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[[Image:Ture.jpg|right|thumb]]
[[Image:Ture.jpg|right|thumb]]
'''Alan Turing''' (23 June 1912 – 7 June 1954) was a British mathematician who contributed to modern [[computer science]] and [[cryptography]].<ref>[http://www.turing.org.uk/bio The Biography of Alan Turing], ''turing.org''</ref> His contributions to the development of computer science and to the Allied victory in [[World War II]] have been exaggerated by those who are more interested in his [[homosexuality]] than in balanced history. The development of the computer in fact goes back to the nineteenth-century and the work of [[Ada Lovelace]] and [[Charles Babbage]].<ref>[http://books.google.de/books?id=r5kOgS1IB-8C&pg=PA35&hl=de#v=onepage&q&f=false Steven Homer, Alan L. Selman: ''Computability and Complexity Theory''], p. 35</ref>
'''Alan Turing''' (23 June 1912 – 7 June 1954) was a British mathematician who contributed to modern [[computer science]] and [[cryptography]].<ref>[http://www.turing.org.uk/bio The Biography of Alan Turing], ''turing.org''</ref> His contributions to the development of computer science and to the Allied victory in [[World War II]] have been exaggerated by those who are more interested in his [[homosexuality]] than in balanced history. The development of the computer in fact goes back to the nineteenth-century and the work of [[Ada Lovelace]] and [[Charles Babbage]].<ref>[http://books.google.de/books?id=r5kOgS1IB-8C&pg=PA35&hl=de#v=onepage&q&f=false Steven Homer, Alan L. Selman: ''Computability and Complexity Theory''], p. 35</ref>
==Early Life==
Turing was sent to Sherborne School in Dorset, a private school for boys, where he showed great aptitude for maths and science, no interest in any other subject and a lack of social skills. His spelling and handwriting remained poor throughout life. His mother expressed concern that he was awkward, slovenly and reluctant to wash. However he obtained a place at King's College, [[Cambridge University]] where he became a follower of [[John Maynard Keynes]]. He did postgraduate work and then in 1936 went to study at [[Princeton University]] in the USA.
==The Turing Machine==
==The Turing Machine==
At Princeton, Turing proposed the concept of a "[[Turing machine|Universal Turing Machine]]". Turing had first proposed that the operations needed to calculate any formula could be broken down into a base set of instructions (or primitive [[Recursion|recursive functions]]) that could, in principle, be followed by a machine: the "Turing Machine". Once fully formalized, the calculations needed to derive the instructions themselves were capable of being run by a Turing Machine. The looped logic allowed the conception of a Turing Machine that could create its own instruction and, in principle, run a huge variety of calculations. Turing then used the concept of Universal Turing Machine to prove the insolubility of the [[halting problem]]. After gaining his PhD in June 1938, he returned to Cambridge University.
==Code breaking==
==Code breaking==
During [[World War II]] Turing was assigned to the codebreaking unit at [[Bletchley Park]], where he worked on the decoding of the German's [[Enigma machine]]. Turing's contribution to this has been massively exaggerated. He was actually only one of hundreds of people working at Bletchley, including John Tiltman the chief cryptographer, who was in charge of all projects, and the mathematicians [[Bill Tutte]], [[Max Newman]] and [[Tommy Flowers]]. Other members of the team Turing worked in included R.V. Jones and Peter Calvocoressi.
During [[World War II]] Turing was assigned to the codebreaking unit at [[Bletchley Park]], where he worked on the decoding of the German's [[Enigma machine]]. Turing's contribution to this has been massively exaggerated. He was actually only one of hundreds of people working at Bletchley, including John Tiltman the chief cryptographer, who was in charge of all projects, and the mathematicians [[Bill Tutte]], [[Max Newman]] and [[Tommy Flowers]]. Other members of the team Turing worked in included R.V. Jones and Peter Calvocoressi.
Work on breaking the Enigma code had started long before the war, and cryptographers from all over Europe including Poland, had done the ground work. Turing's work on Enigma was greatly helped in May 1941 by the lucky capture of an Enigma machine from a German U-boat, which pushed the project forward by several years. <ref> http://ww2today.com/9th-may-1941-enigma-machine-captured</ref>
Work on breaking the Enigma code had started long before the war, and cryptographers from all over Europe including Poland, had done the ground work.
