Choosing a single philosopher to write a biography on turned
out to be a very difficult task. Personally, I’m not really impressed with philosophers whose only contributions
were abstract ideas that didn’t really have any physical manifestation. Some of them, such as Pyrrho, had ideas that
I felt were more ridiculous than useful.
I was very happy to find a familiar name after flipping through our
Little History text, Alan Turing. I knew
of him because of his role in breaking the German Enigma Code during WWII, and
was aware that he played a role in the creation of the first computers. I learned that he was also responsible for
his philosophy on artificial intelligence.
The
following blog post will be the first in a series of three focusing on Turing’s
upbringing and formal education. The second will detail his role in breaking
the Enigma Code during WWII, and the last will dive into his philosophy on
artificial intelligence.
Alan Turing
was born on June 23, 1912 in Paddington, London. He was a successful mathematician,
cryptanalyst, philosopher, as well as an endurance athlete who competed in many
competitions. From a very young age, Turing showed signs of being a
genius. He had natural mathematical
comprehension that had him understanding very complex calculus before even
taking the course. By age 16, he was
studying and understanding the works of Albert Einstein. This did not win him favor among his peers or
teachers. His teachers felt that he
needed to place more emphasis on the classics of education such as ancient art
and literature. Turing continued
studying Mathematics at Cambridge and was instrumental in the invention of
problem solving machines that could solve any problem through the use of
complex algorithms. Turing received his
Ph.D. at Princeton University where he was also studied cryptology. It was the combination of his brilliance in
these two subjects that would cause the British government to call on him for a
very special task.
"Personally, I’m not really impressed with philosophers whose only contributions were abstract ideas that didn’t really have any physical manifestation." Me neither. But a "physical manifestation" can include simply altering the way we think and behave, it doesn't have to result in a a tangible object or invention. It's very cool, and rare, when it does. Thomas Edison was a kind of philosopher, come to think of it. See his statement in the sidebar below about "progress" and failure, for instance.
ReplyDelete