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Freeman Dysons' Letters Offer Another Glimpse of Genius

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Dysons' typed letters give an impression of his quick wit at work; often stray letters appear above or below a given line, the mechanisms of strained typewriters do not match the speed of thought Dysons.Photography by Imke Lass / Redux

Here's a scientist who can really write, observed physicist Hans Bethe in his review of Freeman Dysons first book, Disturb the universe, in 1979. Dyson, who died Friday at the age of ninety-six, was a mathematician and theoretical physicist by training, but he became the best known of most Americans as a writer. The book, a poignant collection of essays, some of which have appeared in The new yorker, was a finalist for the National Book Award; he continued to publish ten more. For twenty-five years, he regularly contributed to The New York Book Review, writing on a dazzling array of authors and topics from Daniel Kahneman to Michael Crichton, from the history of the Galpagos to the concept of infinity. His last piece, about the genius and banned physicist Fritz Zwicky, appeared six weeks before his death.

Even by physicist standards, Dysons thought was not limited by the here and now. For a moment he plunged into the esotericism of quantum theory, and the next day he speculated on the logistics of extraterrestrial civilizations. In the 1950s, he led the team developing a new type of nuclear reactor, which included several new safety features; soon after, he designed an interstellar spacecraft powered by nuclear bombs. (His plans were scuttled by the 1963 Limited Test Ban Treaty) Many of his views were penetrating, some like his insistence that fears rising CO2 the levels were more exaggerated than a bit eccentric. In the end, he was a mental adventurer, not so much an iconoclast as an intellectually intrepid and curiously relentless.

I first met Dyson in January 2001. He welcomed me to the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS), in Princeton, New Jersey, where he had worked for almost ;a half-century. Although it was in the late seventies, Dyson was an elfish and a spry, climbing the stairs two at a time. I was there to interview him for a book I was writing, on how physicists had learned to calculate subtle effects among elementary particles using a theory known as ; quantum electrodynamics, or QED Dyson had played a central role in these developments in the late 1990s, consolidating and advancing the knowledge of three other physicists Richard Feynman, Julian Schwinger and Sin-Itiro Tomonaga. These three people then shared the Nobel Prize for the work, but it was the contribution of Dysons who made the Q.E.D. a workable theory. Drawing directly on the work of Dysons, physicists were able to make theoretical predictions on the behavior of particles like electrons with unprecedented precision. Compared to the results of ultra-sensitive experiments, their answers are only one in a trillion. It's like estimating the distance from a bench in Central Park to a particular crater on the moon, and getting the correct answer across the width of a human hair.

This afternoon in January, Dyson graciously sat down with me for a two-hour interview, answering my questions about the origins of Q.E.D. how the theory had evolved in collaboration with students and colleagues. As we finished, I shyly asked for something more personal. I recently saw some of Dysons 'correspondence quoted from a colleagues' book: letters he had written to his parents and sister during some of the most exciting times in his work. Can i see them?

By the time I asked the question out loud, I was overwhelmed by the awkwardness. It was like asking to read his childhood newspaper. But, without hesitation, Dyson jumped from his chair, opened a few filing cabinets, and produced several thick files, bulging with letters. Even more remarkable, he installed me a photocopier and a spare key for his office, so that I could make copies of the entire collection.

The letters I read started in September 1947, the first month of Dysons in the United States. Born in Berkshire, England, Dyson was a math prodigy and went on to study at the University of Cambridge. Interrupted by the war, he used his quantitative skills as an analyst in the Operational Research Section of the Royal Air Force Bomber Commanda, a thought experiment that he later shared in Disturbing the Universe. Back in Cambridge, he moved from mathematics to physics but quickly got restless. The real excitement in this area, he thought, had moved to the United States and, with the help of a Commonwealth scholarship, he left to pursue graduate studies at Cornell.

From Ithaca, he immediately started sending letters home. Yesterday I came here by train, he wrote to his dear family this fall. A beautiful journey through the mountains and the spectacular Lehigh Valley. He indicated that his new room was very comfortable and suitable for working. It is not designed for social life, in fact, the rules are: no cooking, no alcohol and no women. The student cafeteria was simply filled with the most delicious food, and I will have no trouble gaining weight with $ 2 a day. Sometimes Dyson wrote the letters by hand, but more often he used an inexpensive portable typewriter. The originals give an impression of his lively spirit at work; often stray letters appear above or below a given line, the mechanisms of strained typewriters do not match the speed of thought Dysons.

In response to his mother's questions about her daily routine, he replied: I live a highly professional existence, with no privacy to speak of, and I wake up in the morning thinking of mesons and photons, and he doesn’t ; there is not much to say about this. Rather than dwelling on his studies, Dyson played the amateur anthropologist, sending detailed reports on university life. His competence will soon also include political life. Thomas Dewey, the Republican governor of New York and presidential candidate, seemed very fat to Dyson during a visit to the campus, while the famous Henry Wallace delivered an electrifying speech in front of his comrades and his teachers. Roaming beyond Ithaca, Dyson hitchhiked in New York with friends and made long bus trips along the East Coast and into the Midwest. He sent thoughtful observations on race relations in Chicago, St. Louis and Ypsilanti, Michigan, and described the endless succession of rich, well-kept farms and rich, poorly maintained industrial cities on a long drive to Is.

His letters also testify to his deep friendship and his growing collaboration with Feynman, who was then a young physics professor at Cornell. The famous charismatic physicist struck Dyson as half genius and half buffoon, who keeps all physicists and their children amused by his effervescent vitality. Feynman was still developing a new diagram-based approach for Q.E.D. but had not yet written a detailed account of his thinking. His descriptions of how to use the diagrams seemed to Dyson to be scattered and imprecise.

Dyson learned more about Feynmans' new approach when the two crossed the country together in June 1948, Feynman to visit a girlfriend in Albuquerque, and Dyson to admire the views en route to a physics conference at 39; University of Michigan. Dyson had sixteen hundred miles to choose Feynmans' brain. But their conversation about the electrons was interrupted near Oklahoma City, where the floods closed parts of Route 66, forcing them to leave the road in a small town. Other stranded travelers had already booked all the hotel rooms in the area and Dyson started to get nervous.

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