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Thousands call for Turing apology
- tlrobinson 17y agoLed by our very own jgrahamc (http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jgrahamc http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jgrahamc)
- a-priori 17y agoHere is his blog post with the letter to the Queen. http://www.jgc.org/blog/2009/08/letter-to-her-majesty-queen.html http://www.jgc.org/blog/2009/08/letter-to-her-majesty-queen....
- igorhvr 17y agoFrom the blog post: > "I have the honour to be, Madam, Your Majesty’s humble and obedient subject," This left a very bad taste in my mouth.
- jgrahamc 17y agoI didn't feel that when writing to The Queen asking her to give someone a knighthood that it would be appropriate for me to use the following language: "Yo, Liz. No love for AMT? Dude deserves a KCMG. Peace out, John"
- sophacles 17y agoThank you. That made my day. You should make stickers, with a picture of turing. Across the bottom it should say: "Dude deserves a KCMG".
- igorhvr 17y agoYou can be respectful without being subservient. But assuming RiderOfGiraffes is right about this being nothing more than a code phrase... well, it is a funny one!
- RiderOfGiraffes 17y agoIt is a standard form, adhered to for centuries when writing to a British monarch. Protocols, especially royal protocols, have evolved to ensure that people know what is expected of them and can behave in a way so as not to cause embarrassment or offence. In some ways they really are very similar to computer protocols. They are there to help people communicate effectively without distraction. Many computer protocols seems overly verbose, and they often deal with the potential for things that can no longer happen. So it is with social protocols. At least with computer protocols and royal protocols they are pretty explicit. Often when in a social context your really don't know how you're expected to behave, and hence become anxious, and there is the potential for huge gaffes. Again, don't underestimate the cruft that collects over thousands of years. Most people never have to deal with it.
- LogicHoleFlaw 17y agoI have to admit that I like the idea that as an American I could walk up to President Obama, address him as "Mr. President", and then hold an intelligent conversation as fellow citizens. That's pretty cool.
- RiderOfGiraffes 17y agoI think you'd have trouble getting close enough to do that without first being vetted in some way. Similarly, I've been introduced to the Queen (twice), addressed her as "Your Majesty" followed thereafter as "Ma'am" (to rhyme with "jam", not "arm"), and held an intelligent conversation. Again, no way that would've happened without first being vetted. Random people in the USA don't get simply to walk up to the President, random people in the UK don't get simply to walk up to the Queen.
- philwelch 17y agoIf you're lucky, you might catch him on the campaign trail and have a chat without being vetted. But you can write him a letter without declaring yourself his loyal and obedient subject. I'm halfway convinced the only reason anyone still puts up with this shit is that Elizabeth in particular seems to be pretty cool. Once Prince Chuckles takes over there might be a considerable uptick in republican sentiments.
- george_morgan 17y agoCringe.
- dctoedt 17y agoI smiled when I read it -- a charming throwback to 18th century England. JGC appears to be a Brit; my guess is that he's using this language to signal that he's not some wild-eyed radical bomb-thrower.
- gdp 17y agoI think it serves a purpose very similar to "I am a member of your constituency" when writing to a congressperson in the US - basically saying "you should consider what I say because my relationship to you is _____".
- jacquesm 17y agoIt's part of the 'form' of a petition to the Queen. If you ask for a knighthood and an apology from the royal family then that's what you do. I think knighthoods are pretty silly (and what with Roger Moore and others of little achievement receiving such knighthoods their value is questionable anyway).
- RiderOfGiraffes 17y agoThere's a lot that can be said about this, and this is not the place to do it, but I thought I'd pass on some of my experience. In a country with over a thousand years of history, traditions arise that persist, even when the original circumstances no longer exist. Some of those traditions take the form of words which, in and of themselves, are effectively "code phrases." They should not be interpreted literally, but instead, they must be regarded as idioms within the context. Taking these sorts of things out of context and trying to interpret them literally leads to mistakes and misunderstandings. This is why lawyers exist, to help take what you want to say, and to say it in a way that is correct in the context of a court. In effect, the same thing is happening here. This form of words is a formula that is used. Without it the petition fails on a technicality, as it were. I don't know what country you are from, or where you grew up, or where you are now, so I can't even try to give examples that might make more sense to you, but cross-cultural context shifts are an absolute minefield. As a simple example, I recently went to an event where the invitation read "Black Tie". This doesn't mean that you should wear a black tie, it means you should wear a dinner suit (UK/Australia) or tuxedo (USA). Similarly, another invitation read "Business Dress". That was a code phrase for "Collar and tie," but was interpreted by some as meaning "What you usually wear for your day job" and they came in jeans and a T-shirt. You can probably think of some idiomatic code-phrases of your own which, when interpreted literally, would be totally mis-understood by others not of you cultural context. Being aware of this can really, really help. Finally, having Aspergers is a bit like having the entire rest of the world full of code phrases like this that other people seem magically to understand. Treating this as a puzzle.problem to solve can help a lot in getting along with people.
