The Unparalleled Genius of John von Neumann (2019) • Hacker News Board

Re: The Unparalleled Genius of John von Neumann (2019)

#231

Post by kaba0 » Wed, Apr 07, 2021, 1:21 PM UTC

ykl wrote: post #59

adverbly wrote: post #56

Is it just me or does it seem like there something like there were a lot of celebrity-level STEM heroes to come out of the early 20th century. These folks all seemed to work together closely. Maybe these things take time, but it just doesn't seem like there is anything remotely like this going on today, despite far greater access to education and increases in global population. Is it perhaps that the limelight is les…

They all worked closely together because they all worked on the Manhattan Project. When there’s a single huge government project requiring the nation’s smartest people and on which the survival of the nation depends, it shouldn’t be too surprising that all of the top scientists and mathematicians and engineers all end up working together. :) The fact that so many of them specifically grew up in Hungary, went to schoo…

There is interesting blog post about it here:

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/xPJKZyPCvap4Fven8/the-atomic...

Re: The Unparalleled Genius of John von Neumann (2019)

#232

Post by metalliqaz » Wed, Apr 07, 2021, 1:23 PM UTC

Tuna-Fish wrote: post #218

MrDresden wrote: post #209

He was beyond a brilliant person, of that is no doubt. And not in anyway trying to take away from that fact, reading the following excerpt from the article..; "[..] von Neumann both worked alongside and collaborated with some of the foremost figures of twentieth century science. He went to high school with Eugene Wigner, collaborated with Hermann Weyl at ETH, attended lectures by Albert Einstein in Berlin, worked und…

A lot of those particularly accomplished people he interacted with specifically pointed him out as exceptional. For example, from this article about his eidetic memory: "One of his remarkable abilities was his power of absolute recall. As far as I could tell, von Neumann was able on once reading a book or article to quote it back verbatim; moreover, he could do it years later without hesitation. He could also transla…

My favorite, from Edward Teller:

“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.”

Re: The Unparalleled Genius of John von Neumann (2019)

#233

Post by confidantlake » Wed, Apr 07, 2021, 1:31 PM UTC

newbie578 wrote: post #228

Reading stories like this, makes me certain that one of the biggest breakthroughs the human race will achieve is when we cure cancer. Our progress will start increasing even more. Imagine what our world would look like if the average person lived to over 90 and was still mentally sharp. Imagine an additional 40 years of Neumann, 20 years of Einstein, even from the more modern times also, Steve Jobs or my personal fav…

I agree it will be big breakthrough, but more because it will improve the quality of life of the average person. Don't most of these geniuses produce their best work in their 20s? Not sure if adding another 20 unproductive years would help much.

Re: The Unparalleled Genius of John von Neumann (2019)

#234

Post by kaba0 » Wed, Apr 07, 2021, 1:32 PM UTC

smnplk wrote: post #18

ZephyrBlu wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do we actually have no idea what the biological/genetic differences between geniuses and average people are? That's interesting. > I'd like to take the idyllic position of (somewhat irresponsibly) hoping that some level of genius can be fostered and created in anyone from a young age So you believe that genius is environmental and not genetic? Or maybe we are thinking about different definitions of genius.

I believe the foundations have to be genetic. There are multitude of factors involved and one of them is having a strong memory. But there also needs to be a drive and thirst for knowledge.

I think drive and thirst for knowledge is more “nurture”, but the base is heavily correlated with genetics.

I think it is the same with people holding world records in sports. You can get insanely good no matter where you come from (let alone some unfortunate medical conditions) with only drive and enough exercise, but to win a gold medal, you have to be born for a given sport (of course on top of the insane amount of motivation and exercise spent on it!). Also, probably it is less sport-specific, so someone becoming a world-class soccer player would have been similarly good in a similar sport.

