181–190 of 324 posts
I have always wondered how close von Neumann was to the maximum human potential. Does he sit close the outer edge of possible human potential, or can greater geniuses be created? Is there anyone alive who even comes close to Johnny?
Imagine a von Neumann who didn't drink and kept himself in shape.
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Imagine a von Neumann who didn't drink and kept himself in shape.
He died of cancer, probably a result of nuclear testing. They didn’t fully realize how dangerous it was until later.
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For a depressing analysis on where all the Hungarian geniuses came from and why they vanished: https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/05/26/the-atomic-bomb-consid...
Interesting. I never knew about the link between Ashkenazi genetics and intelligence.
von Neumann, Oppenheimer, Bohr, Einstein, Rutherford, Turing, Teller, Szilard, Wigner, Meitner... the list goes on... -- how did that time produce so many people of colossal intellect? War certainly can't be the primary factor, given that many of them were brilliant/productive even before WWI
Von Neumann invented a novel paradigm for computing using harmonic integration of analog oscillations. The patent was granted after his death. While there were a few prototypes in the 50s, the transistor killed it. A fully functional version of this computational architecture has never been built, to my knowledge: https://patents.google.com/patent/US2815488A/en
What advantages would this have?
Ha! No, but the computer would resemble brain oscillations and harmonic integration much more than linear clock cycles. We still don't know much about how the brain uses rhythms and harmonies to compute, but it does (brainwave bands are octaves, I.e. harmonic doublings, 2.5,5,10,20,40hz)
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> Reportedly, von Neumann possessed an eidetic memory, and so was able to recall complete novels and pages of the phone directory on command. This enabled him to accumulate an almost encyclopedic knowledge of what ever he read If he was able to recall ~entire pages of the phone directory on command, I wonder if he could also recall (near) verbatim text of all the novels he had ever read, to what degree he could do th…
Supposedly, yes-- during his final stay in the hospital, his brother read to him from a book they'd enjoyed during their childhood, Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities . When his brother had to turn the page, John would continue the narration from memory while his brother found his place on the subsequent page. Given that he could be occasionally absent minded, I suspect that it had to be something that piqued his interest…
"Von Neumann would carry on a conversation with my 3-year-old son, and the two of them would talk as equals, and I sometimes wondered if he used the same principle when he talked to the rest of us." - Edward Teller See [0] for a demonstration. I watched a documentary from the 80ies a long time ago. A mathematician (can't remember his name) who worked with von Neumann in Los Alamanos was interviewed. He described von…
I've taken a medication that occasionally makes me feel stupid. For a day I might be unable to continue reading a book without re-reading each sentence a few times. I might not be able to talk to people about a complicated or technical subject without stumbling over my words. I will find it difficult to think in the abstract terms, and when I listen to others who talk about abstract values and concepts I have to cont…
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For a depressing analysis on where all the Hungarian geniuses came from and why they vanished: https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/05/26/the-atomic-bomb-consid...
He mentions Curie as non-Ashkenazi, but even with her I don't know, she was born Polish with full name "Maria Salomea Skłodowska"(-Curie), her middle name "Salomea", given after her grandmother sounds to me like Jewish origin. I wonder how percentage of Nobel price winners/etc. would look like if you'd really dig deeper few generations or did genetic tests.
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At the most charitable, Kripke was not generous in acknowledging influences. http://linguafranca.mirror.theinfo.org/Archive/whose.html
This is interesting. I hadn't heard of this dispute. I just read the Marcus paper from 1961 that is essential to Smith's thesis. I also read the back-and-forth rebuttals between Smith and Soames. I read the Marcus paper before reading the Smith and Soames papers. I don't really see how Soames' primary claim is not likely true. He says: "Marcus, along with certain other philosophers, do deserve credit for anticipating…
Does Kripke describe a query language in Naming and Necessity?
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He mentions Curie as non-Ashkenazi, but even with her I don't know, she was born Polish with full name "Maria Salomea Skłodowska"(-Curie), her middle name "Salomea", given after her grandmother sounds to me like Jewish origin. I wonder how percentage of Nobel price winners/etc. would look like if you'd really dig deeper few generations or did genetic tests.
I have a hypothesis that almost all of the greatest intellectual achievements come from a very small number of bloodlines. I really doubt the idea that people are born and some just end up as the smartest in generations, I think theres more to the story
Nice hypothesis, but not exactly backed up by history. So many different societies have made so many diverse contributions to innovation, I'd be pretty amazed if you could draw a cohesive line through all (or most) of them.
Also, separately, it's pretty difficult to separate "bloodlines", which I assume you mean genetically inherited traits, with socially inherited traits.
A great physicist is probably more likely than average to have offspring that are also great physicists. But is that because of their "blood" (i.e. DNA) or because the children grew up in a household exposed to physics at a much higher degree than average. The children's "blood" is an inherited DNA trait, but their upbringing is an inherited social trait.
The question boils down to the age-old nature vs. nurture argument. All signs seem to point to nurture being the far more powerful influence.