Alan Turing at 100
It is hard to overstate the importance of Alan Turing, the British mathematician who died in 1954. He was a hero in science, for one. Turing invented the concepts that underlie modern computers and artificial intelligence. And he was a hero in war: He was a vital part of the British cryptographic team at Bletchley Park that cracked the German Enigma code during World War II. Harvard is celebrating Turing’s centenary year with “Go Ask A.L.I.C.E.,” an exhibit of “Turing Tests, Parlor Games, and ChatterBots,” which opened Tuesday and will run through Dec. 20 in the Science Center, Room 252. Gerald Holton, professor of the history of science emeritus and Mallinckrodt Professor of Physics, was among the first visitors to the exhibit, minutes after it opened. He stood in front of one of the interactive machines and asked no one in particular, “Can we break the Enigma code?” The exhibit is visually appealing,...