Sigma

@@Pelate Since Sketchy made that remark, Sigma felt it was necessary to ask: "How many classes to we have after lunch?" The white unicorn took another bite out of his hay burger as he waited for an answer. The food at this school tasted good to him, but it wasn't nearly as good as what his old school had.

@@madjack2001 @ @@Pelate @@Little Red Sigma took note of Lightning's agreement to join in. "All right, so it will be five teenage ponies and one ferocious jackalope to a small apartment after school with absolutely no adult supervision." the white unicorn noted. "What can possibly go wrong?"

@@madjack2001 "We also talk over a bit of coffee for a while. It's usually an exchange of ideas about our projects amongst other things, but the topic of personal life tends to come up every once in a while. Me and Hooves are good friends as well as project collaborators."

Ah, well, let's see... I'd say that Dr. Hooves doesn't talk to many ponies beyond exchanges of business, with the exception of Sigma, who comes by weekly, and Derpy, who usually hangs around for a while after delivering his mail.

"Let's see..." Sigma began counting heads. Skylar, Sketchy, and Sunset all seemed interested in going, but Lightning was being quiet. @ "Lightning, do you want to come by my place after school?" Sigma asked. Also, the ponies around him seemed a bit too excited for his liking... "And please try to remember: this won't be a party!" the unicorn emphasized to everypony at the table. @@madjack2001 "Yea, I go there once a week to talk to Hooves and give him my work." Sigma said.

How so? You mean to say that you hope he doesn't talk to many ponies?

Sigma sat back and thought for a moment. Was he forgetting something? Oh, yea. "Also, don't touch my non horse powered cart, or the steam generator I use to charge it. Those things are dangerous to ponies who don't know how to use them, and I need them both so I can travel to Hooves's place on weekends. Train tickets to Ponyville have gotten a lot more expensive ever since Princess Twilight was crowned and given a castle in the area."

@@Little Red @@madjack2001 "It won't be a party; it'll just be a calm afternoon. I don't want my neighbors leaving complaints, nor do I want to give my investors a bad impression. I'll probably be focusing on work most of the time while you're over there, but my pet, who's name is Fluffy, will probably be able to help you out with anything you might need as long as you don't give him the urge to rip your face off."

@@Little Red Sigma thought about it for a moment. He was a busy young stallion, and he needed to spend time developing state machines. "Sorry, but I'll only be able to visit other ponies' houses on Sundays. However, you can all come over to my place if you all are interested."

This probably doesn't sum up my reaction well, but it's still funny.

Yes please. Okay, now I'm curious. What were you about to say?

@@madjack2001 Sigma asked a question after thinking about the machines. It would be better if you responded to that instead.

Deciding to get his mind off the futile worry, Sigma began asking questions around the table. "Where do you all live?" he asked. "Like I said, I live in an apartment with only my pet jackalope for company. It would be nice to visit someone else's house every once in a while, or maybe have somepony besides my investors visit my apartment."

Sigma sat down and began eating. While he was eating, his mind began to wonder, and he began thinking back about the device he used to punch in his lunch code. It was almost certainly magical, but it was also apparent to Sigma that it possessed some form of memory that it could use to recall what was entered in to it. The machines that him and Dr. Hooves were making weren't capable of that. Sigma let out a "Hmm..." sound as he took another bite of his hay burger. Machine memory? This is probably worth running by Hooves. Sigma then began thinking about other things. From what he remembered, magic had some limitations. Will the machines him and Hooves are designing be able to do what magic can't? Sigma let out a sigh, it's been a persisting fear in the back of his mind that the Turing machine will always be hopelessly inferior to magic no matter how much development it undergoes.

@@Pelate Sigma placed his tray next to Sketchy and told him. "I'll be right back. I need to go find Lightning." @ It took Sigma a few minutes, but he finally found who he was looking for. "Hey Lightning," he told the pony. "We're sitting over there. Don't you want to eat with us?"

"I'll take a hay burger as well." Sigma told the lunch mare. She gave him what he asked for, and the white unicorn made sure to say "Thank you." before punching in his lunch code and leaving to go find Lightning. "Where is he?" he asked out loud as he began searching the tables.

