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John von Neumann (1903–57) was a Hungarian-American mathematician,
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Dave P.
Mar 15, 2022, 11:07:17 PM3/15/22
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John von Neumann (1903–57) was a Hungarian-American mathematician,
physicist, computer scientist, engineer and polymath. Von Neumann
was regarded as perhaps the mathematician with the widest coverage
of the subject in his time and was said to have been "the last
representative of the great mathematicians who were equally at home
in pure and applied mathematics". He integrated pure and applied sciences.
Von Neumann made major contributions to many fields, including
mathematics (foundations of mathematics, functional analysis,
ergodic theory, group theory, representation theory, operator algebras,
geometry, topology, and numerical analysis), physics (quantum mechanics,
hydrodynamics, and quantum statistical mechanics), economics (game theory),
computing (Von Neumann architecture, linear programming, self-replicating
machines, stochastic computing), and statistics. He was a pioneer of the
application of operator theory to quantum mechanics in the development
of functional analysis, and a key figure in the development of game theory
and the concepts of cellular automata, the universal constructor and the
digital computer.
Von Neumann published over 150 papers in his life: about 60 in pure
mathematics, 60 in applied mathematics, 20 in physics, and the remainder
on special mathematical subjects or non-mathematical ones. His last work,
an unfinished manuscript written while he was in the hospital, was later
published in book form as The Computer and the Brain.
His analysis of the structure of self-replication preceded the discovery
of the structure of DNA. In a shortlist of facts about his life he
submitted to the National Academy of Sciences, he wrote, "The part of my
work I consider most essential is that on quantum mechanics, which
developed in Göttingen in 1926, and subsequently in Berlin in 1927-29.
Also, my work on various forms of operator theory, Berlin 1930 and Princeton
1935–39; on the ergodic theorem, Princeton, 1931–32."
During WWII, von Neumann worked on the Manhattan Project with theoretical
physicist Edward Teller, mathematician Stanislaw Ulam and others, problem-
solving key steps in the nuclear physics involved in thermonuclear reactions
and the hydrogen bomb. He developed the mathematical models behind the
explosive lenses used in the implosion-type nuclear weapon and coined the
term "kiloton" (of TNT) as a measure of the explosive force generated.
After the war, he served on the General Advisory Committee of the US Atomic
Energy Commission, and consulted for organizations including the USAF, the
Army's Ballistic Research Lab, the Armed Forces Special Weapons Project,
and the Lawrence Livermore National Lab. As a Hungarian émigré, concerned
that the Soviets would achieve nuclear superiority, he designed and promoted
the policy of mutually assured destruction to limit the arms race.
Von Neumann was a child prodigy. When he was six, he could divide two
8-digit numbers in his head and could converse in Ancient Greek. When the
six-year-old von Neumann caught his mother staring aimlessly, he asked her,
"What are you calculating?"
Von Neumann liked to eat and drink. His wife, Klara, said that he could
count everything except calories. He enjoyed Yiddish and "off-color" humor
(especially limericks)
In Princeton, he received complaints for regularly playing extremely
loud German march music on his phonograph, which distracted those in
neighboring offices, including Albert Einstein, from their work.
Von Neumann did some of his best work in noisy, chaotic environments, and
once admonished his wife for preparing a quiet study for him to work in.
He never used it, preferring the couple's living room with its television
playing loudly.
Von Neumann's closest friend in the U.S. was mathematician Stanislaw Ulam.
A later friend of Ulam's, Gian-Carlo Rota, wrote, "They would spend hours
on end gossiping and giggling, swapping Jewish jokes, and drifting in and
out of mathematical talk." When von Neumann was dying in the hospital,
every time Ulam visited, he came prepared with a new collection of jokes
to cheer him up. Von Neumann believed that much of his mathematical thought
occurred intuitively; he would often go to sleep with a problem unsolved
and know the answer upon waking up. Ulam noted that von Neumann's way of
thinking might not be visual, but more aural.
In 1955, von Neumann was diagnosed with what was either bone, pancreatic
or prostate cancer after he was examined by physicians for a fall,
whereupon they inspected a mass growing near his collarbone. The cancer
was possibly caused by his radiation exposure during his time in Los Alamos
National Laboratory. He was not able to accept the proximity of his own
demise, and the shadow of impending death instilled great fear in him.
