Undecidable Problem: Moving Left 3 Times in a Row

Proving that determining if a Turing Machine moves left three times consecutively is undecidable, unlike checking if it does so at all.

Undecidable Problem: Moving Left 3 Times in a Row
Easy Theory
2.6K views โ€ข Aug 9, 2021
Undecidable Problem: Moving Left 3 Times in a Row

About this video

Here we show that the problem of determining whether an arbitrary Turing Machine moves left three times in a row is undecidable, but checking if such a machine moves left *at all* IS decidable! There is a very fine line between decidable and undecidable here. The trick with the decidable part is to run the machine "long enough" before you know that it will never move left; and for the undecidable part, encoding each transition to always interject a Right move and then a Left move, and force 3 lefts in a row at the end. (Update: it IS decidable to check if the Turing Machine moves left TWICE in a row; try to prove why this is.)

Timeline:
0:00 - Intro
1:45 - Moving Left At Least Once is Decidable
5:06 - Moving Left 3 Times in a Row is Undecidable

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Views

2.6K

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46

Duration

13:26

Published

Aug 9, 2021

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