Early life and career
Alan Mathison Turing, mathematician, codebreaker and the inventor of the computer, was born in London in 1912 (Horizon, 1992a) Alan is the son of Julius Mathison Turing, officer in the British administration in India, and Ethel Sara Turing. Alan had an older brother, John, and their parents, Julius and Ethel, both wanted them to be brought up in England so they moved to Maida Vale. His father still had to work in India, so when the two brothers were growing up their parents travelled between England and India leaving the two brothers to live with friends and family.
Alan was enrolled at St. Michael’s school at age six and showed early sign of genius without any encouragement nor support. At age 13 he went on to Sherborne
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“The unique thing about King’s college, that Turing must have found as soon that he arrived here, that they gave a particular atmosphere of moral support for anyone who was a homosexo as Turing was discovering that he was” (Dr. Andrew Hodges, …show more content…
The machine was produced by the thousand and used by the entire German military system. Every U-boat carried one to receive operational orders, to stop the boats Enigma had to be broken.
Enigma was the most evinced enciphering device of its time, it encoded messages via an electro mechanical system incorporating moving wheels or routers.
Bletchley Park was the headquarters of the wartime British code breaking effort. Mathematicians, chess players, linguists, statisticians and engineers were recruited from all around Britain. At its hight the Bletchley operation involved ten thousand people and Alan Turing was one of the first to arrive. He had always shown interests in codes and ciphers in school but now he found him self actually responsible for real methods in a very real world with the most complicated mechanical ideas that had probably been used in fight against the German Enigma machine.
“Turing’s most important contribution I think was a part of the design of the bombe, the cryptanalytic machine. He had the idea that you could use, in effect, a theorem in logic wich sounds to the untrained ear rather absurd; namely from that a contradiction, you can deduce everything.” (Jack Good,
The primary codebook was the Signalbuch der Kaiserlichen Marine (SKM), which had been seized by the Imperial Russian Navy on August 26, 1914 from the German light cruiser SMS Magdeburg. The second codebook was the Verkehrsbuch (VB), found by a British trawler in the North Sea. The third codebook was the Handelschiffsverkehrsbuch (HVB), captured by the Australians early in the war. The VB was used at sea by German flag officers, while the HVB was used by the entire High Sea Fleet, including submarines, Zeppelin a...
Ian Lancaster Fleming, author, journalist, naval intelligence officer, you name it he did it. He was most commonly known not for his work as an intelligence officer but for his series of books about James bond also a British spy. Ian had many different jobs before he finally settled on writing. His stories about James bond were a reflection of the way he lived his life and his job as a British naval intelligence officer.
Coding and encryption were two very important elements in the use of espionage. Enigmas were cipher machines that were based mainly on a wired code wheel. The wired code wheel, known more commonly as a rotor, would be shaped similar to a hockey puck made of non-conductive material, such as rubber, and have two sides, an input plate and an output plate and around the circumference are 26 evenly spaced electrical contacts. The 26 contacts on the input plate would be connected by wired through the body of the rotor to the 26 contacts on the output plate. An alphabet ring would then be placed around the rotors 26 contacts therefore creating a cipher alphabet.
It is the discovering we just described that allowed Shannon to publish in 1949 his paper Communication Theory of Secrecy Systems in which he developed the concept of a Cryptosystem. To understand the revolutionary nature of this publication, we are now going to describe what cryptography was before its publication.
In 1939, British Intelligence recruit Alan Turning, a mathematician/crypt analyst from Cambridge, to help win the war against the Germans. Turing leads a team of linguists and scholars to crack the "unbreakable" Nazi codes, shaped by the Enigma machine, which is used to communicate with the German military. Alan constructs a machine that would decrypt Enigmas messages at a much more substantial rate, rather than mentally solving the codes on paper. While the team finds success, Turing's announces his confined homosexuality to his newly married wife/colleague. Although there are violent and alcoholic actions illustrated and sexual themes portrayed throughout, this movie has a very strong message on perseverance and is suitable for high school age kids.
In this paper I will evaluate and present A.M. Turing’s test for machine intelligence and describe how the test works. I will explain how the Turing test is a good way to answer if machines can think. I will also discuss Objection (4) the argument from Consciousness and Objection (6) Lady Lovelace’s Objection and how Turing responded to both of the objections. And lastly, I will give my opinion on about the Turing test and if the test is a good way to answer if a machine can think.
