Viewing 40 posts - 1 through 40 (of 54 total)
  • Alan Turing petition
  • englishbob
    Free Member

    I know that there are some fellow ITers who hang out on here. For those involved in computer security, this should be of interest. In any case, I'd like to draw attention to this. Please make up your own mind if you wish to sign or not. You may not believe that petitions like this have any value and we now live in different times but I believe Alan Turing (along with all the people from Blethley Park such as Tommy Flowers) is a hero!

    From the petition website.

    Alan Turing was the greatest computer scientist ever born in Britain. He laid the foundations of computing, helped break the Nazi Enigma code and told us how to tell whether a machine could think.

    He was also gay. He was prosecuted for being gay, chemically castrated as a 'cure', and took his own life, aged 41.

    The British Government should apologize to Alan Turing for his treatment and recognize that his work created much of the world we live in and saved us from Nazi Germany. And an apology would recognize the tragic consequences of prejudice that ended this man's life and career.

    Alan Turing pardon petition

    Junkyard
    Free Member

    Thanks you for drawing it to my attention I have signed and also thankfully I dont work in IT either.

    richtea
    Free Member

    Why on earth should the current government/PM apologise for the crazy prejudices and ideals of a long past generation?

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    CHB
    Full Member

    Saw a programme on him a while ago, a true genius.

    At the end of the programme it pointed out that the only thing named after him was a roundabout/junction called "The Turing Ring".

    Someone in the Highways dept has a sense of humour.

    Junkyard
    Free Member

    Why on earth should the current government/PM apologise for the crazy prejudices and ideals of a long past generation?

    I think it is because he was prosecuted and has a crimianl record due to the states
    crazy prejudices and ideals

    allthepies
    Free Member

    >Why on earth should the current government/PM apologise for the crazy prejudices and ideals of a long past generation?

    Because it's the right thing to do ?

    lowey
    Full Member

    They named a road after him in Manchester. Bet he was made up with that.

    fubar
    Free Member

    Go for it.
    I don't see the point…I drive down Alan Turing Way, I can see a statue of him in Manchester city centre…I think that his greatness is well recognised and he isn't going to benefit from an apology now (even though I agree that he was treated very badly)

    CountZero
    Full Member

    Why restrict it to Alan Turing? After all, homosexuality was illegal for everybody. Just to apologise to one man because he was a particular sort of genius seems to say that it was actually ok to persecute all other gays because they made no particular contribution to society. That sounds like hypocracy to me, but I'm sure the right-on brigade will be along to point out my error.

    richtea
    Free Member

    Because it's the right thing to do ?

    Oh right. Well then, while we're at it, let's get the Austrians to apologise for Hitler, and in 50 years time I'll expect your Grandson to apologise to the Iraquis on our behalf for the entirely pointless war that he had nothing to do with. 😆

    Zulu-Eleven
    Free Member

    Sorry, did he break the law or not?

    Was the law morally wrong, by todays standards of course it was, however it was the law of the land and he chose to break it – should we really retrospectively apply todays standards to yesteryear?

    edited to add – a true genius and as a nation we owe him and the others who worked at the stations a great deal, however like may geniuses he had his flaws…

    scuttler
    Full Member

    I believe the apology thing is in some way tied to generations. Where there are people still living from the generation that committed the 'crime' there are clear grounds for an apology. I'm not big into history but Cromwell et al is firmly in the past. Turing could've been someone's great uncle (or even grandad if he'd had a go) and would have still been living in an age where homosexuality was accepted if he'd not killed himself.

    And he's a f%^$in hero. And I do work in IT (encryption).

    GrahamS
    Full Member

    however it was the law of the land and he chose to break it

    So, switcheroo, if the law was changed tomorrow so that you were no longer allowed to sleep with ladies* then would you break it?

    tankslapper
    Free Member

    Not a big believer in the apologist culture.

    It was the fault of 'our fathers' not ours. Things have moved on. It's like apologising for slavery. WTF is the point? Why should our generation be saddled with the idiocies of the past? We've moved on.

    Its up to our generation to see it does not happen again, not to aplogise.

    mudshark
    Free Member

    There is the Turing Test – something to do with gayness I think.

    Hairychested
    Free Member

    Having sex with a sheep might be fun for some but isn't legal. If it becomes legal one day (on the grounds of ethnic minority and its tradition), will our kids need to beg for forgiveness for our dislike of it? Not that I do, having had a few dogs in my youth 😉

    el_boufador
    Full Member

    it was the law of the land and he chose to break it

    er, I don't choose to fancy girls, I just do. Not his fault he fancied a bit of bum. Thankfully we live in amore enlightened age

    ?

    epicyclo
    Full Member

    What happened back then was not our fault, but I think an expression of regret is the decent thing to do.

    And looking at the posts here there are some iconoclasts with different preferences to mine, but so long as your sheep or dog is consenting, have your fun. 🙂

    big_n_daft
    Free Member

    great man

    tragic loss for his family

    campaign pointless with modern political overtones

    mike_p
    Free Member

    Typical PC nonsense being pushed by that arch loony Peter Tatchell

    JulianA
    Free Member

    'The Turing test is a proposal for a test of a machine's ability to demonstrate intelligence.' according to Wikipedia.

    Also, the Apple logo is a (slightly cryptic) reference to Alan Turing:

    (Oh, and what's the point of apologising? Or of giving him a posthumous knighthood? He was badly treated by today's standards but probably not by the standards of the day. Sad but true.)

    uplink
    Free Member

    I think it is because he was prosecuted and has a crimianl record due to the states
    crazy prejudices and ideals

    Damn – I thought any criminal record elapsed when you died
    I'm gonna have to come up with a new plan now

    montylikesbeer
    Full Member

    Done, and happy about it too

    jond
    Free Member

    >Typical PC nonsense being pushed by that arch loony Peter Tatchell

    So when exactly did campaigning against discrimination qualify someone to be described as an 'arch loony' ?

