Alan Turing was a brilliant English code breaker who helped turn the tide of World War II. He is an honorable individual who has made contributions in the fields of computers and mathematics. Turing was born on June 23, 1912 in London. He was known for being an educator and a mathematician. According to his biography, in his 1963 article, “On Computable Numbers,” he demonstrated that there cannot be a universal algorithmic method for determining truth in mathematics. He proved that mathematics will contain undecidable propositions. In his article he introduced the “Turing Machine”, known to be “widely recognized as the foundation of artificial intelligence research. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay At a young age, Alan Turing had shown many signs of intelligence that many of his teachers had recognized. He attended a well-known school in Sherborne at the age of 13 and became interested in maths and science. He subsequently enrolled at King's College (University of Cambridge) in England where he studied from 1931 to 1934. While attending King's College, he submitted a paper "On Computable Numbers, with an Application to Entscheidungs" which dealt with the notion of a universal machine. Over the next two years, Turing studied mathematics and cryptology at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton and then earned his PhD from Princeton University in 1938. He returned to Cambridge to take a part-time position at Government Code and Cypher School, a British code-breaking organisation. This had led Alan Turing to make many contributions to society. He was known to be a Renaissance man who studied and made contributions to the philosophical study of the nature of intelligence, biology, and physics. During World War II, he secretly worked in government cryptanalysis. He wrote two articles on mathematical approaches to codebreaking, which became very important resources for the Code and Cypher School (later known as Government Communications Headquarters). He was responsible for breaking the Enigma code used by the Germans. According to Copeland, his bomb device is estimated to have shortened the war in Europe by two to four years. This had a huge and astonishing impact on the war. Even though Alan Turing had contributed so much to society and the world of computers, he still faced discrimination. In 1952, during an investigation, Alan Turing admitted to having had a sexual relationship with Arnold Murray. Homosexuality was illegal in the UK in the 1950s, so when Turing came to the police, he was charged with indecent exposure. The humiliating trial he endured ruined his life and career. Because he was gay, he was sentenced to hormone “therapy” to which Alan Turing was forced to undergo chemical castration. The treatment lasted a year and made Turing weak and caused him to have gynecomastia. With this criminal record, he would never again be able to work for the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), the code-breaking center of the post-war British government. On June 8, 1954, Alan Turing was found dead by his cleaner. The cause of his death was cyanide poisoning. A half-eaten apple was found next to his bed. Although the apple was never tested for cyanide, it is speculated that it was the means by which Alan committed suicide. Turing showed no signs of despondency before his death and several people, including Turing's mother, believe that he consumed cyanide by accident and that it was not a..
tags