Question

I am supposed to decide whether an arbitrary computer program finishes running or runs forever

Answer 1

of course it depends on the code you wrote..if it involve infinite loops then it may run forever otherwise not

Answer 2

i believe the difficulty in the problem lies in the requirement that the decision procedure must work for all programs and input
a particular program either halts on a given input or does not halt...

Answer 3

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halting_problem

Answer 4

thanks estudier

Answer 5

how would one go about writing a function for this?

Answer 6

"Alan Turing proved in 1936 that a general algorithm to solve the halting problem for all possible program-input pairs cannot exist."

Answer 7

i disagree

Answer 8

I will look forward to reading your paper on the subject....:-)

Answer 9

so long as anything can prove to be consistant, there is a function to it!

Answer 10

Well, you will have to disprove Turing's proof..

Answer 11

naturally

Answer 12

i come to dislike theoretical mathematics, its so abstract and almost irrelevant. Applied mathematics can be useful and amazingly beautiful as well.

Answer 13

There is proof that shows there is a total computable function that decides whether an arbitrary program i halts on arbitrary input x!

Answer 14

at least there should be.