He invited a Catholic priest, Father Anselm Strittmatter, O.S.B., to visit
him for consultation. Von Neumann reportedly said, "So long as there is the
possibility of eternal damnation for nonbelievers it is more logical to be
a believer at the end," referring to Pascal's wager. He had earlier confided
to his mother, "There probably has to be a God. Many things are easier to
explain if there is than if there isn't." Father Strittmatter administered
the last rites to him. Some of von Neumann's friends, such as Abraham Pais
and Oskar Morgenstern, said they had always believed him to be "completely
agnostic". Of this deathbed conversion, Morgenstern told Heims, "He was of
course completely agnostic all his life, and then he suddenly turned Catholic—
it doesn't agree with anything whatsoever in his attitude, outlook and thinking
when he was healthy." Father Strittmatter recalled that even after his
conversion, von Neumann did not receive much peace or comfort from it, as he
still remained terrified of death.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_von_Neumann
physicist, computer scientist, engineer and polymath. Von Neumann
was regarded as perhaps the mathematician with the widest coverage
of the subject in his time and was said to have been "the last
representative of the great mathematicians who were equally at home
in pure and applied mathematics". He integrated pure and applied sciences.
Von Neumann made major contributions to many fields, including
mathematics (foundations of mathematics, functional analysis,
ergodic theory, group theory, representation theory, operator algebras,
geometry, topology, and numerical analysis), physics (quantum mechanics,
hydrodynamics, and quantum statistical mechanics), economics (game theory),
computing (Von Neumann architecture, linear programming, self-replicating
machines, stochastic computing), and statistics. He was a pioneer of the
application of operator theory to quantum mechanics in the development
of functional analysis, and a key figure in the development of game theory
and the concepts of cellular automata, the universal constructor and the
digital computer.
Von Neumann published over 150 papers in his life: about 60 in pure
mathematics, 60 in applied mathematics, 20 in physics, and the remainder
on special mathematical subjects or non-mathematical ones. His last work,
an unfinished manuscript written while he was in the hospital, was later
published in book form as The Computer and the Brain.
His analysis of the structure of self-replication preceded the discovery
of the structure of DNA. In a shortlist of facts about his life he
submitted to the National Academy of Sciences, he wrote, "The part of my
work I consider most essential is that on quantum mechanics, which
developed in Göttingen in 1926, and subsequently in Berlin in 1927-29.
Also, my work on various forms of operator theory, Berlin 1930 and Princeton
1935–39; on the ergodic theorem, Princeton, 1931–32."
During WWII, von Neumann worked on the Manhattan Project with theoretical
physicist Edward Teller, mathematician Stanislaw Ulam and others, problem-
solving key steps in the nuclear physics involved in thermonuclear reactions
and the hydrogen bomb. He developed the mathematical models behind the
explosive lenses used in the implosion-type nuclear weapon and coined the
term "kiloton" (of TNT) as a measure of the explosive force generated.
After the war, he served on the General Advisory Committee of the US Atomic
Energy Commission, and consulted for organizations including the USAF, the
Army's Ballistic Research Lab, the Armed Forces Special Weapons Project,
and the Lawrence Livermore National Lab. As a Hungarian émigré, concerned
that the Soviets would achieve nuclear superiority, he designed and promoted
the policy of mutually assured destruction to limit the arms race.
Von Neumann was a child prodigy. When he was six, he could divide two
8-digit numbers in his head and could converse in Ancient Greek. When the
six-year-old von Neumann caught his mother staring aimlessly, he asked her,
"What are you calculating?"
Von Neumann liked to eat and drink. His wife, Klara, said that he could
count everything except calories. He enjoyed Yiddish and "off-color" humor
(especially limericks)
In Princeton, he received complaints for regularly playing extremely
loud German march music on his phonograph, which distracted those in
neighboring offices, including Albert Einstein, from their work.
Von Neumann did some of his best work in noisy, chaotic environments, and
once admonished his wife for preparing a quiet study for him to work in.
He never used it, preferring the couple's living room with its television
playing loudly.
Von Neumann's closest friend in the U.S. was mathematician Stanislaw Ulam.