- radu_floricica 17y agoA common similar example is "Yours faithfully" at the end of letters/formal emails.
- a-priori 17y agoOr addressing a judge as "Your honour".
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- revorad 17y agoSigned. Bravo jgc. You can sign it too: http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/turing/ http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/turing/
- lucumo 17y agoOnly UK citizens, expats, etc. Foreigners can't sign it.
- hughprime 17y agoWhat about Australians and other Commonwealth citizens who are nonetheless the Queen's subjects?
- omouse 17y agoDoes Canada still count?
- gdp 17y agoIt's a petition to the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, so Commonwealth status is unlikely to have any meaning, because he has nothing to do with the Commonwealth (except for happening to be the leader of a member country). However, writing to the Queen in support of the knighthood would be within your rights as a citizen of a Commonwealth country, I should think.
- bdfh42 17y agoI have the very greatest respect for Alan Turing and his achievements - fantastic guy and should have got proper recognition for both his war work and his contributions to maths and the emerging science of computing. OK - here comes the however. You can't apologise to just one person for the persecution of homosexuals during that era. What was done to Turing was disgusting and probably we should be ashamed of it as a nation but it was done to so many - any apology must be to them all.
- jonsen 17y agoapology must be to them all Agree, but this is a way to do exactly that, isn't it?
- lsc 17y agowhy? Turing made an 'above and beyond' contribution to his country, and really, to the world. It seems to me like the government should go out of it's way, in an 'above and beyond' sort of way to apologize for repaying that contribution with shit.
- Confusion 17y agoCommon men doing common jobs make it possible for exceptional people to exist. Nobody has time for art or science unless all the more basic human needs are provided for by someone else. We are all contributors to their possibility.
- DannoHung 17y agoAnd without exceptional people to forge the way ahead, we'd all be doing common jobs. What does the plight of the gay community, the world over, have to do with the exceptionally unfair treatment of one Alan Turing by the British Government?
- RyanMcGreal 17y agoIt has everything to do with it - gays were and in many places are still persecuted for being gay just as Turing was persecuted for being gay. Even if your concern is only with exceptional people, think of this: what if a potential future Alan Turing is stymied from exceptional achievements because of barriers due to societal intolerance of his sexual orientation?
- cabalamat 17y agoWhile it was wrong that Turing was persecuted, this feels to me a bit like trying to re-write history. The same goes for British soldiers in WW1 who were executed for cowardice and recently pardoned.
- lucumo 17y agoHow is it rewriting history? It seems to me that it's acknowledging that this has happened in the past and that it was wrong. Acknowledging past mistakes helps us prevent them from happening in the future.
- jacquesm 17y agoNonsense. These issues are to be tackled one by one. What was done to Alan Turing and other homosexuals in that period was absolutely despicable and apology, even though much too late is a way of recognizing this. For an encore, there is plenty of stuff done TODAY to homosexuals all over the world that we would do well to recognize and to act upon. There are only people, any attempt at discriminating some subgroup is wrong. Nobody is trying to rewrite history here, it is rare that governments will admit to errors and it takes persistence by individuals living today to 'educate' the governments of their responsibilities. Let's hope that actions like this will make people think twice before doing stupid stuff today. People living in future times are the ultimate judges.
- ig1 17y agoDo you also think Germany apologising for the holocaust is rewriting history ? We apologies for our actions to acknowledge that what we did under the guise of governance was a crime, a crime against humanity, a crime against our fellow humans. To be able to take the moral ground against those who commit those very same crimes today.
