lotta interesting folks buried in princeton cemetery. plenty of mathematician/physicist types. but alonzo church stands out amongst them.

look at this one full sentence from his wikipedia page.

he is best known for the lambda calculus, church–turing thesis, proving the unsolvability of the entscheidungsproblem, frege–church ontology, and the church–rosser theorem.

i said look at it, not read it. especially not out loud. i should have said this earlier, but, i don’t know what those words do. i wouldn’t chance it.

though, it checks out that the entscheidungsproblem turned out to be unsolvable. i could’ve taken one look at it and told you that. anyway, thanks to dr. church we all can stop trying.

just one thing … if he proved a problem is unsolvable, did he not then solve that problem? solve means to “find an answer to, explanation for, or means of effectively dealing with (a problem or mystery).” giving up is an effective means to deal with a problem. i’ve also been saying that for years.

decide for yourself. but in my book, this man solved an unsolvable problem. he’s in the power rankings.

mmxxii