Isolation | O'Really?

July 7, 2021

Would YOU want to live in Alan Turing’s house?

Filed under: education,engineering,football,programming,Science,technology,wikipedia — Duncan Hull @ 9:06 am
Tags: 1912, 1948, 1954, 43 Adlington Road, Adlington, Adlington Road, Alan O'Donohoe, Alan Turing, alan turings house, Andrew Hodges, anxiety, Apple, Artificial Intelligence, Benedict Cumberbatch, Bletchley Park, bombe, castration, chemical castration, cheshire, codebreaking, Computer Science, computing, Copper Folly, cryptography, cyanide, death, depression, Derek Jacobi, england, enigma, football, footballer belt, gay pride, GCHQ, GCSE, ghost, Harry Kane, Harry Maguire, haunted house, heterosexual, homophobia, homophobic, imitation game, Isolation, , Jack Copeland, Jonathan Swinton, Joseph Birr-Pixton, Leslie Ann Goldberg, LGBT, loss, Manchester, manturing, Marcus Rashford, Melvyn Bragg, mental health, nurturing your future, pride, Rahmeem Sterling, rightmove, savills, sexuality, Simon Schaffer, SK9, SK92BJ, spooky, Steve Furber, stress, sue black, suicide, The imitation game, torture, tragedy, tragic, turing, Turing test, turings house, wellbeing, wikipedia, Wilmslow, World War II

The blue plaque on Alan Turing’s house, commemorating his work in cryptography which founded both Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence as new disciplines. Picture by Joseph Birr-Pixton on Wikimedia Commons w.wiki/3aYW

The house where Computer Scientist Alan Turing spent his final years is currently up for sale. The estate agent describes the property on 43 Adlington Road, Wilmslow as a Victorian family residence of significant historical importance. Wilmslow and the surrounding Cheshire countryside is popular with Manchester commuters, including many Man United, Man City & England football stars. Even if you could afford its premier league price tag, would YOU want to live in the house where Turing’s life ended so tragically?

Turing was found dead at this house, on the 8th June 1954 by his cleaner. The cause of his death the previous day was established as cyanide poisoning. He was just 41 years old. When his body was discovered, an apple lay half-eaten by his bedside. 

The coroner recorded a verdict of suicide.

At the end of his life Turing was suffering mentally and physically. The homophobic British authorities were using a form of legalised torture, known as forced chemical castration, to punish him for being homosexual. At the time, homosexuality was a crime. Turing put on a brave face and joked about his castration (“I’m growing breasts!”), but it must have been horrible to endure.

If you’re feeling suicidal or tortured, you don’t have to struggle with difficult feelings alone. If you’re suffering from emotional distress or struggling to cope a Samaritan can face your problems with you. Whatever you’re going through, samaritans.org are available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. They respond to around 10,000 calls for help every day. No judgement. No pressure. Call them free any time, from any phone on 116 123.

While everyone can have a good old nosey at Turing’s house through the estate agents window, no-one needs to suffer like its famous former resident did. Personally I think I’d find this property an enigmatically haunted house to live in, knowing that this was the place where a great man’s life ended in such tragedy. How about you?

Turing’s House: Copper Folly, 43 Adlington Road, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 2BJ

Rightmove details www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/109329428
Savills.com details in a single pdf file bit.ly/alan-turings-house
Turing’s house in Google maps goo.gl/maps/krMM3A2JfgTUVFfm8
GCSE computing: Alan Turing: Creator of modern computing bbc.co.uk/teach/alan-turing-creator-of-modern-computing/zhwp7nb
Alan Turing’s Manchester by Jonathan Swinton describes what it was like to make new friends and lovers in the smog-bound, bombed-out city of Manchester from 1948 to 1954 manturing.net
Leslie Ann Goldberg, Simon Schaffer and Andrew Hodges discuss Turing’s ideas and life with Melvyn Bragg https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000ncmw
Breast enlargement in men undergoing chemical castration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gynecomastia

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Alan O’Donohoe for spotting Turing’s house on the market and to Joseph Birr-Pixton for publishing his picture of Turing’s blue plaque on Wikimedia Commons.

February 6, 2009

The Loneliness of the Long Distance Researcher

Filed under: Science — Duncan Hull @ 8:53 am
Tags: Allan Sillitoe, Bernhard Palsson, Britney Spears, Gordon Plotkin, hermit, Isolation, Libby Miller, lonely, lyrical, mcisb, Paul Duguid, phd, Scott Berkun, Yuri Lazebnik

Despite what some people think (see “the myth of the lone inventor” in [1]) most scientists are usually pretty sociable people. Science is an inherently social activity [2], just take a look around you. Most laboratories are full of like-minded people working on related problems, our lab is no exception. Outside the lab, there are all the conferences, workshops, seminars, trips to the pub, coffee breaks and other meetings where scientists meet and exchange ideas and results. Finally, note the peer in peer-review – another essentially social activity, even when it is anonymous.

But in between these gregarious social activities there is a long, lonely and pretty unsociable road where you need to spend lots of time thinking, reading, writing and experimenting. Essentially you are alone, like a modern day hermit, especially at the earlier stages of a career. Solitary confinement in your ivory tower of choice needs to be balanced with various kinds of socialising. Talking about and watching what other people are doing, as well as publicising your own work are an essential part of the mix. But you still need to put the hours in on the road. It isn’t always easy to get it right, so how do you strike a balance between the social and the solitary activities to establish yourself as an independent research scientist? (more…)

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