I would like to thank all those that contributed to the Turing Centennial series: all those who wrote posts, for sure; but also all those who spread the word about this, on blogs, twitter, facebook, and in real life; those who came to read them; and those who wrote lots of thoughtful comments. In a community where discussions over conference organizational issues or over the importance of matrix multiplication algorithms can become very acrimonious, I am impressed that we could have such a pleasant and troll-free conversation. This goes to show that in theory has not only the smartest and most handsome readers of the whole internet, as was well known, but also the nicest ones!
We will definitely do this again in 2054, to mark the centennial of Turing’s death.
A few days ago, I was very saddened to hear of the death of Sally Ride. A Stanford Alumna, Sally Ride became to first American woman to travel in space, she served on both the investigative committees after the two Shuttle disasters, and dedicated the past decade to the goal of getting young kids, and girls in particular, interested in science and technology. She cofounded, and directed, a non-profit foundation to further these goals, and wrote several books. After her death, it was revealed that she had been in a 25-year relationship with another woman, who was also the coauthor of her books and a partner in her foundation.
I think it is significant that a person that certainly had a lot of courage, determination, willingness to defy stereotypes, and to be an inspiration for people like her, felt that she could not be publicly out during her life. (In interviews about their books, Ride and her partner Tam O’Shaughnessy referred to each other as “friends”.)
Let’s hope that in 2054 it’s not just computer science professors in the West that are confortable being out, but also astronauts, movie stars, professional athletes, and so on.
in theory 