Re: The Unparalleled Genius of John von Neumann (2019)

#235

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Apr 07, 2021, 1:36 PM UTC

masswerk wrote: post #85

jshier wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lawsuits? Unless you're talking personal suits, the only one I know of, Honeywell v. Sperry Rand, did not go well for Eckert or Mauchly, personally or professionally, especially Mauchly.

My (moral) problems with von Neumann are of entirely different nature, namely his persistent advocacy for a "preemptive" nuclear first strike, before the USSR could roll out a thermonuclear bomb in production. Which might be regarded as attempted, cold-blooded genocide. So, not my personal hero.

[deleted]

Re: The Unparalleled Genius of John von Neumann (2019)

#236

Post by kaba0 » Wed, Apr 07, 2021, 1:36 PM UTC

stephc_int13 wrote: post #20

ZephyrBlu wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do we actually have no idea what the biological/genetic differences between geniuses and average people are? That's interesting. > I'd like to take the idyllic position of (somewhat irresponsibly) hoping that some level of genius can be fostered and created in anyone from a young age So you believe that genius is environmental and not genetic? Or maybe we are thinking about different definitions of genius.

From a genetic standpoint, all humans are 99.9% identical beasts. There is of course some genetic components in potential abilities. But I strongly believe that most of the differences we are seeing are built on compounded interest of environmental factors, starting from a very young age.

Well, one amino acid change can render someone’s whole life into a suffering, so I don’t see how the 99.9% mean anything. If the difference is only in a few genes, it can already have a huge effect.

Re: The Unparalleled Genius of John von Neumann (2019)

#237

Post by CWuestefeld » Wed, Apr 07, 2021, 1:42 PM UTC

read_if_gay_ wrote: post #222

Tuna-Fish wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of those particularly accomplished people he interacted with specifically pointed him out as exceptional. For example, from this article about his eidetic memory: "One of his remarkable abilities was his power of absolute recall. As far as I could tell, von Neumann was able on once reading a book or article to quote it back verbatim; moreover, he could do it years later without hesitation. He could also transla…

Another: > “There was a seminar for advanced students in Zürich that I was teaching and von Neumann was in the class. I came to a certain theorem, and I said it is not proved and it may be difficult. von Neumann didn’t say anything but after five minutes he raised his hand. When I called on him he went to the blackboard and proceeded to write down the proof. After that I was afraid of von Neumann” — George Pólya The…

The nature vs. nurture argument has its merits in general, but sometimes nature just produces a complete freak.

Possibly less of a freak relative to his surroundings, compared to the difference relative to the rest of us:

Here's some argument from both sides of the nature v nurture debate (from https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/05/26/the-atomic-bomb-consid... )

The locality here suggests some "nature":

the Manhattan Project was led by a group of Hungarian supergeniuses, all born in Budapest between 1890 and 1920. These included Manhattan Project founder Leo Szilard, H-bomb creator Edward Teller, Nobel-Prize-winning quantum physicist Eugene Wigner, and legendary polymath John von Neumann, namesake of the List Of Things Named After John Von Neumann.

Or, maybe it's not just localized gene pool, but an experience common to all of them? (from same esay)

The coincidences actually pile up beyond this. Von Neumann, Wigner, and possibly Teller all went to the same central Budapest high school at about the same time, leading a friend to joke about the atomic bomb being basically a Hungarian high school science fair project. [...]

In this case, the guy was Laszlo Ratz, legendary Budapest high school math teacher. I didn’t even know people told legends about high school math teachers, but apparently they do, and this guy features in a lot of them. There is apparently a Laszlo Ratz Memorial Congress for high school math teachers each year, and a Laszlo Ratz medal for services to the profession. There are plaques and statues to this guy. It’s pretty impressive.

Re: The Unparalleled Genius of John von Neumann (2019)

#238

Post by Retric » Wed, Apr 07, 2021, 1:45 PM UTC

arethuza wrote: post #215

masswerk wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My (moral) problems with von Neumann are of entirely different nature, namely his persistent advocacy for a "preemptive" nuclear first strike, before the USSR could roll out a thermonuclear bomb in production. Which might be regarded as attempted, cold-blooded genocide. So, not my personal hero.

