07-19-2022, 10:30 AM
Full title: The Man from the Future: The Visionary Life of John von Neumann
There comes a point in this book when von Neumann returns home to his wife after being absent for weeks and he goes to bed. As his wife recounts it, he slept for ten hours, which is unheard of for him. Normally he sleeps very little. When he gets up, he's pacing about, all animated. And he's talking. And while it's not in the book, he sounds like one of those click-bait youtube videos. You know the type. This is insane! This changes everything! Things will never be the same! This can't happen! But in this case, von Neumann isn't exaggerating. He's working on the hydrogen bomb. It's a thousand times more powerful than the atom bomb. In fact, it uses an atom bomb as detonator.
"We shouldn't be working this," he says. "This is too dangerous. It could spell the end of us all. But we have to, because our enemies are working on it too."
Previous to this, von Neumann had worked on the Manhattan Project. He was key to figuring out the detonator. This consists of a specially shaped shell of dense matter that needs to implode just right to critically compress the central fissionable matter. Not only that, but it has to stay compressed long enough to start a chain reaction. All it takes is about 7 uranium (or plutonium) atoms. But accomplishing this was exceedingly difficult. All sorts of calculations had to be made. Most of these were done by an army of physicists' wives working on calculators.
Anyway, when it came to the hydrogen bomb, the calculations were so complicated that computers were essential. Only a rudimentary few existed. So von Neumann went about designing the computer as we know it today. You know, memory, disk storage, processor, instructions. You've heard mention of von Neumann architecture. Well, that's it. He not only came up with the basic layout but he freely broadcast it, speeding up the wide propagation of computers--to the chagrin of some colleagues who had intended to get patents and monetize the whole affair.
Perhaps the most sobering aspect of the book was von Neumann's stance that there was room for only one nation to have the hydrogen bomb. He viewed it as insanely dangerous for more than one nation to have it. He believed that once we had it, we should force other countries to give up their efforts, and, if necessary, resort to a first strike. He felt that once we had the H-bomb, there would be a very small window of opportunity (five years?) to take this action.
What I didn't realize was that this idea was seriously entertained by presidents Truman and Eisenhower. And in hindsight, as horrific as it seems, I have to wonder if von Neumann was right. Governments of all stripes seem susceptible to electing very unstable leaders. What are the odds of one or more of them making a miscalculation? In the search for intelligent life, there is the theory of "the great filter" to explain why we have not found any. In effect, the idea that every civilization destroys itself at some point in its development. The hydrogen bomb is certainly a candidate for the great filter.
This is just a small part of von Neumann's biography. What he was known for was his breadth of brilliance. Often he would create a whole new field of study and then move on to something else, leaving it to other scientists to devote their entire careers to that field. He was instrumental in solving some of the most difficult philosophical problems that had stumped Bertrand Russell and others. He made revolutionary advances in "game theory," such as the prisoner's dilemma, where two cohorts are each separately promised various deals if they will rat on the other, and predicting the outcome. (Game theory is now heavily used in every aspect of international interaction, with lying and bluffing essential ingredients.) He came up with the term "singularity" to define the time when the abilities of a computer overtake the abilities of the human brain. He came up with the Game of Life, that self-propagating computer simulation that might very well tell us something very profound about the creation of life itself.
Near the end of his life, von Neumann was flying all over the country, consulting for various government agencies and big corporations. Many people considered him the smartest man alive. He certainly brushed shoulders with Einstein, Godel, John Nash, Edward Teller, and countless others. But he died at the relatively young age of 54, stricken with bone cancer. As the author suggests, he may have watched one too many nuclear tests.
Recommended.
There comes a point in this book when von Neumann returns home to his wife after being absent for weeks and he goes to bed. As his wife recounts it, he slept for ten hours, which is unheard of for him. Normally he sleeps very little. When he gets up, he's pacing about, all animated. And he's talking. And while it's not in the book, he sounds like one of those click-bait youtube videos. You know the type. This is insane! This changes everything! Things will never be the same! This can't happen! But in this case, von Neumann isn't exaggerating. He's working on the hydrogen bomb. It's a thousand times more powerful than the atom bomb. In fact, it uses an atom bomb as detonator.
"We shouldn't be working this," he says. "This is too dangerous. It could spell the end of us all. But we have to, because our enemies are working on it too."
Previous to this, von Neumann had worked on the Manhattan Project. He was key to figuring out the detonator. This consists of a specially shaped shell of dense matter that needs to implode just right to critically compress the central fissionable matter. Not only that, but it has to stay compressed long enough to start a chain reaction. All it takes is about 7 uranium (or plutonium) atoms. But accomplishing this was exceedingly difficult. All sorts of calculations had to be made. Most of these were done by an army of physicists' wives working on calculators.
Anyway, when it came to the hydrogen bomb, the calculations were so complicated that computers were essential. Only a rudimentary few existed. So von Neumann went about designing the computer as we know it today. You know, memory, disk storage, processor, instructions. You've heard mention of von Neumann architecture. Well, that's it. He not only came up with the basic layout but he freely broadcast it, speeding up the wide propagation of computers--to the chagrin of some colleagues who had intended to get patents and monetize the whole affair.
Perhaps the most sobering aspect of the book was von Neumann's stance that there was room for only one nation to have the hydrogen bomb. He viewed it as insanely dangerous for more than one nation to have it. He believed that once we had it, we should force other countries to give up their efforts, and, if necessary, resort to a first strike. He felt that once we had the H-bomb, there would be a very small window of opportunity (five years?) to take this action.
What I didn't realize was that this idea was seriously entertained by presidents Truman and Eisenhower. And in hindsight, as horrific as it seems, I have to wonder if von Neumann was right. Governments of all stripes seem susceptible to electing very unstable leaders. What are the odds of one or more of them making a miscalculation? In the search for intelligent life, there is the theory of "the great filter" to explain why we have not found any. In effect, the idea that every civilization destroys itself at some point in its development. The hydrogen bomb is certainly a candidate for the great filter.
This is just a small part of von Neumann's biography. What he was known for was his breadth of brilliance. Often he would create a whole new field of study and then move on to something else, leaving it to other scientists to devote their entire careers to that field. He was instrumental in solving some of the most difficult philosophical problems that had stumped Bertrand Russell and others. He made revolutionary advances in "game theory," such as the prisoner's dilemma, where two cohorts are each separately promised various deals if they will rat on the other, and predicting the outcome. (Game theory is now heavily used in every aspect of international interaction, with lying and bluffing essential ingredients.) He came up with the term "singularity" to define the time when the abilities of a computer overtake the abilities of the human brain. He came up with the Game of Life, that self-propagating computer simulation that might very well tell us something very profound about the creation of life itself.
Near the end of his life, von Neumann was flying all over the country, consulting for various government agencies and big corporations. Many people considered him the smartest man alive. He certainly brushed shoulders with Einstein, Godel, John Nash, Edward Teller, and countless others. But he died at the relatively young age of 54, stricken with bone cancer. As the author suggests, he may have watched one too many nuclear tests.
Recommended.