101–110 of 171 posts
Looking at the dates in the article - when Turing was convicted in 1952 the reigning monarch was... Elizabeth II, just like now. That's a long time.
It would be nice if that precipitated the end of the monarchy here. Depose them, seize all their land and other assets, it's only fair. Useless scroungers, the lot of them.
A larger image, for people who want to see the detail: https://i.imgur.com/qmTZc9C.jpg
Hop over to Switzerland, and you can buy a coffee with a 1000 franc (GBP780) note without any issues.
Cool design + polymer, but they should probably just abolish the £50 already. Very few places accept them. Never mind the £100 notes you can get in some parts of the UK. I would say they should encourage better acceptance of these denominations, but cash seems to be dying in general. I look to Switzerland with envy, where as far as I can tell you can stroll into the supermarket and drop a 1000-franc note without issu…
>Very few places accept them I have heard this since I was a kid, in reality, it isn't true, at least not in London. I have never been refused when presenting a £50, not that I have carried them more than a dozen times. Most places that have issues taking them are small merchants who give away too many notes breaking them, so will often ask for a smaller note. When I was in New York once, I went into a CVS and bought…
Is there a service that lets me exchange USD for GBP that guarantees I'd get my GBP in cold, hard cash in these? Preferably newer, perhaps uncirculated? I'm no collector, I just think it's cool that Turing is on a bank note, and I want one.
The caveat is because places with lots of tourists will have their "pocket change" (old notes)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think the situation is different in the UK. I've never come across a person who disbelieves evolution. It would be equivalent to a flat-earther or person who genuinely thinks political figures are lizard folk.
The UK does have a Creation Science Movement[0]. My partner and I unwittingly stumbled into their Genesis Expo[1] in Portsmouth the other year – we blindly walked in without noticing the building's name or any paraphernalia, just "ooh, look, fossils". Only when inside did we realise it was full AND THIS IS WHY EVOLUTION IS WRONG stuff. [0] https://csm.org.uk/ > Founded in 1932 as “The Evolution Protest Movement” by a…
I've lived in London for a while, and I'm still fascinated how uncommon £50 notes were. You try to pay with one and they look at you as if you were some kind of drug lord. Hop over to Switzerland, and you can buy a coffee with a 1000 franc (GBP780) note without any issues.
I personally think Turing was more worthy of being buried between the graves of Darwin and Newton than Hawking.
The £50 note feels like lipservice if anything.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, I had the opposite experience here in the North East - when my dad came over to visit he had a bunch of £50 notes he got from the cash exchange office and we literally couldn't spend them. He wanted to buy some jewlery for my mum and the store wouldn't take his notes. Few other places around the town wouldn't either. We literally ended up going to the branch of my bank and changing them for £20 notes and sudden…
I don't agree that it's dumb - at least not from the government's point of view. High denomination bank notes are very useful for tax evasion. What's in it for them?
How so? And if this is an actual, real problem...then stop printing them? What's the point of making currency that normal citizens have issues using?
I just don't undestand it on some fundamental level. Where I'm from(Poland)_200PLN(about £40) notes are very common in circulation, and if you were to pay for a 5PLN loaf of bread with a 200PLN banknote I can guarantee literally no one would bat an eyelid. It's a common and completely normal banknote to use.
Yet in UK, where people make more money on average and also buy more expensive things, the £50 is some alien piece of paper that most Brits have never even seen. The only other place which treats its own currency with such disdain is Germany where I saw signs on petrol stations sayng they don't accept 500 Euro notes. Well if you don't, then why even have them? What's the point? The government should be going after all retailers who don't accept any official currency, because that seems like the very basis of working currency system.
I've lived in London for a while, and I'm still fascinated how uncommon £50 notes were. You try to pay with one and they look at you as if you were some kind of drug lord. Hop over to Switzerland, and you can buy a coffee with a 1000 franc (GBP780) note without any issues.
I know you're exaggerating slightly, but how would a coffee vendor make change for that many francs?
(Serious price comparison: I walked over the St Bernard's pass from Switzerland to Italy. In Switzerland, we paid €6.50 for mediocre commercial ice cream. Over the border in Italy, €2 for the most incredible gelato. Although it may be that walking down a mountain to get it improves your perception of an ice-cream.)