Apology to Alan Turing

The UK government apologises for its treatment of Alan Turing.

A pointless feel-good exercise? Too little too late? A fitting tribute to a national hero? I don’t know. Maybe all of the above, but on the whole I’m happy with it. Turing damn well deserves some recognition for being one of the founding fathers of computer science, not to mention his cracking of the Enigma ciphers.

The UK government apologises for its treatment of Alan Turing:

Earlier this year I stood with Presidents Sarkozy and Obama to honour the service and the sacrifice of the heroes who stormed the beaches of Normandy 65 years ago. And just last week, we marked the 70 years which have passed since the British government declared its willingness to take up arms against Fascism and declared the outbreak of World War Two. So I am both pleased and proud that, thanks to a coalition of computer scientists, historians and LGBT activists, we have this year a chance to mark and celebrate another contribution to Britain’s fight against the darkness of dictatorship; that of code-breaker Alan Turing.

Turing was a quite brilliant mathematician, most famous for his work on breaking the German Enigma codes. It is no exaggeration to say that, without his outstanding contribution, the history of World War Two could well have been very different. He truly was one of those individuals we can point to whose unique contribution helped to turn the tide of war. The debt of gratitude he is owed makes it all the more horrifying, therefore, that he was treated so inhumanely. In 1952, he was convicted of ‘gross indecency’ – in effect, tried for being gay. His sentence – and he was faced with the miserable choice of this or prison – was chemical castration by a series of injections of female hormones. He took his own life just two years later.

A pointless feel-good exercise? Too little too late? A fitting tribute to a national hero? I don’t know. Maybe all of the above, but on the whole I’m happy with it. Turing damn well deserves some recognition for being one of the founding fathers of computer science, not to mention his cracking of the Enigma ciphers. And who knows what other contributions he may have made, if he’d lived? In his last years Turing researched neural nets and artificial intelligence, amongst other topics. He might have helped drive not one but two information revolutions.

I read Andrew Hodges’ excellent biography Alan Turing: The Enigma not too long after coming out. Borrowed it from the library, which is a shame because I’d really like to reread it now. An abridged version (also maintained by Andrew Hodges) is available online which, shameless plug, was the basis of an article I co-wrote in my first semester at SFU.

And in all the discussion surrounding this apology, I found a link to an excellent short story that sort of answers my previous question. What might have Turing done, if he’d lived (and was helped by a time traveller)? Check it out

Relics

Quebec (the province and the city) has a lot of history. In Vancouver, “old” just means turn of the century (Gastown, some of Strathcona and New Westminster). But Vieux-Québec? Try turn of the eighteenth century, then we’ll talk. Everything just feels old, every street corner has a hundred stories to tell.

Quebec (the province and the city) has a lot of history. In Vancouver, “old” just means turn of the century (Gastown, some of Strathcona and New Westminster). But Vieux-Québec? Try turn of the eighteenth century, then we’ll talk. Everything just feels old, every street corner has a hundred stories to tell.

Maison Leber, 1686

Most of that history is Catholic. Half the streets are named after saints, many of the historical buildings are churches, convents, presbyteries and so on. Every aspect of French-Canadian history is soaked in religious tradition. I don’t especially mind, when I see it purely as history. As much as I despise organised religion in general, and the Catholic Church in particular, it has inspired some beautiful art and architecture.

Mind you, Quebec’s not as religious as it used to be. A lot of these traditions are dying off, and so are the communities. Just as an example, Île-d’Orléans used to contain six parishes, one for each village, each with its own church and presbytery (where the religious folks lived). And maybe school, too, although I’m not sure about that. About twenty years ago, those six parishes were merged into two. Nowadays, there’s only one priest to serve the entire island, assisted by one other priest from the mainland to hold services at all the churches on the weekend. Which, let’s face it, is not a big trek, but still. It’s a hell of a change in just a couple of generations.

Many cash-strapped religious orders have also sold off buildings and property, which have been converted to other uses. Just as a for instance, the former presbytery of Sainte-Famille, Île-d’Orléans, is now a genealogy museum. Not to mention that Anglican church in Strathcona, converted to an art studio. A big improvement in both cases, I think.

Genealogy Museum

We had dinner with a family friend, a parish priest in downtown Quebec who used to be assigned to our parish in Ottawa. He had some fun stories about the Dominican order’s internal politics, at the local and provincial level. But also stories of shrinking, and aging, flocks as well as priest communities themselves. Part of me felt a little sad for him. It can’t be easy to see your community and your whole way of life implode like that in his lifetime. As much as I believe the world is better off with less oppressive tradition, dogma and blind faith, it’s nothing personal. This friend of ours, he’s good people, and though I don’t respect his beliefs I respect the fact that they’re important to him.

