Turing and the origins of digital computers

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian Randell
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
General Belief ◽  
Alan Turing ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Intensive Investigation ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Second World

In this chapter I describe my initial attempts at investigating, during the early 1970s, what Alan Turing did during the Second World War. My investigations grew out of a study of the work of Charles Babbage’s earliest successors—in particular, the Irish pioneer Percy Ludgate—a study that led me to plan an overall historical account of the origins of the digital computer. The investigation resulted in my learning about a highly secret programmable electronic computer developed in Britain during the Second World War. I revealed that this computer was named Colossus, and had been built in 1943 for Bletchley Park, the UK government’s wartime codebreaking establishment. However, my attempt to get the details of the machine declassified were unsuccessful, and I came to the conclusion that it might be a long time before anything more would become public about Bletchley Park and Colossus. Around 1970, while I was seeking information about the work of Charles Babbage and Ada Lovelace to use in my inaugural lecture at Newcastle University, I stumbled across the work of Percy Ludgate. In a paper he wrote about Babbage’s ‘automatic calculating engines’, Ludgate mentioned that he had also worked on the design of an Analytical Engine, indicating that he had described this in an earlier paper in the Proceedings of the Royal Dublin Society.From a copy of that paper I learned that an apparently completely forgotten Irish inventor had taken up and developed Babbage’s ideas for what would now be called a program-controlled mechanical computer. Previously I had subscribed to the general belief that over a century had passed before anyone had followed up Babbage’s pioneering 1837 work on Analytical Engines. This discovery led me to undertake an intensive investigation of Ludgate, the results of which I published in the Computer Journal. With the help of a number of Irish librarians and archivists I managed to find out quite a few details about the tragically short life of this Irish accountant, and even to make contact with one of his relatives. Unfortunately, I found nothing more about his design for a paper-tapecontrolled analytical machine beyond what was given in his 1909 paper. My investigations into the background to Ludgate’s work left me with a considerable amount of information on pre-computer technology and on other little-known successors to Babbage.

scholarly journals The Anglosphere beyond Security

2019 ◽  
pp. 77-92
Author(s):  
Srdjan Vucetic
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Racial Politics ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
World War ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
The One ◽  
Second World

Contemporary Anglospherism – a convenient shorthand for recent calls for more cooperation and unity between select English-speaking polities – draws considerable potency from the existence of the Five Eyes network, ABCANZ and many institutions and practices that constitute the Anglosphere in security. For some, the connection is self-evident and should be made explicit: ‘we’ are already glued together in security, so why not build a zone of free movement in goods, services and labour, too? The mutual constitution of these two Anglospheres – political Anglospherism on the one hand and the Anglosphere in security on the other – is more than a century old but remains poorly understood. In this chapter I perform three tasks set out to interrogate this relationship. First, I provide a genealogy of the Anglosphere and of the nearby ‘CANZUK Union’. Next, I map out the Anglosphere in security, probing the depth and frequency of coordination and cooperation among Five Eyes states since the Second World War. I then argue that the deep origins of the Anglosphere in security lie in late nineteenth-century inter-racial politics.

Marie Ulčová and her Contribution to the West Bohemian Museums

2018 ◽  
Vol 56 (1) ◽  
pp. 13-23
Author(s):  
Nela Štorková
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
The West ◽  
West Bohemia ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Second World

While today the Ethnographic Museum of the Pilsen Region represents just one of the departments of the Museum of West Bohemia in Pilsen, at the beginning of the twentieth century, in 1915, it emerged as an independent institution devoted to a study of life in the Pilsen region. Ladislav Lábek, the founder and long-time director, bears the greatest credit for this museum. This study presents PhDr. Marie Ulčová, who joined the museum shortly after the Second World War and in 1963 replaced Mr. Lábek on his imaginary throne. The main objective of this article is to introduce the personality of Marie Ulčová and to evaluate the activity of this Pilsen ethnographer and the museum employee with an emphasis on her work in the Ethnographic Museum of the Pilsen Region. The basic aspects of the ethnographic activities, not only of Marie Ulčová but also of the Ethnographic Museum of the Pilsen Region in the years 1963–1988, are described through her professional and popularising articles, archival sources and contemporary periodicals.

