On the functions generated by the general purpose analog computer

PreprintWe consider the General Purpose Analog Computer (GPAC), introduced by Claude Shannon in 1941 as a mathematical model of Differential Analysers, that is to say as a model of continuous-time analog (mechanical, and later one electronic) machines of that time. The GPAC generates as output univariate functions (i.e. functions f:R→R). In this paper we extend this model by: (i) allowing multivariate functions (i.e. functions f:Rn→Rm); (ii) introducing a notion of amount of resources (space) needed to generate a function, which allows the stratification of GPAC generable functions into proper subclasses. We also prove that a wide class of (continuous and discontinuous) functions can be uniformly approximated over their full domain. We prove a few stability properties of this model, mostly stability by arithmetic operations, composition and ODE solving, taking into account the amount of resources needed to perform each operation. We establish that generable functions are always analytic but that they can nonetheless (uniformly) approximate a wide range of nonanalytic functions. Our model and results extend some of the results from [19] to the multidimensional case, allow one to define classes of functions generated by GPACs which take into account bounded resources, and also strengthen the approximation result from [19] over a compact domain to a uniform approximation result over unbounded domains.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

On Cayley graphs of virtually free groups

In 1985, Dunwoody showed that finitely presentable groups are accessible. Dunwoody's result was used to show that context-free groups, groups quasi-isometric to trees or finitely presentable groups of asymptotic dimension 1 are virtually free. Using another theorem of Dunwoody of 1979, we study when a group is virtually free in terms of its Cayley graph and we obtain new proofs of the mentioned results and other previously depending on them

Polynomial Time corresponds to Solutions of Polynomial Ordinary Differential Equations of Polynomial Length

We provide an implicit characterization of polynomial time computation in terms of ordinary differential equations: we characterize the class $\operatorname{PTIME}$ of languages computable in polynomial time in terms of differential equations with polynomial right-hand side. This result gives a purely continuous (time and space) elegant and simple characterization of $\operatorname{PTIME}$. This is the first time such classes are characterized using only ordinary differential equations. Our characterization extends to functions computable in polynomial time over the reals in the sense of computable analysis. This extends to deterministic complexity classes above polynomial time. This may provide a new perspective on classical complexity, by giving a way to define complexity classes, like $\operatorname{PTIME}$, in a very simple way, without any reference to a notion of (discrete) machine. This may also provide ways to state classical questions about computational complexity via ordinary differential equations, i.e.~by using the framework of analysis

Turing machines can be efficiently simulated by the General Purpose Analog Computer

The Church-Turing thesis states that any sufficiently powerful computational model which captures the notion of algorithm is computationally equivalent to the Turing machine. This equivalence usually holds both at a computability level and at a computational complexity level modulo polynomial reductions. However, the situation is less clear in what concerns models of computation using real numbers, and no analog of the Church-Turing thesis exists for this case. Recently it was shown that some models of computation with real numbers were equivalent from a computability perspective. In particular it was shown that Shannon's General Purpose Analog Computer (GPAC) is equivalent to Computable Analysis. However, little is known about what happens at a computational complexity level. In this paper we shed some light on the connections between this two models, from a computational complexity level, by showing that, modulo polynomial reductions, computations of Turing machines can be simulated by GPACs, without the need of using more (space) resources than those used in the original Turing computation, as long as we are talking about bounded computations. In other words, computations done by the GPAC are as space-efficient as computations done in the context of Computable Analysis

The Agent Intellect as “form for us” and Averroes’s Critique of al-Fârâbî

This article explicates Averroes\u27s understanding of human knowing and abstraction in this three commentaries on Aristotle\u27s De Anima. While Averroes\u27s views on the nature of the human material intellect changes through the three commentaries until he reaches is famous view of the unity of the material intellect as one for all human beings, his view of the agent intellect as \u27form for us\u27 is sustained throughout these works. In his Long Commentary on the De Anima he reveals his dependence on al-Fârâbî for this notion and provides a detailed critique of the Farabian notion that the agent intellect is \u27form for us\u27 only as agent cause, not as our true formal cause. Although Averroes argues that the agent intellect must somehow be intrinsic to us as our form since humans are per se rational and undertake acts of knowing by will, his view is shown to rest on an equivocal use of the notion of formal cause. The agent intellect cannot be properly our intrinsic formal principle while remaining ontologically separate