Note this is not the simplest Turing machine ever made. The Big Idea is Turing created an example computer (the Turing Machine) on paper, then proved a bunch of stuff using the machine model. He then showed that if another machine is "Turing Complete", ie does the same things (I am simplifying, obviously), then the other machine can do the same things as his, and the list of things (the proofs) apply to any "Turing Complete" machine. In truth, it is hard, but not impossible, to make a non-Turing Complete computer.

Check out the link to the dry-erase machine - it uses film stock as the read/write tape.

Kind of depressing to thing someone would make a Turing Machine from Gamers Crack. Sigh.

Post : Building a Turing Machine from Magic the Gathering
URL : http://hackaday.com/2012/09/12/building-a-turing-machine-from-magic-the-gathering/
Posted : September 12, 2012 at 12:01 pm
Author : Mike Szczys
Tags : magic the gathering, Turing machine
Categories : pcs hacks, toy hacks

http://hackadaycom.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/magic-the-gathering-turing-machine.png

If you really know your Magic the Gather and you're a programming wiz you'll appreciate this paper on building a functioning Turing Machine from Magic the Gathering cards (http://games.slashdot.org/story/12/09/12/0059200/magic-the-gathering-is-turing-complete) . We're sure you're familiar with Turing Machines, which uses a rewritable strip to store and recall data. Most of the time we see these machines built as... machines. For instance, this dry-erase marker Turing Machine (http://hackaday.com/2010/03/27/turing-machine-a-masterpiece-of-craftsmanship/) has long been on the top of our favorites list. But as The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson illustrates, there's more than one way to skin this cat.

A complete list of the cards used in this machine can be found here (http://www.toothycat.net/~hologram/Turing/Cards.html) . A little bit of preparation (casting to tweak abilities) goes into making sure the cards will work as called for in the Turing design. The tape is made of Ally tokens to the right of the head, and Zombie tokens to the left. The computational abilities of the head depend on the colors of the cards. It's a bit too complex to paraphrase, but the design is based on this 2-state, 3-symbol setup (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfram%27s_2-state_3-symbol_Turing_machine) whose rules are listed in the image above.

It's going to take us a while to fully wrap our heads around this thing, but it'll be fun getting to that point!

[via Slashdot (http://games.slashdot.org/story/12/09/12/0059200/magic-the-gathering-is-turing-complete) ]

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