THE ALLIED NEUTRAL? PORTUGUESE BALANCE OF PAYMENTS WITH THE UK AND GERMANY IN THE SECOND WORLD WAR, 1939-1945

2020 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-110
Author(s):  
Eric Golson
Keyword(s):  
Raw Materials ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Balance Of Payments ◽  
International Standards ◽  
Third Party ◽  
World War ◽  
Portuguese Empire ◽  
Active Choice ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Second World

ABSTRACTIn September 1939, Portugal made a realist strategic choice to preserve the Portuguese Empire maintaining by its neutrality and also remaining an ally of Great Britain. While the Portuguese could rely largely on their colonies for raw materials to sustain the mainland, the country had long depended on British transportation for these goods and the Portuguese military. With the British priority now given to war transportation, Portugal's economy and Empire were particularly vulnerable. The Portuguese dictator Antonio Salazar sought to mitigate this damage by maintaining particularly friendly financial relations with the British government, including increased exports of Portuguese merchandise and services and permission to accumulate credits in Sterling to cover deficits in the balance of payments. This paper gives an improved set of comprehensive statistics for the Anglo-Portuguese and German–Portuguese relationships, reported in Pounds and according to international standards. The reported statistics include the trade in merchandise, services, capital flows, loans and third-party transfers of funds in favour of the British account. When compared with the German statistics, the Anglo-Portuguese figures show the Portuguese government favoured the British in financial relations, an active choice by Salazar to maintain the Portuguese Empire.

A ‘Sound Investment’? British Cultural Diplomacy and Overseas Students: The British Council's Students Committee, 1935–1939

2021 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 265-283
Author(s):  
Alice Byrne
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Diplomacy ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Overseas Students ◽  
British Council ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Foreign Office ◽  
Run Up ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Second World

This article explores the UK government's first foray into cultural diplomacy by focusing on the activities of the British Council's Students Committee in the run-up to the Second World War. Students were placed at the heart of British cultural diplomacy, which drew on foreign models as well as the experience of intra-empire exchanges. While employing cultural internationalist discourse, the drive to attract more overseas students to the United Kingdom was intended to bring economic and political advantages to the host country. The British Council pursued its policy in cooperation with non-state actors but ultimately was guided by the Foreign Office, which led it to target key strategic regions, principally in Europe and the Mediterranean Basin.

scholarly journals Ética y nihilismo. A propósito de "On Contemporary Nihilism" de Aron Gurwitsch

1970 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jesús M. Díaz Álvarez
Keyword(s):  
Second World War ◽  
Human Being ◽  
World War ◽  
The West ◽  
Common Base ◽  
Long Time ◽  
The Common ◽  
Aron Gurwitsch ◽  
Second World

RESUMENEl presente artículo es una exposición reflexiva del texto de Aron Gurwitsch "On Contemporary Nihilism". Escrito en plena conflagración mundial, su intención última es mostrar que el nihilismo, en tanto que fenómeno que define la situación de occidente desde el declive de las ideas racionalistas, es el sustrato común, la base de la que van a emerger, por un lado, el "nihilismo epistemológico", que afecta a los diferentes saberes (teóricos y prácticos), y, por el otro, el terrible hecho del totalitarismo. Frente a esta situación, Gurwitsch defenderá que la única manera de salir del nihilismo y recuperar la cordura y la dignidad del ser humano es volviendo a reactivar, en el sentido husserliano, el ideal racionalista, el famoso dar y recibir razones con el que un día nació la filosofía en Grecia.PALABRAS CLAVENIHILISMO-TOTALITARSMO-RACIONALIDAD-ABSOLUTOABTRACTThis article is an expostion and a reflection on Aron Gurwitsch´s "On Contemporary Nihilism". He worte this text during the Second World War and his ultimate intention was to show that nihilism, as the fact which defined the situation of the West since the decline of the rationalistic ideas, was the common base from which two phenomena arose. The first of them is the "epistemological nihilism", which affects our theoretical and practical disciplines. The second one is the terrible fact of totalitarianism. Taking this situation into account, Gurwitsch will maintain that the only way to overcome hilism and to recover the dignity of the human being is through the re-activation, in the husserlian sense, of the rationalist ideal, the famous "lógon diadónai" with which a long time ago philosophy was born in Greece.KEYWORDSNIHILISM-TOTALITARISM-RATIONALITY-ABSOLUTE

scholarly journals Menneskeverdet i tre nyere tolkninger som placeholder, heuristisk og «flytende signifikant»

2019 ◽  
pp. 215-237
Author(s):  
Ådne Valen-Sendstad
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Second World War ◽  
European Law ◽  
World War ◽  
Normative Concept ◽  
New Meanings ◽  
Second World ◽  
Common Understanding

In this chapter I discuss three new ways, of understanding human dignity. First, Christopher McCrudden’s concern is with the fact that there is no common understanding of the concept. He argues that dignity is a placeholder. It is open to interpretations from a diversity of normative understandings, – religious and secular. Still, he argues for a core of overlapping content within the diversity of understandings. Second, Catherine Dupré understands human dignity as a heuristic concept, open for new interpretations. The concept is in itself inexhaustible. New meanings develop in confrontation with new issues. Observing that the concept has become one of the pillars in European law and democracies, and has been crucial in several junctions when dictatorships has fallen and democracies has been established after the Second World War, she finds that the concept comes to its right in particular in transitional and transformative situations. Finally, Costas Douzinas does not work with the concept human dignity but with the concept of the human, to whom human dignity is designated in the human rights. I reinterpret his theory to also cover the normative concept human dignity. It is brought into force by proclamations, and as such becomes a transformative and life changing concept in particular for people living in need of dignity.

