Bletchley Park

From: Amara Graps (amara@amara.com)
Date: Wed Apr 30 2003 - 03:54:26 MDT

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    Dear Extropes/Transhumans:

    Last Monday evening, I had the pleasure to visit a place near Milton
    Keyes, England called: Bletchley Park. I was with a group of ten
    people from my ESA Earth dust/debris project working group. Our
    formal meeting took place in Milton Keynes during Monday and Tuesday
    and so Monday evening was our social evening night out, hosted by
    the Planetary Sciences department at Open University, and the
    company: Unispace Kent.

    Bletchley Park
    http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk

    This was one of the most interesting places I have ever visited, and
    I recommend that, if ever you are within a couple hundred kilometers
    of London, set aside _at least_ one day and devour this place.

    Bletchley Park was the place that, during WWII, the German military
    cypher machine ENIGMA was studied and methods devised to enable the
    Allied forces to to decipher secret communications. It was also here
    that the early important research and design and implementation
    (Alan Turing's direction) for the world's first computer: the
    Colossus took place.

    Bletchley Park is an elaborate museum now, spanning many acres and
    buildings demonstrating every aspect about cryptography. With
    regards to the machines designed: there are replicas, some working
    replicas too (A working "Bombe" that is a copy of that built by
    Turing to decipher the ENIGMA will be ready by the end of this year
    the lecturer told us, and one can already try out a German 60 year
    old ENIGMA machine.)

    What is the ENIGMA machine? You can see pictures and read some
    text here:

    The ENIGMA machine
    http://www.iwm.org.uk/online/enigma/enigma7.htm
    http://www.iwm.org.uk/online/enigma/enigma8.htm

     From September 1938, Alan Turing gave part-time assistance to the
    British cryptanalytic organisation, the Government Code and Cypher
    School to break code produced by the ENIGMA machine. Their work was
    transformed by the transfer of information from Polish mathematical
    cryptanalysts in July 1939. From 4 September 1939, Turing worked
    full-time at the GC&CS war-time headquarters, Bletchley Park.

    I've never been a 'war buff', but I'm a physicist, and seeing parts
    of the electro-mechanical machines with dozens of rotors, running
    through sequences of letters to break codes tickled me to no end. In
    addition, one learns about the human elements- how the scientists at
    Bletchley Park took advantage of mistakes made by the code senders-
    for example: forgetting to reset the rotors to their initial
    positions, noticing significant words, hearing how the Italian
    pilots regularly goofed with the German ENIGMA machines given to
    them, which helped the codebreakers more, added dimensions to the
    story. In addition, and even more tickling of my fancy: Bletchley
    Park was indeed, where the beginnings of the computer took place,
    that is, the results of Turing's work. Turing's first computer
    design during the war was implemented with 1920s parts from the
    British Telegraph company. It only required the right people being
    together at the right time to put the already existing know-how
    together, and we have our first electromechanical computer.

    A regular tour takes about 4 or 5 hours (our dust/debris group got
    the 'condensed version' and all of us want to return), and I think
    that you won't regret spending the full day there. More than enough
    material to see and to learn.

    Bletchley Park and the Codebreakers
    http://www.iwm.org.uk/online/enigma/enigma10.htm

    Some pieces of Alan Turing's writings during his time at Bletchley Park
    http://www.turing.org.uk/publications/profsbook.html
    http://www.turing.org.uk/turing/scrapbook/treatise.html

    Happy (almost)May Day,

    Amara

    -- 
    ********************************************************************
    Amara Graps, PhD          email: amara@amara.com
    Computational Physics     vita:  ftp://ftp.amara.com/pub/resume.txt
    Multiplex Answers         URL:   http://www.amara.com/
    ********************************************************************
    "I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
    --Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.
    


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