The company – conversational AI leader Conversica – is designating Turing’s June 23 birthday as “AI Day” in his honor as it celebrates a milestone of 50 million interactions – the equivalent of reaching 1 in 5 Americans – with its AI-based sales assistant software.
“We owe a huge debt to Alan Turing,” said Alex Terry, CEO of conversational AI company Conversica. “Without Turing’s research on ‘Intelligent Machinery,’ artificial intelligence companies like Conversica could not have been imagined. When Turing first described how machines could learn, computers as we know them were in their infancy – using vacuum tubes. But Turing articulated ideas in 1948 that guide how modern AI works 70 years later. Without Turing’s vision to shape the future of computer and data science, we would not be benefiting from the tremendous capabilities of AI today, and likely my company and countless other successful AI enterprises would not exist. That’s why it’s appropriate that his June 23rd birthday be henceforth known as ‘AI Day’ in his honor.”
Born on June 23, 1912 in London, Turing proved in his seminal 1936 paper “On Computable Numbers” that a universal algorithm of determining truth in math cannot exist. During World War II, Turing was a leading participant in wartime code-breaking and played a crucial role in breaking the Nazi code.
But there is a heartbreaking side to Turing’s legacy: the famed mathematician was persecuted for committing homosexual acts, only to die in disgrace at the age of 41. That’s why it’s appropriate that his birthday, which takes place during LGBT Pride, be known as “AI Day.”
