We learn of the early roots of Turing’s interest in the function of the mind, and the shift to a materialist focus after the death of his close friend Christopher Morcom, who was his first love. This is a complete biography, from his earliest years. As both a mathematician and a leader in the London Gay Liberation Front, Hodges was uniquely suited to write this work and it reflects these qualifications. Andrew Hodges wrote this tour de force of a biography, dealing both with the singular scientific accomplishments of his life and the struggles he faced in his time as a gay man. The title of this work reflects both the important, and long secret work, Turing did to decrypt German transmissions encrypted by their Enigma machine, for which he was awarded an OBE, and that Turing, in life and death was something of an enigma, even to those closest to him. Summary: Perhaps the definitive account of the brilliant mathematician, cryptanalyst, and computer scientist, Alan Turing, who was prosecuted for his homosexuality, not long before the end of his life due to cyanide poisoning. London: Vintage Books, 1983, 2012 (publisher’s link is for an updated edition by Princeton University Press, 2015).
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