In June 1938, Sir Stewart Menzies, the chief of MI6, received a message that the Polish Intelligence Service had encountered a man who had worked as a mathematician and engineer at the factory in Berlin where the Germans were producing the Enigma Machine. The man, Richard Lewinski (not his real name), was a Polish Jew who had been expelled from Nazi Germany because of his religion. He offered to sell his knowledge of the machine in exchange for £10,000, a British passport and a French resident permit. Lewinski claimed that he knew enough about Enigma to build a replica, and to draw diagrams of the heart of the machine - the complicated wiring system in each of its rotors.
Menzies suspected that Lewinski was a German agent who wanted to "lure the small British cryptographic bureau down a blind alley while the Germans conducted their business free from surveillance". Menzies suggested that Alfred Dilwyn Knox, a senior figure at the Government Code and Cypher School, should go to interview Lewinski. He asked Turing to go with him. They were soon convinced that he had a deep knowledge of the machine and he was taken to France to work on producing a model of the machine.
Turing's more famous machine was based on this Polish prototype.<ref>http://spartacus-educational.com/Alan_Turing.htmhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-37443639</ref>
Turing's work on Enigma was greatly helped in May 1941 by the lucky capture of an Enigma machine from a German U-boat, which pushed the project forward by several years. <ref> http://ww2today.com/9th-may-1941-enigma-machine-captured</ref>
In the later part of WW2, because of the capture of the Enigma machine, the Nazis shifted from using the Enigma code to using a far more complicated one. They called it the Lorenz cipher and the Bletchley control nicknamed it Tunny, or the Fish. While the Enigma code machine had only three wheels, the Tunny machine had twelve, and had other random tricks built into it to make decoding so difficult that even a mathematician could hardly calculate all the possible combinations. The code changed with every letter of the same message. In the later part of the war, from 1943 onwards, Tunny, not Enigma, was the code that the Germans depended on for their top-most secrets and attack plans. Tutte and Flowers worked on breaking the Tunny code.
In the later part of WW2, because of the capture of the Enigma machine, the Nazis shifted from using the Enigma code to using a far more complicated one. They called it the Lorenz cipher and the Bletchley control nicknamed it Tunny, or the Fish. While the Enigma code machine had only three wheels, the Tunny machine had twelve, and had other random tricks built into it to make decoding so difficult that even a mathematician could hardly calculate all the possible combinations. The code changed with every letter of the same message. In the later part of the war, from 1943 onwards, Tunny, not Enigma, was the code that the Germans depended on for their top-most secrets and attack plans. Tutte and Flowers worked on breaking the Tunny code.
==Sexuality and prosecution==
==Sexuality and prosecution==
Turing's reputation has been inflated by those who wish to glorify him as a "gay genius" and "gay martyr". In 1952, when working as a mathematics lecturer at Manchester University, he went to the police and complained that a young man who had spent the night at his house had stolen a sum of money from him. The police questioned the young man, 19-year-old Arnold Murray, who told them that Turing had picked him up in a public house and taken him home for homosexual purposes, then illegal. This meant that the police had no choice but to prosecute Turing, who was not given a custodial sentence, but ordered by the court to undergo chemical treatment for his homosexuality. As a result of the conviction, Turing lost his security clearance for government work. A year later, he was found dead, prompting speculation that he committed suicide. <ref>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-37443639</ref>
Turing's reputation has been inflated by those who wish to glorify him as a "gay genius" and "gay martyr". While at Cambridge University, where homosexuality was prevalent, he had various relationships with other men. In December 1951, when working as a mathematics lecturer at Manchester University, he went to the police and complained that a young man who had spent the night at his house had stolen a sum of money from him. The police questioned the young man, 19-year-old Arnold Murray, who told them that Turing had picked him up in a public house and taken him home for homosexual purposes, then illegal. This meant that the police had no choice but to prosecute Turing, who was not given a custodial sentence, but ordered by the court to undergo chemical treatment. As a result of the conviction, Turing lost his security clearance for government work. A year later, he was found dead, prompting speculation that he committed suicide. <ref>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-37443639</ref>
==Death and posthumous reputation==
==Death and posthumous reputation==