Before Newton, physics used to be called natural philosophy. Newton made it tractable.
Before von Neumann, strategy was philosophy.
("But it's so simple. All I have to do is divine from what I know of you: are you the sort of man who would put the poison into his own goblet or his enemy's? Now, a clever man would put the poison into his own goblet, because he would know that only a great fool would reach for what he was given. I am not a great fool, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of you. But you must have known I was not a great fool, you would have counted on it, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me.")
After von Neumann, strategy became tractable.
(Obviously, this view of history is very simplified.)
Yap, and he made a 1-5 scale for good looking girls as well when he was studying in Germany. Like science, he felt that the best physics development have already been done, and all the best looking girls taken. (Disclaimer: no relation to Lev, even though we share the same name).
