[math-fun] "Imitation Game" slanders Turing (Henry Baker)
Since Turing died 60 years ago and no heirs, I daresay nobody can sue. What actually was a much larger problem was the fact that after WW II, Churchill ordered that most of the Bletchley computers be destroyed by chopping into tiny pieces and everybody was sworn to secrecy including about the machines' very existence. This was since there were still Nazi crypto machines floating around, which mostly had been appropriated by, e.g. Russia for use, and Churchill wanted to crack their codes to the extent they kept using those old machines for postwar communication. As a result of this, the careers of what otherwise would have been Computer Pioneers, were almost entirely destroyed, and the advent of computers generally was set back by perhaps 10 years. Was that really worth the "benefit" of being able to listen in on a few Russian communications? Plus, Cairncross (genuine spy) gave the USSR some decypts so they likely KNEW the UK had decryption capability for such machines ANYWAY! In particular Tommy Flowers, their main computer designer/builder, was... well, I bet you'd never heard of him. You've heard of guys like Eckert & Mauchly who probably were a lot lesser.
participants (1)
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Warren D Smith