One of the upsides is that nowadays, and especially for children, religious differences are not such a big deal anymore. As the bonds of faith are breaking down, so have the walls between faiths. We visited an Anglican church in Vieux-Québec: Holy Trinity Cathedral (the first Anglican cathedral built outside the British Isles, dating from 1804). There happened to be a gaggle of schoolkids on a field trip, and a guide (or the teacher, maybe) was explaining to these presumably Catholic children some differences between Catholicism and Anglicanism. For one thing, Anglicans display the Ten Commandments in the church. For another, they arrange them a little differently.

Holy Trinity Altar

I’ve got a hard time imagining many pre-Vatican II Catholics willingly setting foot inside a hell-bound Protestant church, let alone having their children be educated on the finer points of Anglican worship and maybe learn that—gasp!—they really aren’t so different after all. Plus, Holy Trinity is supposed to be haunted. Those kids will go home thinking Anglicans churches are wicked cool.

But never fear, true believers. They say the heart of hardcore Catholicism is still beating, and from what I’ve seen I believe ’em.

Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré

Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré, a little ways from Quebec City, has been a major pilgrimage site for over 300 years. The faithful—who these days are more likely to come in coach buses than on foot—can enjoy the Jerusalem Cyclorama (IIRC, a big diorama of the Passion, with some multimedia thrown in), visit the Museum to Sainte-Anne (gawd knows what’s there, the woman only appears in apocryphal tales and Catholic tradition), browse the gift shop for that perfect tacky plaster Virgin Mary or whatever, and even get their swag blessed by a priest.

No, I’m not kidding. A priest was actually sitting in a little glass-enclosed booth near the gift shop, in full priestly gear, waiting to bless things (for a modest donation, I’ll bet). I just hope that booth was air-conditioned, because it was really hot, and those clothes looked heavy.

First Station

But then you’ve got all the really traditional stuff: the Stations of the Cross behind the church, as well as a couple of small shrines whose purpose wasn’t too clear to me. And the church itself, a huge newly-renovated monster of a cathedral hiding, amongst the pretty architecture and frankly fascinating artwork, some pretty creepy shit.

Fishermen

Exhibit A: genuine holy relic of Sainte-Anne. Yeah. Never seen a relic before, and frankly I could have gone longer without seeing one. It’s a fucking arm, people! Who goes around putting parts of dead people literally on a pedestal? And who accepts on faith that these bits, the earliest dating back to 1670, are really from a woman who was said to exist 2,000 years ago?

Relic

Exhibit B: Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré, as you may or may not be aware, is reputed to be a site of healing and other miracles. The front pillars of the main church are covered with dozens of crutches presumably left there by people who were healed. Not everybody was so lucky, though. We visited a smaller chapel in the basement, housing another tiny little shrine to Sainte-Anne. Most disturbingly, this one had a couple of photos of children propped up against the statue, and a few folded pieces of paper wedged under the statue’s base. Not hard to guess what that’s about.

I’ll never know how those kids are doing, or if those parents’ prayers were answered. I hope they’re doing better than these other pilgrims from a hundred years ago.

I’ll tell you this, though: at least Catholic faith healing is dressed up with nicer ritual than modern televangelists. Maybe that’s just me, though.

If I had to pick one word to sum up Sainte-Anne, it would be: horrifying. The whole complex, basilica and sideshows, is a monument to blind faith, superstition, and the fleecing of the sheep. It is a scary, scary look at old-school Catholic belief and I for one am so very glad I’m living in a time when the Church’s power is shrinking.

Crescent Moon and Venus

I admit, it was a pure stroke of luck. I was walking home, looking forward to an evening of volleyball, when I happened to look up and saw a lovely new crescent moon. The light was still good so I took its picture, not paying much attention to the nearby bright spot. But it turns out, it’s Venus.

I admit, it was a pure stroke of luck. I was walking home, looking forward to an evening of volleyball, when I happened to look up and saw a lovely new crescent moon. The light was still good so I took its picture, not paying much attention to the nearby bright spot. Turns out, that bright spot is Venus.

Crescent Moon and Venus

Absolutely gorgeous. I had no idea where Venus was supposed to be located that night. And hey: the first photo on this here blog published exclusively on Flickr!

