Every country has their own heroes. Not only heroes who saved other people’s lives but also heroes who made the nation proud. In Hungary we have some people in our hearts who made our country more respected in the world. Just to mention some examples: Ernő Rubik, the inventor of ‘rubik cube’; Laszló Bíró, the inventor of ‘biro pen’ or ‘ball pen’; János Irinyi, the inventor of ‘safety matches’; Dr Albert Szent - Györgyi, the discoverer of ‘Vitamin - C’, who received the Nobel – prize for it in 1937 and John von Neumann /János Neumann/. As Nathan Myhrvold, chief technology officer for Microsoft, writes in an article for the Time Magazine: “Virtually all computers today, from $10 million supercomputers to the tiny chips that power cell phones and Furbies, have one thing in common: they are all "Von Neumann machines," variations on the basic computer architecture that John von Neumann, building on the work of Alan Turing, laid out in the 1940s. Men have become famous for less. But in the lifetime of this Hungarian-born mathematician who had his hand in everything from quantum physics to U.S. policy during the cold war, the Von Neumann machine was almost the least of his accomplishments.” (John von Neumann: Computing's Cold Warrior, 1999)
John von Neumann (1903 Budapest – 1957 Washington, DC) immigrated to the U.S. in 1933 and was hired by the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, N.J. with Albert Einstein. He invented the ’game theory’ „a branch of mathematics that has brought new insights to fields as diverse as economics and evolutionary theory.” (John von Neumann: Computing's Cold Warrior, 1999)
John von Neumann became interested in computational mathematics in 1943. “In early 1944 a project of the Applied Mathematics Panel was organised under his direction at the IAS. ... The project was taken over by the Navy Bureau of Ordnance in 1945 and expanded to include the development of computing methods for the high – speed calculating devices just beginning to be built. ” (Aspray, 1990, p. 27) Von Neumann became a scientific consultant in Los Alamos where he worked together with “Stanley Frankel and Eldred Nelson, who had organized a computing service for the electromagnetic isotope separator...” (Aspray, 1990, p. 28) The scientists and employees in Los Alomos used ‘Marchant and Friden’ desk calculators which they called ‘computers’. After a while they started to use the “most up-to-date electromechanical IBM accounting equipment”. (Aspray, 1990, p. 29) They organised a contest to decide whether the desk-calculators or the ‘punched-card equipment’ would be more efficient. The IBM computer won, after the contest they used that for all large calculations. John von Neumann became very interested in programming the machine. “Metropolis and Nelson remember: ...he spent two weeks working in the punched – card machine operation ...learning how to wire plugboards and design card layouts, and becoming...familiar with the machine operations. He found wiring the tabulator plugboards particularly frustrating...He later told us this experience led him to reject parallel computations in electronic computers and in his design of the single-address instruction code where parallel handling of operands was guaranteed not to occur.” (Aspray, 1990, p. 30)
He never gave up; he convinced the board of I.A.S. to allocate $100.000 to build his machine, the MANIAC that contained the JOHNNIAC and IBM 701. According to Nathan Myhrvold „Von Neumann didn't just design the stored-program computer; he was the first hacker.” He also worked on the ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer) with Arthur W. Burks and Herman H. Goldstine.” The Eniac’s job was to calculate the trajectory of artillery shells.” (Arthur W. Burks, 92, Dies; Early Computer Theorist, 2008) The ENIAC was attributed as the first “electronic digital computer”. The three theorists published two papers in 1945 and 1946. Von Neumann wrote the first which was a draft of the EDVAC, the ENIAC’s successor. The three of them were the co-authors of the second. “The papers described the design for the modern programmable, general-purpose computer, initially called the “stored-program computer,” and later termed the von Neumann architecture.” (Arthur W. Burks, 92, Dies; Early Computer Theorist, 2008) After Neumann’s death, Mr. Burks finished the paper von Neumann had been working on which was published in 1966. The paper described “how a machine might reproduce itself”.