    And from what I can see from a quick web search, it's not particularly being 'pushed' by Tatchell, unless you can say the other 28,000-odd signatories are 'pushing' it too…

    Re the apologist issue – statues of people of note have generally been erected posthumorously, so why not belatedly recognise that Turing was hard done by ?

    For that matter, he probably deserves a bloody statue too !

    allthepies
    Free Member

    >Also, the Apple logo is a (slightly cryptic) reference to Alan Turing:

    Often quoted but unlikely – more like a reference to Isaac Newton (first Apple logo was a pic of Newton sitting under a tree)

    uplink
    Free Member

    So when exactly did campaigning against discrimination qualify someone to be described as an 'arch loony' ?

    It's probably all the other stuff that he does that qualifies him as a prat

    What exactly would Turing get out of an apology? – nothing
    Turing did a great job during the war but working at Milton Keynes was hardly on the same scale as – say – the Atlantic convoys
    1000s of people worked just as hard as he did during the war & were hard done by during & after it, should we individually apologise to each & every one of them? – of course not, it's stupid
    The fact that laws get changed is enough IMO

    Northwind
    Full Member

    "Turing did a great job during the war but working at Milton Keynes was hardly on the same scale as – say – the Atlantic convoys"

    Oh come on, the work done at Bletchley is universally recognised as some of the most important work done in the war. Ultra decrypts played a key part throughout the war- Churchill said "It was thanks to Ultra that we won the war"

    If you want to talk about Atlantic convoys, ask yourselves how many lives on those ships were saved by the ultra intelligence. Again, ask Churchill- he said "The only thing that ever really frightened me during the war was the U-boat peril."- and the biggest factor in breaking that, was breaking enigma.

    Just because it wasn't dangerous doesn't mean it wasn't utterly critical.

    JulianA
    Free Member

    allthepies – Member
    >Also, the Apple logo is a (slightly cryptic) reference to Alan Turing:

    Often quoted but unlikely

    Well the logo does have a bite out of it… and Turing committed suicide by taking a bite from an apple laced with cyanide…

    uplink
    Free Member

    Oh come on, the work done at Bletchley is universally recognised as some of the most important work done in the war.
    ……………Just because it wasn't dangerous doesn't mean it wasn't utterly critical.

    Absolutely – I was simply making the point that many other people put as much effort into the war as Turing did, each of them as important as the next

    Northwind
    Full Member

    And I was saying you're wrong. A sailor on the atlantic convoys was putting as much or more effort in, in worse conditions, and in constant danger- but they weren't as important as the people at Bletchley, and very few of the people at Bletchley were as important as Turing. And I'm saying this despite the fact that my grandad was on the atlantic convoys 😉

    I don't think he should be pardoned, incidentally- not unless everyone else prosecuted under the same laws is to be pardoned. It's part of his story and should be remembered, since it can't be undone. But I think he should receive an awful lot more attention and remembrance than he does. (the recognition he does get is welcome and I don't play it down but I also don't think it's enough, for what he and his people achieved)

    pantsonfire
    Free Member

    I demand an apology from the Italians for the Roman invasion of Britain in 43 AD

    Which has about as much relevance as a pardon for Alan Turing

    Empty gesture politics

    Zulu-Eleven
    Free Member

    I demand an apology from the Italians for the Roman invasion of Britain in 43 AD

    Agreed, I mean – what have the Romans ever done for us?

    Junkyard
    Free Member

    just on newsnight Brown apologises on behalf of Govt.

    NZCol
    Full Member

    His work is seminal , they still teach the Turing Machine theories because they are still valid. I did a bit of work at Bletchley a long time ago and its all very interesting. He was certainly an interesting character thats for sure, I'm reading a book about him just now. Saying that, other cryptographers I worked with were equally, um, unique !.

    aracer
    Free Member

    I suppose as I work in AT building (next door is BL building – any guesses?) I should support this, and I do think he was very harshly treated, but like others I'm not a big fan of the next generation apologising for the sins of the fathers.

    El-bent
    Free Member

    Its up to our generation to see it does not happen again, not to aplogise.

    My thoughts exactly, although history tells us that some learn the wrong lessons from history.

    a true genius and as a nation we owe him and the others who worked at the stations a great deal, however like may geniuses he had his flaws…

    Define "flaws" labrat.

    allyharp
    Full Member

    I fully agree on his genius…

    BUT what good will an apology do? The people who are in charge of the government now played no part in decisions back then. So why apologize?

    That said, an apology doesn't take much effort either so if you look at it that way I suppose there's no reason why they shouldn't.

    nuke
    Full Member

    PM apology after Turing petition

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8249792.stm

    AndyP
    Free Member

    Why should our generation be saddled with the idiocies of the past? We've moved on.
    exactly. Why on earth should we feel ashamed of any of our country's past? We've moved on. It doesn't matter that we were utter bastards a few centuries ago, invading whoever we wanted and nicking their marbles etc. Falklands? **** 'em. Afghanistan? The decision was made a few years ago, not right now. Sod it. That Fritzl bloke? Well, that was all in the past. Full pardon. Hitler? pah. Ancient history. Circumstances were different. Good bloke really. That Plevin driver who tried to kill me this morning? 2 hours ago. Why should I be annoyed with him. etc.

    samuri
    Free Member

    PM apology after Turing petition…

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8249792.stm

    No! Bad boy! You have to say it like you MEAN it!

Viewing 40 posts - 1 through 40 (of 54 total)

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