7 June 2014
panopticon
[pan-op-ti-kon]
noun
– a building, as a prison, hospital, library, or the like, so arranged that all parts of the interior are visible from a single point.
Example:
‘Snowden showed us just how big the panopticon was’
– Headline from the Guardian, 5 June 2014
Origin:
1760–70; pan- + Greek optikón sight, seeing (neuter of optikós; see optic)
Anagram
no panic top
contain pop
Today’s aphorism
Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up, it knows it must outrun the fastest lion or it will be killed. Every morning in Africa, a lion wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the slowest gazelle, or it will starve. It doesn’t matter whether you’re the lion or a gazelle-when the sun comes up, you’d better be running.
― Christopher McDougall, Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen
On this day
7 June 1099 – the First Crusade: Siege of Jerusalem begins.
7 June 1893 – Mohandas Gandhi commits his first act of civil disobedience.
7 June 1929 – The Lateran Treaty is ratified by the Italian Parliament, allowing Vatican City to become an independent sovereign state.
7 June 1954 – death of Alan Turing, British mathematician and computer scientist. Turing is considered to be the father of computer science and artificial intelligence. He invented the ‘Turing machine’ which formulated the computer algorithm. It’s the forerunner for the modern computer. During World War 2, Turing was instrumental in cracking German messages encrypted by the Enigma machine. Sadly, Turing’s achievements were overshadowed by him being charged with gross indecency after admitting to being in a homosexual relationship. On 31 March 1952, following his guilty plea, he was chemically castrated. Two years later, on 7 June 1954,Turing took his own life with cyanide. On 10 September 2009, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown publicly apologised on behalf of the British Government for the ‘appalling way he was treated’. On 23 December 2013, Queen Elizabeth II issued a posthumous royal pardon, clearing Turing of the charge of gross indecency. Born 23 June 1912.
7 June 1975 – the inaugural World Cup cricket match is held in London.