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WORLD WAR II code-breaker Alan Turing has been chosen to feature on the back of Britain’s new £50 banknote, according to the Bank of England.
Due to enter circulation by the end of 2021, the note shows a photo of Turing taken in 1951.
“Alan Turing was an outstanding mathematician whose work has had an enormous impact on how we live today,” Bank of England governor Mark Carney said as he unveiled the note at the Science and Industry Museum in Manchester.
“As the father of computer science and artificial intelligence, as well as war hero, Alan Turing’s contributions were far ranging and path breaking. Turing is a giant on whose shoulders so many now stand,” the chief added.
The Bank of England said that Turing played a pivotal role in the development of early computers.
Turing received a posthumous pardon from Queen Elizabeth II in 2013 over a conviction in 1952 for gross indecency with a 19-year-old man.
He did not go to prison but was chemically castrated and died of cyanide poisoning in an apparent suicide in 1954, aged 41.
In 2017, the Alan Turing Law posthumously pardoned men who had been cautioned or convicted under historical legislation that outlawed homosexual acts in Britain.
The Oscar-winning 2014 film The Imitation Game starring Benedict Cumberbatch brought belated acclaim for Turing’s role in wartime code-breaking.
The Bank of England is putting new faces on Britain’s banknotes as it switches from paper to polymer, a thin, flexible plastic film that is seen as more durable and secure.
The new £20 note, due to enter circulation next year, will feature artist J. M. W. Turner on its back.
The new polymer £5 and £10 notes already in circulation show wartime leader Winston Churchill and author Jane Austen respectively.
Queen Elizabeth II features on the front of Britain’s bank notes.
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Nice gesture… a little too late from his perspective but a good recognition of his great work nonetheless
@Fergal O Lachtnain: Yes, even better seeing that they labelled him a criminal for decades due to his sexual orientation. That orientation never bothered them when they needed him during the war.
@Cal Mooney: And our treatment of gay people – and that of the holy catholic church – is commendable?
@Alonzo Margate: The Catholic Church is dead, we were the first country in the world to legalise same-sex marriage by popular vote, so yeah, our treatment is a bit better.
@Graham Wilson:
Was our treatment better in the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s too?
@Alonzo Margate: Fingers crossed, a parochial organisation whose tribalism results in a very base outlook by its followers. It’s an organisation we’d be better off without, far too insular.
@Cal Mooney: Well said.
@Graham Wilson: Like all religions.
@Cal Mooney:
Well said.
@Fergal O Lachtnain: Yes, great to see. The man was a genius. The least they could do. I’m sure that some of his colleagues are still alive and appreciated how much went into the early science of computing. Sure they weren’t allowed to talk about any of it at the time.
@Fiona Fitzgerald: A genius yes – but one, the RCC would ostracise, condemn and denigrate…
You might say this man won the war. He was part of a team that broke the German Enigma codes, the Allies were able to tell the Russians in advance of German plans for the Battle of Kursk, a severe setback for the Germans.
Very shabbily treated by his country afterwards.
Always thought it a bit odd that when you consider how common €50 notes are here, the Brits don’t seem to like taking £50 notes (there’s not that much a difference in their value). I’ve had shops and pubs there refuse to take them sometimes. I’ll now ask for £20 notes only if I’m at a Bureau de Change instead of taking cash from an ATM.
@Jumperoo: €50 note are more common in Ireland because it’s far more expensive to live in Ireland than the Uk, everything overpriced compared to the rest of Europe
@Jumperoo: atms in UK don’t give out 50 pound notes, everywhere I have been in Euro Zone the ATM gives out 50 Euro notes.
@Jumperoo: Agreed. Had this experience several times myself and thought it was very odd considering its not a huge amount of money. They don’t seem to have the forgery tester pens or machines like here which would speed things up and reassure them. Instead the employees are afraid to take the risk of handling a 50 note and either call management or just refuse to take them.
@Gus Sheridan: Just checked. In Italy, Germany, France and Denmark the average price of petrol is dearer than my nearest pump. I stopped checking after that.
@sean o’dhubhghaill: Did u check car tax? Among the highest in eu, or vrt the highest in eu by nearly double? Or 4 times!! 4 times the eu average for insurance? No thought not, cos petrol is few cents cheaper a litre
@Dougal67: No. Somebody came out with the generalisation ‘everything is over priced here’ so I just checked the first thing that popped into my mind – petrol. And I discovered quickly and easily that in many European countries petrol is more expensive than here. My point? Avoid Generalisations. They are usually wrong.
@sean o’dhubhghaill: Like you made…. “everything overpriced here” doesn’t mean everything is the most expensive here either just that it’s overpriced? The others I pointed out go inline with his comment which basically was it’s v expensive to live here with a car, the most expensive in the eu?
Alan Turing is the grandfather of computing.
@Do the Bort man: The Colossus computer used for codebreaking was developed by a BPO engineer named Tommy Flowers.
@Thomas Sheridan: any relation to Tim Flowers asking for a friend……
They should apologise for making that really boring movie about him. I’m sure in reality he was an interesting person.
@thephantomshit: I have just completed reading a book on his life, he actually was quite the oddball and not exactly the life of the party.
