The Annotated Turing: A Guided Tour through Alan Turing's Historic Paper on Computability and the Turing Machine

Methodology and Conclusions

Charles Petzold's book «The Annotated Turing» offers a detailed analysis and commentary on Alan Turing's famous paper «On Computable Numbers, with an Application to the Entscheidungsproblem», published in 1936. The book's methodology involves a step-by-step breakdown of Turing's original text, supplemented with historical context, explanations, and modern interpretations. Petzold aims to make complex mathematical and logical concepts more accessible to a broad audience by explaining Turing's ideas in simple language and illustrating them with examples. The book's conclusions highlight the significance of Turing's work for the development of computer science and computation theory. Petzold demonstrates how Turing's ideas about machines capable of performing computations became the foundation for the creation of modern computers. The book also emphasizes Turing's influence on subsequent research in artificial intelligence and algorithm theory.