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Etymology edit

Named after English mathematician, logician, and cryptographer Alan Turing (1912–1954), who introduced the concept in 1936 to present a mathematically precise definition of computability.

Noun edit

Turing machine (plural Turing machines)

  1. (computing theory) An abstract computing machine that has a finite number of possible internal states and operates on an infinite memory tape by first reading a symbol from a cell in the tape, and then, deterministically, based on that symbol and the machine’s state, writing a symbol in that cell, moving to a neighboring cell, or changing state.
    • 2017, Arlindo Oliveira, The Digital Mind: How Science Is Redefining Humanity, MIT Press, →ISBN, page 81:
      Another class, P, is a subset of NP, and includes all decision problems that can be solved by a (deterministic) Turing machine in polynomial time.

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