Was John von Neumann a "horrible" person when he proposed a preemptive war against the Soviets within the framework of Cold War geopolitics? Was he an altruist when he stood by Mandelbrot and defended Oppenheimer (the communist "father" of the atomic bomb), or was he a rigid rationalist when he quietly sowed solutions to the challenges humanity would face in the future? Difficult questions without easy answers for this multifaceted personality, for this unimaginable supermind of the 20th century.

• Our smartphones and the architecture of computers that mimic our minds,
• the relentless winning strategy in game theory and the dynamics of evolutionary biology (from self-replicating spaceships to xenobots),
• the terrible thermonuclear bomb and the anxiety for our planet,
• the unparalleled mathematical intelligence, the quirky philanthropy, and the gift of enjoying thinking...

... all bear the indelible imprint of the resourceful "Johnny." The mathematical contributions of this Hungarian scientist with "alien" intelligence defined the intellectual currents of our century from politics to economics and from technology to psychology. His ideas were inexhaustible. He generously shared them with Hilbert, Turing, Gödel, Heisenberg, Feynman, Minsky, and all the leading scientists of his time, as he jumped from field to field, providing solutions everywhere.

Wherever he went, "Johnny" sparked revolutions. The incomparably "proper" professor at Princeton drove the fastest cars, threw the wildest parties, married beautiful women, and enjoyed wealth. But above all, he loved thinking. He became unpopular when he offered his expertise to the Rand Corporation and the cold logic of nuclear deterrence, yet he was tormented by dark thoughts about the future of our world and the death of innocents.

He was the mathematician who paved the way for the arrival of the first digital computer. He ignited the birth of artificial intelligence and nanotechnology, and defined the development of neuroscience. He was lauded! He had the reputation of the smartest mind in the world – even surpassing Einstein! After his death, his image dimmed; many portrayed him as the most "cold" of the Cold Warriors. Almost forgotten, however, year by year, we experience the oddly vast predictive power of his mind.

A biography of the torrential, astonishing life of the cosmopolitan visionary John von Neumann and the world he created for us. A "biography of ideas" that electrifies.