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Turing (A Novel about Computation)
The world of computation according to Turing, an interactive tutoring program, as told to star-crossed a novel.
Our hero is Turing, an interactive tutoring program and namesake (or virtual emanation?) of Alan Turing, World War II code breaker and father of computer science. In this unusual novel, Turing's idiosyncratic version of intellectual history from a computational point of view unfolds in tandem with the story of a love affair involving Ethel, a successful computer executive, Alexandros, a melancholy archaeologist, and Ian, a charismatic hacker. After Ethel (who shares her first name with Alan Turing's mother) abandons Alexandros following a sundrenched idyll on Corfu, Turing appears on Alexandros's computer screen to unfurl a tutorial on the history of ideas. He begins with the philosopher-mathematicians of ancient Greece—"discourse, dialogue, argument, proof... can only thrive in an egalitarian society"—and the Arab scholar in ninth-century Baghdad who invented algorithms; he moves on to many other topics, including cryptography and artificial intelligence, even economics and developmental biology. (These lessons are later critiqued amusingly and developed further in postings by a fictional newsgroup in the book's afterword.) As Turing's lectures progress, the lives of Alexandros, Ethel, and Ian converge in dramatic fashion, and the story takes us from Corfu to Hong Kong, from Athens to San Francisco—and of course to the Internet, the disruptive technological and social force that emerges as the main locale and protagonist of the novel.
Alternately pedagogical and romantic, Turing (A Novel about Computation) should appeal both to students and professionals who want a clear and entertaining account of the development of computation and to the general reader who enjoys novels of ideas.
Our hero is Turing, an interactive tutoring program and namesake (or virtual emanation?) of Alan Turing, World War II code breaker and father of computer science. In this unusual novel, Turing's idiosyncratic version of intellectual history from a computational point of view unfolds in tandem with the story of a love affair involving Ethel, a successful computer executive, Alexandros, a melancholy archaeologist, and Ian, a charismatic hacker. After Ethel (who shares her first name with Alan Turing's mother) abandons Alexandros following a sundrenched idyll on Corfu, Turing appears on Alexandros's computer screen to unfurl a tutorial on the history of ideas. He begins with the philosopher-mathematicians of ancient Greece—"discourse, dialogue, argument, proof... can only thrive in an egalitarian society"—and the Arab scholar in ninth-century Baghdad who invented algorithms; he moves on to many other topics, including cryptography and artificial intelligence, even economics and developmental biology. (These lessons are later critiqued amusingly and developed further in postings by a fictional newsgroup in the book's afterword.) As Turing's lectures progress, the lives of Alexandros, Ethel, and Ian converge in dramatic fashion, and the story takes us from Corfu to Hong Kong, from Athens to San Francisco—and of course to the Internet, the disruptive technological and social force that emerges as the main locale and protagonist of the novel.
Alternately pedagogical and romantic, Turing (A Novel about Computation) should appeal both to students and professionals who want a clear and entertaining account of the development of computation and to the general reader who enjoys novels of ideas.
280 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2003
9 people are currently reading
186 people want to read
About the author
Christos H. Papadimitriou
14 books37 followersChristos Harilaos Papadimitriou (Greek: Χρίστος Χ. Παπαδημητρίου) is a Professor in the Computer Science Division at the University of California, Berkeley, United States.
Papadimitriou is the author of the textbook Computational Complexity and has co-authored Algorithms with Sanjoy Dasgupta and Umesh Vazirani.
He has collaborated with Apostolos Doxiadis on the graphic novel Logicomix, and has published one novel, Turing.
Papadimitriou is the author of the textbook Computational Complexity and has co-authored Algorithms with Sanjoy Dasgupta and Umesh Vazirani.
He has collaborated with Apostolos Doxiadis on the graphic novel Logicomix, and has published one novel, Turing.
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
September 10, 2012
Very few academics write good books popularizing their area of expertise. Christos Papdimitriou is no exception. Examples of academics successfully making the transition are J.R.R. Tolkien and Iain M. Banks.
