

The Ternary Calculating Machine of Thomas Fowler - tgrass
http://www.mortati.com/glusker/fowler/index.htm

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dhamidi
See also Setun
<[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Setun>](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Setun>), a
computer from 1958 using the balanced ternary system.

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dsplatonov
Nice. It's strange why don't we have such computers nowadays

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todd8
Knuth's _Art of Computer Programming, vol 2_ [1], not surprisingly, gives a
thorough discussion of the balanced ternary system.

The solution for a nice brainteaser can be found quickly once one thinks about
balanced trinary, here it is: "Using a balance scale, what is the minimum
number of wheights needed to weigh any whole number of grams up to 40g?"

[1] [http://www.amazon.com/Art-Computer-Programming-Volume-
Seminu...](http://www.amazon.com/Art-Computer-Programming-Volume-
Seminumerical/dp/0201896842)

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ssdfsdf
I often wonder if there is some notion of a basis of computation in
mathematics. You can do stuff in binary, trinary, what about further out
systems? What about working with functions/mappings which take more than two
inputs. What can be said about the expressive power of these different ways of
computing? Any one know where I should be looking for this kind of stuff?

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arethuza
Describing computation in mathematical terms is arguably the core of Computer
Science as a subject - particularly the "Theory of Computation":

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_computation](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_computation)

If you are interested in "functions/mappings" then you can look at Lambda
Calculus and work your way right up to modern functional programming
languages:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lambda_calculus](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lambda_calculus)

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ssdfsdf
I'm reasonably well versed in these topics, I found them unsatisfying, they
don't capture the essence for me. I don't really know what I'm looking for I
just know I haven't seen it yet.

