Brian John Copeland (born 1950) is Professor of Philosophy at the

University of Canterbury The University of Canterbury ( mi, Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha; postnominal abbreviation ''Cantuar.'' or ''Cant.'' for ''Cantuariensis'', the Latin name for Canterbury) is a public research university based in Christchurch, New Zealand. It was ...

Christchurch Christchurch ( ; mi, Ōtautahi) is the largest city in the South Island of New Zealand and the seat of the Canterbury Region. Christchurch lies on the South Island's east coast, just north of Banks Peninsula on Pegasus Bay. The Avon Rive ...

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, and author of books on the computing pioneer

Alan Turing Alan Mathison Turing (; 23 June 1912 – 7 June 1954) was an English mathematician, computer scientist, logician, cryptanalyst, philosopher, and theoretical biologist. Turing was highly influential in the development of theoretical ...

Education

Copeland was educated at the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

, obtaining a

Bachelor of Philosophy Bachelor of Philosophy (BPhil, BPh, or PhB; la, Baccalaureus Philosophiae or ) is the title of an academic degree that usually involves considerable research, either through a thesis or supervised research projects. Unlike many other bachelor's d ...

degree and a

Doctor of Philosophy A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is ...

degree in 1978, where he undertook research on

modal logic Modal logic is a collection of formal systems developed to represent statements about necessity and possibility. It plays a major role in philosophy of language, epistemology, metaphysics, and natural language semantics. Modal logics extend ot ...

and

non-classical logic Non-classical logics (and sometimes alternative logics) are formal systems that differ in a significant way from standard logical systems such as propositional and predicate logic. There are several ways in which this is done, including by way of ...

supervised by of

Dana Scott Dana Stewart Scott (born October 11, 1932) is an American logician who is the emeritus Hillman University Professor of Computer Science, Philosophy, and Mathematical Logic at Carnegie Mellon University; he is now retired and lives in Berkeley, Ca ...

Career and research

Jack Copeland is the Director of the Turing Archive for the History of Computing, an extensive online archive on the computing pioneer

. He has also written and edited books on Turing. He is one of the people responsible for identifying the concept of

hypercomputation Hypercomputation or super-Turing computation refers to models of computation that can provide outputs that are not Turing-computable. Super-Turing computing, introduced at the early 1990's by Hava Siegelmann, refers to such neurological inspired, b ...

and machines more capable than

Turing machine A Turing machine is a mathematical model of computation describing an abstract machine that manipulates symbols on a strip of tape according to a table of rules. Despite the model's simplicity, it is capable of implementing any computer alg ...

s. With Jason Long he restored some of the first computer music recorded on the Ferranti Mark I. Copeland has held visiting professorships at the

University of Sydney The University of Sydney (USYD), also known as Sydney University, or informally Sydney Uni, is a public research university located in Sydney, Australia. Founded in 1850, it is the oldest university in Australia and is one of the country's si ...

, Australia (1997, 2002), the

University of Aarhus Aarhus University ( da, Aarhus Universitet, abbreviated AU) is a public research university with its main campus located in Aarhus, Denmark. It is the second largest and second oldest university in Denmark. The university is part of the Coimbra Gr ...

, Denmark (1999), the

University of Melbourne The University of Melbourne is a public research university located in Melbourne, Australia. Founded in 1853, it is Australia's second oldest university and the oldest in Victoria. Its main campus is located in Parkville, an inner suburb ...

, Australia (2002, 2003), and the

University of Portsmouth , mottoeng = Let us follow the Light , established = 1870 (Portsmouth and Gosport School of Science and Art) , type = Public , budget = £282.5 million (2020/21) , chancellor ...

, United Kingdom (1997–2005). In 2000, he was a Senior Fellow in the

Dibner Institute for the History of Science and Technology The Dibner Institute for the History of Science and Technology (1992–2006) was a research institute established at MIT, and housed in a renovated building (E56) on campus at 38 Memorial Drive, overlooking the Charles River.Charles H. BallMIT to ...

at the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of th ...

, United States. Copeland is also President of the US Society for Machines and Mentality and a member of the UK

Bletchley Park Bletchley Park is an English country house and estate in Bletchley, Milton Keynes (Buckinghamshire) that became the principal centre of Allied code-breaking during the Second World War. The mansion was constructed during the years following ...

Trust Heritage Advisory Panel. He is the founding editor of '' The Rutherford Journal'', established in 2005. Jack-copeland-eth-zuerich

Jack Copeland and Diane Proudfoot suggested the establishment of a Turing Center in Zurich during a guest stay at

ETH Zurich (colloquially) , former_name = eidgenössische polytechnische Schule , image = ETHZ.JPG , image_size = , established = , type = Public , budget = CHF 1.896 billion (2021) , rector = Günther Dissertori , president = Joël Mesot , a ...

in 2012. The idea was implemented and ETH Zurich was able to open the Turing Center Zurich in 2015. It is operational organizes regular conferences on questions related to computer, artificial intelligence and other.

