Friday, 11 September 2009

Sorry Turing

The Prime Minister has (in response to a petition) made a public apology for the way Dr. Alan Mathison Turing was treated after WWII. [see this bbc article for details - link.] While it could perhaps be taken as an empty gesture (we can't change the way homosexuals were treated in the past, only the present and the future,) it is good to see recognition of our own mistakes as a nation, and also another reminder of one of the "great" war's great men.

Turing was a key player in the development of computers as we know them, and even more importantly in the making of the machine that cracked the infamous German Enigma code. Without him back then, the likelihood of us all speaking Deutsch and heiling Hitler's successor here in 2009 is considerably higher. May his contribution be remembered for centuries to come.

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