https://www.economist.com/books-and-arts/a-new-biography-explains-the-genius-of-john-von-neumann/21805346

 Skip to content

  * Menu
  * Weekly edition
  * Search

Sign in

  * Featured

      + Coronavirus
      + The Biden presidency
      + Climate change
      + Germany's election
      + Daily briefing
      + What If?
      + 1843 magazine
  * Sections

      + The world this week
      + Leaders
      + Letters
      + Briefing
      + United States
      + The Americas
      + Asia
      + China
      + Middle East & Africa
      + Europe
      + Britain
      + International
      + Business
      + Finance & economics
      + Science & technology
      + Books & arts
      + Graphic detail
      + Obituary
      + Special reports
      + Technology Quarterly
      + Essay
      + By Invitation
      + Schools brief
      + The World in 2021
      + What If?
      + Open Future
      + The Economist Explains
  * More

      + Newsletters
      + Podcasts
      + Video
      + Subscriber events
      + iOS app
      + Android app
      + Executive courses

  * Manage my account
  * Sign out

Search
[                    ]
Books & artsOct 9th 2021 edition

The history of science
A new biography explains the genius of John von Neumann

His peers transformed science. He transformed daily life

[20211009_bkp002]
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Oct 7th 2021

  *  
  *  
  *  
  *  

The Man from the Future. By Ananyo Bhattacharya. Allen Lane; 368
pages; PS20. To be published in America in February by W.W. Norton &
Company; $30

IN 1945, WHILE in a state of exhaustion, the mathematician John von
Neumann had a kind of stammering premonition. He was in Los Alamos,
working on the atom bomb, and he told his wife Klari that the "energy
source" he was helping to develop would make scientists "the most
hated and also the most wanted citizens of any country". Then he
informed her that his other ongoing project, the computer, would one
day be even more important--and potentially even more dangerous.

Listen to this story

Your browser does not support the <audio> element.

Enjoy more audio and podcasts on iOS or Android.

Good biographies of some of the greatest mathematical minds are rare:
because they were polymaths, biographers who can interpret their
manifold achievements for the ordinary mortal are themselves thin on
the ground. This has been von Neumann's fate, and the upshot is that
he has not had the recognition he deserves. Ananyo Bhattacharya, a
science journalist formerly at The Economist, sets out to correct
that injustice, and so fill a yawning gap in the history of science.

Von Neumann belonged to a small group of brilliant Hungarians, of
mainly Jewish backgrounds, who in the 1930s fled Nazism for America,
where they were dubbed "the Martians" because of their strange
language and even stranger brains. All would transform science, but
von Neumann would transform daily life, and he did so in varied and
profound ways. He was undoubtedly a genius, and reading this book
gives you an inkling of what that overused word really means. More
than one highly intelligent acquaintance remarks that it was as if
von Neumann was the only person who was really awake.

The problem facing the biographer of a mathematician is that
conveying mathematical concepts in mere words risks either boring the
cognoscenti or bemusing the uninitiated. Rather like the books of
Stephen Hawking or Carlo Rovelli, though, this one is rewarding on
different levels. Everyone can grasp the significance of the puzzles
posed, and if readers want to follow the genius through the steps of
his solutions then Mr Bhattacharya is a clear and authoritative
guide.

Perhaps it was because he was fluent in the language of the universe
that von Neumann flitted so easily between disciplines. While still a
young man he made important contributions to quantum mechanics. Later
he played a seminal role in the Manhattan Project that built the
bomb, and devised the architecture for the first programmable
computers. He laid the foundations of game theory (introducing the
term "zero-sum" along the way), stimulating revolutions across the
social sciences and biology. At times he was in such demand that a US
Air Force plane was kept on standby to whisk him from one top-secret
government lab to another.

He was equally comfortable in basic and applied research, sitting
with pencil and paper in his dining room in Princeton or debating
with top military brass out in the New Mexico desert; but his
interests were clearly linked. He needed programmable computers to
calculate the size and force of shock waves from explosions, and game
theory to address the thorny question of nuclear deterrence. The
years of the second world war were especially productive for him, as
if he were propelled by the destruction of the "perfect intellectual
setting" that was the Central Europe of his youth, not to mention the
deaths of millions of its inhabitants.

And yet, Mr Bhattacharya argues, the reputation that von Neumann
acquired as the coldest of cold warriors was undeserved. He knew the
depths to which humankind could sink, but he was by nature more
co-operative than competitive. The man from the future had seen for
himself that science could be used for both good and bad, and
considered the only legitimate response to be the exercise of
intelligent judgment. "For progress," he wrote, "there is no cure." #

An early version of this article was published online on October 6th
2021

This article appeared in the Books & arts section of the print
edition under the headline "Martian's landing"

Reuse this contentThe Trust Project
The Economist today

Handpicked stories, in your inbox

A daily newsletter with the best of our journalism

[                    ]Sign up

More from Books & arts

The world after the pandemic
Two new books assess the geopolitical lessons of covid-19

[20211009_BKD001_0]

The Russia option
How an English miner's daughter rose to work in the White House

[20211009_BKP001_0]

Virtue's reward
An advocate of sustainable capitalism explains how it's done

[20211009_bkp504]

Hidden gems
The New York Public Library mines its archive of 56m objects

[20211009_BKP507]

Bard of the buffeted
Abdulrazak Gurnah wins the Nobel prize in literature for 2021

[20211009_BLP507]

More from Books & arts

[20211009_BKD001_0]

Two new books assess the geopolitical lessons of covid-19

[20211009_BKP001_0]

How an English miner's daughter rose to work in the White House

---------------------------------------------------------------------
[20211009_bkp504]

An advocate of sustainable capitalism explains how it's done

---------------------------------------------------------------------
[20211009_BKD001_0]

Two new books assess the geopolitical lessons of covid-19

[20211009_BKP001_0]

How an English miner's daughter rose to work in the White House

---------------------------------------------------------------------
[20211009_bkp504]

An advocate of sustainable capitalism explains how it's done

---------------------------------------------------------------------

The New York Public Library mines its archive of 56m objects

---------------------------------------------------------------------

Abdulrazak Gurnah wins the Nobel prize in literature for 2021

---------------------------------------------------------------------

  * Subscribe
  * Group subscriptions
  * Reuse our content
  * Help and contact us

Keep updated

  *  
  *  
  *  
  *  
  *  
  *  

Published since September 1843 to take part in "a severe contest
between intelligence, which presses forward, and an unworthy, timid
ignorance obstructing our progress."

The Economist

  * About
  * Advertise
  * Press centre
  * Store

The Economist Group

  * The Economist Group
  * Economist Intelligence
  * Economist Impact
  * Economist Events
  * Working Here
  * Which MBA?
  * GMAT Tutor
  * GRE Tutor
  * Executive Jobs
  * Executive Education Navigator
  * Executive Education: The New Global Order
  * Executive Education: Business Writing

  * Terms of Use
  * Privacy
  * Cookie Policy
  * Manage Cookies
  * Accessibility
  * Modern Slavery Statement
  * Do Not Sell My Personal Information

Copyright (c) The Economist Newspaper Limited 2021. All rights
reserved.