Steven Meyer
Steven Meyer | |
|---|---|
| Residence | Minneapolis, MN, United States |
| Nationality | USA |
Steven Meyer (also published as Steven Jay Meyer) is an American computer scientist, software developer and independent philosopher of science based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He is the founder and president of Tachyon Design Automation Corp. (formerly Pragmatic C Software Corp.), the Minnesota electronic design automation company that develops the open-source CVC Verilog HDL simulator. Alongside his engineering work he publishes and lectures on the philosophy and methodology of science, computation and physics, and is a critic of artificial intelligence and of quantum computing.
Biography
Meyer worked as a compiler and simulator developer in the electronic design automation (EDA) industry, writing translators, compilers and logic simulators, before founding Pragmatic C Software Corp., which was later renamed Tachyon Design Automation Corp. The company develops, supports and markets the OSS CVC Verilog simulator, which is distributed under an open-source (Perl-style artistic) license and is free for electronic design use.
He pursued graduate study in computer science at the University of California, Berkeley; his intended Berkeley Ph.D. thesis, "Pragmatic Versus Structured Computer Programming", was never completed as a dissertation and has been circulated by him as a stand-alone essay. He has also lectured at the University of Minnesota Center for Austrian Studies on "The Vienna Circle's Successors in Minnesota and America".
Work
Meyer presents regularly at philosophy of science and computing conferences, including the European Conference on Computing and Philosophy (ECAP), the International Association for Computing and Philosophy (IACAP), the Congress on Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science and Technology (CLMPST), the History of Philosophy of Science (HOPOS) conference, the Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft philosophy of physics working group, and Eurocrypt rump sessions.
His work is built on the mid-twentieth-century methodological tradition he calls the Lakatos–Feyerabend–Kuhn (LFK) research programme, and on a defence of Vienna Circle unified science. Recurring themes in his papers and talks include:
- Falsification of artificial intelligence. In "A Popperian Falsification of Artificial Intelligence – Lighthill Defended" (arXiv:1704.08111) he argues that AI was already falsified by James Lighthill's 1972 report to the British Science Research Council, that Lighthill's combinatorial-explosion argument still applies to modern AI, and that AI research should adopt the Popperian duty to attempt falsification. He has continued this line of criticism against large language models.
- Criticism of quantum computing. In talks such as "Quantum computers are a delusion – Feynman's joke" and "Methodological Testing of Fast Quantum Computers as Illusions" he argues that fast quantum computers cannot exist and that existing ion-trap devices are best understood as imprecise analog computers, although quantum key exchange may be practical.
- Anti-formalist computer science. Following Peter Naur's "dataology", he argues that computer science should be treated as an empirical science and a branch of the physics of computation rather than as formal mathematics, and he has criticised formal program-verification methods and the Cobham–Edmonds thesis.
- History and philosophy of computation and mathematics. He has written on John von Neumann as a post-Hilbert philosopher of computation, on William Tutte's Colossus methods as the beginning of modern computation, on George Pólya's influence on Imre Lakatos's quasi-empirical philosophy of mathematics, and on Paul Finsler's set theory and views on infinity.
- Philosophy of quantum mechanics. He argues for methodological pluralism in the interpretation of quantum mechanics, has presented a "Popper school methodological disproof of quantum logic", and has examined Erwin Schrödinger's Alpbach influence on Paul Feyerabend's philosophy of physics.
He also holds published software patent applications in the Verilog simulation area and distributes free utility software, and writes a Substack blog devoted to falsifying AI.
External links
- Steve Meyer's Research Web Page – papers, extended abstracts and conference slides
- Tachyon Design Automation Corp.
- "A Popperian Falsification of Artificial Intelligence – Lighthill Defended" (arXiv)