George Dyson

How did computers take over the world? In late 1945, a small group of brilliant engineers and mathematicians gathered at the newly created Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. Their ostensible goal was to build a computer which would be instrumental in the US government's race to create a hydrogen bomb. The mathematicians themselves, however, saw their project as the realization of Alan Turing's theoretical 'universal machine.' In Turing's Cathedral, George Dyson vividly re-creates the intense experimentation, incredible mathematical insight and pure creative genius that led to the dawn of the digital universe, uncovering a wealth of new material to bring a human story of extraordinary men and women and their ideas to life. From the lowliest iPhone app to Google's sprawling metazoan codes, we now live in a world of self-replicating numbers and self-reproducing machines whose origins go back to a 5-kilobyte matrix that still holds clues as to what may lie ahead.

The Origins of the Digital Universe

Turing's Cathedral

In Analogia, technology historian George Dyson presents a startling look back at the analog age and life before the digital revolution—and an unsettling vision of what comes next. In 1716, the philosopher and mathematician Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz spent eight days taking the cure with Peter the Great at Bad Pyrmont in Saxony, seeking to initiate a digitally-computed takeover of the world. In his classic books, Darwin Among the Machines and Turing’s Cathedral, Dyson chronicled the realization of Leibniz’s dream at the hands of a series of iconoclasts who brought his ideas to life. Now, in his pathbreaking new book, Analogia, he offers a chronicle of people who fought for the other side—the Native American leader Geronimo and physicist Leo Szilard, among them—a series of stories that will change our view not only of the past but also of the future. The convergence of a startling historical archaeology with Dyson’s unusual personal story—set alternately in the rarified world of cutting-edge physics and computer science, in Princeton, and in the rainforest of the Northwest Coast—leads to a prophetic vision of an analog revolution already under way. We are, Dyson reveals, on the cusp of a new moment in human history, driven by a generation of machines whose powers are beyond programmable control. Includes black-and-white illustrations

The Emergence of Technology Beyond Programmable Control

Analogia

A brilliant combination of history and personal recollections documents the incredible story of a wild idea--a spacecraft powered by hydrogen bombs--and brings to life an episode in U.S. scientific research that brought together a vast array of brilliant physicists, including the author's father, who participated in the vision of a renowned theoretician, during the political and cultural backdrop of the Cold War. Reprint. 12,500 first printing.

The True Story of the Atomic Spaceship

Project Orion

'Full of historical anecdotes . . . but this is much more than a history book. [George Dyson] weaves his threads together for a purpose. Using voices of the past and present, he describes a fresh and sometimes startling viewpoint of the emerging relationship between nature and machines. From vignettes about Olaf Stapledon, George Boole, John von Neumann, and Samuel Butler, a larger story develops in which the twin processes of intelligence and evolution are inseparably intertwined' Danny Hillis, Wired

Darwin Among the Machines

Here George Dyson considers the intriguing question of artificial life: the possibility that machines will one day come to life, or are even alive already. Dyson argues that life, having emerged once already through biological evolution, is presently emerging for a second time, on this occasion through the spontaneous evolution of intelligence within our rapidly expanding computer networks. Dyson shows that to a real extent we have created life, but have largely failed to notice. Others have considered this possibility and Dyson guides us through this alternative scientific and literary tradition, recounting the insights of historical figures such as Hobbes, Samuel Butler, Erasmus and Charles Darwin, as well as a variety of researchers from the 20th century.

Turing's Cathedral: The Origins of the Digital Universe (Penguin Press Science)

The race to the moon dominated space flight during the the 1960s yet, during the late 1950s and early 1960s, the US Government sponsored a project that could possibly have sent 150 people on expeditions to Mars or Saturn.The project was code-named Orion and centred upon the effort to develop a fast, manoeuvrable, nuclear-powered space vehicle for long-range voyages in space. The proposed 4000-ton spaceship would be propelled by nuclear bombs but, strictly classified, the project was never given a chance to succeed or fail - due partly to its apparent absurdity - but its mix of sublime physics, madcap engineering, and a cast of Cold War warriors and would-be inter-galactic engineers made the mission a tantalising what if story.In this book George Dyson, son of physicist Freeman Dyson, one of the original project team, pieces together the story his father could only tell him in fragments at the time.

The Atomic Spaceship, 1957-1965

David Edgerton

Alfred Jarry

Enda Duffy

Pauline Oliveros

Siegfried Zielinski

Mark Fell

Timothy Druckrey

Arie Altena

Thomas W. Patteson

Joel Ryan

Catherine Christer Hennix

Robin Hayward

Hilary Jeffery

Keith Fullerton Whitman

Gilles Aubry

Hilel Schwartz

Omar Muñoz-Cremers

Critical essays and interviews in this volume reveal the significance and intricacies of time and particularly how we experience it. Time is a complex and ambiguous concept. Relativity theorists and quantum mechanics have tinkered with the seemingly unambiguous concept of time since the beginning of the previous century. Art, film, and music make abstract notions of time tangible and comprehensible, and manipulate how we experience it. The ongoing development and implementation of technology constantly challenge, change and undermine our perception of time. This book is, in a sense, a homage to the human experience of time. One half of this anthology consists of articles and essays dealing with conceptions and imaginings of time in the fields of technology, culture and literature. The other half, collects interviews, with composers and performing musicians, concerning their intimate knowledge of working with time.

Travelling Time 

In a world where humans coexist with technologies they no longer control or understand, who holds the future? George Dyson plots a thrilling and unexpected course through 300 years of history and science to reveal the hidden connections that underpin the digital transformation of the current age, ending with a premonition of what might follow. From an eighteenth-century Russian expedition to the furthest reaches of North America, to the mirror signals that heralded the age of digital long-range communications and invention of the vacuum tube, Analogia interweaves historical adventure wit scientific insight in a deeply personal story that frame the pursuit - and cost - of the digital revolution in a captivating new light.

The Entangled Destinies of Nature, Human Beings and Machines

Dyson Magnificat & Nunc Dimittis in F

In den 1940er Jahren kam es am Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton zu einer einzigartigen Zusammenarbeit wissenschaftlicher Genies, die als Keimzelle der digitalen Welt gelten kann. Zu ihnen gehörten Albert Einstein, Robert Oppenheimer, Kurt Gödel, Alan Turing und John von Neumann. In engem Austausch arbeiteten sie an streng geheimen Projekten, darunter dem Bau der Atombombe und der Entwicklung des Computers, weitgehend finanziert vom US-Militär. Auf der Basis jahrelanger Recherchen erzählt der amerikanische Wissenschaftshistoriker George Dyson erstmals die faszinierende Geschichte dieser Anfänge des digitalen Zeitalters.

Die Ursprünge des digitalen Zeitalters

Turings Kathedrale

Untitled on Turing, Shannon, Wiener and Von Neuman

Describes history, development and redevelopment of Aleut kayak. Traces author's odyssey to refine and re-design ancient Aleut kayak. Includes photography of construction details and plans.

George Dyson

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