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About LinkBacksShould have been raising his bat today for a pretty spectacular century.
Great man.
Should have been raising his bat today for a pretty spectacular century.
Great man.
Curveball Champion! Properly inspirational man. A message from history about discrimination that many of us seem to have forgotten....
Originally Posted by Top_Cat
Was going to do that myself, obviously in jest to see if anyone took a bite (geddit?)
Obviously as a Manc, who studied Computer Science, before moving to Politics (with lots of War history in the mix), the guy is simply one of the most astounding people of the 20th Century, and really more should be made of this fine occasion
"All are lunatics, but he who can analyze his delusions is called a philosopher." - Ambrose Bierce
Langeveldt: I of course blame their parents.. and unchecked immigration!
GingerFurball: He's Austrian, they tend to produce the odd ****ed up individual
Burgey: Be careful dealing with neighbours whose cars don't have wheels but whose houses do.
Uppercut: Maybe I just need better strippers
Wag. One of the best of the past century. Did not deserve the despicable treatment he received (though neither did anyone else).
"The future light cone of the next Indian fast bowler is exactly the same as the past light cone of the previous one"
-My beliefs summarized in words much more eloquent than I could come up with
How the Universe came from nothing
An undeniably great man. It's tragic to think he died in ignimony and it wasn't until twenty years after his death that the full extent of his heroism became apparent due to the declassification of the documents pertaining to his work at Bletchley.
One must note he made some terrible choices tho; not least the decision to allow himself to be chemically castrated to avoid a custodial sentence. A gay man not wanting to be sent to prison is rather like a kid not wanting to go to a sweet shop, surely?
- As featured in The Independent.
"This is not the time for namby-pamby promising youngsters who might just do something; not the time for building for the future. Pragmatism rules and they don't come more pragmatic than Rogers."
- Victor Marks makes the case for stiff-legged and stiff-armed 35 year old left-handers in Ashes squads
Legend. Should be talked about more.
+ time's fickle card game ~ with you and i +
Respect to the man. Quickly googled his private life and...
"Turing was given a choice between imprisonment or probation conditional on his agreement to undergo hormonal treatment."
What the ****, in England, in the 20th century?!?! Unpleasantly surprised by the british law here.
aspiring social cricket player, left-handed batsman, grainy low-res streams watcher, cricket-related crap reader
Beeb carrying an an article suggesting new evidence that he didn't commit suicide, but was just a bit careless with his personal cyanide stock...
Yes I was surprised how late homosexual acts were decriminalised - 1967 apparently for England and Wales. 1980 and 1982 in Scotland and Northern Ireland respectively. Obviously it is still illegal in a lot of countries.
I had read the BBC item about how it may not have been suicide. It was interesting and it certainly doesn't sound as though there should be a conclusion one way or another based on the evidence.
Discrimination and prejudice is a part of human evolution, in this day and age Turing would instead be discriminated on because of the autism he likely had. Perhaps it would have been harder in the 21st century for his talent to come through - in the UK at least anyway.
As the film Gattaca goes, we now have discrimination down to a science. I think that is going to be true soon.
Last edited by Scaly piscine; 25-06-2012 at 07:10 AM.
National Scrabble Champion 2009, 8th in 2009 World Championships, gold medal (team) at Causeway, 2011 Masters Champion
24 Hour Scrabble World Record Attempt for Charity, in aid of Daisy Chain and End Polio Now
Countdown Series 57 Champion
King of the Arcade
Reply from mods to my prank bans in public:
Reply from mods to my prank bans in private:
MSN - evil_budgie @ hotmail.co.uk
Gattaca was a pretty awesome society on the whole tbf. But back to Turing, i doubt that in this day and age he wouldn't be able to do mathematics - there are lots of people in many fields who have some form of autism. If you can prove theorems, people will take notice.
I mean to suggest that people with autism had it better in the 40s and 50s than they do now seems to me a bit of an outlandish statement.
During the war it would be all hands to the pump. The drive for any sort of exceptional ability that could help the war effort would trump everything else. Even the educational system back then may have been more suited to someone with exceptional talent, instead of what we have now where everything is watered down and the morons are the priority. With less discipline he may also have been more prone to bullying. The level of evolution at that time may also have been suited to Turing's skillset.
The UK is actually pretty pathetic at taking notice of talent in regards to autists. The USA is far better. Their culture and society is better geared to making the most of a talented autist. They have their cliques - jocks, nerds, cheerleaders etc. but they're more accepted for who there are. And they realise talented people will make an absolute fortune because it's a free for all where ability gets a very high premium - there is also the pressure to work in the USA, the number of autistic people in the UK not in full time work is over 80% (off the top of my head). Also in this country the vending machine repairman will get more money than an award winning scientist.
TBF pure science doesn't pay well anywhere. That statement is true here as well - unfortunately that's just the price youve always had to pay to be a scientist.
Alan Turing report cards: Alex Bellos Blog Archive Turing’s school reports
Ah a lot of that brings back memories from my own time at school. Except I was even lazier and disorganised rather than untidy. I used to lug around my bag with all of the books etc. I had, regardless of whether I needed them that day or not. Never took anything out and any homework was done at school, if at all.
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