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 in achieving 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 we let all that go because our present concerns are grounded and 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 neutral dynamics is a static fixed point; it is computing the identity function; its state-versus-time phase plot is just one single dot.

And such static neutral dynamics is certainly one sensible option. The program tells the computer everything it should do, we reason, so without a program the machine can do nothing. Being in a single completely determined 'Reset' state makes our job as programmers easier — at least to get started.

But fixed-point neutral dynamics is far from the only possible case. 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 quite likely achieve our goal. Whatever it was, the behavior of that programmable system, before we exerted our will upon it, would probably be considered something.

And in any case, classical computers with static neutral dynamics are getting harder to find. When you power up a typical new machine today, it tries to program you. It tries to get you going answering questions, giving your name and this and that and god forbid your credit card number, and like a pushy house guest it immediately wants your wifi password to start sucking down who knows what through your internet connection. Programmers often have to do quite a bit of work to gain the upper hand in such who's-programming-whom shoving matches.