Turing's Cathedral: The Origins of the Digital Universe

by George Dyson

What could be wiser than to give people who can think the leisure in which to do it? —Walter W. Stewart to Abraham Flexner, 1939

We have been trying to see how far it is possible to eliminate intuition, and leave only ingenuity. We do not mind how much ingenuity is required, and therefore assume it to be available in unlimited supply. —Alan Turing, 1939

The reaction of most meteorologists toward computer-assisted forecasting paralleled that of the Institute mathematicians toward computer-assisted mathematics: skepticism that a machine could improve upon what they were doing with brains alone. As Thompson explained, they “were against it, not for any objective reasons but because they really wanted to believe that forecasting should be an art.