A standout biography of a remarkable man!

Absolutely loved this book. Really brought Von Neumann to life and made clear his phenomenal impact across almost all technological breakthroughs in the past century. The story was brought to life through the sidebar summaries of the other great minds he worked with over this critical period in history.

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nice history of mathematics and computing

This was really worth reading, though not for the reasons I expected. There isn't as much biographical information on Von Neumann as you would think and this material is the least interesting part of the book. What fascinated me was the history of maths and computing - it goes into a decent amount of depth and I learned a great deal. There is also a lot on the characters adjacent to von Neumann such as John Nash and Stephen Wolfram which was great and led to lots of reading on Wikipedia

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Wow. 'Larry David meets Einstein and Godel'

I had heard of Johnnie von Neumann, but there was so much more I hadn't heard about him. An astonishingly enjoyable biography- and the author's first! I can't wait for Bhattacharya's next.

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Great biography of JVN

I decided to listen to this audiobook after reading “Turing’s Cathedral” by George Dyson, and I was not disappointed. The book is a great listen for those interested in the life of von Neumann.

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Not really a biography

well written and well narrated enumeration of John von Neumann's contributions to science. As a biography of the man though, this was disappointing. You won't learn more about John Von Neumann as a person than if you read his wikipedia page

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Blown away by genius

Not heard much of JvN before getting stuck into this book so understandably (for those who know him) blown away by the sheer breadth of vision and intellect of the man. His achievements and contributions are nicely summarised by Bhattacharta in a way that someone not too familiar with maths and physics can at least grasp the significance of what’s going on. Recommended for anyone remotely interested in science and the origins of modern technology.

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Very interesting, but infocused

As other reviewers note, this isn’t actually a biography. It’s an introduction to Von Neumann’s scientific work, along with many digressions about its context and influence.

As an introduction to Von Neumann’s work, the book is very good! I would have liked more detail about the IAS machine that Von Neumann built – it was a very interesting computer with a unique architecture, but the author doesn’t go into any detail about it. But the explanations of Von Neumann’s work in quantum theory, nuclear physics, game theory and cellular automata are all nicely explained.

It must be said that the book is very disgressive, and the author lets his interests show quite palpably. I would have preferred the sections about Von Neumann’s influence to be curtailed, and instead to have more of a biographical narrative about the man.

One point where I do disagree with the author is about intelligence. The notion that there is such a person as “the most intelligent man alive” is dangerous post-Romantic rubbish. Luckily this rhetoric of genius drops off after the first couple of Chapters. Ironically, one thing the biography does extremely well is to show just how collaborative science is, and how little even a great scientist like Von Neumann actually contributes of their own accord.

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more the ideas than the person behind them

This book provides a thorough investigation of JvN's ideas and their ongoing influence. However, it is not exactly a biography in the sense that the man behind these ideas remains largely a mystery. Don't expect Walter Isaacson-style descriptions of JvN's daily routines or excerpts from his diaries. Rather get this book if you're curious about his influence on the fields of mathematics, physics, military technology, computers, and artificial intelligence. I found the audiobook format somewhat hard to follow at times since many of the descriptions require one to visualise images (e.g. the layers of an atom bomb or self-replicating automata on a chequered board). nevertheless it is well written and very well narrated and leaves one humbled by JvN's enormous impact across so many fields. It's hard to imagine any greater polymath in the last 300 years.

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Worst narrator ever!

A different narrator would have saved this audible title. It's as if he is trying to hard to be dramatic instead of just reading the book.

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Not a biography of an incredible man

Far too emphasis on detailed mathematics which for the average reader such as me is total overkill. I am now looking for a true biography of a fascinating mind where we learn more of the man, his ideas and way of thinking and leaving the detailed maths to textbooks.

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2 people found this helpful