“Listening to the heartbeat of a star in its womb”

Last night I attended a meeting of the Center For Inquiry Vancouver, with invited guest Dr. Jaymie Matthews, mission scientist of the MOST project. MOST (Microvariability and Oscillations of STars/Microvariabilité et Oscillations STellaires) is Canada’s first space telescope, studying minute variations in stars’ light output to understand their inner structure, as well as detecting any planets that may be orbiting them.

Last night I attended a meeting of the Center For Inquiry Vancouver, with invited guest Dr. Jaymie Matthews, mission scientist of the MOST project. MOST (Microvariability and Oscillations of STars/Microvariabilité et Oscillations STellaires) is Canada’s first space telescope, studying minute variations in stars’ light output to understand their inner structure, as well as detecting any planets that may be orbiting them.

In the over 5 years since its launch, MOST has studied hundreds of star systems, upending a few theories, confirming others, and generally expanding our understanding not only of others stars, but our own as well.

The event was named What if Galileo had a Space Telescope? in reference to Galileo’s groundbreaking observations of celestial bodies, which forever altered our perception of the universe and our place within it. Dr. Matthews argues that we are currently going through a similar revolution, what with new cosmological theories like dark energy (to explain why the expansion of the universe is still accelerating), and our continuing quest for Earth-like exoplanets, further putting our home in its proper perspective.

Unfortunately, MOST’s imaging technology doesn’t lend itself to pretty pictures like, say, the Hubble Telescope. Still, the words, simple graphics and animations are enough to fire the imagination. This is head-spinningly exciting science! I’ve read up on some of it over the years, but I’d never heard of MOST and had no idea so much was being done right here in Canada!

Caw!

Hey, remember the last time I blogged about crows? Back then I was just on one of their commuting routes. But my present job happens to be very near their roosting grounds around Still Creek and Willingdon. Until recently it was still dark when I left work, so I had so I walked past, oh, a couple of thousand crows, I’d say, settled in the trees along Gilmore Ave. And that’s just a suburb of Crow Central.

Hey, remember the last time I blogged about crows? Back then I was just on one of their commuting routes. But my present job happens to be very near their roosting grounds around Still Creek and Willingdon. Until recently it was still dark when I left work, so I had so I walked past, oh, a couple of thousand crows, I’d say, settled in the trees along Gilmore Ave. And that’s just a suburb of Crow Central. There was no way to avoid walking under them, so I used to pull the hood of my jacket up, afraid of getting shat on. Which hasn’t happened so far, but I’m not keen on tempting fate.

Settling In

But the days are getting longer and a few times this week I’ve been able to get out of work early enough to see all the zillions of crows on the last leg of their commute, resting on trees, roofs, power lines or any convenient spot. And then, without warning, take off again like a swarm of, well, screechy black birds.

A lot of crows

“There is grandeur in this view of life…”

In the last chapter of The Origin of Species, Darwin recapped all the evidence he so carefully and meticulously presenting for his theory of common descent. And then took a step back to ponder where it was all going, and what it all meant.

In the last chapter of The Origin of Species, Darwin recapped all the evidence he had so meticulously presented for his theory of common descent. And then took a step back to ponder where it was all going, and what it all meant.

When we no longer look at an organic being as a savage looks at a ship, as at something wholly beyond his comprehension; when we regard every production of nature as one which has had a history; when we contemplate every complex structure and instinct as the summing up of many contrivances, each useful to the possessor, nearly in the same way as when we look at any great mechanical invention as the summing up of the labour, the experience, the reason, and even the blunders of numerous workmen; when we thus view each organic being, how far more interesting, I speak from experience, will the study of natural history become!

He predicted that the theory would open up rich new fields of scientific research in biology, geology, paleontology, psychology and anthropology. Armed with the understanding that all individuals of all species are related, however distantly, that species have been shaped by their environments over the eons, scientists would look backwards, and outwards, free of counterproductive labels and dogmas, answering many current questions and discovering even more interesting questions to ask. This prediction would prove to be correct. As Theodosius Dobzhansky wrote, “nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.”

And then he went one step further:

When I view all beings not as special creations, but as the lineal descendants of some few beings which lived long before the first bed of the Silurian system was deposited, they seem to me to become ennobled.

What ennobles them? Simply having such a long and complex history. They—and all their ancestors—were lucky or tough enough to survive everything Nature could throw at them. Every being now living, worm or eagle, peasant or aristocrat, is descended from a long line of survivors. That’s a pedigree anyone should be proud of.

