<div dir="ltr">Also at least one reference to Walter Pitts' sexuality is from Elizabeth Wilson's fantastic <i>Affect and Artificial Intelligence</i> (2010) where she describes the homosocial environment of early cybernetics researchers and suggests that Wiener broke off relations with Pitts in part due to accusations of homosexuality. It's actually a fantastic part of the book that revolves around the famous anecdote of Pitts meeting Bertrand Russell in a park in 1938:<div>
<br></div><div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex">Rook McCulloch (Warren's widow and editor of his collected works) appears to have removed a part of this story that veers too close to manifest homosexuality. A copy-edited typescript of Blum's story reads as follows: “Walter was just 15 when he ran away from home, turned up in Chicago and there, in a park, made friends with a fellow who called himself Bert." Blum's original phrase "in a park…" has been deleted by hand. In another version of the same manuscript, the word "park" is deleted and the suggestion "small restaurant" is inserted (see Appendixes 2 and 3). The final published version of the story, as we have seen, alludes to no particular location at all. As if the meeting of these mathematical minds was untouched by geographical orientation, and, in particular, that it was unsullied by the class, sexual and gendered implications that meetings between men in public parks entail. This act of editing does not just erase any sexual frisson that may or may not have been part of this encounter, it also desexualizes the conceptual schemata that these men (Pitts, Russell, Carnap, Rashevsky, Lettvin, McCulloch) would build. It straightens out, and forswears, the longing that motivates AI. To be perfectly clear: I am, not making claims about actual homosexual encounters. Nor am I trying to build a case that Pitts was homosexual On the contrary, I am arguing that attachments cannot be readily contained within the logic of alloerotic object choice that dominated the twentieth century. Smalheiser (2000) reports that: "his friends are emphatic that Pitts was neither asexual nor homosexual [yet] there is no record of him actually having any romantic relationships with women. A shy, introverted lost soul, with glasses, bad teeth, a habit of twirling his hair, a slight nervous tremor and a tendency to bump into things, more comfortable with small children than with adults, he appealed rather to women's maternal instincts." (221)</blockquote>
<div><br></div><div>Refs: </div>Wilson, Elizabeth. 2010. <i>Affect and Artificial Intelligence</i>. Seattle: University of Washington Press: 126-127.<br>Smalheiser, Neil. 2000. Walter Pitts. <i>Perspectives in Biology and Medicine</i> 43(2): 217-26. <div>
<br></div><div>Apologies for the repeated posting, but this is all very related to my second research project.</div></div><div><br></div><div>- Jacob</div><div><br></div><div><br></div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br>
<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Jun 5, 2014 at 9:17 PM, Jacob Gaboury <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:jacob.gaboury@nyu.edu" target="_blank">jacob.gaboury@nyu.edu</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
<div dir="ltr"><div>While Turing's sexuality as something of an open secret is certainly a complicated issue, there are several historical accounts that suggest he was very open about his sexuality. I think the clearest and most widely quoted is from the IEEE <<a href="http://computer.org/computer-pioneers/turing.html" target="_blank">http://computer.org/computer-pioneers/turing.html</a>><span style="font-family:Times;font-size:9pt"><br>
</span></div><div><br></div><div>--</div><div><br></div>In a set of interviews in 1992 with I. Jack Good and Donald Michie, [Sponsored in part by the National Science Foundation.] both colleagues of Turing during his Bletchley Park sojourn, I led them to discuss their knowledge of Turing's homosexuality:<br>
<br>Good: ...when we walked down King's Parade [in 1947] that was the first time I discovered that he was homosexual. That was when he said that he was going to Paris to "see a boy." It was obvious that he was admitting or proclaiming his homosexuality.<br>
<br>Lee: He was very open about it?<br><br>Good: Yes, at that time.<br><br>Michie: He certainly wasn't during the war, for some of us, including both of us, were quite unaware.... I took quite seriously his engagement to ...<br>
<br>Good: Joan Clarke?<br><br>Lee: Peter Hilton [1991] quotes you, Jack, as saying, 'It was fortunate that the authorities did not know during the war that Turing was a homosexual, otherwise the Allies might have lost the war."<br>
<br>Good: Yes.<br><br>Michie: Oh but that's absolute nonsense, because Bletchley had some flamboyant homosexuals--Peter's ideas that security people were down on homosexuality itself, is absolute nonsense. I can't think how he could write that. The most flamboyant case was Angus Wilson--he later became a very successful novelist, and he had a boyfriend called Beverly, and these two, Angus was about that high [indicating small] with flowing yellow hair (I remember it went white later) and Beverly (I forget his second name) was very "weed-like," very tall. They could be seen shambling along the horizon, a daily sight, as they took their walk around lawns after lunch. <div>
