Jack Copeland
Brian Jack Copeland (born 1950) is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand, and author of books on the computing pioneer Alan Turing.
Also recorded as Brian Jack Copeland · B. Jack Copeland · B J Copeland · BJ Copeland
Jack Copeland

Royal Society Te Apārangi · CC BY 3.0
- Birth Name
- Brian Jack Copeland
- Born
- 1950
- Birthplace
- London, England
- Education
- University of Oxford (BPhil, DPhil)
- Nationality
- United Kingdom · New Zealand
- Occupation
- philosopher · historian · writer · university teacher
- Honours
- Barwise Prize · University of Canterbury Research Medal · Fellow of the Royal Society Te Apārangi · Humanities Aronui Medal · Covey Award
- Languages
- English
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Documentary summary
Brian Jack Copeland (born 1950) is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand, and author of books on the computing pioneer Alan Turing.
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wikidata · Q327637 · wikipedia · Jack Copeland
In this article
Biography
Biography
Jack Copeland studied at Corpus Christi College and University of Oxford. The recorded working language is English. Places of work recorded in the authority are Christchurch. Employment is recorded with University of Canterbury and University of Portsmouth. Distinctions recorded are Barwise Prize, University of Canterbury Research Medal, Fellow of the Royal Society Te Apārangi and Humanities Aronui Medal.

Jack Copeland, historian of computing, speaking during the Turing centennial conference at Manchester
David.Monniaux