The conditions of the present scenario are as follows: a machine, Siri*, capable of passing the Turing test, is being insulted by a 10 year old boy, whose mother is questioning the appropriateness of punishing him for his behavior. We cannot answer the mother's question without speculating as to what A.M. Turing and John Searle, two 20th century philosophers whose views on artificial intelligence are starkly contrasting, would say about this predicament. Furthermore, we must provide fair and balanced consideration for both theorists’ viewpoints because, ultimately, neither side can be “correct” in this scenario. But before we compare hypothetical opinions, we must establish operant definitions for all parties involved. The characters in this scenario are the mother, referred to as Amy; the 10 year old boy, referred to as the Son; Turing and Searle; and Siri*, a machine that will be referred to as an “it,” to avoid an unintentional bias in favor of or against personhood. Now, to formulate plausible opinions that could emerge from Turing and Searle, we simply need to remember what tenants found their respective schools of thought and apply them logically to the given conditions of this scenario.
One of the hottest topics that modern science has been focusing on for a long time is the field of artificial intelligence, the study of intelligence in machines or, according to Minsky, “the science of making machines do things that would require intelligence if done by men”.(qtd in Copeland 1). Artificial Intelligence has a lot of applications and is used in many areas. “We often don’t notice it but AI is all around us. It is present in computer games, in the cruise control in our cars and the servers that route our email.” (BBC 1). Different goals have been set for the science of Artificial Intelligence, but according to Whitby the most mentioned idea about the goal of AI is provided by the Turing Test. This test is also called the imitation game, since it is basically a game in which a computer imitates a conversating human. In an analysis of the Turing Test I will focus on its features, its historical background and the evaluation of its validity and importance.
Alan Turning is known to be a pioneer of many facets of the computer age. The digital computer, artificial intelligence, memory subroutines, the Turning Machine, the Turing Test, and the application of algorithms to computers are all ideas somehow related to this man.
In this essay, I describe in detail a hypothetical test contemporarily known as the Turing test along with it’s respective objective. In addition, I examine a distinguished objection to the test, and Turing’s consequential response to it.
Her accomplishments were so significant that she earned a new title that motivates many individuals to pursue their aspirations. Her influence on present-day technology and society was huge (Capstone, n.d.), to the extent that a computer programming language was named after her, Ada (Encyclopdia Britannica, n.d.). She remains a symbol of the past, as without her foundational algorithm for Babbage's machine, our capacity to program the cutting-edge technology we currently enjoy
In order to work on cracking the code Alan’s sexuality must be hidden deep in the closet. Alan Turing’s homosexuality makes up a big part of who he is. Turing always felt uncomfortable around other men, because his old friend Christopher was the only one that filled his heart with love. From a social conflict perspective, we can see how the
Alan Turing being the protagonist of this film undergoes many scenes of conflict which makes the film more appealing to the audience by allowing them to either relate to him or sympathise for him. There are many scenes where Turing is advised to keep his gender preference under the radar or even black mailed to keep quiet under the threat of telling authorities that he is a homosexual. There is a scene where Turing finds the Soviet Spy in Bletchley Park who turns out to be John Cairncross. Cairncross catches Turing before he spreads the secret and says "if you tell them my secret I'll tell them your's". Another example of black mail is when Stewart Menzies, who is in on Cairncross's undercover work, finds out of Turing's knowledge and blackmails Turing in the same way Cairncross did. These examples of the protagonist being seen in conflict makes the film more appealing to the audience by making the character seem more relatable as everyone in life come across different types of conflict and it is appealing to see how other people overcome their
Although the majority of people cannot imagine life without computers, they owe their gratitude toward an algorithm machine developed seventy to eighty years ago. Although the enormous size and primitive form of the object might appear completely unrelated to modern technology, its importance cannot be over-stated. Not only did the Turing Machine help the Allies win World War II, but it also laid the foundation for all computers that are in use today. The machine also helped its creator, Alan Turing, to design more advanced devices that still cause discussion and controversy today. The Turing Machine serves as a testament to the ingenuity of its creator, the potential of technology, and the glory of innovation.