History
The Entscheidungsproblem, German for "Decision-problem", is attributed to David Hilbert: "At 1928 conference Hilbert made his questions quite precise. First, was mathematics complete... Second, was mathematics consistent... And thirdly, was mathematics decidable? By this he meant, did there exist a definite method which could, in principle be applied to any assertion, and which was guaranteed to produce a correct decision on whether that assertion was true" (Hodges, p. 91). Hilbert believed that "in mathematics there is no ignorabimus' (Hodges, p. 91ff) meaning 'there is no limit to what can be known'. See David Hilbert and Halting Problem for more.
Read more about this topic: Decision Problem
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—Catherine Drinker Bowen (1897–1973)