Alan Turing (1912-1954) was appointed to the University of Manchester in 1948. In his earlier career, he had made crucial – though often overlooked – contributions to both the conceptualisation and the engineering of computing machines. Manchester, however, already had a well-developed computer design project: Turing’s interests had moved on, to questions of how the new machines could be used, and what their existence might imply for human society. His wide-ranging and interdisciplinary Manchester work is best remembered for two strands: the iconic 1950 Mind article, which posed the question, ‘Can machines think?’; and investigations of how computers might be used to model morphogenesis, the development of shape and form in biology.

Though the scope of these ideas was vast, the physical site of their development was notably small. Around 1950, most of the University was still confined to the immediate vicinity of the original Owens College buildings, on the west side of Oxford Road. This very short walk (with longer explanations) includes visits to two of the buildings where Turing worked, and aims to give a flavour of the geographies of interdisciplinary collaboration practiced in Turing’s time.

The walk will be led by Dr James Sumner of the University’s Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine.

There is no charge for this walk. Numbers will be limited to 20 people, so please register in advance. You can do this at any time before the Congress by emailing tours@ichstm2013.com with your details; or you can sign up in person at the Congress Events Desk.

Those attending may also be interested in the Turing Machine Opera event at the Capitol Theatre on Monday and Tuesday evenings.