scholarly journals The War Hotel

2013 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 114-116
Author(s):  
Paul Solomon
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Extended Family ◽  
First World War ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Israeli Defense Force ◽  
Tv News ◽  
The First World War ◽  
Second World ◽  
First World

War frames our lives. We live, as Billy Bragg (1985) put it, “Between the Wars”; or we live during wars, or after wars; or we live in terror of the threat of war; or get passionately aroused into war. We may watch helplessly as TV news shows us events of horror and violence overseas; on 19th June this year New Zealanders watched video on TV3 News of Kiwi troops under fire in Afghanistan, recorded on a soldier’s helmet-cam. Recent events unfolded once more on TVNZ with gut-wrenching inevitability: I watched as two soldiers were killed, and four injured. The survivors probably will return home traumatised. My interest in reviewing The War Hotel was personal: my grandfather fought in the First World War, my father in the Second World War. I served in the Israeli Defense Force, 1965-1967, and soon felt appalled by Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians. Some of my Jewish extended family perished in Poland during the Shoah. All humanity is touched by war, in varying degrees of separation.

scholarly journals The War of Khalkhin Gol in 1939 and the German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 585-594 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander Sukhodolov ◽  
Tuvd Dorj ◽  
Yuriy Kuzmin ◽  
Mikhail Rachkov
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Historical Science ◽  
World War ◽  
The World ◽  
Long Time ◽  
History Of ◽  
First Time ◽  
Further Development ◽  
Second World

For the first time in Russian historiography, the article draws attention to the connection of the War of Khalkhin Gol in 1939 and the conclusion of the German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact of 1939. For a long time, historical science considered these two major events in the history of the USSR and history of the world individually, without their historic relationship. The authors made an attempt to provide evidence of this relationship, showing the role that surrounding and defeating the Japanese army at Khalkhin Gol in August 1939 and signing in Moscow of the German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact played in the history of the world. The study analyzes the foreign policy of the USSR in Europe, the reasons for the failure in the conclusion of the Anglo-Franco-Soviet military union in 1939 and the circumstances of the Pact. It shows the interrelation between the defeat of the Japanese troops at Khalkhin Gol and the need for the Soviet-German treaty. The authors describe the historic consequences of the conclusion of the pact for the further development of the Japanese-German relations and the course of the Second World War. They also present the characteristics of the views of these historical events in the Russian historiography.

scholarly journals CONSERVATIVE PARTY AND THE PROBLEMS OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE IN THE EARLY YEARS OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR (on the pages of “Diary of a diplomat” by I. M. Maisky)

2016 ◽  
pp. 32-37
Author(s):  
E. V. Khakhalkina
Keyword(s):  
British Empire ◽  
Conservative Party ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Early Years ◽  
World War ◽  
Dominant Position ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Close Relationship ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Second World

The “Diary” of the Soviet diplomat I. M. Maisky, who worked in London for more than ten years first as a messenger, then as the Soviet ambassador to the UK, is one of the valuable sources for the interwar period and the Second World War. The “Diary” contains records of Maisky’s conversations with the leading British politicians and public figures and his own thoughts on a wide range of issues, including the problems of the British Empire. The author of the paper analyzes the views of the Tories on the prospects for the British Empire and the Commonwealth of the postwar period and reveals the plans for the reconstruction of the Empire and its transformation while maintaining the dominant position of Britain in the format of a new relationship with the dominions and colonies. The paper shows that within the British political establishment there was no consensus on the future of the empire and, as the materials of the “Diary of diplomat” evidence, the problem of the evolution of the Empire had a close relationship with other areas of foreign and domestic policy.

The Work of a Left-Handed Man

2000 ◽  
pp. 86-105
Author(s):  
John Lucas
Keyword(s):  
Second World War ◽  
Personal Interest ◽  
Writing Style ◽  
World War ◽  
Left Handed ◽  
Jazz Piano ◽  
The Many ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Second World ◽  
Formal Constraints

In chapter three, John Lucas describes the UK jazz scene following the Second World War. Lucas describes the free and unlimited qualities of jazz and makes comparative reference to Fisher’s own personal interest in the genre. The chapter goes on to state that Fisher’s writing style can arguably be linked to the many styles of jazz piano, in that the two both adhere to imaginative thought and liberation from formal constraints. As well as music, the chapter also focuses on the significance and impact of the themes of location and belonging found in Fisher’s poetry.

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