Misc
Colloquium
“Errors, Eavesdroppers, and Enormous Matrices”
Dr. Jessalyn Bolkema, SUNY Oswego
Thursday, November 29, 2:30 PM, Newton 203.
Extra credit for short reactions to the talk.
Questions?
Peer Review Turing Essays
Guidelines
Guidelines for these peer reviews are similar to those for the Enigma essays:
- Use a bullet-point outline showing thesis, main argumentative points and the evidence for them
- Try to develop conclusions that do more than just reaffirm the thesis. For instance suggest other conversations impacted by your view, new questions that can now be asked, ways readers can carry your ideas forward, etc.
- Summarize each other’s theses, arguments, and conclusions; make sure you agree with the summaries you’re hearing.
- Does evidence have a clearly identified source?
- Does the argument flow logically?
Comments
Adherence to assignment: I use flexible essay prompts to encourage you to write essays that follow your interests, so most likely any essay inspired by Turing will be OK. You can always ask me about your specific plans if you want to be sure.
Using Breaking the Code as a source: It’s quite accurate about the facts, but is nonetheless a work of fiction, and views of Turing’s thoughts and feelings are completely Whitemore’s. If something in it seems like it would help your argument, check a biographical or historical source to see what really happened (and it might very well be the event portrayed in the play).
Citing Breaking the Code: If you refer to the play in your essay, you don’t need to include it in a “works cited” section. But direct quotations from it still need attribution, e.g., “As Turing says in Act 2, Scene 3 of Breaking the Code, ‘....’.”
Conclusions: Use them to do more than just repeat your thesis, use conclusions to suggest further implications of your ideas, where the conversation this essay is part of can go now that you’ve said your piece. See reviewing guidelines above for ideas.
Quotations: Beware the temptation to over-use them. Paraphrases or summaries can actually be more flexible in terms of allowing you to work ideas from an outside source seamlessly into your prose.
Next
What’s new about “modern” cryptography?