After watching the movie John Nash, I found myself searching the biographies of Von Neumann, Kurt Godel and Einstein from wikipedia. I learned some important facts that I didn't know. I had some info about Einstein but not that much about Von Neumann.
First of all Von Neumann's origin is mathematics and physics (I didn't know) while Einstein's is physics (I knew :)). Although Von Neumann is well-known with his "computer architecture" in the computer literacy, he has done really important contributions in physics (especially nuclear physics --> hydrogen bomb), economics and mathematics (Game theory).
They are three of the four people invited to Princeton. Einstein was born earlier than Von Neumann who is around the same age with Godel. Von Neumann and Einstein were born to Jewish families, Kurt Godel lived in the circles of Jewish people. I think that's why they all moved to the US because of German pressure. They all grew up in German-origin countries (Germany, Hungary-Austria).
Then I could conclude that, World War II worked for the US :)... But I would say the president of US at that time (transferring these guys to the US) is a really brilliant guy predicting the future.
Name Contributed to
Von Neumann --> Physics, Computer Science, Mathematics,
Economics (ohh man this guy is great)
Einstein --> Mathematics, Physics
Kurt Godel --> Logic, Mathematics
There are lots of things to learn from these biographies : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_von_Neumann
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_G%C3%B6del
Stay tuned...