@ Sigma smiled because of Lightning's kindness, and said "Thanks." before taking his place in line behind Skylar. "I hope I manage to eat before lunch is over; it would help my food budget if I did." Sigma stated before looking at Skylar and noticing how desperate she was to get a hay burger. "Are you okay?" he asked.

@@Little Red Sigma looked over at Skylar. "It would probably be a good idea to get in line with her before it gets any longer." he told Lightning. "The food smells really good, and the lunch mare seems polite. My only worry is that somepony will take the seats Sketchy and Sunset picked out for us." Sigma thought about it for a moment. "Maybe we should instead sit at their seats immediately, and wait for the line to go away."

I was hoping that lunch would go by uneventful so our characters could get to know each other, but I can't control what Skylar does.

Question: what day of the week is it in the roleplay?

@@Pelate Sigma sighed. In terms of Ponyville residents, that was the typical reaction to his and Dr. Hooves's work, but at least it was kinder than the eye rolling remarks he would receive from the residents of his home town. "A machine that can do anything? Ha! come back when you have something other than a fairy tale to talk about." @ Sigma grimaced as bad memories began to resurface, but he quickly pushed them in to the back of his head and put on a neutral expression as he turned to Lightning. "Did you transfer over here too?" he asked while the two ponies who left were finding seats for all of them to sit.

@@Little Red Sigma shrugged. "Turing machines are an interesting topic to those who understand them well." he said as he looked around the cafeteria. "What kind of food are they serving? If it's anything like the small parcels of food I see the Equestrian elite eat, then I won't know what to do."

@@madjack2001 Sigma saw that he made Sunset nervous, and put his hoof on the stallion's back. "It seems that you've had a difficult experience before you made it over here. If its not something you want to share, then I won't make you share it." Sigma tried his best to smile reassuringly at the stallion. He actually seemed pretty cute...

Fair warning: Sigma will have the tendency to ramble on for paragraphs when it comes to anything related to his work.

@@madjack2001 "Yea, I already have more friends here than I ever did back home." Sigma stated. "It was pretty hard living over there, but one day, I used my skills in mathematics to optimize my town's irrigation systems, and it caught the attention of a smart stallion in Ponyville called Dr. Hooves. We were pen pals for a while before we eventually met for the first time. Once we met, we worked on several projects together such as carts that move and can be steered without having to be pulled. Usually, how it works is that he describes the idea, I fiddle around with mathematics to see whether or not the idea will work, and if so, how efficiently, and once that's determined, he starts building the actual project." Sigma took a breath of air, and then moved on to what led him to move to Canterlot. "While reading one of Hooves's books, I discovered a concept originally created by a mathematician named Turing called a 'Turning machine'. I tested the concept with some mathematics, and it turns out that it has enormous potential. I told Hooves about the idea of possibly mechanizing the process, effectively making the hypothetical machine a reality, and he agreed that the project was worth working on. It didn't take long for us to build a jukebox sized machine from the concept capable of adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing huge quantities in a matter of seconds with absolutely no magic involved. However, the resources needed to make such a machine were expensive, and we needed investors if we wanted to keep working on the idea. We found two married business owners in Canterlot, Upper Crust and Jet Set, who were willing to give us funding in return for allowing them to manufacture and sell anything we manage to create. Seeing the opportunity, I asked them if they could increase our funding slightly so that I could rent an apartment and go to school in Canterlot. They agreed that it would be easier to get a hold of me if I lived nearby, they gave me what I asked for, and now... here I am." Sigma stated. "I have an apartment all to myself and my pet jackalope, and I'm continuing to write papers for state machines and travelling to Hooves's place on weekends so I can give them to him as well as talk before he implements what's written on the papers in to actual, physical machines." The group then approached the cafeteria door. "Huh, time flies when you're telling stories." Sigma remarked before turning to Sunset. "So, why did you transfer over here?" (For a more detailed explanation of Turing machines, click here.)