John Von Neumann
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John von Neumann: The Founding Pierre Marchal Centre Suisse d’Electronique et Father of Artificial Life de Microtechnique SA CH-2007 Neuchatelˆ Switzerland [email protected] http://www.csem.ch Abstract Aside from being known for his contributions to mathematics and physics, John von Neumann is considered one of the founding fathers of computer science and engineering. Not only did he do pioneering work on Keywords sequential computing systems, but he also carried out a major computer architecture, universal ma- investigation of parallel architectures, leading to his work on chine, cellular automata, self-repro- ducing machine cellular automata. His exceptional vision and daring, borrowing from biology the concept of genomic information even before the discovery of DNA’s double helix, led him to propose the concept of self-reproducing automata. 1 The Life of John von Neumann John von Neumann, or rather Margittai1 Neumann Janos Lajos was born in Budapest (Hungary) on December 28th, 1903. His father, Miksa, was a successful lawyer who became the chief counsel and director of the Magyar Jelzalog Hitelbank. His mother, Margit, ran the home. Miksa and Margit fostered a rich intellectual environment in their household, where the entire family participated in regular discussions of current events, science, music, literature, and theater, as well as school subjects. Only governesses able to teach French and German were selected. Growing up in an extended family, with his parents, cousins, and two younger brothers, Michael and Nicholas, Jancsi, as he was called by the family, was a precocious child with a remarkably quick mind. He read avidly with almost photographic memory. As a child, he read a popular 44-volume set on general history. Von Neumann received private tutoring at home until the age of 10, when he was enrolled in the Lutheran Gymnasium. In addition to the usual courses, he received—as did all Jewish students—the instruction of a visiting rabbi teaching Hebrew writing and literature. His talent in mathematics was already recognized as early on as secondary school. The senior mathematics teacher, L. Racz, encouraged his parents to provide him with training beyond that offered by the school. A young mathematician, M. Fekete, tutored von Neumann at home throughout his eight years of secondary school. He read mathematics at the University of Budapest in 1921; however, due to a rather turbulent period in Hungary’s history, he adopted the unorthodox practice of attending the university only at the end of each term when examinations were given. To obtain the practical education desired by his father, von Neumann enrolled in the Eidgenossische¨ Technische Hochschule in Zurich in 1923 to study chemical engineering. He received his diploma in 1925. In Zurich, much of his spare time was devoted to mathematics, writing publications, and corresponding with mathematicians. Thus, one year later 1 His father was awarded the von Margitta title of nobility by Emperor Franz Joseph in 1913 for his contribution to the economic development of Hungary, which he passed on to his sons. When von Neumann moved to Zurich, he used the name Johann Neumann von Margitta, which the German-language publishers shortened to von Neumann. c 1998 Massachusetts Institute of Technology Artificial Life 4: 229–235 (1998) Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/106454698568567 by guest on 30 September 2021 P. Marchal The Founding Father of Artificial Life (1926), he received his doctorate in mathematics from the University of Budapest, having written a thesis on set theory. Von Neumann arrived in Princeton in February 1930, returning to Europe every summer from 1930 to 1938. In the summer of 1932 he came back with his bride, the former Mariette Kovesi, their marriage producing his only child, Marina, in 1935. The marriage ended in divorce in 1937. That same year he was naturalized as a U.S. citizen. In 1939, von Neumann returned from a summer vacation in Hungary with a new wife, the former Klara Dan, who became one of the first computer programmers. Throughout his life, von Neumann received numerous honors and awards: hon- orary degrees from Princeton University (1947), University of Pennsylvania, Harvard University (1949), Istanbul University, Case Institute of Technology, Maryland Univer- sity (1952), Munich Polytechnic Institute (1953), and Columbia University (1954). He also received the Medal of Merit—Presidential Award (1947), the Science Award (1955), the Medal of Freedom—Presidential Award (1956), the Enrico Fermi Science Award (1956), and the American Meteorological Society Award for extraordinary scientific ac- complishment (1957). His professional life began with a Rockefeller Fellowship at Gottingen¨ University for 