On the Rehabilitation of Alan Turing

On the Rehabilitation of Alan Turing

By Barry Sheppard
December 28. 2013

On Christmas Eve the Queen of England, Scotland, Wales, Northern
Ireland, and the Commonwealth deigned to pardon one of the twentieth
century's most important mathematicians of the crime of homosexuality.

In 1952 Alan Turing was tried and convicted of engaging in sex with
other men. He was then presented with the choice of prison or chemical
castration. He chose the latter, estrogen treatments that caused him to
grow breasts, made him impotent, and sent him into depression. He was
fired from his job with the British government. Washington barred him
from entering the United States, which he had often visited to work with
mathematicians in Bell Labs.

In 1954 he ate an apple laced with cyanide, which was ruled a suicide.

He was 41 years old.

In 1936 Turing developed a model of the "universal computing machine," a
concept which lies behind all computers. Other subsequent mathematical
models of computers have been found to be equivalent to what has become
known as the "Turing machine."

Besides this accomplishment, Turing broke the German enigma code in the
Second World War, and proved two important mathematical theorems, and
other work.

The law under which Turing was convicted was repealed in 1967. But in
the years since, attempts to have him pardoned were repeatedly rebuffed.
The most recent was last year, 50 years after his conviction, when
Parliament voted down a motion to pardon him.

The reasoning of the majority of this most august body was that since
the law was the law in 1952, and Turing had knowingly violated it, he
was a lawbreaker and lawbreakers cannot be pardoned. This decision
provoked an immediate response, when 10,000 signed a petition that
Turing be put on the new 10-pound note.

There was international outrage in addition. All this led to the Queen's
pardon this year. The wording of the pardon itself is disgusting: "Now
Know Ye: that We, in consideration of circumstances humbly represented
unto Us, are Graciously pleased to extend Our Grace and Mercy unto the
said Alan Mathison Turing and to grant him Our Free Pardon posthumously
in respect of said convictions."

The "We" and "Us" and "Our" refer to the Queen's double personhood, as
both the physical person Elizabeth II and as the embodiment of the "body
politic," which is immutable and "utterly void of Infancy and Old Age."
It's something like the Pope's "We," which refers to him and God.

But Turning does not need forgiving because he did nothing wrong. If any
entity requires being extended Grace and Mercy it is the UK government
for its crime against Turing, which arguably directly led to his death.

Turing was pardoned because of his fame and accomplishments. But some
75,000 men were convicted under the same law as Turing, of whom 26,000
are still alive. Turing's pardon should be extended to the 75,000, and
would improve the lives of the 26,000 today.

A final thought -- those reading this are doing so on a "Turing machine."