Here's a question. It's sort of a riddle or a koan:

What is the behavior of a computer without a program?

Before a programmable computer has been programmed, before a customizable machine has been customized, before an adaptable device has been adapted — before, in short, we have exerted our will upon a system — how does it behave? What does it do?

We call the answer to that question a machine's neutral dynamics. The behavior of a programmable machine, before we program it or interact with it, is its neutral dynamics. If the machine is sufficiently stateless, its behavior between our interactions with it may also be called its neutral dynamics.

The neutral dynamics is a fundamental concept for predicting a machine's behavior. It is the background, the playing field, the givens, in the design and implementation of a program for a machine, and in the assignment of credit or blame when a program execution succeeds or fails to achieve its goals.

In the general philosophical case, the definition of neutral dynamics depends not only upon the programmable machine, but also upon the machine's programmer — as well as upon their mutual surroundings, and upon the phase of the fabled double moon of Ivvaric III, and so on — but our present concerns are basically practical. As programmers, we want to familiarize ourselves with typical neutral dynamics — and gain some experience dealing with them — to make more effective use of the machines we encounter in our environment.

So, then: What is the behavior of a computer without a program? Well, for a classical, traditional computer, typically the answer is: Nothing, or Waiting For Program. Before being programmed, a traditional computer sits waiting, frozen. Its state is unchanging; it is computing the identity function; its state-versus-time phase plot has shrunk to a single dot.

And such stasis is certainly one sensible option. A program tells a traditional computer everything it should do, we reason, so without a program the machine can only do nothing. Being in only one possible state makes our job as programmers easier — at least to get started.

But 'nothing' or 'waiting' behavior is far from the only possible answer. If it is our will to learn the time of day, for example, and we happen upon a person that seems likely to know, we can run the 'Excuse me, have you got the time?' program upon that person, and very likely achieve our goals. The behavior of that programmable system, before we exerted our will upon it, would quite likely be described as something rather than nothing.

And even putting aside people machines and the like, the classical computer itself is getting harder to find. Today, when you first power up a new machine, its typical behavior far from nothing. New computers today are basically trying to program you. They try to get you going answering their questions, giving your name and this and that and god forbid your credit card number, and like a pushy house guest they immediately try to get you to let them start sucking down who knows what through your internet connection.