The Proponent of the Possibilities of Chance

We should give up the attempt to derive results and answer with complete certainty.

- Michael O. Rabin

From the very beginning, Michael Rabin, born in Breslau, Germany in 1931, was a brilliant mathematician. While attending Hebrew University in Israel in the early 1950s, he was especially fond of Alan Turing's early work; it was Turing, in fact, who made him realize that he "was going to be interested in logic, actually computability." Turing built the foundation not only for Rabin but also for so many after other - he proposed a definition of what is computable, he introduced the idea of a machine's "state of mind", and he defined the realms of computability. Rabin took an advantage of that. While pursuing his PhD in mathematics, more specifically logic, at Princeton University, he and another young graduate student Dana Scott has the opportunity to work with IBM Research for one of the summers. Rabin and Scott were left to do whatever they found interesting, and soon, the two proposed "a notion of a computer that could 'guess' solutions" which quickly evolved into the miniature computers more commonly known as finite state machines (73). Finite state machines (FSMs) comprise the most fundamental structure in mathematics, computing, computer science, and electronics engineering; today, they help solve difficult computation problems, process digital signals, and make up controllers of virtually every conceivable type. Rabin's work did not stop with FSMs, though, as he continued research in a different field - error in computation and how some of very difficult problems can be solved without obtaining an answer with complete certainty. The idea is revolutionary, especially at the time, and would become a fitting precursor to many other inventions in computer science, such as RSA encryption. Rabin's stellar career closed with yet another idea and yet another outline of how to proceed to make a computer all it can be: "I don't think this [difference in the way memories - computer vs. human - operate] has to do with a difference between the power of the mind and the power of the computer. It is simply that we don't know how to write a computer program to do it" (88).