The book Turing lacked sufficient style and seriously weak plot in driving coverage of the history of computation. From a stylistic point of view, the book is extremely fragmented and confusing in parts. The Turing interactions seemed disconnected and contrived relative to the other romantic narrative. The Turing interactions read like a series of chat room sessions interjected into the other major plot line. The parallel story around Ian, Ethel, and Alexandros had gaping gaps and was jumpy lacking a fluent harmony.
Finally, my main complaint of the book is the lack of rigor and completeness. I know this literary fiction, but I more got the impression that is was a sloppy exposition of the Theory of Computation. Dr. Papadimitriou is much better than his book. He is a great mathematician and a fantastic teacher. I have studied one of his texts and read quite a few of his academic papers. Unfortunately as an artist, he is seriously flawed. Mind you, what he attempts is difficult. Typically when buried is a rigorous and difficult discipline as the Theory of Computation, it is difficult to separate the forest from the trees and adequately edit such a vast expanse of mathematical knowledge. He fails in that some of his oversimplifications lead to misleading technical flaws in the field as witnessed by the commentary in the afterword.
I give this book one star for trying and would not recommend it. Dr. Papadimitriou should stick to graphic novels where half truths are more liberally accepted and certainly more entertaining. I highly recommend Logicomix as a more magnetic example of rendering historical narrative of logic and a biography of Bertrand Russel than this analogous artistic work on the history of computation.
The book Turing lacked sufficient style and seriously weak plot in driving coverage of the history of computation. From a stylistic point of view, the book is extremely fragmented and confusing in parts. The Turing interactions seemed disconnected and contrived relative to the other romantic narrative. The Turing interactions read like a series of chat room sessions interjected into the other major plot line. The parallel story around Ian, Ethel, and Alexandros had gaping gaps and was jumpy lacking a fluent harmony.
Finally, my main complaint of the book is the lack of rigor and completeness. I know this literary fiction, but I more got the impression that is was a sloppy exposition of the Theory of Computation. Dr. Papadimitriou is much better than his book. He is a great mathematician and a fantastic teacher. I have studied one of his texts and read quite a few of his academic papers. Unfortunately as an artist, he is seriously flawed. Mind you, what he attempts is difficult. Typically when buried is a rigorous and difficult discipline as the Theory of Computation, it is difficult to separate the forest from the trees and adequately edit such a vast expanse of mathematical knowledge. He fails in that some of his oversimplifications lead to misleading technical flaws in the field as witnessed by the commentary in the afterword.
I give this book one star for trying and would not recommend it. Dr. Papadimitriou should stick to graphic novels where half truths are more liberally accepted and certainly more entertaining. I highly recommend Logicomix as a more magnetic example of rendering historical narrative of logic and a biography of Bertrand Russel than this analogous artistic work on the history of computation.
April 5, 2011
I picked this up at a library book sale because it looked rather interesting. A novel about computation? In actual fact this is barely a novel; the story really serves as a backdrop to the presentation of ideas. Most of the book is spent in long monologues about various computational topics. In that sense what the book really is is a friendly-ish introduction to the history of computation. If you treat it as such, I think it succeeds, but if you are looking for a good plot or well developed characters you will be highly disappointed.
I think this is something fun to read if you are a geek, but a bit much for most normal people.
I think this is something fun to read if you are a geek, but a bit much for most normal people.
April 1, 2016
I liked a lot of this book, but a lot of what I liked didn't make this book a good novel. I'd love to hear Papadimitriou give a longform lecture about the concepts he covers in here, from the early Greeks' mathematical attainment all the way through Hilbert's programme and Turing and Godel's respective "deathblows" to his dreams in the form of incomputability and incompleteness respectively.
But that lecture was shoehorned into a frankly not particularly interesting narrative. And though I appreciated a soft-cyberpunk story focused on historical artifacts and a more diverse cast than "glowery American man", there really wasn't enough meat on the story to keep me interested during the periods where we weren't just getting free didactic lectures.