- ftse 17y agoThe problem with an 'apology' from a government is it is unlikely to be sincere. How about we track down the individuals who persecuted Turing and force them to apologise? We can't, can we, because assuming they are all still alive, 'forcing' them to do so means their apology is insincere. Instead of asking governments to pronounce faux apologies, why don't we we acknowledge what they do is often wrong and ask them to build checks and balances into their operation to prevent this sort of abuse? At the moment they seem to be eagerly dismantling these mechanisms.
- edw519 17y agoWhether it's Alan Turing, slavery, war crimes, or anything else, the best apology to someone who is dead would be to stop doing the same things to those who are living.
- RyanMcGreal 17y agoYes, but an explicit apology forces a benchmark of accountability: if the government apologized to group A for committing B, why are they still committing B to group C?
- ftse 17y agoIn an ideal world it would force a benchmark that a government would be honoured to meet. In reality, a government will do whatever it decides is in its own best interest. Which could be anything from making an 'apology' for misdeeds of a past generation to aggressively stimulating the bigotry found in the present one.
- anamax 17y ago"forces"? You clearly don't have much experience with groups of monkeys. Some of the known-successful ways to get around said "benchmark" are "this time it's different", "this government is good", "group C deserves it", and "we're not doing B".
- radu_floricica 17y agoYeah, but it's still much worse if the official climate is that it's "acceptable". It can always be worse, you know.
- anamax 17y ago> Yeah, but it's still much worse if the official climate is that it's "acceptable". How about some supporting evidence? > It can always be worse, you know. Yes, it can always be worse, but whether or not a govt has said something is wrong has no predictive power on that issue. Every post-1900 by-govt mass murder was committed by a "we don't do those things" regime.
- mynameishere 17y agoI hope I don't die and wind up a political tool.
- jacquesm 17y agoHeise.de picked it up on the 18th: http://www.heise.de/newsticker/Petition-verlangt-Entschuldigung-fuer-die-Verfolgung-Alan-Turings--/meldung/143664 http://www.heise.de/newsticker/Petition-verlangt-Entschuldig...
- seshagiric 17y agoUnfortunately as a society we still have discrimination. Either it is against one's sexual preferences or race or color - we still have a lot of ground to cover.
- araneae 17y agoMaybe it's a little bit silly, but I do think a posthumous knighthood is in order. After all, he did crack the Enigma single-handedly (ok, with a lot of help), doing more for the Allied forces than probably any other individual. And Britain repays him by forcing him to take estrogen for a year because he had sex with some guy who robbed him? Clearly he deserves it more than anyone else.
- philwelch 17y agoActually, a Polish mathematician named Marian Rejewski had the best claim of breaking Enigma "single-handedly".
- DanielBMarkham 17y agoThis is one of those things that sound well-meaning, but rubs me the wrong way. Each person has to live in the time they are in -- and looking back from each age to the previous one, we've always thought the old ways were barbaric. This means that everybody in those ages did things we think are awful: persecution of gays, slavery, infant selection, serfdom, Jim Crow Laws -- the list goes on and on and on. Going back and applying our current morality to 50 years ago is silly. The people this happened to are dead. The people who did this are either dead or very, very old. Many thousands or millions more suffered the same fate and received no such modern recognition. It serves no purpose other that to pat ourselves on the back at how much more morally superior we are today. And in fifty more years? Guess what? They'll be feeling the same way about us. We live in a world where people are still kept as slaves. Where millions starve. Where governments systematically kill large groups of people who they don't like. I'm thinking we should take real, live action against current evils in the world instead of symbolic action against evils we had no part in and did not observe. EDIT: I'm going to rant a bit more here, because I think we've grown this generation of people who think that all of history has to fit inside of their modern mind, i.e. that history is some kind of morality play made for current moral standards. It's not. It's a complicated dance of personalities and forces that has to be observed in it's own way, by it's own lights. To retroactively expect history to fit into some kind of conception of what you think it ought to be denies all those people their humanity. </rant>
- nate_meurer 17y agoYour thinking seems self-contradictory to me. On the one hand, you seem to acknowledge the existence of evil in some objective sense, saying that such evil is rampant in the present time, yet you rule out the use of objective morality to evaluate our past actions. Do I have that right? If so, then I think you'll find that you have little in common with most commenters here. If you reject the premise that Britain's treatment of Turing was objectively wrong, then the rest of debate will be unfruitful.