''The Rutherford Journal''

Copeland serves as

editor-in-chief An editor-in-chief (EIC), also known as lead editor or chief editor, is a publication's editorial leader who has final responsibility for its operations and policies. The highest-ranking editor of a publication may also be titled editor, managing ...

of ''The Rutherford Journal'', an

open-access Open access (OA) is a set of principles and a range of practices through which research outputs are distributed online, free of access charges or other barriers. With open access strictly defined (according to the 2001 definition), or libre op ...

peer-reviewed Peer review is the evaluation of work by one or more people with similar competencies as the producers of the work ( peers). It functions as a form of self-regulation by qualified members of a profession within the relevant field. Peer revie ...

online

academic journal An academic journal or scholarly journal is a periodical publication in which scholarship relating to a particular academic discipline is published. Academic journals serve as permanent and transparent forums for the presentation, scrutiny, and ...

published in

that covers the

history History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbrella term comprising past events as well ...

and

philosophy of science Philosophy of science is a branch of philosophy concerned with the foundations, methods, and implications of science. The central questions of this study concern what qualifies as science, the reliability of scientific theories, and the ultim ...

and

technology Technology is the application of knowledge to reach practical goals in a specifiable and reproducible way. The word ''technology'' may also mean the product of such an endeavor. The use of technology is widely prevalent in medicine, scien ...

.About the Journal
''The Rutherford Journal''. The journal is published as needed and was established in December 2005 by Copeland. The full text of articles is freely available online in

HTML The HyperText Markup Language or HTML is the standard markup language for documents designed to be displayed in a web browser. It can be assisted by technologies such as Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and scripting languages such as JavaS ...

format. The journal is named after the New Zealand physicist

Ernest Rutherford Ernest Rutherford, 1st Baron Rutherford of Nelson, (30 August 1871 – 19 October 1937) was a New Zealand physicist who came to be known as the father of nuclear physics. ''Encyclopædia Britannica'' considers him to be the greatest ...

(1871–1937), who studied at the

Canterbury College Canterbury College may refer to: * Canterbury College (Indiana), U.S. * Canterbury College (Waterford), Queensland, Australia * Canterbury College (Windsor, Ontario), Canada * Canterbury College, Kent, England * Canterbury College, Oxford, England ...

(

). The journal is indexed in various index lists. It was listed in an article on

electronic journal An academic journal or scholarly journal is a periodical publication in which scholarship relating to a particular academic discipline is published. Academic journals serve as permanent and transparent forums for the presentation, scrutiny, and ...

s in the Journal for the Association of History and Computing and included in the ''Isis Current Bibliography of the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences''. The journal features technology as diverse as

totalisator A tote board (or totalisator/totalizator) is a numeric or alphanumeric display used to convey information, typically at a race track (to display the odds or payoffs for each horse) or at a telethon (to display the total amount donated to the chari ...

s and the

CSIRAC CSIRAC (; ''Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Automatic Computer''), originally known as CSIR Mk 1, was Australia's first digital computer, and the fifth stored program computer in the world. It is the oldest surviving first-gener ...

computer.

Publications

* ''

Artificial Intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence—perceiving, synthesizing, and inferring information—demonstrated by machines, as opposed to intelligence displayed by animals and humans. Example tasks in which this is done include speech ...

: A Philosophical Introduction'' ( Blackwell, 1993, 2nd edition due) * ''Logic and Reality Essays on the Legacy of

Arthur Prior Arthur Norman Prior (4 December 1914 – 6 October 1969), usually cited as A. N. Prior, was a New Zealand–born logician and philosopher. Prior (1957) founded tense logic, now also known as temporal logic, and made important contributi ...

'' (

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print book ...

, 1996) * ''The Essential Turing'' (Oxford University Press, 2004) (pbk); (hbk) * ''Alan Turing’s

Automatic Computing Engine The Automatic Computing Engine (ACE) was a British early Electronic storage, electronic Serial computer, serial stored-program computer designed by Alan Turing. It was based on the earlier Pilot ACE. It led to the MOSAIC computer, the Bendi ...

: The Master Codebreaker's Struggle to Build the Modern Computer'' (Oxford University Press, 2005) * ''

Colossus Colossus, Colossos, or the plural Colossi or Colossuses, may refer to: Statues * Any exceptionally large statue ** List of tallest statues ** :Colossal statues * ''Colossus of Barletta'', a bronze statue of an unidentified Roman emperor * ''Col ...

: The Secrets of Bletchley Park's Codebreaking Computers'' (Oxford University Press, 2006) * ''Alan Turing’s Electronic Brain: The Struggle to Build the ACE, the World’s Fastest Computer'' (Oxford University Press, 2012) * ''Computability: Turing, Gödel,

Church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a building for Christian religious activities * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian communal worship * Chri ...

, and Beyond'' (

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, 2013). (with Carl Posy and Oron Shagrir) * ''Turing: Pioneer of the Information Age'' (Oxford University Press, 2014: Paperback edition) * ''

The Turing Guide ''The Turing Guide'', written by Jack Copeland, Jonathan Bowen, Mark Sprevak, Robin Wilson, and others and published in 2017, is a book about the work and life of the British mathematician, philosopher, and early computer scientist, Alan Turi ...

'' (Oxford University Press, 2017) (hardcover), (paperback) (with

Jonathan Bowen Jonathan P. Bowen FBCS FRSA (born 1956) is a British computer scientist and an Emeritus Professor at London South Bank University, where he headed the Centre for Applied Formal Methods. Prof. Bowen is also the Chairman of Museophile Limite ...

, Robin Wilson, Mark Sprevak, et al.)

Awards and honours

Copeland was awarded Lecturer of the Year 2010 by the University of Canterbury's student union.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Copeland, Jack 1950 births 20th-century English philosophers 20th-century essayists 20th-century English historians 21st-century English philosophers 21st-century essayists 21st-century English historians Academic journal editors Academics of the University of Portsmouth Alumni of Corpus Christi College, Oxford English logicians English male non-fiction writers British historians of mathematics Historians of philosophy Historians of science Lecturers Living people New Zealand philosophers New Zealand writers Philosophers of logic Philosophers of science Philosophers of technology Philosophy academics Philosophy writers University of Canterbury faculty