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refers to well-defined functional properties of an abstract entity rather than
to an assembly of cogwheels, buttons and levers, although such assemblies
may represent embodiments of these abstract functional entities.
A trivial machine is characterized by a one-to-one relationship between
its “input” (stimulus, cause) and its “output” (response, effect). This invari-
able relationship is “the machine.” Since this relationship is determined
once and for all, this is a deterministic system; and since an output once
observed for a given input will be the same for the same input given later,
this is also a predictable system.
Non-trivial machines, however, are quite different creatures. Their input-
output relationship is not invariant, but is determined by the machine's
previous output. In other words, its previous steps determine its present
reactions. While these machines are again deterministic systems, for all
practical reasons they are unpredictable: an output once observed for a
given input will most likely be not the same for the same input given later.
In order to grasp the profound difference between these two kinds of
machines it may be helpful to envision “internal states” in these machines.
While in the trivial machine only one internal state participates always in
its internal operation, in the non-trivial machine it is the shift from one
internal state to another that makes it so elusive.
One may interpret this distinction as the Twentieth Century version of
Aristotle's distinction of explanatory frameworks for inanimate matter and
living organisms.
All machines we construct and buy are, hopefully, trivial machines. A
toaster should toast, a washing machine wash, a motorcar should pre-
dictably respond to its driver's operations. In fact, all our efforts go into one
direction, to create trivial machines or, if we encounter non-trivial machines,
to convert them into trivial machines. The discovery of agriculture is the
discovery that some aspects of Nature can be trivialized: If I till today, I
shall have bread tomorrow.
Granted, that in some instances we may be not completely successful in
producing ideally trivial machines. For example, one morning turning the
starter key to our car, the beast does not start. Apparently it changed its
internal state, obscure to us, as a consequence of previous outputs (it may
have exhausted its gasoline supply) and revealed for a moment its true
nature of being a non-trivial machine. But this is, of course, outrageous and
this state of affairs should be remedied at once.
While our pre-occupation with the trivialization of our environment may
be in one domain useful and constructive, in another domain it is useless
and destructive. Trivialization is a dangerous panacea when man applies it
to himself.
Consider, for instance, the way our system of education is set up. The
student enters school as an unpredictable “non-trivial machine.” We don't
know what answer he will give to a question. However, should he succeed
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