Hero of of the Computer Age

[ellestra]

Today is 100 anniversary of Alan Turing's birth. Now, 100 years after he was born he's a hero. He's lauded as a man who broke the Enigma code (although this was not something he did alone and, as a Pole, I cannot not mention it was first broken by Polish cryptographers - Turing made a machine broke the second generation Enigmas). He is considered the father of computer programming and everyone who dip into it learn his programming basics. The Turing machine concept ies what made computers as we know them today possible. He is known to science fiction fans because of the Turing test (the basic test for Artificial Intelligence when it's considered to be AI if a human is unable to tell the difference between human and AI in a blind test conversation). He did all this and he could've done so much more - the whole computer age before him. However his career was cut short what it was discovered he was homosexual and he was forced to choose between prison and chemical castration and eventually pressure was to much and he committed suicide (although some believe it might've been accident). I remember the first time I heard about it and thought about how unfair, stupid and what and incredible waste it was. British government finally officially apologised for this in 2009 (at least it took them less the Catholic Church to apologise to Galileo).

Now Alan Turing is celebrated - io9 has a great collection of articles and resources about him and Google made a great puzzle Doodle for him (if it's still 23 June where you are just go to your local main google page - if not you can watch one version being solved). I played it first last night after the midnight and again today (it was different every time). It helps if you know the programming logic rules he invented but you can figure it out even without it. Have fun with Alan Turing. You do it using his ideas everyday.