week4

‘The Imitation Game’ Distorts Alan Turing‘s Legacy

by MATTHEW GAULT

The framing device in The Imitation Game is an act of treason.

That’s not a hyperbolic dig at a bad movie, but a simple truth. The hot, new Oscar-nominated biopic about Alan Turing—brilliant mathematician, hero of World War II and father of computer science—opens and closes with him committing treason.

It’s 1951 and someone has broken into Turing’s home. The police investigate and Turing blows them off. He doesn’t want more men ruining his privacy. He has important research to do.

The detective in charge pursues the case, anyway. He’s convinced the grumpy college professor is a Soviet spy. The truth is that Turing is gay and the burglar was his lover’s friend.

The detective discovers this and brings Turing in for questioning. Homosexuality was a crime in England until 1967.

During the interrogation, Turing reveals he worked at Bletchley Park during World War II. He confesses that he broke the Enigma code—the famous cipher used by the Nazis—and helped end the war early.

It’s a story that was still classified at the time, and contained information Britain didn’t want to get out. Although the war was over, much of the world anticipated another conflict erupting, this time between the West and Russia.

The filmmakers want the audience to feel that Turing has been hiding all his life, and is now revealing his true self. He was a man who imitated normal behavior but never understood it. As a trope, this interrogation scene serves as a confession framing the story of his life.

But revealing his war record is treason, a crime Turing never committed. Nor was he ashamed of—or afraid—to reveal his sexuality.

It was an open secret. When questioned by the police, he readily admitted the fact because he felt it would soon no longer be a crime.

These are just two of the many ways The Imitation Game screws up one of the greatest stories of World War II.

Film adaptations of a life will always change facts and cut out complicated information. Such is the nature of movies—bio pics are themselves condensed and entertaining versions of a subject’s life.

These films work best when they focus on one aspect of a famous life and capture that essence.

Walk the Line works because it’s the love story of Johnny Cash and June Carter as told through their music. Raging Bull works because director Martin Scorsese juxtaposed Jake LaMotta’s control in the ring against his instability outside of it. Amadeus works because the audience watches a genius through the eyes of a jealous rival.

The Imitation Game doesn’t work. The filmmakers want audiences to believe a myth about Turing that isn’t true—that he was a misunderstood genius who didn’t understand human relations and single-handedly broke the enigma code.

In the film, Turing is rude to everyone around him. “You wouldn’t understand,” is his catch phrase. One telling scene consists largely of a female friend explaining the basics of courtship to him in bar.

It’s true that Turing was a genius, but The Imitation Game would have audiences believe he was the kind of asshole-misfit genius only found in Hollywood films. The real-life Turing was affable, possessed a mischievous sense of humor and had many friends at Bletchley Park.

He did enjoy working alone and would—at times—talk over people, but most people found him charming.

The movie also depicts Turing as the driving force behind cracking the Enigma code. In this depiction, he built the computer that decoded it, and pulled his fellow cryptographers kicking and screaming to the answers.

In truth, Turing had great help from the hundreds of other scientists working to break the Nazi code. He did pioneer many code-cracking techniques, but couldn’t have accomplished so much without the help of his co-workers.

Turing based the bombe—his code-breaking computer—on an existing Polish design. He constructed the machine alongside Gordon Welchman—a mathematician not even mentioned in the film.

The real Turing was a brilliant, affable man with many friends and a charming personality. The Imitation Game’s Turing doesn’t understand an invitation to lunch from his coworkers.

The filmmakers took a complicated and interesting story about cryptography and the birth of computer science and turned it into A Beautiful Mind set during World War II.

Structure of the Lead：

   who-Alan Turing

   when-not given

   What-opens and closes with him committing treason

   Why-Not given

   How-Not given

Key Words:

framing-取景

hyperbolic-誇張的

grumpy-性情乖戾的

interrogation-問診

asshole-混蛋

week3

New Year's Eve stampede kills 36 on Shanghai waterfront

(Reuters) - A stampede killed at least 36 people during New Year's Eve celebrations in Shanghai, authorities said, but police denied reports it was caused by people rushing to pick up fake money thrown from a building overlooking the city's famous waterfront.

The government in China's gleaming business capital said large crowds started to stampede on Chen Yi Square, in the riverside area known as the Bund, just before midnight.

