Rebel Without a Pause Wounding at the Battle of Austerlitz in Tolstoy’S War and Peace Made Me Wince

BOOKS & ARTS COMMENT

PHYSICS arrived safely in Ithaca,” Schewe writes of his subject’s migration to Cornell. That made me smile. But comparing Dyson’s mug- ging in Washington DC to Prince Andrei’s Rebel without a pause wounding at the battle of Austerlitz in Tolstoy’s War and Peace made me wince. Robert P. Crease delves into a life of Freeman Dyson, a And likening Dyson to the Beatles — and his theoretical physicist who chose a non-conformist path. papers on renormalization to Please Please Me — is embarrassing. A few of Schewe’s metaphors about other reeman Dyson looks like a wizard. published in Physical Maverick Genius: elements of the story also misfire. He com- Tall and lanky, he has piercing blue Review in 1949, work The Pioneering pares the twentieth-century physics commu- eyes, elfin ears, an aquiline nose and for which many feel he Odyssey of nity to the early Christian church, and calls Freeman Dyson Fa full head of hair, despite being in his 90th should have received a the initial Shelter Island conference — the PHILLIP F. SCHEWE year. From the cover of Phillip Schewe’s Nobel Prize. Schewe Thomas Dunne Books: first important post-war US gathering of the- buoyant biography Maverick Genius, he describes it as a pro- 2013. 352 pp. $27.99 oretical physicists — an “ecumenical coun- stares at us with an expression that is half cess that involves rede- cil”. The conference was no such thing. Not cherub, half imp. fining an electron’s charge and mass by using all key figures attended it, and those who did Dyson’s career is marked by equally sharp the “countervailing blizzard of electromag- reviewed and prepared, rather than decreed. contrasts. He has made significant contri- netic fields” to neutralize infinities that kept It would be more accurate, and equally acces- butions to technical areas of mathematical cropping up in theories, making the electron sible, to compare the event to a symphony physics and quantum electrodynamics — “normal again, fit to participate in atomic orchestra’s pre-performance rehearsal. but also to speculative fields such as space society”. However, Schewe’s decision to Schewe doesn’t shy away from the personal, travel and astrobiology. His writings mix pitch his breezy account at the non-scientist such as who slept with whom in Princeton’s science and poetry. He is not religious, yet is, I think, justifiable, as the story has already intense, tightly knit community. Yet avoiding won the Templeton Prize for “progress in been covered by several technical histories technical details sometimes inhibits his focus. religion”. He crusades against nuclear weap- of physics, such as Frank Close’s The Infinity From today’s perspective, was TRIGA safe ons, but engages in defence research. And Puzzle (Oxford Univ. Press, 2011) and Silvan or risky? Was Orion realistic or foolhardy? he is known for taking heretical positions on Schweber’s QED and the Men Who Made It Surely the answers matter and reveal aspects subjects such as extrasensory perception and (Princeton Univ. Press, 1994). of Dyson the man, but Schewe doesn’t give us climate change. Yet his most eccentric facet is One of the pleasures of Schewe’s book is enough information to judge. that he became an eminent theoretical physi- waiting for him to uncork the next flam- In The Scientist as Rebel, one of many cist without having a PhD — a feat for which boyant metaphor. Some are more success- articles he has written for the New York Richard Feynman, that other famous non- ful than others. “Like Odysseus, Dyson had Review of Books, Dyson himself writes that conformist of physics, much envied him. been entangled in a great war and afterward “science is a human activity, and the best “This is a biography,” Schewe alerts us, “and way to understand it is to understand the not science history.” Thus we learn of Dyson’s individual human beings who practice it”. beginnings in the United Kingdom, his early But sometimes an understanding of science attraction to mathematics and his operations is needed to understand the human being research at Royal Air Force Bomber Com- who engages in it. This is especially true for mand during the Second World War. After the someone like Dyson, who uses scientific CONTRASTO/EYEVINE war, Dyson moved to the United States, where arguments to defend offbeat positions. he worked first at Cornell University in Ithaca, For instance, is Dyson’s high-profile, New York, and then the Institute for Advanced controversial position on climate change Study in Princeton, New Jersey, along with the — in which he challenges the need to take likes of Albert Einstein and J. Robert Oppen- drastic measures — realistic or reckless? heimer. We hear of Dyson’s work on the We cannot judge without more discussion TRIGA project to build a foolproof nuclear of the science of modelling. Discussion of reactor model, and on the Orion project to Dyson’s opposition to the Superconduct- design a spacecraft that would boost itself to ing Super Collider and to the Hubble high speeds by surfing on atomic explosions Space Telescope — in his view, oversized — and that Dyson intended to be aboard the enterprises that monopolize resources at first flight. We read about his work on neutron the expense of numerous smaller, more bombs; his opposition to the Nuclear-Test- worthy projects — would also have Ban Treaty (because it would inhibit defence brought a sharper, more critical focus on research); the solar-energy collector known Dyson’s contrarian personality, and made as the ‘Dyson sphere’ once mentioned on Star the end of Schewe’s book read less like an Trek; and his thought experiments classifying extended, flattering magazine portrait of a possible extrasolar civilizations. prophet. Still, Maverick Genius provides a These episodes are rendered without tech- vivid and enjoyable sketch of one of the most nical detail, which may frustrate those hop- prominent scientific rebels of our day. ■ ing for insights into the NATURE.COM science. Take the defi- Robert P. Crease is professor of philosophy For Freeman Dyson nition of renormaliza- at Stony Brook University, New York 11794, on Enrico Fermi, see: tion — the subject of USA, and author of World in the Balance. go.nature.com/wq6jau two papers that Dyson e-mail: [email protected]