Question: Who will appear on UK’s new 50 pound note?
(a) Stephen Hawkins
(b) Winston Churchill
(c) Charles Darwin
(d) Alan Turning
Answer: (d)
Related facts:
(a) Stephen Hawkins
(b) Winston Churchill
(c) Charles Darwin
(d) Alan Turning
Answer: (d)
Related facts:
- British mathematician and World War II codebreaker, Alan Turing will feature on UK’s new PS50 note. The mathematician will appear on the note by the end of 2021.
- The note’s design will reflect Turing’s work and feature a ticker tape of binary numbers which translates to his birthday, i.e. 23rd June, 1912. It will also depict the ‘British Bombe’ machine which helped crack the Enigma code.
- Turing killed himself on 7th June, 1954, about two years after being subjected to chemical castration, by consuming cyanide.
Alan Turning’s contribution:
- Alan Turing is touted to be the father of theoretical computer science and artificial intelligence.
- He worked towards cracking Germany’s Enigma code at Bletchley Park, saving thousands of lives during World War II.
- In July 1942, Turing developed a complex code-breaking technique Turingery for use against the Lorenz cipher messages produced by the Germans’ new Geheimschreiber (secret writer) machine.
- A paper published by the mathematician in 1937 introduced the Turing machine, which forms the basis of modern computing. He also studied cryptology, the study of codes and cyphers which can be used to send secret messages, and built three out of four stages of an electro-mechanical binary multiplier.
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