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Wolfram and the Computing Nature
Publication Type:
Book chapter
Venue:
Irreducibility and Computational Equivalence: 10 Years After the Publication of Wolframs A New Kind of Science
Abstract
WolframÂ’s work, and especially his New Kind of Science, presents as much a
new science as a new natural philosophy ‐ natural computationalism. In the same way as
Andrew Hodges, based on Alan TuringÂ’s pioneering work on computability and his ideas on
morphological computing and artificial intelligence, argues that Turing is best viewed as a
natural philosopher we can also assert that WolframÂ’s work constitutes natural philosophy. It is
evident through natural and formal computational phenomena studied in different media, from
the book with related materials to programs and demonstrations and computational
knowledge engine. WolframÂ’s theoretical studies and practical computational constructs
including Mathematica and Wolfram Alpha reveal a research program reminiscent of LeibnizÂ’
Mathesis universalis, the project of a universal science supported by a logical calculation
framework. Wolfram’s new kind of science may be seen in the sense of Newton’s Philosophiæ
Naturalis Principia Mathematica being both natural philosophy and science, not only because of
the new methodology of experimental computer science and simulation, or because of
particular contributions addressing variety of phenomena, but in the first place as a new unified
scientific framework for all of knowledge. It is not only about explaining special patterns seen in
nature and models of complex behaviors; it is about the computational nature derived from the
first computational principles. WolframÂ’s as well as TuringÂ’s natural philosophy differs from
GalileoÂ’s view of nature. Computation used in modeling is more than a language. It produces
real time behaviors of physical systems: computation is the way nature is. Cellular automata as
explored by Wolfram are a whole fascinating computational universe. Do they exhaust all
possible computational behaviors that our physical universe exhibit? If we understand physical
processes as computations in a more general sense than the computations performed by
symbol manipulation done by our current computers, then universal Turing machines and
universal cellular automata exhibit only a subset of all possible information‐processing
behaviors found in nature. Even though mathematically, there is a principle of computational
equivalence, in physical nature exists a hierarchy of emergent processes on many levels of
organization that exhibits different physical behavior and thus can be said compute with
different expressive power. This article argues that, based on the notion of computing nature,
where computing stands for all kinds of information processing, the development of natural
computationalism have a potential to enrich computational studies in the same way as the
explorations in the computational universe hold a promise to provide computational models
applicable to the physical universe.
Bibtex
@incollection{Dodig-Crnkovic2923,
author = {Gordana Dodig-Crnkovic},
title = {Wolfram and the Computing Nature},
editor = {Hector Zenil },
pages = {417--437},
month = {January},
year = {2013},
booktitle = {Irreducibility and Computational Equivalence: 10 Years After the Publication of Wolframs A New Kind of Science},
publisher = {Springer},
url = {http://www.es.mdu.se/publications/2923-}
}