Alan
Turing, I won’t bet but I know most of you don’t know him, was a British
mathematician and cryptographer who lived in the 20th century and was also a
very integral part of Britain’s operations during the World War II (according
to a novel I read).
 |
| Alan Turing |
I got to
know him through a novel, Cryptonomicon, as one of three intelligent friends. I
thought he was a fictional character (because the novel was a fiction) until I heard about him later. You can read the novel to get more details(I have to warn you, it is over 900
pages…).
Ever heard
of the computing device Turing machine? This man was responsible for it. Here
are some of his quotes we would like to remind you this week:
“A computer would deserve to be called
intelligent if it could deceive a human into believing that it was human.”
“Science is a differential equation.
Religion is a boundary condition.”
“I believe that at the end of the century
the use of words and general educated opinion will have altered so much that
one will be able to speak of machines thinking without expecting to be
contradicted.” (Unfortunately, that has not happened.)
“No, I’m not interested in developing a powerful
brain. All I’m after is just a mediocre brain, something like the President of
the American Telephone and Telegraph Company.”
“Mathematical reasoning may be regarded
rather schematically as the exercise of a combination of two facilities, which
we may call intuition and ingenuity.”
“A very large part of space-time must be
investigated, if reliable results are to be obtained.”
“A man provided with paper, pencil, and
rubber, and subject to strict discipline, is in effect a universal machine.”
“I’ve now got myself into the kind of
trouble that I have always considered quite a possibility for me, though I have
usually rated it at about 10:1 against. I shall surely be pleading guilty to a
charge of sexual offences with a young man. The story of how it all came to be
found out is a long and fascinating one, which I shall have to make into a
short story one day, but haven’t the time to tell you now. No doubt I shall
emerge from it all a different man, but quite who I’ve not found out.” (He
was gay.)
Have an eventful week.
Posts
Quotes for the week: Alan Turing (1912-1954)