A later friend of Ulam's, Gian-Carlo Rota, wrote, "They would spend hours
on end gossiping and giggling, swapping Jewish jokes, and drifting in and
out of mathematical talk." When von Neumann was dying in the hospital,
every time Ulam visited, he came prepared with a new collection of jokes
to cheer him up. Von Neumann believed that much of his mathematical thought
occurred intuitively; he would often go to sleep with a problem unsolved
and know the answer upon waking up. Ulam noted that von Neumann's way of
thinking might not be visual, but more aural.
In 1955, von Neumann was diagnosed with what was either bone, pancreatic
or prostate cancer after he was examined by physicians for a fall,
whereupon they inspected a mass growing near his collarbone. The cancer
was possibly caused by his radiation exposure during his time in Los Alamos
National Laboratory. He was not able to accept the proximity of his own
demise, and the shadow of impending death instilled great fear in him.
He invited a Catholic priest, Father Anselm Strittmatter, O.S.B., to visit
him for consultation. Von Neumann reportedly said, "So long as there is the
possibility of eternal damnation for nonbelievers it is more logical to be
a believer at the end," referring to Pascal's wager. He had earlier confided
to his mother, "There probably has to be a God. Many things are easier to
explain if there is than if there isn't." Father Strittmatter administered
the last rites to him. Some of von Neumann's friends, such as Abraham Pais
and Oskar Morgenstern, said they had always believed him to be "completely
agnostic". Of this deathbed conversion, Morgenstern told Heims, "He was of
course completely agnostic all his life, and then he suddenly turned Catholic—
it doesn't agree with anything whatsoever in his attitude, outlook and thinking
when he was healthy." Father Strittmatter recalled that even after his
conversion, von Neumann did not receive much peace or comfort from it, as he
still remained terrified of death.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_von_Neumann
Louis Epstein
Mar 16, 2022, 8:20:38 PM3/16/22
to
Dave P. <imb...@mindspring.com> wrote:
> John von Neumann (1903=E2=80=9357) was a Hungarian-American mathematician,=
> =20
I recall decades ago I used him in creating a set of "nested" lives
(each born before and died after the last)...
John Gunther Jr 1929-1947 (subject of DEATH BE NOT PROUD)
Dylan Thomas 1914-1953
James Agee 1909-1955 (novelist)
John Von Neumann 1903-1957
Frederic Joliot-Curie 1900-1958 (physicist)
C.S. Lewis 1898-1963
Edmund Wilson 1895-1972
J.R.R. Tolkien 1892-1973
Carl A. Spaatz 1891-1974
...this set of course fits within the life of Jeanne Calment
(1875-1997),still the all-time longevity record-holder,but as
I wrote it I was putting in more obscure local worthies,
such as Ethel Augusta Wallbridge Gilman (subject of a grandson's
Op-Ed memorial in the NY Times,1878-1978),Henry H. Wells (my
county's last surviving Spanish-American War veteran,1877-later
in 1978),J. Franklin Ryan (a town judge in the county south of
me,spent an extraordinary time as member of a volunteer fire
department,1876-1981),and I don't recall if I had any 1880s-born
people who died in 1975/6....may have forgotten others.
This is independent of the present oldest person Kane Tanaka's
life including the non-overlapping lifespans of
Bix Beiderback 1903-31
Betty Jack Davis 1932-53
Freddie Prinze 1954-77
Aaliyah 1979-2001
Some years back I think I posted a living person's life
including FIVE short-lived,non-overlapping notables' lives.
But has anyone born after 2001 achieved notability and then
died?
-=-=-
The World Trade Center towers MUST rise again,
at least as tall as before...or terror has triumphed.
> John von Neumann (1903=E2=80=9357) was a Hungarian-American mathematician,=
> =20
> physicist, computer scientist, engineer and polymath.
What was the occasion for mentioning him here now?
I recall decades ago I used him in creating a set of "nested" lives
(each born before and died after the last)...
