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The Mechanical Turk, a chess-playing machine with a figure in Turkish robes, toured Europe and America for 84 years and beat players including Benjamin Franklin and Napoleon. A human chess master was hidden inside its cabinet.

Vienna, 1770

TechnologyHistory

The story behind the card

Wolfgang von Kempelen built the Turk in 1770 to impress Empress Maria Theresa at Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna. Before each show the cabinet doors were opened one at a time to reveal gears, while the hidden player slid out of sight from one compartment to another; he followed the game through magnets under the board. The machine won most of its games but lost to François-André Philidor, the leading player of the day. After Kempelen's death it was bought by Johann Maelzel, who took it to America. Edgar Allan Poe argued in 1836 that a person must be inside, though many of his details were wrong. It burned in a Philadelphia fire in 1854, and in 2005 Amazon named its Mechanical Turk service, in which people do small tasks computers cannot, after it.

Türkçe oku
“Mekanik Türk” diye bilinen satranç makinesi 84 yıl boyunca Avrupa'yı ve Amerika'yı dolaştı, Benjamin Franklin ve Napolyon gibi rakipleri yendi. Osmanlı kıyafetli figürün dolabında aslında bir satranç ustası saklanıyordu.
Viyana, 1770

Wolfgang von Kempelen, Türk'ü 1770'te Viyana'daki Schönbrunn Sarayı'nda İmparatoriçe Maria Theresa'yı etkilemek için yaptı. Her gösteriden önce dolabın kapıları teker teker açılıp içindeki dişliler gösteriliyor, bu sırada gizli oyuncu görünmeden bir bölmeden ötekine kayıyordu. Oyunu, tahtanın altındaki mıknatıslar sayesinde izliyordu. Makine oyunlarının çoğunu kazandı, ama dönemin en güçlü oyuncusu François-André Philidor'a yenildi. Kempelen'in ölümünden sonra onu satın alan Johann Maelzel, makineyi Amerika'ya götürdü. Edgar Allan Poe 1836'da içeride bir insan olması gerektiğini savundu, ama ayrıntıların çoğunda yanıldı. Makine 1854'te Philadelphia'daki bir yangında yandı. Amazon da 2005'te, bilgisayarların yapamadığı küçük işleri insanların üstlendiği hizmetine onun adını verdi: Mechanical Turk.

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Background reading: Mechanical Turk
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