Judging from the past, we may safely infer that not one living species will transmit its unaltered likeness to a distant futurity. And of the species now living very few will transmit progeny of any kind to a far distant futurity; for the manner in which all organic beings are grouped, shows that the greater number of species of each genus, and all the species of many genera, have left no descendants, but have become utterly extinct.

Is it all doom and gloom, though? Not at all.

As all the living forms of life are the lineal descendants of those which lived long before the Silurian epoch, we may feel certain that the ordinary succession by generation has never once been broken, and that no cataclysm has desolated the whole world. Hence we may look with some confidence to a secure future of equally inappreciable length. And as natural selection works solely by and for the good of each being, all corporeal and mental endowments will tend to progress towards perfection.

I don’t know about that “perfection,” but hey, that’s Victorians for you.

It’s interesting to note how Darwin’s attitude contrasts with that of creationists, then or now. To them, the idea of being related to apes is just as abhorrent as the idea the Bible isn’t literally true. Animals aren’t ennobled by their connection with us; it’s we who are demeaned by our connection with them. The only way Humankind can be seen as special is through our creation, not our history or achievements. And they certainly don’t look forward to a far distant future where our descendants—however different they’ll be from us—will continue to thrive.

The book concludes with a final appeal, not to the truth, but the beauty of his theory.

There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.

Darwin’s no poet, I grant you, but this passage works. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: the theory of evolution—with its notions of deep time and the fundamental interconnectedness of all living beings—tells a far more satisfying story than any creation myth our various cultures have cooked up. Our long journey from the trees—and before that, from the swamps and the seas—has made us what we are, flaws and all. We dishonour our ancestors by ignoring their struggles, their achievements, and yes, their failures. We honour them by remembering their lives, and continuing the journey they made possible for us.

Happy 200th, Mr. Darwin.

I got my picture taken with James Randi!

The Amazing Randi was invited to UBC to give the keynote address for Science Week 2009. I decided to attend even though it was a weeknight, and really out of my way. And the map I printed out from Google Maps still didn’t keep me from getting lost. Health Sciences Mall is a street, my ass.

Check it, kids!

Me and James Randi

The Amazing Randi was invited to UBC to give the keynote address for Science Week 2009. I decided to attend even though it was a weeknight, and really out of my way. And the map I printed out from Google Maps still didn’t keep me from getting lost. Health Sciences Mall is a street, my ass.

But it was totally worth it. Randi is well in his seventies now, I think, but still going strong, and as a great showman as always. He demonstrated a few tricks (both sleight-of-hand and mentalist) to educate and entertain, and of course went over the old standbys: Peter Popoff and Uri Geller and Sylvia Browne. I’d read about all that, of course, both on his site and others, but it was a different experience to hear about it from The Man himself, in an auditorium full of other skeptics.

The Amazing One

Nice job as always, Mr. Randi. Here’s to many more years or debunking frauds.

Has the Large Hadron Collider destroyed the world yet?

Let’s check…

Not that doomsday crackpots haven’t tried to stir up fear of black holes swallowing the Earth, and whatnot.

Let’s check…

Not that doomsday crackpots haven’t tried to stir up fear of black holes swallowing the Earth and whatnot. Here’s what the scientists actually expect to find.

And because the world needs more cute nerds putting high-energy particle physics to music, I present you with…

I’d say Jack Chick’s lost it, except I don’t think he ever had it to begin with

Seriously, what the hell?

Seriously, what the fuck? A nerdy vampire called Igor? A Christian girl called Faith repelling Igor like a 15th level Cleric? Igor accepting Jesus and becoming human? That’s kind of over the top even for Chick. Just what are potential convertees supposed to get out of this? Or should I not be applying Earth logic to this?

I am full of hot air

…literally. Or I was until Sunday night.

…literally. Or I was until Sunday night.

See, while playing volleyball on Sunday afternoon, I inadvertently demonstrated a basic principle of Physics: gases will expand when heated. Here’s how I set up the experiment: a week before, my arms got pretty sunburned because I forgot to put sunscreen on them. By last weekend they were healing, and ready to peel. This time I made sure to put on sunscreen but pretty soon I noticed tons of little blisters on the burned areas. It actually looked pretty cool, a microscopic landscape of itty-bitty bubbly hills and mountain ranges. My theory is that tiny air pockets, trapped under the loosening skin and sunscreen, just started expanding. These blisters didn’t hurt, and disappeared soon after I got out of the sun leaving only whiter spots of dead skin.

And now my arms are peeling with a vengeance. I should probably stop picking at it, but I love the barely audible crinkly sound peeling skin makes when I pull it off. It’s… soothing.

Yeah, I think I need help.