Alan Turing is a famous mathematician who is known as the founder of modern computer science. Alan Turing, who played a very important role in breaking the codes of the German encryption machine Enigma during World War II, is remembered as a war hero. Turing caught attention with his superior intelligence in the schools he attended. He was elected as an academic member at Cambridge College, where he studied for one year after graduating by giving important theses in the field of mathematics. Turing worked part-time for the government in a British code-breaking organization and was warned by government officials not to disclose this information to anyone as it could change the course of the war. It is stated that the cyanide-tainted apple found in the room of Alan Turing, who is known to have committed suicide at the age of 41, is one of the factors that created the bitten apple symbol of Apple.
Alan Turing’s Family Background
Alan Turing was born in London on June 23, 1912, as the second son of a father who worked as an Indian civil servant. Turing showed signs of intelligence in the early stages of his life. He constantly engaged in such behavior. Turing, whose intelligence was noticed by the instructors and head teachers at the school he enrolled at the age of 6, went to Sherborne School, a famous and very expensive private school in Dorset, at the age of 14. Turing also showed his interest in mathematics and science at this school. Additionally, the school principal wrote a letter to his family as follows. “If he is going to stay in a private school, he should accept the special education of the private school. Otherwise, he is wasting his time in this school, even though he will only be a scientist devoted to science.”
In his mathematics class, Turing started to solve advanced mathematics problems before he had learned the subjects of derivatives and integration. When he was 16, he came across the work of Albert Einstein and discovered Einstein’s Newtonian motion arguments and criticisms by studying on his own, without using textbooks. It is said that Turing became close friends with Christopher Morcom, an academic student who was older than him, and later established a love affair with Christopher. It happened a few weeks after Morcom ended his last term at school due to tuberculosis, which he contracted as a child. This death shook Alan Turing deeply and his religious belief collapsed and he became an atheist.
Turing attended Kings College, Cambridge, between 1931 and 1934. After graduating with a distinguished diploma in 1935, Turing was elected as an academic member of the school where he studied at the university the year he graduated. On May 28, 1936, in a very important paper called “Computable Numbers: An Application of the Decision-Making Problem”, he proved that any conceivable mathematical problem could be solved using such a machine if it could be represented by an algorithm. Alan Turing received the title of Doctor of Philosophy after completing his thesis in June 1938.
Turing’s Enigma Story
Alan Turing started working part-time for the British code-breaking organization (GCHQ) in 1938. Since England’s involvement in the Second World War on September 4, 1939, he and a group of people in Bletchley Park tried to solve the German encryption machine Enigma for military service. Turing designed an electromechanical machine that would help breaking the Enigma quickly. This machine, called Bombe, with additions made with the suggestions of mathematician Gordon Welchman, was used as the only and fully automatic code breaking machine to attack the Germans’ protected message traffic. Turing changed the outcome of the Second World War by breaking German codes with this machine he was declared a war hero.
Alan Turing had a great interest in the field of cryptology in his childhood. After the Second World War, he worked on computers and artificial intelligence. He became one of the greatest pioneers of the modern computer with a program he prepared in 1948. While he was at the University of Manchester, he laid the conceptual foundations of these modern computers with the definition of the algorithm called the “Turing Machine”.
In those years, homosexuality was illegal in England and was considered a crime. Alan Turing had a relationship with a man named Alan Murray in 1952. A few days later, Turing’s house was burglarized and the police caught the thieves. However, during the investigation, Alan Turing’s homosexual relationship with Murray was revealed. Turing who was tried for homosexuality, chose hormone treatment instead of prison. Due to the investigation in which he was found guilty, his credibility clearance for the secret affairs of the state was revoked. His ongoing consultancy on crypto issues at GCHQ has been terminated.
On June 8, 1954, his charwoman found Turing dead at his home in Manchester. A bitten cyanide-poisoned apple was found on the edge of his bed the day before. Since the apple was never tested for cyanide poison, there was much debate as to whether this death was a suicide or an assassination. Starting 14 years after his death, the Turing Award, which is now considered the Nobel Prize in the field of computers, is given every year by the Computer Mechanisms Association to a person who writes technical articles in the computer community.
In Summary
Alan Turing is shown as an expert in the fields of cryptoanalysis, computer science and artificial intelligence, and mathematical biology. We recommend you watch the movie “The Imitation Game” (Enigma), which explains one by one the story of Turing breaking the Enigma codes during the Second World War. Also, it should not be forgotten that; It is thought that the bitten apple, the symbol of the Apple company, was adopted as a reference to Alan Turing, one of the pioneers of computer science. In 2013, Queen Elizabeth II granted a royal pardon to Turing, who is considered the father of modern computers and she honored Alan Turing’s unique achievements.
