World War II Profile:
Alan Turing
Even though we are still
learning about the beginning of World War II, I decided to write a blog post
about a man who helped bring about the end of the war, only to be convicted
with “indecency” for being gay.
Warning: this post may include WWII spoilers!
Alan Turing was a British
mathematician and computer scientist who was instrumental in the Allied
victory. His work in cryptanalysis during World War II both gave the Allies
another edge against Hitler and played a large hand in advancing the field of
cryptography. His major work during the war focused on perfecting a decryption
mechanism for the German Enigma machine.
What is an enigma
machine?
Enigma machines use a
system of rotors to encrypt messages. The idea of a cipher system like the
enigma machine is to assure that if someone intercepts just the encrypted
message, they will not be able to recover the original text. The enigma machine
was seemingly good at that task. The cipher key of an enigma machine is always
rotating, which is good for secrecy because it means that each time you type
‘m’, the encrypted text will show a different letter. For example, “aaa” might
become “bci” in the secret code. When you send the encrypted message to your
recipient, the idea is that they also have an enigma code with the same rotors
and they will be able to that to decrypt your message. That’s a basic overview
of how they work, but if you want more info I recommend this video:
How and why did Turing
break the code?
The Nazis used their
enigma machines to encrypt all of their secret messages, from weather reports
to war strategies. Police cryptanalysts had already made a working bombe: a electromechanical device that
can be used to break enigma machines. However, the Polish bombe was not a perfect method, and as Germans perfected their
enigma machines, it became increasingly difficult to break their codes. Turing,
working with Gordon Welchman, created the Turing-Welchman bombe, which was more
efficient and accurate and helped the Allies greatly. They exploited one
fundamental weakness in the enigma machine – the fact that no matter what
configuration the rotors are in, a letter will never be mapped to itself in the
encrypted message (“a” in the normal message will never be “a” in the secret
code).
By creating this method for breaking German codes, Turing directly aided the United States in
For more information on
how Turing broke the enigma machine:
A Turing-Welchman Bombe
Other work:
Turing’s work during
World War II was helpful to the Allies victory as well as to the field of
cryptography. Even beyond this work, Turing was an enormous contributor to the
fundamentals of computing: his Turing machine and Turing thesis are still the
basis of how engineers think about the limitations of computers. A computer can
only perform a certain function if that function can be performed on a Turing
machine, pictured here:
Check out more about Turing’s
contributions to math, logic, and computer science here: http://www.math.rutgers.edu/courses/436/Honors02/turing.html
Conviction and Death
In 1952, Turing plead
guilty to charges of “gross indecency” for being in a relationship with a man.
In 1952 in England, homosexual acts were criminal offences. When convicted, he
was given a choice of jail time or chemical castration. Turing chose chemical
castration. Two years later, Turing committed suicide.
Only in recent years has
the despicable treatment of Turing been condemned by the British government.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown issued a formal apology to Turing in 2009, but in
2012, the PM David Cameron’s government refused to offer him a governmental
pardon. In December 2013, Turing was awarded a royal pardon, which is issued by
the queen rather than parliament.
The apology and pardon
were issued because people believe that Turing’s amazing life and achievements
should be focused on rather than his conviction. However, human rights
activists argue that Turing should not be given special treatment and
apologized to because of his fame; instead all people similarly convicted
should be apologized to because a terrible law infringed on his human rights.
What do you guys think about Turing's conviction?
The Allies were much more proficient than Germany when it came to code breaking. Do you guys think this played a large role in the outcome of the war or a relatively small one? Also, is it just me or is it really cool that Turing was able to break the Enigma machine with a bombe that could decrypt messages in less than 20 minute?
Sources:
http://mg.co.za/article/2014-01-09-10-things-about-alan-turing
http://www.turing.org.uk/scrapbook/ww2.html
http://www.forbes.com/sites/daviddisalvo/2012/05/27/how-alan-turing-helped-win-wwii-and-was-thanked-with-criminal-prosecution-for-being-gay/
http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/24/world/europe/alan-turing-royal-pardon/
Excellent post Maya. This sort of information is the kind that can really fall through the cracks but is extremely interesting and gives us a sense of some of the darker side of morals and values from an earlier time. I find it very interesting that while the British would be very quick to point out that the Germans persecuted many groups of innocent people, both of these countries persecuted homosexuals (in different ways no doubt). It's very sad for me to hear that Alan, who should have been hailed as a hero, was punished for something that he had no choice in being. I can only hope that someday this sort of injustice will be unheard of.
ReplyDeleteWow I can't believe that Alan did all of these great stuff for the British and was treated with "gross indecency". I agree with Rebecca because it's really unfair that he had been treated the way he had been
ReplyDeleteI really like this post, Maya. I think it shows how important it is to look at the social history in conjunction with the political history of any war. Turing was certainly a hero on all fronts, and it's a pity that he was treated as a monster. It seems so ironic that Britain, which was fighting for democracy, was subduing it back home. Just like the irony of the US fighting for a double victory while segregating its army, the British were fighting a double victory with anti-gay legislation running rampant. I think this also illustrates the worthlessness of moral absolutism. While we assign a good and bad side to WWII (and while Nazi domination would have been 1 x 10^10 times worse than anything in the past ever), all of the countries in the war had their good and bad sides.
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