It was the worst disaster in the cosmopolitan city since 58 died in an apartment building fire in 2010.

The cause of the crush has still to be confirmed, though state media and some witnesses have said it was at least partly triggered when people rushed to pick up coupons that looked like bank notes.

A man named Wu, who brought one of the 47 injured to hospital for treatment, said the fake money had been thrown down from a bar above the street as part of the celebrations.

But Shanghai police said on their official microblog that while closed-circuit television footage did show some bills had been thrown from a bar in a building overlooking the Bund, which a small number of people picked up, this did not cause the crush.

"This incident happened after the stampede," police said in a brief statement, without saying what the real cause was.

Another witness, who gave his family name as Wei, said there had been a problem away from the area where the fake bills were thrown, with people trying to get on to a raised platform overlooking the river.

Xinhua news agency said that people had been trampled on after falling down on the steps up to the platform.

"We were caught in the middle and saw some girls falling while screaming. Then people started to fall down, row by row," a witness surnamed Yin told Xinhua.

Some Chinese media outlets carried criticism of the authorities for lack of adequate policing and planning.

Police officer Cai Lixin said they did not have a large presence on the Bund as there were no formal New Year events planned, Caixin magazine said.

Foreign media were forbidden from attending a police press conference, underscoring government sensitivity about any critical coverage of disasters.

State media said many of the dead and injured were students, and 28 of the dead were women.

Authorities had shown some concern about crowd control in the days leading up to New Year's Eve. They recently canceled an annual 3D laser show on the Bund, which last year attracted as many as 300,000 people.

On New Year's Eve, Beijing also canceled a countdown event in the central business district, Chinese media said, due to police fears about overcrowding.

President Xi Jinping has asked the Shanghai government to get to the bottom of the incident as soon as possible, and ordered governments across the country to ensure a similar disaster could not happen again, state television said.

The Shanghai government said on its official microblog that an inquiry had begun, and that all other New Year events had been canceled.

Photographs on Weibo, the Chinese version of Twitter, showed densely packed crowds of revelers along the Bund where buildings from Shanghai's pre-communist heyday face the Huangpu River and house upscale restaurants, bars, shops and hotels.

In 2004, 37 people died in a stampede in northern Beijing, on a bridge at a scenic spot, during the Lunar New Year holiday.

(Aditional reporting by Pete Sweeney and Fayen Wong, and Judy Hua in BEIJING; Writing by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Mark Bendeich, Ryan Woo and Mark Trevelyan)

Structure of the Lead：

   who-people in Shanghai

   when-new year eve

   What-A stampede killed at least 36 people

   Why-Not given

   How-Not given

Key Words:

  stampede-踩踏

  waterfront海濱

  cosmopolitan-國際化

  surname-姓

  

week2

Mastermind of Peshawar school attack killed

Pakistani troops have killed the Taliban leader who planned the massacre of 132 children at a Peshawar school earlier this month, a senior government official claimed.

Saddam Jan, commander of one of the most militant Taliban factions waging war against Pakistan, was killed on Christmas Day in a shoot out with army forces in Khyber agency, a remote tribal area close to the Afghanistan border.

Shahab Ali Shah, a local government official, said Jan "was responsible for facilitating the massacre at the Army Public School and College".

"He was the mastermind of several attacks carried out throughout the country. We had credible reports that he facilitated the Peshawar school attack," he said.

He added: "He was killed by security forces in Jamrud Tehsil late on Thursday night." Another six militants were arrested during the raid.

Analysts said his killing was a major setback to the Tehrik-e-Taliban alliance because Jan was one its few commanders still mounting regular attacks on the country’s government and military.

He was killed in Gundi, Jamrud, as part of an intensification of anti-Taliban operations by the Pakistan Army following the massacre at Peshawar’s Army Public School on December 16th in which 148 were killed, including 132 pupils.

The deliberate targeting of children by seven Taliban gunmen was greeted with horror throughout Pakistan and Afghanistan where both Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders denounced it as "un-Islamic”.

Since then the government has ended its moratorium on capital punishment and executed six convicted terrorists as part of a renewed campaign against terrorist groups.