Jack Copeland, philosopher and Turing specialist. The picture was taken during his stay at the ETH Zurich in December 2013
Sternenjaeger
Key facts
Key facts
• Birth Name — Brian Jack Copeland • Born — 1950 • Birthplace — London, England • Fields — Philosophy Logic Alan Turing • Workplaces — University of Plymouth University of Canterbury • Education — University of Oxford (BPhil, DPhil) • Thesis Url — https: ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:c19f98e4-3163-4195-9fb6-5ac4ea6aa1c0 • Thesis Title — Entailment: the formalisation of inference • Thesis Year — 1978 • Doctoral Advisor — Dana Scott • Website — https: www.canterbury.ac.nz/arts/contact-us/people/jack-copeland.html
Education
Education
Copeland was educated at the University of Oxford, obtaining a Bachelor of Philosophy degree and a Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1978, where he undertook research on modal logic and non-classical logic supervised by Dana Scott.
Career and research
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 Alan Turing. He has also written and edited books on Turing. He is one of the people responsible for identifying the concept of hypercomputation and machines more capable than Turing machines. 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, Australia (1997, 2002), the University of Aarhus, Denmark (1999), the University of Melbourne, Australia (2002, 2003), and the University of Portsmouth, United Kingdom (1997–2005). In 2000, he was a Senior Fellow in the Dibner Institute for the History of Science and Technology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, United States. Copeland is also President of the US Society for Machines and Mentality and a member of the UK Bletchley Park Trust Heritage Advisory Panel. He is the founding editor of The Rutherford Journal, established in 2005. • Illustration — Jack Copeland at the ETH Zurich (Switzerland), October 2013 Jack Copeland and Diane Proudfoot suggested the establishment of a Turing Center in Zurich during a guest stay at ETH Zurich 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 computers and artificial intelligence.
Key facts
Key facts
• Title — The Rutherford Journal • Abbreviation — Rutherford J. • Editor — Jack Copeland • Discipline — History and philosophy of science • Publisher — University of Canterbury • Country — New Zealand • History — 2005 onwards • Website — http: www.rutherfordjournal.org • Issn — 1177-1380 • Oclc — 145735058 • Italic Title — no Copeland serves as editor-in-chief of The Rutherford Journal, an open-access peer-reviewed online academic journal published in New Zealand that covers the history and philosophy of science and technology. 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 format. The journal is named after the New Zealand physicist Ernest Rutherford (1871–1937), who studied at the Canterbury College (Christchurch). The journal is indexed in various index lists. It was listed in an article on electronic journals 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 totalisators and the CSIRAC computer.
Identity
Identity
Jack Copeland is recorded as philosopher, historian, writer and university teacher.
Life and career
Dated record
Life and career
The full dated record · 1 entries
1950
Jack Copeland born at United Kingdom.
Publications
Publications
• Artificial Intelligence: A Philosophical Introduction (Blackwell, 1993, 2nd edition due) • Logic and Reality Essays on the Legacy of Arthur Prior (Oxford University Press, 1996) • The Essential Turing (Oxford University Press, 2004) (pbk); (hbk) • Alan Turing’s Automatic Computing Engine: The Master Codebreaker's Struggle to Build the Modern Computer (Oxford University Press, 2005) • Colossus: 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, and Beyond (MIT Press, 2013). (with Carl Posy and Oron Shagrir) • Turing: Pioneer of the Information Age (Oxford University Press, 2014: Paperback edition) • The Turing Guide (Oxford University Press, 2017) (hardcover), (paperback) (with Jonathan Bowen, Robin Wilson, Mark Sprevak, et al.)
Text attribution
Licensing
Text attribution
Part of the biographical narrative on this page reuses licensed material. Its origin, revision and licence are recorded here.
The biographical narrative on this page is based on the Wikipedia article Jack Copeland, revision 1372287952 (EN edition), by its contributors. VALÉORINE has edited that text and built its own documentary record around it. The reused material is available under CC BY-SA 4.0, and this page's reuse of it is offered under the same licence. Everything else on this page — the chronology, the holdings, the evidence, the plates and the connections — is VALÉORINE's own record. Sources and licences.
Where the work is held
Recognition and collections
Jack Copeland received Barwise Prize, University of Canterbury Research Medal, Fellow of the Royal Society Te Apārangi, Humanities Aronui Medal and Covey Award.
Awards and honours
Copeland was awarded Lecturer of the Year 2010 by the University of Canterbury's student union.
Literature
Scholarly footprint
A count of publications is evidence of attention, not of standing, and is given here only as a measure.
Notes from the source article
Cited by Wikipedia
Notes from the source article
These works are cited by the source article, in its own numbering. They are recorded as its citations, not as sources VALÉORINE has verified.
- 1.MathGenealogy
- 2.Jack Copeland. University of Canterbury.
- 3.Alan Turing: Father of the Modern Computer
- 4.DBLP
- 5.Copeland, Brian John. Entailment : the formalisation of inference. ox.ac.uk. University of Oxford. 1978. 863373224.
- 6.Turing Archive for the History of Computing.
- 7.Copeland, Brian Jack. Philosophical Explorations of the Legacy of Alan Turing. Springer International Publishing. 324. 189–218. 2017. 978-3-319-53278-3.
- 8.Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dibner Institute for the History of Science and Technology.
- 9.Society for Machines and Mentality , USA.
- 10.University of Canterbury. Distinguished Professor Jack Copeland. July 2025.
- 11.New Zealand > Education > Academic Journals. indexNS.
- 12.About the Journal, The Rutherford Journal.
- 13.Jenkin, John. Review of Copeland, Jack, ed., The Rutherford Journal: the New Zealand Journal for the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology (2005). Historical Records of Australian Science. 17. 2. 298–299. 2006.
- 14.The University of Queensland. Professor Jack Copeland. Archive.org.
- 15.Clarke, Simon. Rutherford at Canterbury University College. The Rutherford Journal. 1. December 2005.
- 16.ROAD. The Rutherford Journal. Directory of Open Access Scholarly Resources.
- 17.The Rutherford Journal. JournalIndex.net.
- 18.Intute. Rutherford Journal: the New Zealand journal for the history and philosophy of science and technology.
- 19.History and Theory of Computation Sites. AlanTuring.net.
- 20.Westney, Lynn C. E-Journals – Inside and Out. Journal of the Association of History and Computing. MPublishing. 10. 3. December 2007.
- 21.University of Chicago Press / History of Science Society. Current Bibliography of the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences. Isis. 101. S1. 1–305. December 2010. 10.1086/660768.
- 22.Panos, Kristina. Tote Boards: The Impressive Engineering of Horse Gambling. Hackaday. 4 November 2015.
- 23.McKenzie, Don. Was George Julius the inspiration for CSIRAC, Australia's first electronic digital computer?. Godzilla Sea Monkey. 12 March 2011.
- 24.Coutinho, S. C. The essential Turing, Copeland Jack (ed). Pp. 613. £50 (hbk). £14.99 (pbk). 2004. (Oxford University Press). The Mathematical Gazette. Cambridge University Press. 90. 517. 185–186. March 2006. 10.1017/S0025557200179513.
- 25.Ferry, Georgina. The Colossus of codes: Georgina Ferry on four new books that tackle the story of Bletchley Park's other decryption machine. The Guardian. 29 July 2006.
- 26.Smith, Alvy Ray. His Just Deserts: A Review of Four Books. Notices of the AMS. American Mathematical Society. 61. 8. 891–895. September 2014. 10.1090/noti1155.
- 27.Moriarty, Tom. Turing: Pioneer of the Information Age, by Jack Copeland. The Irish Times. 18 January 2015.
- 28.Hughes, Colin. Review Essay: B. Jack Copeland, Turing: Pioneer of the Information Age (Oxford University Press, 2012). Logos: A Journal of Modern Society and Culture. 15. 2–3. Summer 2016.
- 29.Añel, Juan A. Turing: Pioneer of the Information Age, by B. Jack Copeland. Contemporary Physics. 54. 5. 259. 9 September 2013. 10.1080/00107514.2013.836246.
- 30.Robinson, Andrew. The Turing Guide: Last words on an enigmatic codebreaker?. New Scientist. 4 January 2017.
- 31.UCSA. CANTA survey. March 2011.
References
Citations
References
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reference work
Wikidata, structured authority record Q327637: Jack CopelandWikimedia Foundation
Secondary witnessreference work
Secondary witness
The Encyclopedia exists whether or not anything is for sale. Corrections are recorded rather than overwritten, and every version of this record is kept. Published 14 August 2026.
Elsewhere in Books
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