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It is funny how the article doesnt mention him committing suicide as a result of being chemically castrated by the UK authorities for being gay.

dschuetz 7y ago
Yes, exactly. Doesn't even feel like an apology.
Luc 7y ago
You already knew about it, so obviously there was no need to mention it. Again.
mises 7y ago
I'm not sure it needed to? I don't think they tried to exclude it, and more that "by the way, we castrated this guy decades ago" doesn't naturally come up in the article. Plus, they did actually issue a formal apology. I would hope they're doing this to honor Turing, not to apologize for what they did to him. Face on a bill is nice, but doesn't make up for ruining some one's life, so it would be a lousy apology any way. So I kind of hope the media more covers what Turing accomplished than the things Engkand did.
mike-cardwell 7y ago
The short paragraph which talks about his mistreatment, links to a much longer article regarding his pardon, and his alleged suicide. This seems totally reasonable to me.
brighter2morrow 7y ago
>It is funny how the article doesnt mention him committing suicide as a result of being chemically castrated by the UK authorities for being gay. Yeah I agree, I assume this is actually the main reason he is so well known and celebrated today. Mere obsession with computers would make Godel, Alonso Church, and others with equivalent models of computation just as famous.
- edanm 7y ago
  > Yeah I agree, I assume this is actually the main reason he is so well known and celebrated today. Mere obsession with computers would make Godel, Alonso Church, and others with equivalent models of computation just as famous. I absolutely disagree. For one thing, Turing didn't just invent a model of computation - he invented what is seen, in some sense, to be the precursor to the actual, physical computer (the Turing Machine). But more importantly, in addition to doing that, he actually built one of the first actual computers. And he did that in order to break the German encryption in WW2. I am a huge fan of Godel's work, don't get me wrong, but Alan Turing was far more important in world history, and indeed in math/science history (though Godel is of course hugely important too).
  - throw0101a 7y ago
    While Turing did practical crypto work during WW2, I think Tutte's work on the Lorenz cipher was more impressive: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._T._Tutte#Second_World_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._T._Tutte#Second_World_War * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptanalysis_of_the_Lorenz_cipher https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptanalysis_of_the_Lorenz_ci... Everyone talks about Enigma during WW2, but the Poles had mostly figured things out pre-War (for which they're generally forgotten), and it was largely a matter of brute forcing things during the War IMHO.
    - brighter2morrow 7y ago
      Yes but traditionally the media has not portrayed poles positively.
  - twic 7y ago
    > But more importantly, in addition to doing that, he actually built one of the first actual computers. And he did that in order to break the German encryption in WW2. Not quite. He built the Bombe, which was not a computer. Elsewhere at Bletchley Park, other people built Colossus, one of the earliest electronic computing machines - but still not a computer, really, as it had no program. After the war, the first computer was built in Manchester, and although Turing was around, and it was clearly based in part on his ideas, my understanding is that he wasn't directly involved with building it. I think it's Turing's dual role in laying the theoretical foundation of computing and winning World War 2 that made him famous. I don't think his tragic death has made him more famous; if anything, it delayed his fame - imagine how well-known he would have been if he'd lived on into the computer age! Not a BBC documentary would go by without photos of Turing looking seriously at an ICL 2900, Turing sat at a BBC Model B, an elderly Turing and a thirtysomething Tim Berners-Lee mugging at the camera, etc.
wlll 7y ago
TBH if it was me I think I'd prefer it if not every single mention of me in the future brought up what is ultimately a rather personal and unpleasant thing. Yes, it was an appalling thing to have been done to him, but if I were successful I think I'd rather my successes were celebrated standing alone.
- robert_foss 7y ago
  I think there's value to not sweeping these things under the rug. In the shockingly recent past we've committed atrocious things, and there's nothing stopping us from doing it again apart from us learning from our past. As for a society honouring it's heroes, it rings a bit hollow when it through persecution killed said heroes. Being honoured when you're dead does you very little good.
  - robert_foss 7y ago
    As for current atrocities, look no further than the American border, the Chinese surveillance state (and the western hemisphere's complicity & avoiding the issue) or corporate monstrosities like FB enabling the persecution of minorities like the Rohingya.
  - GarrisonPrime 7y ago
    Not beating a dead horse about something isn’t the same as sweeping it under a rug. I’d rather not have every single bit of communication contain a reminder of some past horror.
    - SolaceQuantum 7y ago
      I tend to assume when a past horror is reiterated that it might be new information for someone else. I'd much rather new historical nuance be introduced to a new person over the unpleasant information being privately mine and others left ignorant.
- mywittyname 7y ago
  Understanding his fate allows him to be an icon for disenfranchised minorities as well.
mhh__ 7y ago
This is common knowledge at least in the UK (in my experience).
simplicio 7y ago
FWIW, after reading Hodges biograpy on Turing, I don't think its anywhere near as clear that his death is due to suicide as is commonly stated, or that if he did commit suicide, that it was due to his (unjust) indecency conviction.
justin66 7y ago
There's a sentence in the article that mentions his chemical castration, trial, and posthumous pardon and links to a more detailed article detailing all this and broaching the topic of suicide. I bet you want an editorial (and I bet you want one that mirrors your own beliefs and is a bit preachy about it). That's not what this article is for.

dschuetz 7y ago

Yes, exactly. Doesn't even feel like an apology.