<br></div><div>--</div><div><br></div><div>It certainly seems anachronistic to ascribe our contemporary definition of homosexuality as a coherent and fixed identity, but by many accounts he viewed the trial and arrest with humor and openness, and the letter Bernard included above might be read in that light.</div>
<div><br></div><div><br>-- <br><div dir="ltr">Jacob Gaboury<br>--<br>Assistant Professor of Digital Media and Visual Culture<br>Dept. of Cultural Analysis and Theory, Stony Brook University<br>--<div>Junior Fellow, MECS Institute for Advanced Study on Media Cultures of Computer Simulation</div>
<div>Leuphana University, Lüneburg, Germany (Summer 2014)</div><div>--<br>Staff Writer, Rhizome.org<br>New Museum for Contemporary Art<br>--<br><a href="http://www.jacobgaboury.com/" target="_blank">http://www.jacobgaboury.com/</a></div>
</div></div><div><div class="h5"><div><br></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Jun 5, 2014 at 8:45 PM, <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:geoghegb@cms.hu-berlin.de" target="_blank">geoghegb@cms.hu-berlin.de</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex">Hi Sigcis,<br>
<br>
I concur with Paul. Turing's fear of being thought of as a gay man is<br>
alluded to in the letter below, which I've copied and pasted from<br>
<a href="http://www.lettersofnote.com/2012/06/yours-in-distress-alan.html" target="_blank">http://www.lettersofnote.com/2012/06/yours-in-distress-alan.html</a> . It<br>
suggests his fear that his professional credibility would collapse if his<br>
sexual identity became public knowledge. As an aside, I think I read<br>
something in archival correspondences -- maybe among Norbert Wiener and<br>
Warren McCulloch? -- suggesting that suspicions about Walter Pitts' sexual<br>
orientation (among other issues) likewise threatened his employability. In<br>
case I'm confabulating, don't quote me on that though...<br>
<br>
Best,<br>
Bernard<br>
<br>
<br>
Turing wrote the following letter in 1952 to his friend and fellow<br>
mathematician, Norman Routledge, shortly before pleading guilty.<br>
<br>
(Source: Alan Turing: The Enigma - The Centenary Edition; Image: Alan<br>
Turing, via.)<br>
<br>
My dear Norman,<br>
<br>
I don't think I really do know much about jobs, except the one I had<br>
during the war, and that certainly did not involve any travelling. I think<br>
they do take on conscripts. It certainly involved a good deal of hard<br>
thinking, but whether you'd be interested I don't know. Philip Hall was in<br>
the same racket and on the whole, I should say, he didn't care for it.<br>
However I am not at present in a state in which I am able to concentrate<br>
well, for reasons explained in the next paragraph.<br>
<br>
I've now got myself into the kind of trouble that I have always considered<br>
to be quite a possibility for me, though I have usually rated it at about<br>
10:1 against. I shall shortly be pleading guilty to a charge of sexual<br>
offences with a young man. The story of how it all came to be found out is<br>
a long and fascinating one, which I shall have to make into a short story<br>
one day, but haven't the time to tell you now. No doubt I shall emerge<br>
from it all a different man, but quite who I've not found out.<br>
<br>
Glad you enjoyed broadcast. Jefferson certainly was rather disappointing<br>
though. I'm afraid that the following syllogism may be used by some in the<br>
future.<br>
<br>
Turing believes machines think<br>
Turing lies with men<br>
Therefore machines do not think<br>
<br>
Yours in distress,<br>
<br>
Alan<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
Dr. Bernard Dionysius Geoghegan<br>
Institut für Kulturwissenschaft<br>
Wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter<br>
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin<br>
<a href="http://www.bernardg.com" target="_blank">www.bernardg.com</a><br>
<div><div><br>
On Jun 5, 2014, at 4:01 PM, Paul N. Edwards wrote:<br>
<br>
I expect “openly gay,” with all the implications that phrase carries<br>
today, is an anachronistic label -- not an accurate description of<br>
Turing’s public persona, nor truly of his private one either.<br>
<br>
Paul<br>
<br>
<br>
On Jun 5, 2014, at 0:36 , Thomas Haigh <<a href="mailto:thaigh@computer.org" target="_blank">thaigh@computer.org</a>> wrote:<br>
<br>
My initial guess was that this was an anachronism. Hodge's book Alan Turing:<br>
The Enigma appeared in hardcover late 1983, and one might expect it to have<br>
taken a while to spread far into popular awareness or to have its rather<br>
complex narrative reduced to "won World War II." The Turing play "Breaking<br>
the Code" was not written until 1986. That did a huge amount to boost<br>
Turing's public profile, at least in the UK.<br>
<br>
However, the Amazon "search inside the book" finds a line of this kind in a<br>
recent reissue of The Normal Heart script and a 2000 volume combining it<br>
with the sequel. It is of course possible that the play was revised from its<br>
original 1985 version, which is not searchable online.<br>
<br>
So apparently Kramer was a pioneer in taking the complex portrait of Turing<br>
given in the Hodges biography, which I believe was widely reviewed on its<br>
initial release, and turning it into the slogan that "it was an openly gay<br>
Englishman who was as responsible as any man for winning he Second World<br>
War." Kramer continues, "His name was Alan Turing and he cracked the<br>
Germans' Enigma code so the Allies knew in advance what the Nazis were going<br>
