programming without one hand tied behind one's back.
We want to be able to say, as a specification, or possibly
in a program, that when we return from a subroutine, the
ac should contain f(contents(ac,when the subroutine was
entered corresponding to the exit)).
We need to be able to refer to all past events.
We need sets (of past events) and maximal elements.
Palindrome patterns (added to regular exps),
(pushdown automata?) (return from subroutine).
when I entered.  The matching entry.
The times in Old Elephant are just labels for what is
accessed through them.  With enough language, the times
themselves may not be needed.
Consider a Spider program.
Is "the corresponding entry" the linguistic construction
we need or is it just something programmed with the
needed construction?

*spider - 1988 Aug 7
List heuristics for spider before trying to determine framework for
program.
We also need a list of concepts.
1. predicates on moves.
2. predicates on columns in a position
movable
a move to a column makes the column not movable, it may be immovable
directly, but may be still movable because there are other places
to put the covering card

heuristics: we prefer moves that don't make any column immovable.
we prefer moves from short columns.
If all moves make a some column immovable, we prefer covering a
high rank card.
We prefer the move that is part of the longer sequence.
If we would make a move that gets more information after
a given sequence of moves that don't provide information,
make, if possible, the information providing moves first.
At least if there is any possible outcome of the
information providing move sequence that would cause
us not to make the other sequence.
We prefer  move that leaves a card of a certain rank
available to a move that makes it unavailable - given
the choice and ceteris paribus.

1988 Oct 12
	In a spider solitaire position, let there be two moves A
and B that can be made in either order.  Suppose A does not turn
over a card, and we can determine that if we made A, then B would
be the next move made.  Suppose B does turn over a card.  Then B
should be done first, since it gains information.  The problem is
to express this rule in a general way so that a program could
take it into account in addition to its other rules.  Note that
explaining the principle requires little information about
spider.

Oct 17
	Ascending to the metalevel by making an assertion about
the quotation of any subexpression of anything that has come up
in memory should be worthwhile.

Oct 19
	Genius and scientist social service agency
One reads about geniuses who commit suicide, e.g. Turing.  Suppose
there were an agency that would try to help genius in difficulty.
That Turing was about to commit suicide, if he did, was probably
unknown, but his friends probably knew he was in difficulty.
They could have asked the agency to help.  Maybe he would have
rejected help, and maybe nothing could have been done.  On the
other hand, they might have saved him for many more years of
productive activity.

More examples: Sylvia Plath, Janis Joplin, Arthur Koestler?,
Ramanujan, the Santa Cruz 11 year old college graduate.

What about marginal geniuses, e.g. Gunkel?  Obviously that
depends on resources.

Undoubtedly the agency would have to do triage, deciding it
couldn't help.

The first step might be a survey of biographical information to
try to identify cases which might have been helped.

The help should be unpublicized in particular cases.

1988 Nov 22
NYT has article referring to Phys. Rev. Letters paper by Kip Thorne
and others suggesting time travel through wormholes may be possible.
I should explore the hypertime idea to see if there can be relaxation
to ordinary space-time solutions that correspond to time travel.

We also need to ask what kinds of differential equations permit
the evolution of intelligence.

1988 Nov 28
Maybe it will help with YSP to postulate that changes must have
causes.  If the gun becomes unloaded there must be a cause of that.