- DanielBMarkham 17y agoYou're asking me about the existence of ultimate truth. That's a little above my pay grade (although it doesn't stop lots of folks from attempting it!) I'd rather put it like this: according to the best I know, Turing was treated unfairly. I do not believe it is moral to treat somebody this way. (Morals, to me, are inherently personal) Looking at my own life, I find things that I feel are immoral to me yet I allow them to happen anyway: modern slavery, the narcotizing of our youth with technology, or genocide. When I see things in the past that I find reprehensible or immoral, the interesting question to me is: how did moral and ethical people at time feel about this? Why was it allowed? It seems that understanding these people for who they were -- warts in all -- is to respect them and try to understand them. The moment I step back and start applying my values totally to another age, I stop individualizing the people who lived there. They become puppets or cartoons for me to lionize or demonize depending on my personal values. Take Jefferson and slavery. Jefferson is one of my heroes -- he lived very close to my house, and I admire his thoughts and works. He was the brilliant author of the DOI, and more importantly, the Virginia Declaration of Human Rights. Yet at the same time he allowed slavery -- kept slaves, in fact. There's even proof that he sired children by his slaves. What to make of that? Was he a genius? An evil slave-holder? The truth is that he was person, who lived in his times and did the best he could. He knew slavery had to go yet couldn't figure out for the life of him how things would change eventually. He once compared slavery to holding a rabid wolf by the ears: you don't dare hold on to him, but you don't dare let him go, either. Looking at these conflicts in people is how we identify and learn from what happened. It gives history depth, and it give us a little humility. Looking back through history, and applying just a little bit of that humility, it seems totally obvious to me that a hundred years from now people are going to be doing the same to our generation. And I don't like it. The things I've done that are immoral I did for what I thought to be good reasons, likewise these folks with Turing. The people of this age, both good and bad, deserve our respect because that's the way we want to be treated by future generations. It's not a matter of being right or wrong. It's a matter of all of us being human, and respecting each other for it.
- vixen99 17y agoHow do you apologize for something you haven't done? Governments are constituted by human beings; so who today is complicit in the persecution of Turing? Answer, no one at all. The past is the past.It happened and there's nothing we can do to change it. Use of the word apology' in this context by people not responsible for that action merely degrades the meaning of the word. By all means express regret that a previous government did such and such but don't let's call it an apology which is rather cheap if you think about it. If this pseudo-apology-for-past-sins-by-dead-people bandwagon gets going, where's it going to stop? Will we define a year zero prior to which we will not be apologizing for what we now regard as foul behaviour by the elite who ran the country at that time? Or do we form national bureaucracies to deal with the massive inbox of accumulated misdeeds down the ages?
- pbhj 17y ago"By all means express regret that a previous government did such and such" Of course the government didn't act unilaterally against the wishes of the people - they implemented the laws as required by society at the time.
- kentosi 17y agoAfter reading what you wrote South Africa comes to my mind. On the one hand there are people who think that "black economic empowerment" should stop because it's causing reverse-discrimination towards young white South-Africans who were born after apartheid and therefore have nothing to do with it. On the other hand the reverse argument is that although many young white South Africans have had nothing to do with apartheid directly, many of them are indirectly better from it - eg - the suburb/area they're raised in, the business connections they have, etc. I don’t have a concrete opinion on this, because I’m not South African. However, being an Australian, I can see how important the public apology to the indigenous Australians was. Before the public apology was given, many (particularly older generation Australians) disagreed by your line of argument – which is that we shouldn’t apologise for something done by people in the past. It’s true that the atrocities committed towards Indigenous Australians are in the past, but where the Indigenous Australians are now is a result of all that has happened to them. To these people the apology goes a lot deeper than just a symbolic gesture. It's a form of closure that begins and allows the healing process.
- wakeboarder3780 17y agoYeah I heard his name growing up learning CS, I had no idea the troubles he endured. A tragedy to be sure. As for all the comments regarding apologies to groups of people being impossible, I'm fairly certain I've heard some before. A certain Michal Richards comes to mind for dropping some prejudice remarks. I'm pretty sure he made a prompt apology. Just my $.02
- monkeygrinder 17y agoThe best way to apologise would be to commemorate his work. But the government has also rejected a petition to fund Bletchley Park. http://www.number10.gov.uk/Page20409 http://www.number10.gov.uk/Page20409