to do--and when the war was over he committed suicide he was so hounded for<br>
being gay."<br>
<br>
That would be an important passage in a history of Turing in popular memory,<br>
which would be a great dissertation topic for someone.<br>
<br>
Tom<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
-----Original Message-----<br>
From: <a href="mailto:members-bounces@sigcis.org" target="_blank">members-bounces@sigcis.org</a> [mailto:<a href="mailto:members-bounces@sigcis.org" target="_blank">members-bounces@sigcis.org</a>] On<br>
Behalf Of Janet Abbate<br>
Sent: Wednesday, June 04, 2014 4:42 PM<br>
To: sigcis<br>
Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] Alan Turing as gay icon<br>
<br>
Did anyone catch the shout-out to Alan Turing in the HBO AIDS-themed movie<br>
"The Normal Heart"? The main character rants, "A gay man won World War II!<br>
They should teach that in schools."<br>
<br>
I wonder if that was actually the image of Turing in 1985 (when the original<br>
play was written) or something they added later for the movie? (I mean that<br>
he won WWII, not that he was gay.)<br>
<br>
<br>
Dr. Janet Abbate<br>
Associate Professor, Science & Technology in Society Co-director, National<br>
Capital Region STS program Virginia Tech <a href="http://www.sts.vt.edu/ncr" target="_blank">www.sts.vt.edu/ncr</a><br>
<a href="http://www.linkedin.com/groups/STS-Virginia-Tech-4565055" target="_blank">www.linkedin.com/groups/STS-Virginia-Tech-4565055</a><br>
<a href="http://www.facebook.com/VirginiaTechSTS" target="_blank">www.facebook.com/VirginiaTechSTS</a><br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
_______________________________________________<br>
This email is relayed from <a href="mailto:members@sigcis.org" target="_blank">members@sigcis.org</a>, the email discussion list of<br>
SHOT SIGCIS. The list archives are at <a href="http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/" target="_blank">http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/</a><br>
and you can change your subscription options at<br>
<a href="http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members" target="_blank">http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members</a><br>
<br>
_______________________________________________<br>
This email is relayed from <a href="mailto:members@sigcis.org" target="_blank">members@sigcis.org</a>, the email discussion list<br>
of SHOT SIGCIS. The list archives are at<br>
<a href="http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/" target="_blank">http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/</a> and you can change your subscription<br>
options at <a href="http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members" target="_blank">http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members</a><br>
<br>
___________________________<br>
<br>
Paul N. Edwards<br>
Professor of Information and History, University of Michigan<br>
A Vast Machine: Computer Models, Climate Data, and the Politics of Global<br>
Warming (MIT Press, 2010)<br>
<br>
Terse replies are deliberate (and better than nothing)<br>
<br>
University of Michigan School of Information<br>
3439 North Quad<br>
105 S. State Street<br>
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285<br>
<a href="tel:%28734%29%20764-2617" value="+17347642617" target="_blank">(734) 764-2617</a> (office)<br>
<a href="tel:%28206%29%20337-1523" value="+12063371523" target="_blank">(206) 337-1523</a> (fax)<br>
<a href="http://pne.people.si.umich.edu" target="_blank">pne.people.si.umich.edu</a><br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
_______________________________________________<br>
This email is relayed from <a href="mailto:members@sigcis.org" target="_blank">members@sigcis.org</a>, the email discussion list<br>
of SHOT SIGCIS. The list archives are at<br>
<a href="http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/" target="_blank">http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/</a> and you can change your subscription<br>
options at <a href="http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members" target="_blank">http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members</a><br>
<br>
<br>
_______________________________________________<br>
This email is relayed from <a href="mailto:members@sigcis.org" target="_blank">members@sigcis.org</a>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. The list archives are at <a href="http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/" target="_blank">http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/</a> and you can change your subscription options at <a href="http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members" target="_blank">http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members</a></div>
</div></blockquote></div><br></div><br clear="all"><div><br></div></div></div></div>
</blockquote></div><br><br clear="all"><div><br></div>-- <br><div dir="ltr">Jacob Gaboury<br>--<br>Assistant Professor of Digital Media and Visual Culture<br>Dept. of Cultural Analysis and Theory, Stony Brook University<br>
--<div>Junior Fellow, MECS Institute for Advanced Study on Media Cultures of Computer Simulation</div><div>Leuphana University, Lüneburg, Germany (Summer 2014)</div><div>--<br>Staff Writer, Rhizome.org<br>New Museum for Contemporary Art<br>
--<br><a href="http://www.jacobgaboury.com/" target="_blank">http://www.jacobgaboury.com/</a></div></div>
</div>