Historical Figure
Albert Einstein
1879–1955
German-born theoretical physicist (1879–1955)
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Biography
Albert Einstein was a German-born theoretical physicist best known for developing the theory of relativity. Einstein also made important contributions to quantum theory. His mass–energy equivalence formula E = mc2, which arises from special relativity, has been called "the world's most famous equation". He received the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics for "his services to theoretical physics, and especially for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect".
In Their Own Words (5)
I am fascinated by Spinoza's pantheism, but I admire even more his contribution to modern thought because he is the first philosopher to deal with the soul and body as one, and not two separate things.
Did not appear in the Saturday Evening Post story, but quoted in Einstein: His Life and Universe by Walter Isaacson, p. 387, in the section discussing Viereck's interview. , 1929
Dear Habicht, / Such a solemn air of silence has descended between us that I almost feel as if I am committing a sacrilege when I break it now with some inconsequential babble... / What are you up to, you frozen whale, you smoked, dried, canned piece of soul...?
Opening of a letter to his friend Conrad Habicht in which he describes his four revolutionary Annus Mirabilis papers (18 or 25 May 1905) Doc. 27 , 1905
By a clock we understand anything characterized by a phenomenon passing periodically through identical phases so that we must assume, by the principle of sufficient reason, that all that happens in a given period is identical with all that happens in an arbitrary period.
"Principe de relativité" Archives des sciences physiques et naturelles (1910) ser. 4. 29 5-28 pp. 125–244, as quoted by Julian Barbour, "The Nature of Time" (Mar 20, 2009) p. 7, arXiv:0903.3489. , 1910
Our entire much-praised technological progress, and civilization generally, could be compared to an axe in the hand of a pathological criminal.
Letter to Heinrich Zangger (1917), as quoted in A Sense of the Mysterious: Science and the Human Spirit by Alan Lightman (2005), p. 110, and in Albert Einstein: A Biography by Albrecht Fölsing (1997), p. 399 , 1917
The mass of a body is a measure of its energy content.
Ist die Trägheit eines Körpers von seinem Energieinhalt abhängig? ("Does the inertia of a body depend upon its energy content?") , 1905
Timeline
The story of Albert Einstein, told in moments.
Renounces his German citizenship at 17 to avoid military service. He is stateless for five years. He enrolls at the Swiss Federal Polytechnic in Zurich, where he skips most of his classes and reads physics on his own.
Publishes four papers in a single year while working as a patent clerk in Bern. Photoelectric effect. Brownian motion. Special relativity. Mass-energy equivalence. He is 26. Nobody at the patent office knows.
Presents the field equations of general relativity to the Prussian Academy of Sciences. Ten years of work. The theory replaces Newton's law of gravitation, which had held for 228 years.
A solar eclipse over West Africa confirms general relativity. Light bends around the sun exactly as Einstein predicted. Newspapers worldwide run the story. He wakes up famous.
Awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics. Not for relativity. For the photoelectric effect, from that 1905 paper. The committee considered relativity too controversial.
Attends the Fifth Solvay Conference in Brussels. Twenty-nine physicists. The photo becomes the most famous group portrait in science. Einstein spends the week arguing with Niels Bohr about quantum mechanics. He loses. He never accepts it.
Flees Nazi Germany and settles in Princeton, New Jersey. He'll never return to Europe. His books are burned in Berlin. His property is seized. His name appears on a Nazi bounty list with a ,000 price on his head.
Dies at Princeton Hospital of an abdominal aortic aneurysm. He is 76. He refuses surgery. "I want to go when I want," he tells his doctor. "It is tasteless to prolong life artificially." The pathologist on duty steals his brain during the autopsy. It won't be returned to his family for decades.
Show full timeline (11 entries)
Signs a letter to President Roosevelt warning that Germany might build an atomic bomb. The letter, drafted by Leo Szilard, leads to the Manhattan Project. Einstein later calls signing it the greatest mistake of his life.
Offered the presidency of Israel after Chaim Weizmann dies. He declines. He is 73, a theoretical physicist in Princeton, and he says he lacks the natural aptitude for dealing with people.
Time magazine names Einstein the Person of the Century. Not of the year. Of the hundred years.
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