Joint Pure Math/C&O Grad Colloquium
Rian Neogi, Combinatorics & Optimization, University of Waterloo
"The Birth of Computation"
In 1928, Hilbert posed the Entscheidungsproblem, which is informally stated as follows: "Given a mathematical statement, is there a well-defined procedure by which one can decide whether the statement is true or false?". This is a natural question for mathematicians to ask. Essentially the question asks whether one can solve mathematical problems in some automatic and structured manner, or must we rely on human insight, wit and intuition?