According to ‘The Internet Encyclopedia of Science’ “A von Neumann machine is able to move over interstellar or interplanetary distances and to utilize local materials to build new copies of itself. Named after the Hungarian-born American mathematician John von Neumann who, among many other achievements, was the first to develop a mathematical theory of machines that can make exact copies of themselves.” (von Neumann machine) The ‘Webopedia’ explains the von Neumann machine like this: “An early computer created by Hungarian mathematician John von Neumann (1903-1957). It included three components used by most computers today: a CPU; a slow-to-access storage area, like a hard drive ; and secondary fast-access memory (RAM). The machines stored instructions as binary values (creating the stored program concept) and executed instructions sequentially - the processor fetched instructions one at a time and processed them. Today "von Neumann architecture" often refers to the sequential nature of computers based on this model.” (von Neumann machine)
István Hargittai, a Hungarian writer, calls von Neumann “the father of modern computing”. In his book, ‘The Martians of Science’, he writes about five very famous Hungarian scientists, whose life stories are very similar. They were all Hungarian Jews and they all went to the United States. Hargittai thinks that this similarity is the key to their success. (Hargittai, 2006) John von Neumann did much more than I could have mentioned in 1000 words. I finish my essay with a last quotation. „ Von Neumann also became an icon of the cold war. Disabled with pancreatic cancer, he stoically continued to attend AEC meetings until his death in 1957.” (John von Neumann: Computing's Cold Warrior, 1999)
John von Neumann (1903 Budapest – 1957 Washington, DC) immigrated to the U.S. in 1933 and was hired by the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, N.J. with Albert Einstein. He invented the ’game theory’ „a branch of mathematics that has brought new insights to fields as diverse as economics and evolutionary theory.” (John von Neumann: Computing's Cold Warrior, 1999)
John von Neumann became interested in computational mathematics in 1943. “In early 1944 a project of the Applied Mathematics Panel was organised under his direction at the IAS. ... The project was taken over by the Navy Bureau of Ordnance in 1945 and expanded to include the development of computing methods for the high – speed calculating devices just beginning to be built. ” (Aspray, 1990, p. 27) Von Neumann became a scientific consultant in Los Alamos where he worked together with “Stanley Frankel and Eldred Nelson, who had organized a computing service for the electromagnetic isotope separator...” (Aspray, 1990, p. 28) The scientists and employees in Los Alomos used ‘Marchant and Friden’ desk calculators which they called ‘computers’. After a while they started to use the “most up-to-date electromechanical IBM accounting equipment”. (Aspray, 1990, p. 29) They organised a contest to decide whether the desk-calculators or the ‘punched-card equipment’ would be more efficient. The IBM computer won, after the contest they used that for all large calculations. John von Neumann became very interested in programming the machine. “Metropolis and Nelson remember: ...he spent two weeks working in the punched – card machine operation ...learning how to wire plugboards and design card layouts, and becoming...familiar with the machine operations. He found wiring the tabulator plugboards particularly frustrating...He later told us this experience led him to reject parallel computations in electronic computers and in his design of the single-address instruction code where parallel handling of operands was guaranteed not to occur.” (Aspray, 1990, p. 30)
He never gave up; he convinced the board of I.A.S. to allocate $100.000 to build his machine, the MANIAC that contained the JOHNNIAC and IBM 701. According to Nathan Myhrvold „Von Neumann didn't just design the stored-program computer; he was the first hacker.” He also worked on the ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer) with Arthur W. Burks and Herman H. Goldstine.” The Eniac’s job was to calculate the trajectory of artillery shells.” (Arthur W. Burks, 92, Dies; Early Computer Theorist, 2008) The ENIAC was attributed as the first “electronic digital computer”. The three theorists published two papers in 1945 and 1946. Von Neumann wrote the first which was a draft of the EDVAC, the ENIAC’s successor. The three of them were the co-authors of the second. “The papers described the design for the modern programmable, general-purpose computer, initially called the “stored-program computer,” and later termed the von Neumann architecture.” (Arthur W. Burks, 92, Dies; Early Computer Theorist, 2008) After Neumann’s death, Mr. Burks finished the paper von Neumann had been working on which was published in 1966. The paper described “how a machine might reproduce itself”.
According to ‘The Internet Encyclopedia of Science’ “A von Neumann machine is able to move over interstellar or interplanetary distances and to utilize local materials to build new copies of itself. Named after the Hungarian-born American mathematician John von Neumann who, among many other achievements, was the first to develop a mathematical theory of machines that can make exact copies of themselves.” (von Neumann machine) The ‘Webopedia’ explains the von Neumann machine like this: “An early computer created by Hungarian mathematician John von Neumann (1903-1957). It included three components used by most computers today: a CPU; a slow-to-access storage area, like a hard drive ; and secondary fast-access memory (RAM). The machines stored instructions as binary values (creating the stored program concept) and executed instructions sequentially - the processor fetched instructions one at a time and processed them. Today "von Neumann architecture" often refers to the sequential nature of computers based on this model.” (von Neumann machine)
István Hargittai, a Hungarian writer, calls von Neumann “the father of modern computing”. In his book, ‘The Martians of Science’, he writes about five very famous Hungarian scientists, whose life stories are very similar. They were all Hungarian Jews and they all went to the United States. Hargittai thinks that this similarity is the key to their success. (Hargittai, 2006) John von Neumann did much more than I could have mentioned in 1000 words. I finish my essay with a last quotation. „ Von Neumann also became an icon of the cold war. Disabled with pancreatic cancer, he stoically continued to attend AEC meetings until his death in 1957.” (John von Neumann: Computing's Cold Warrior, 1999)
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