I don't think there is any doubt that a "preemptive" nuclear first strike by the US would have morally and legally been regarded as genocide. The last time we had a debate on HN on this topic a number of people seemed to think it would have been a good idea - which I found genuinely disturbing. Hopefully I was just being trolled.

Genocide is about destruction of a people not simply large numbers of deaths. The Holocaust is the model people assume, but China’s current genocide of the Uyghur is genocide based on intent even without large scale slaughter.

Now you might be overestimating the US nuclear arsenal at the time, remember he died in 1957. At the time a nuclear exchange could have killed a lot of people, but only on the scale of a major bombing campaign not glassing the country.

As such, assuming US attacked and occupied Russia after an early nuclear exchange, it would have been war but not fit the definition of genocide because the intent to destroy a people simply wasn’t there.

PS: One of the less well known examples, the US forcibly sending American Indian children to boarding schools to be Americanized actually fits the UN definition of genocide. That’s the heart of the issue, the intent to destroy a people or culture rather than say conquest or even retaliation.

Re: The Unparalleled Genius of John von Neumann (2019)

#239

Post by kaba0 » Wed, Apr 07, 2021, 1:54 PM UTC

iandanforth wrote: post #90

wombatmobile wrote: post #9

"Anybody who looks at living organisms knows perfectly well that they can produce other organisms like themselves. This is their normal function, they wouldn’t exist if they didn’t do this, and it’s not plausible that this is the reason why they abound in the world. In other words, living organisms are very complicated aggregations of elementary parts, and by any reasonable theory of probability or thermodynamics hig…

In this I disagree with von Neumann. The relevant phrase to understand my point of departure is "That which persists exists." There is a continuum of strategies for persistence and reproduction is only one of them. While thermodynamics over a large enough timescale dictates even disorder, over shorter timescales and in specific local it allows for the temporary increase in order. This is no more or less probable than…

I am by no means knowledgeable enough on this topic, but what we think of as increased order may not always equate to physically having larger order.

Eg. your atom/molecule example, it may only be more orderly to a human brain, when in actuality the added entropy of the tight packing is overcome by the favorable energy state at the temperatures we are used to. So there may be a difference in a fixed order by energy expenditure like a cell (Neumann’s point) and seemingly ordered state that in physical actuality requires no additional energy like a salt crystal (your point). With this (maybe faulty) distinction, Neumann’s point still stands in my reading.

If we were to have an immortal supercell that didn’t reproduce, it would likely seize to exist at an “infinite” timeline due to some rare external event, even if it is superior in every way to a simple cell that only reproduces. While at the other hand a “single” crystal will similarly not survive a long timeline, but by simply its structure being a law of nature, it will form again in the same way.

Re: The Unparalleled Genius of John von Neumann (2019)

#240

Post by arethuza » Wed, Apr 07, 2021, 1:55 PM UTC

Retric wrote: post #238

arethuza wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think there is any doubt that a "preemptive" nuclear first strike by the US would have morally and legally been regarded as genocide. The last time we had a debate on HN on this topic a number of people seemed to think it would have been a good idea - which I found genuinely disturbing. Hopefully I was just being trolled.

Genocide is about destruction of a people not simply large numbers of deaths. The Holocaust is the model people assume, but China’s current genocide of the Uyghur is genocide based on intent even without large scale slaughter. Now you might be overestimating the US nuclear arsenal at the time, remember he died in 1957. At the time a nuclear exchange could have killed a lot of people, but only on the scale of a major…

In 1961 the Pentagon's own estimates gave the expected casualties at 600 million plus when it had ~20K weapons. In 1950 the US had ~2500 weapons so scaling that back proportionally still looks like 10s of millions dead.

Edit: I suspect maximum lethality of the US stockpile would have been during the 1960s when they still used large numbers of very large and dirty weapons.