@Adrian Versey: Because that’s what’s most important in life when you’re trying to help end a world war – being the life of the party!
@Adrian Versey: Asperger’s, I’ve often thought? I had a programming student once remark that she reckoned he had difficulty speaking because there was so much, potentially, to be said, in his field.
Why does this make irish news?
@Gareth Forde: because he is a significant world figure… should we only concern ourselves with parish issues?
@Gareth Forde: So people like you will click into the article.
@Gareth Forde:
British people live here in Ireland so they probably would like to read this article.
@Sal Paradise: So true. :)
@Gareth Forde: ‘Cos its a very visual inter-cultural warning what’ll happen to you for being different; kinda like what happened to that young lad from the People’s Front of Judea… :)
@Gareth Forde: because he had Irish blood in him (through his mother’s side)? Because *the entire world* has been *massively* changed by what he did? How are you reading this? On a computer? Well the entire field of computer science was invented by this guy.
@Gareth Forde: Turing had strong Irish connections. His grandfather was from Tipperary. And he is my second cousin twice removed – so that’s a good enough reason to have it reported here! :-)
@Deirdre O’Byrne: Or just because it’s just interesting news and it’s OK to read about things that happen in other countries.
@Gareth Forde: Do some research. A worthy news item. A highly signifiant player in the discovery of computing. You are able to type your comment because of his work and
contribution.
@Gareth Forde: Fair enough comment ,we do seem to know a lot more about them than they know about us
@Gareth Forde: because of his invention of the modern computer and how he shortened the second world war by atleast one year. was treated by his own nation as a criminal because he had relationship with other men . His files were closed up until recently under the law of the countrys secrets act and the population realised how many lives he saved through his genius of breaking the German enigma code. And yet he was a criminal up to about 5 years ago and was reprived too late
@Gareth Forde: because if we just covered local irish news in the media readers would think it was a Father Ted episode
Fair enough, though his was more the Hall’s Pictorial Weekly generation.
@Gareth Forde: It was a world war he helped end. Clue there surely.
Story goes he laced his apple with poison and died. The creator of apple computers used the gay colours and a bite out of an apple to use as there logo in a bid of recognizing the memory of Alan Turing as the man who invented the modern computers
@Denis Riordan: fake news. According to Stephen Fry, who met Steve Jobs and asked him if there was a link between the logo and Turing, Jobs replied “No but I really wished there was”
@Denis Riordan: the fact he laced the apple with poison is true… the rest is coincidence
What a crowd of hypocrites they are honoring Alan Turin by putting his photo on their new £50 note. Turing was the main in breaking the Nazi Enigma Code, saving thousands of lives and helping to bring an end to World War 2. Yet after the war he was stripped of his honors and taken to court for gross indecency because he was gay.
@☘: i don’t see it this way. As a post further up states, Catholic Ireland at that time or even after would have treated his nature in a similarly despicable way. By honoring him now it is about acknowledging the historical wrong and that is a worthwhile thing to do … not hypocritical in the least although I can see how you went that way. They are not papering over the cracks … the history is well known so cannot get away with that
They’ll put him on their notes now but 60 years ago after he saved millions of lives they called him a criminal
Alan Turing “had ben chosen” implies the decision has been reversed. Typo?
@Fergal O Lachtnain: “been”
Soon to be worth €25..
The UK government murder the guy! By chemically castrating him just because he was gay he was a war hero but still a undesirable
An incredible story , very sad how they treated him.
@John A. Dixon: Very sad how they treated the real code breakers as in the Wrens but they were only women, they treated Tommy Flowers worse…
Why not put him on a credit/debit card as not as many people will get the opportunity to be handling a £50 note whereas using plastic is more common in the UK
An amazing man
That was pretty horrific what they did to him poor man.
If you need o comment on this man and his place in the world history without knowing his achievements I suggest you look him up first . His sexuality is not important . But what is is the countless lives he saved through his brilliance of code breaking and invention of the modern computers. He was the grandfather of intelligence that inspired how to win wars today.
It’s a pity most place will not accept a 50 pound note
Polyphemus was named Nobody by Odysseus
@Means of escape: Turning had a brilliant mind that deserves full recognition
@Means of escape: Is this just a mistake or is there a meaning to it?
What a joke, what did he do for code breaking, he is more famous in the UK because of where he went to be educated at due to his class than what he did. Then what adds to it is that he was gay. He was suppose to have killed himself but the fact as many believe it was that it was the UK secret service who killed him because they feared that he was busy spilling the beans as pillow talk in Sweden to Russian spies.
Tommy Flowers should be on that note instead as he invented Colossus that saw the Lorenz SZ40, SZ42a and SZ42b which were German rotor stream cipher machines as toys, also his earlier invention of the Heath Robinson (invented by Max Newman ) outdid anything Turing did.
Can you imagine inventing the first real computers as Max Newman or Tommy Flowers did to break codes and not to get the rightful acknowledgement for it because of social status, history being cruel and bias as well as it celebrates lies to recreate a false past to look up to. It’s crazy… All the UK wants to do is to celebrate war to make state murder a thing to be proud of???
https://www.tnmoc.org/news-releases/2019/6/6/colossus-at-75-videos
Mór do ghlóir .
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