John Gunther Jr 1929-1947 (subject of DEATH BE NOT PROUD)
Dylan Thomas 1914-1953
James Agee 1909-1955 (novelist)
John Von Neumann 1903-1957
Frederic Joliot-Curie 1900-1958 (physicist)
C.S. Lewis 1898-1963
Edmund Wilson 1895-1972
J.R.R. Tolkien 1892-1973
Carl A. Spaatz 1891-1974
...this set of course fits within the life of Jeanne Calment
(1875-1997),still the all-time longevity record-holder,but as
I wrote it I was putting in more obscure local worthies,
such as Ethel Augusta Wallbridge Gilman (subject of a grandson's
Op-Ed memorial in the NY Times,1878-1978),Henry H. Wells (my
county's last surviving Spanish-American War veteran,1877-later
in 1978),J. Franklin Ryan (a town judge in the county south of
me,spent an extraordinary time as member of a volunteer fire
department,1876-1981),and I don't recall if I had any 1880s-born
people who died in 1975/6....may have forgotten others.
This is independent of the present oldest person Kane Tanaka's
life including the non-overlapping lifespans of
Bix Beiderback 1903-31
Betty Jack Davis 1932-53
Freddie Prinze 1954-77
Aaliyah 1979-2001
Some years back I think I posted a living person's life
including FIVE short-lived,non-overlapping notables' lives.
But has anyone born after 2001 achieved notability and then
died?
-=-=-
The World Trade Center towers MUST rise again,
at least as tall as before...or terror has triumphed.
Dave P.
Mar 16, 2022, 10:15:29 PM3/16/22
to
Louis Epstein wrote:
> Dave P. wrote:
> > John von Neumann was a Hungarian-American mathematician,
Since everybody's talking about World War III !
--
--
> including FIVE short-lived, non-overlapping notables' lives.
> Dave P. wrote:
> > John von Neumann was a Hungarian-American mathematician,
> > physicist, computer scientist, engineer and polymath.
> What was the occasion for mentioning him here now?
-------------
> What was the occasion for mentioning him here now?
Since everybody's talking about World War III !
--
--
Louis Epstein
Mar 17, 2022, 2:00:00 PM3/17/22
to
Dave P. <imb...@mindspring.com> wrote:
> Louis Epstein wrote:
>> Dave P. wrote:
>> > John von Neumann was a Hungarian-American mathematician,
>> > physicist, computer scientist, engineer and polymath.
>> What was the occasion for mentioning him here now?
> -------------
> Since everybody's talking about World War III !
> --
Many others have written of that since WW II...
> Louis Epstein wrote:
>> Dave P. wrote:
>> > John von Neumann was a Hungarian-American mathematician,
>> > physicist, computer scientist, engineer and polymath.
>> What was the occasion for mentioning him here now?
> -------------
> Since everybody's talking about World War III !
> --
Beiderbecke's name)
>> Betty Jack Davis 1932-53
>> Freddie Prinze 1954-77
>> Aaliyah 1979-2001
>>
>> Some years back I think I posted a living person's life
>> including FIVE short-lived, non-overlapping notables' lives.
>> But has anyone born after 2001 achieved notability and then
>> died?
>> Freddie Prinze 1954-77
>> Aaliyah 1979-2001
>>
>> Some years back I think I posted a living person's life
>> including FIVE short-lived, non-overlapping notables' lives.
>> But has anyone born after 2001 achieved notability and then
>> died?
A Friend
Mar 17, 2022, 3:52:37 PM3/17/22
to
In article <t0vsut$k4c$1...@reader1.panix.com>, Louis Epstein
Or maybe you were thinking of Beider Back Better.
Dave P.
Mar 17, 2022, 7:25:57 PM3/17/22
to
Louis Epstein wrote:
> Dave P. wrote:
> > Louis Epstein wrote:
> >> Dave P. wrote:
> >> > John von Neumann was a Hungarian-American mathematician,
> >> > physicist, computer scientist, engineer and polymath.
> >> What was the occasion for mentioning him here now?
> > -------------
> > Since everybody's talking about World War III !
> > --
> Many others have written of that since WW II...
-----------------------
> Dave P. wrote:
> > Louis Epstein wrote:
> >> Dave P. wrote:
> >> > John von Neumann was a Hungarian-American mathematician,
> >> > physicist, computer scientist, engineer and polymath.
> >> What was the occasion for mentioning him here now?
> > -------------
> > Since everybody's talking about World War III !
> > --
> Many others have written of that since WW II...
But not ordinary people. They've just been joking about it:
Original Vintage Poster in case of nuclear attack
https://www.ebay.com/itm/304401880477
Condition: Used “New, old stock”, Price: $59.95
----
But now, ordinary people are worried about it...
--
--
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