Alan Turing, the man who created computer science, while simultaneously saving the entire world from fascism through his critical role in winning WWII, only to later be chemically castrated and driven to suicide as a punishment for the crime of homosexuality, is to finally be honoured by appearing on British currency, in particular the new 50 pound note.
My book, Rage, retells some stories about Turing, including a re-appraisal of his eponymous “test” (aka The Imitation Game), a casting of new light on how Universal Computation relates to human thought, and Turing’s little known role in evolutionary algorithms.
But all that’s by-the-by. Turing was a great hero, and bestowing this public honour on him is a small start at redressing the historic injustice he faced. For my money, he should be on the far-more-used 20, but none this less, this is a triumph. Hurrah.