Did Alan Turing really commit suicide?
Linked by David Adams on Mon 25th Jun 2012 19:32 UTC, submitted by Adurbe
In the News The BBC reports on a Turing scholar's recent claims that by today's standard of evidence, there's reason to doubt the commonly-held belief that the famed computing pioneer committed suicide in response to government persecution over his homosexuality. To be clear, he does not claim to have disproved the suicide theory -- only that the cyanide poisoning that killed Turing could well have been an accident caused by his careless at-home experimentation with dangerous chemicals.
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RE: Peacefully in his sleep?
by zima on Tue 26th Jun 2012 10:30 UTC in reply to "Peacefully in his sleep?"
zima
Member since:
2005-07-06

I can't imagine that he would have managed to get to bed to die peacefully, in his sleep. Cyanide poisoning is pretty quick and nasty from all accounts

Apparently only at high doses. At low you can feel dizzy and weak at first ...which might entice you to lie down on a bed, I guess; then you lose conciousness and die.

(not that I'm strictly convinced it was an accident)

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