1926–1927. In 1927 he became Privatdozent at Berlin University, the youngest ever nominated. At the beginning of the academic year 1929–1930 he was also Privat- dozent at Hamburg University. In February 1930, he was nominated visiting lecturer in mathematics at Princeton University (invited by Oswald Veblen). In January 1933, he became one of four professors appointed by the world-famous Princeton Institute for Advanced Studies (IAS), along with Oswald Veblen, James Alexander, and Albert Ein- stein. He remained there for the rest of his life. During the war he was involved in sev- eral government consultancies: Ballistics Research Labs, Navy Bureau of Ordnance, Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory, Naval Ordnance Laboratory, Washington DC Research and Development Board, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Armed Forces Special Weapons Project, Weapon Systems Evaluation Group, U.S. Air Force Scientific Advisory Board, and Member General Advisory Committee of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, Cen- tral Intelligence Agency, Livermore Radiation Laboratory, Strategic Missiles Evaluation Committee of the U.S. Air Force, National Security Agency Advisory Board at Washing- ton DC, Nuclear Weapons Panel and Scientific Advisory Board of the U.S. Air Force, Technical Advisory Panel on Atomic Energy for the Department of Defense, and Ad Hoc Panel on University Computing Facilities for the National Science Foundation. 2 Scientific Contribution John von Neumann’s scientific contribution may be divided into three periods of his life. The first period began with his university days and ended with his work with government consultancies during the war. The second period corresponded mainly to his wartime occupation. The last period, devoted to computer science and engineering, was driven by the huge number of calculations necessary to resolve many war-related problems. 2.1 The University Days During the first period, von Neumann addressed the topics of measure theory (Haar measure), the theory of integration, and game theory and its application to economics (thus founding the field of mathematical economics). Aside from this work, he concen- trated on set theory, logical foundation of mathematics (Hilbert’s formalist program2), 2 As early as 1925, von Neumann had some inkling of problems with the formalist program and it was a great disappointment to him not to have discovered the incompleteness of the results himself. 230 Artificial Life Volume 4, Number 3 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/106454698568567 by guest on 30 September 2021 P. Marchal The Founding Father of Artificial Life Table 1. Some “offspring” of the IAS machine. Name Institution Avidac Argone National Lab Besk Swedish Board of Computing Machinery Besm Academy of Sciences, Moscow Dask Danish Academy, Institute of Computing Machinery George Argone National Lab IBM 701 IBM Corporation Illiac University of Illinois Johnniac RAND Corporation Maniac Los Alamos Scientific Lab Msudc Michigan State University Oracle Oak Ridge National Lab. Perm Technische Hochschule, Munich Silliac University of Sydney SMIL Lund University TC-1 International Telemeter Corporation Weizac Weizmann Institute, Rehovoth spectral theory of multidimensional Hilbert spaces, ergodic theory, rings of operator theory (now known as von Neumann algebras), as well as the mathematical founda- tions of quantum mechanics. 2.2 The War Epoch Starting in 1941, von Neumann began to contribute increasingly to the ongoing war effort. His fields of contribution covered the theory of detonation, arrangement of high-power explosives in shaped charges, physical effects of detonation and mine war- fare, mine countermeasures, aerodynamics (with Theodore von Karman), atomic bombs (Los Alamos), interaction and reflection of blast waves, effects of explosive blasts, and effects of projectile impact on various structures. This work tended to generate a huge number of calculations, leading von Neumann to develop appropriate numerical meth- ods. These were followed by computing methods for high-speed calculating devices as soon as the first computing devices appeared. 2.3 The Birth of Computer Science Driven by the necessity of using computational devices, John von Neumann partici- pated in discussions on the design of the EDVAC machine (electronic discrete variable arithmetic computer) with J. Prespert Eckert and John W. Mauchly, addressing logical design as well as programming aspects. Then he turned toward engineering the IAS computer, where he participated in the early design, solving the memory problem, and was also involved in the computer’s maintainability. The IAS machine gave birth to several offspring (see Table 1). He also concentrated on numerical analysis: evaluation of algorithm complexity, stability