Luc 7y ago

You already knew about it, so obviously there was no need to mention it. Again.

mises 7y ago

I'm not sure it needed to? I don't think they tried to exclude it, and more that "by the way, we castrated this guy decades ago" doesn't naturally come up in the article. Plus, they did actually issue a formal apology. I would hope they're doing this to honor Turing, not to apologize for what they did to him. Face on a bill is nice, but doesn't make up for ruining some one's life, so it would be a lousy apology any way. So I kind of hope the media more covers what Turing accomplished than the things Engkand did.

mike-cardwell 7y ago

The short paragraph which talks about his mistreatment, links to a much longer article regarding his pardon, and his alleged suicide. This seems totally reasonable to me.

brighter2morrow 7y ago

>It is funny how the article doesnt mention him committing suicide as a result of being chemically castrated by the UK authorities for being gay. Yeah I agree, I assume this is actually the main reason he is so well known and celebrated today. Mere obsession with computers would make Godel, Alonso Church, and others with equivalent models of computation just as famous.

edanm 7y ago
> Yeah I agree, I assume this is actually the main reason he is so well known and celebrated today. Mere obsession with computers would make Godel, Alonso Church, and others with equivalent models of computation just as famous. I absolutely disagree. For one thing, Turing didn't just invent a model of computation - he invented what is seen, in some sense, to be the precursor to the actual, physical computer (the Turing Machine). But more importantly, in addition to doing that, he actually built one of the first actual computers. And he did that in order to break the German encryption in WW2. I am a huge fan of Godel's work, don't get me wrong, but Alan Turing was far more important in world history, and indeed in math/science history (though Godel is of course hugely important too).
- throw0101a 7y ago
  While Turing did practical crypto work during WW2, I think Tutte's work on the Lorenz cipher was more impressive: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._T._Tutte#Second_World_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._T._Tutte#Second_World_War * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptanalysis_of_the_Lorenz_cipher https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptanalysis_of_the_Lorenz_ci... Everyone talks about Enigma during WW2, but the Poles had mostly figured things out pre-War (for which they're generally forgotten), and it was largely a matter of brute forcing things during the War IMHO.
  - brighter2morrow 7y ago
    Yes but traditionally the media has not portrayed poles positively.
- twic 7y ago
  > But more importantly, in addition to doing that, he actually built one of the first actual computers. And he did that in order to break the German encryption in WW2. Not quite. He built the Bombe, which was not a computer. Elsewhere at Bletchley Park, other people built Colossus, one of the earliest electronic computing machines - but still not a computer, really, as it had no program. After the war, the first computer was built in Manchester, and although Turing was around, and it was clearly based in part on his ideas, my understanding is that he wasn't directly involved with building it. I think it's Turing's dual role in laying the theoretical foundation of computing and winning World War 2 that made him famous. I don't think his tragic death has made him more famous; if anything, it delayed his fame - imagine how well-known he would have been if he'd lived on into the computer age! Not a BBC documentary would go by without photos of Turing looking seriously at an ICL 2900, Turing sat at a BBC Model B, an elderly Turing and a thirtysomething Tim Berners-Lee mugging at the camera, etc.

wlll 7y ago

TBH if it was me I think I'd prefer it if not every single mention of me in the future brought up what is ultimately a rather personal and unpleasant thing. Yes, it was an appalling thing to have been done to him, but if I were successful I think I'd rather my successes were celebrated standing alone.

robert_foss 7y ago
I think there's value to not sweeping these things under the rug. In the shockingly recent past we've committed atrocious things, and there's nothing stopping us from doing it again apart from us learning from our past. As for a society honouring it's heroes, it rings a bit hollow when it through persecution killed said heroes. Being honoured when you're dead does you very little good.
- robert_foss 7y ago
  As for current atrocities, look no further than the American border, the Chinese surveillance state (and the western hemisphere's complicity & avoiding the issue) or corporate monstrosities like FB enabling the persecution of minorities like the Rohingya.
- GarrisonPrime 7y ago
  Not beating a dead horse about something isn’t the same as sweeping it under a rug. I’d rather not have every single bit of communication contain a reminder of some past horror.
  - SolaceQuantum 7y ago
    I tend to assume when a past horror is reiterated that it might be new information for someone else. I'd much rather new historical nuance be introduced to a new person over the unpleasant information being privately mine and others left ignorant.
mywittyname 7y ago
Understanding his fate allows him to be an icon for disenfranchised minorities as well.

mhh__ 7y ago

This is common knowledge at least in the UK (in my experience).

simplicio 7y ago

FWIW, after reading Hodges biograpy on Turing, I don't think its anywhere near as clear that his death is due to suicide as is commonly stated, or that if he did commit suicide, that it was due to his (unjust) indecency conviction.

justin66 7y ago

There's a sentence in the article that mentions his chemical castration, trial, and posthumous pardon and links to a more detailed article detailing all this and broaching the topic of suicide. I bet you want an editorial (and I bet you want one that mirrors your own beliefs and is a bit preachy about it). That's not what this article is for.