John von Neumann Quotes

John von Neumann was born in Budapest, Hungary. He was a Hungarian-born American mathematician. He made major contributions to a number of fields, including mathematics, physics, economics, computing, and statistics. He was a pioneer of the application of operator theory to quantum mechanics in the development of functional analysis, and a key figure in the development of game theory and the concepts of cellular automata, the universal constructor and the digital computer. He earned a BS degree in Chemical Engineering from ETH Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology). He received his PhD in Mathematics from the University of Budapest. He also studied at the University of Berlin and the University of Göttingen. From 1933-1957, he served as professor of Mathematics at Institute for Advanced Studies, Princeton, New Jersey. His analysis of the structure of self-replication preceded the discovery of the structure of DNA. During World War II, he worked on the Manhattan Project. After the war, he served on the General Advisory Committee of the United States Atomic Energy Commission. He wrote several books include: Mathematical Foundations of Quantum Mechanics, Continuous Geometry, Theory of Games and Economic Behavior (with Oskar Morgenstern), The Computer and the Brain, and Invariant measures. He received many awards, including Bôcher Memorial Prize, Navy Distinguished Civilian Service Award, Medal for Merit, Presidential Medal of Freedom (by President Dwight D. Eisenhower), and Enrico Fermi Award.