[jll29]

I've emailed DEK to point out that the first person to break Enigma was not actually Alan M. Turing (as stated in one of the recent pre-fascicles) but the Polish mathematician Marian Rejewski (Turing's contribution was to automate the task, which was important because the rotors/settings were reconfigured by the German Wehrmacht every morning).

Bletchley Park now has a prominent bust of Rejewski that credits his accomplishment. The Polish wisely passed on their knowledge to the British to keep the intel safe, because they expected a German invasion.

On another note, I hope Professor Knuth has a continuity plan in place that ensures that his book series gets completed despite his advanced age (I'm worried about that, but tact prohibited me from asking, of course).

[WillAdams]

Given his quite healthy lifestyle, I believe that we should be okay on that latter front --- I certainly hope so.

[irrational]

It's not his lifestyle I'm worried about. There was a healthy youtuber who made videos about wilderness survival who was killed when he was rear ended by a drunk driver while stopped at a red light (the drunk driver, of course, survived). It's all the morons around Knuth I'm worried about.

[ks2048]

I hate to be morbid and I wish him a long life, but at age 87, I don’t think drunk drivers are his biggest risk.

[rgmerk]

The book series will never be completed, and wouldn't be if Knuth lives to 120.

And that's perfectly fine.