But that lecture was shoehorned into a frankly not particularly interesting narrative. And though I appreciated a soft-cyberpunk story focused on historical artifacts and a more diverse cast than "glowery American man", there really wasn't enough meat on the story to keep me interested during the periods where we weren't just getting free didactic lectures.
December 27, 2007
This book is less a novel than a (very accessible) book playing on certain aspects of theoretical computer science. The plot is not particularly dramatic, and the character development is more workmanlike than great, but for the most part these serve as a way of stitching together the ideas that Papadimitriou finds most fascinating. It is when playing with these ideas that the author is at his best.
September 3, 2018
I don't know whether I'll ever come back to this book. I only read the first 20 pages or so, but it is just so puerile -- everything is about sex and hookups, and there is basically no plot development detectible. I flipped ahead and it didn't look like it was going to get better any time soon (if ever). Sooner or later one presumably gets to some material about computation and an AI agent, but I really don't think I can wade through the "look how racy I am" opening to get to that part of the book.
Disappointed 'cause I know Papadimitriou is brilliant and probably has a lot to say about theoretical computing, but this novel isn't the way he's going to get his points across. I'd rather go re-read Lewis & Papadimitriou's "Elements of the Theory of Computation." Now there's a classic.
Disappointed 'cause I know Papadimitriou is brilliant and probably has a lot to say about theoretical computing, but this novel isn't the way he's going to get his points across. I'd rather go re-read Lewis & Papadimitriou's "Elements of the Theory of Computation." Now there's a classic.
April 10, 2021
It is a strange genre, mixing a (loose) romance plot with pages and pages of lectures. To me the lectures were either too superficial to not provide any new knowledge, or too difficult to follow without the help of Wikipedia (the notes at the back of the book did help in some cases). I'm not sure who the target audience is.
This book also hasn't really aged well, or perhaps it should not have been set just a decade or so after it was written. The references to modern day tech miss the mark (on both sides) which often makes for jarring reading.
In any event, it was an enjoyable way of reading about the history of computation in a less dry way than wading through a textbook.
This book also hasn't really aged well, or perhaps it should not have been set just a decade or so after it was written. The references to modern day tech miss the mark (on both sides) which often makes for jarring reading.
In any event, it was an enjoyable way of reading about the history of computation in a less dry way than wading through a textbook.
May 9, 2019
It felt weird -- the book tries to be educational and have some artistic value at the same time, but is neither here nor there. I'm biased about the educational part here -- I'm a computer scientist, I was already familiar with the material, but it might be good for somebody who's not, I guess. Not very deep and pretty selective, but it might spark an interest. The novel part is just underdeveloped. I did not get into that story and was not convinced by the characters.
May 30, 2019
I gave up on it about 50 pages in. It was interesting - like a cross between Richard Powers and Milan Kundera - but not interesting enough t0 make me stick with it.
July 25, 2019
Metaphors, explanations of technical concepts are superb.
Story is also fine, trivial, but could've been written without the obscenity which is currently there.
Story is also fine, trivial, but could've been written without the obscenity which is currently there.
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September 5, 2012Sebuah novel tentang idea. Cita-cita besarnya untuk menunjukkan bagaimana pertanyaan manusia tentang hidup membawa kepada ciptaan-ciptaan teknologi yang sofistikated. Misalnya kepada penciptaan komputer. Turing adalah Alan Turing, bapa sains komputer.
March 12, 2008
This is that other book that tricked me by having Turing's name in the title. I would rate it "not that good."
September 12, 2008
Not quite Cryptonomycon, but a fun airplane read. Enjoyed the Greek touches. Romantic stuff a bit awkward, but not bad. Strange web reviews in the back.
July 22, 2010
Loved the themes, ideas, and issues... Struggled through the language and computational explanations. Still, I am committed to returning to this novel. Such promise exists in its pages.
March 14, 2016
So good. Wish I read this earlier.
August 31, 2019
This was a great introduction to computing for someone just getting into it. I had just completed Andrew Hodges's biography of the real Alan Turing so this was a very entertaining follow on.
January 3, 2013
Confusing story-line but nice history of the evolution of the computer and the internet in between.
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews