Nils Aall Barricelli: The Italian-Norwegian Mathematician was a Genuine Original

"In March 2003, science and technology historian George Dyson gave a typically entertaining TED talk about the creation of the modern computer, featuring characters ranging from Thomas Hobbes and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz in the 17th century, to John von Neumann, a pioneer of the modern computer in the 1940s.

Despite the luminous supporting cast, however, the star of Dyson’s show was Italian-Norwegian mathematician Nils Aall Barricelli.

'This is Barricelli’s universe,' Dyson says. 'This is the universe we live in now. It’s the universe in which these machines are now doing all these things, including changing biology.'"

Read more at Cosmos.