It has announced new military courts to fast-track trials of terrorist suspects and new curbs on madrassa seminaries, which have been blamed for encouraging students to join terrorist groups.

The Peshawar school massacre is believed to have been ordered by Umar Mansoor on behalf of Maulana Fazlullah, the Tehrik-e-Taliban’s top leader.

But according to Pakistani officials the planning of the operation was carried out by Saddam Jan, the leader of the umbrella group’s Tariq Gedar faction.

He was also said to be the mastermind behind the 2013 attack on a team of polio immunization workers in which 11 security personnl were killed and an attack which killed eight government paramilitary Scouts and several tribal elders.

Brigadier (retired) Mahmood Shah, a former head of security in the lawless tribal areas, said that Saddam Jan’s death was a serious blow to the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan when it was already facing an Army onslaught.

“Saddam, a commander of the Darra Adam Khel chapter of the TTP was a significant man because he had been fighting the security forces at a time when most Taliban have gone into hibernation”, he said.

Jan had attacked Army personnel and members of the Lashkar Islam militant group which opposes the Taliban, he added.

Last week Army forces killed seven militants including the brother of Taliban commander Umar Mansoor who ordered the Peshawar school massacre.

Last year, the security forces had killed Tariq Afridi, a previous TTP commander in Darra Adam Khel and also killed his successor Jangreiz Khan shortly after.

“Taliban are on the run and losing important commanders is a sign that they are getting weaker and weaker”, Mr Shah said.

Talat Khan, another security analyst, said that the Army offensive in the area and revulsion over the massacre of children in Peshawar had prevented Taliban fighters finding sanctuary among local people.

“The TTP’s attack on the Army Public School has enraged and saddened the people due to which they do not want to provide sanctuaries to the TTP’s men”, he said

Structure of the Lead：

   who-Taliban leader

   when-this month

   What-Kill by Pakistani troops

   Why-Not given

   How-Not given

KeyWords:

  massacre-大屠殺

  militant-激進
  commander-指揮官
  setback-挫折
  sanctuary-避難所

  

  

  

.

week 1-air asia 8501 crash

AirAsia Flight 8501: Pilots Cut Power To Critical Computers Shortly Before Crash: Report

The pilots of AirAsia Flight 8501 cut power to a critical computer system designed to prevent the aircraft going out of control a short time before the plane crashed in the Java sea Dec. 28, according to people with direct knowledge of the investigation into the crash, cited in a Bloomberg report.

The decision to cut power to the computers was reportedly a factor in causing the crash. The sources said that the pilots were attempting to address alerts from other flight control computers, and subsequently cut power to the entire system, which comprises two separate computers that back each other up.

An aviation safety consultant told Bloomberg that Airbus, the manufacturer of the aircraft in question, an A320, discourages pilots from cutting power to systems, as the aircraft is highly dependent on its computer systems, and one component of the system can affect others.

Questions about the flight's final moments still remain, but significant information about those last seconds has come to light in recent days.

Yesterday it was revealed that that Flight 8501's relatively inexperienced first officer was at the aircraft's controls when it made what investigators described as an “unbelievably” steep climb, ascending 5,000 feet in just 30 seconds.

Such a rate of climb is outside the performance envelope of the A320. It is believed that the climb may have slowed the aircraft to the extent that its wings ceased to generate lift.

"It is not normal to climb like that. It's very rare for commercial planes, which normally climb just 1,000 to 2,000 feet per minute," Indonesia's transport minister, Ignasius Jonan, told the BBC. "It can only be done by a fighter jet," he added.

The first officer, Rémi-Emmanuel Plesel, had just over 2,200 hours of logged flight experience, while captain Iriyanto had more than 20,000 hours.

Data from the aircraft's black box recorders has given investigators a “pretty clear picture” of what happened in its final moments, according to Reuters.

Indonesian search and rescue teams recently suspended an operation that was attempting to lift the aircraft's fuselage from the sea floor using balloons. The wreckage is reportedly too fragile to be lifted and authorities believe that no bodies remain inside.

Structure of the Lead：

   who-AirAsia Flight 8501

   when-Dec. 28

   What-the aircraft going out of control

   Why-Not given

   How-Not given

KeyWords:

  investigation-調查

  subsequently-後來
  comprise-包括
  component-部件
  Reuter-路透社