Could Computers Understand Their Own Programs

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• Prof Sir Tony Hoare - Microsoft Research & Computer Laboratory
• Wednesday 24 April 2013, 14:30-15:30
• Lecture Theatre 1, Computer Laboratory.

If you have a question about this talk, please contact David Greaves.

Could Computers Understand Their Own Programs? – In summary, my answer to the question is Yes.

In principle, computers could understand their own programs, and those of other computers, although their understanding is rather weak at present. It was Alan Turing who suggested that we can gather evidence of the understanding of computers if we subject them to the same kind of examination that we have inflicted on many generations students at schools and universities. An examination usually requires the student to justify each given answer by logical reasoning. The most rigorous principles of logical reasoning was first formulated by the ancient Greek Philosopher Aristotle; and they were further refined by the ancient Egyptian philosopher Euclid. Finally, Alan Turing also showed that these principles apply equally to logical reasoning about computer programs. Finally, I will suggest how to set the pass mark in the examination. A computer passes the test of understanding if the answers to the questions about its own program are useful to the human software engineer who wrote the program. I hope that one day, computers will pass this test. Then they will be able to serve as intelligent assistants to the programmer during the task of writing the programs.

This talk is part of the The Wheeler Lectures in Computer Science series.

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