Freeman Dyson unified quantum electrodynamics, designed a nuclear-powered spacecraft, challenged climate orthodoxy, and argued that biotechnology would become a household art. He won every major physics prize except the Nobel and spent his career crossing boundaries that other scientists respected.

This episode traces how a British mathematician became one of America’s most original and unpredictable scientific minds.

• How he proved Feynman’s and Schwinger’s approaches to QED were equivalent
• Project Orion and the dream of propelling spacecraft with nuclear explosions
• His contrarian stance on climate change and what motivated it
• The Dyson sphere concept and its influence on science fiction