George Dyson | |
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 Dyson at his workshop in 2025 | |
| Born | (1953-03-26)March 26, 1953 (age 72) Ithaca, New York, U.S. |
| Occupation(s) | Science historian, writer, boat designer, builder |
| Children | Lauren |
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George Dyson (born March 26, 1953) is an American non-fictionauthor andhistorian oftechnology whose publications broadly cover the evolution of technology in relation to the physical environment and the direction of society.[1]
He has written on a wide range of topics, including thehistory of computing, the development ofalgorithms and intelligence,communications systems,space exploration, and the design ofwatercraft.
Dyson's early life is described inKenneth Brower's bookThe Starship and the Canoe.[2] When he was sixteen he went to live inBritish Columbia to pursue his interest inkayaking.
From 1972 to 1975, he lived in atreehouse at a height of 30 metres that he built from salvaged materials on the shore ofBurrard Inlet. Dyson became a Canadian citizen and spent 20 years in British Columbia, designing kayaks, researching historic voyages and native peoples, and exploring theInside Passage. He was, during this period, estranged from his father for some time.[3]
"What if the cost of machines that think is people who don't?"
Dyson's first book,Baidarka, published in 1986, described his research on the history of theAleutian kayak, its evolution in the hands of Russian fur traders, and his adaptation of its design to modern materials. He is the author ofProject Orion: The Atomic Spaceship 1957–1965 andDarwin Among the Machines: The Evolution of Global Intelligence, in which he expands upon the premise ofSamuel Butler's1863 article of the same name and suggests that theInternet is a living, sentient being. His 2012 bookTuring's Cathedral[5] has been described as "a creation myth of the digital universe." It was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times 2012 Book Prize in the science and technology category[6] and was chosen by University of California Berkeley's annual "On the Same Page" program for the academic year 2013–14.[7]
Dyson is the founder/owner of Dyson, Baidarka & Company, a designer ofAleut-style skinkayaks; he is credited with the revival of thebaidarka style of kayak.
Dyson was a visiting lecturer and research associate at Western Washington University'sFairhaven College and was Director's Visitor at theInstitute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey, in 2002–03. He was a frequent contributor toEdge.org between 1998 and 2019.[8]
Turing's Cathedral is Dyson's fourth book. ThoughAlan Turing is in the title, the book focuses onJohn von Neumann and his 1946 attempt to build a computer at Princeton'sInstitute for Advanced Study (known as theIAS machine,MANIAC I was the same machine later built at Los Alamos Laboratory). Dyson interviewed several people who knew von Neumann, including his father, Freeman Dyson. The book received mostly positive reviews.[9][10] Brian E. Blank noted in his review "[e]xtensive biographical and institutional backgrounds", and concludes it with:[11]
It is difficult to avoid the conclusion thatTuring's Cathedral is an idiosyncratic, undisciplined, crazy quilt of a book. The reviewer had no preconceived notions about the sort of book that might be authored by a man who once lived for three years in a treehouse 95 feet above the ground, but the eccentricities ofTuring's Cathedral do not seem inconsistent with what might be imagined. And yet, for all its flaws, shortcomings, and waywardness, it is a book that amply rewards its readers.
George Dyson's parents were the theoretical physicistFreeman Dyson and mathematicianVerena Huber-Dyson.[20] He is the brother of technology analystEsther Dyson, and the grandson of the composerGeorge Dyson.[21]
George Dyson[22] and Ann Yow-Dyson[23] have a daughter. He lives and works inBellingham, Washington.[citation needed]
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