Synopsis
The present book is intended, as far as possible, to give an exact insight into the theory of relativity to those readers who, from a general scientific and philosophical point of view, are interested in the theory, but who are not conversant with the mathematical apparatus of theoretical physics. The text is divided into three parts which deal respectively with the special theory of relativity, with the general theory of relativity, and with considerations on the universe as a whole. The special theory deals with the physics of elementary particles while the general theory is concerned with the force of gravity and its effect on the other forces of nature. These two theories, while exceptional in their explanations of their particular focus, are inconsistent with each other, and it has long been an aim of the science of physics to help resolve these inconsistencies. Einstein proposed that, rather than discarding these two principles for being conflicting, the rules of time and space should be completely revamped and rethought in order to find a way to make these two principles work in harmony. It is Einstein's work on relativity which would earn him the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics and establish his legacy as one of the most famous scientists of all time. This edition is translated by Robert W. Lawson and is printed on premium acid-free paper.
Biographie de l'auteur
ALBERT EINSTEIN was born in Ulm, Germany, on March 14, 1879. An indifferent student, Einstein gave little hint of the great scientist he would become: he found school merely monotonous; indeed, one of his teachers at the Polytechnic Institute of Zurich, Switzerland, where Einstein enrolled in 1896, later described him as "a lazy fellow, [who] never cared for mathematics."
Following graduation in 1900, Einstein worked for two years as a private teacher before being hired by the Swiss Patent Office at Bern. In 1903 Einstein married Mileva Maric, who had also been a student at the Polytechnic. Following the birth of two sons, the couple divorced in 1919.
The undemanding job at the Patent Office left Einstein time to give birth to those burgeoning ideas that would change physics forever. In 1905 he published the first of his revolutionary papers on relativity (the second would follow a decade later), as well as groundbreaking papers on Brownian motion and the photo-electric effect. Yet, despite this prodigious output, Einstein could not leave the Patent Office until 1909, when he was offered an associate professorship at the University of Zurich. From Zurich Einstein went to spend a year at the German University of Prague, and two years at the Zurich Polytechnic. In 1914 he moved to Berlin, where he became professor and later director at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Physics. Einstein continued to work unstintingly on quantum mechanics (publishing two great papers in 1924-25) and a unified field theory.
In the 1920s, Einstein, witnessing the growing anti-Semitism around him, began to espouse Zionism. In 1933, while Einstein was visiting the United States with his second wife, Elsa, Adolf Hitler ascended to power. Effectively barred from Germany because he was a Jew, Einstein accepted a professorship at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, and became a naturalized American citizen in 1940. From his home in Princeton, Einstein used his fame and influence to rescue colleagues still trapped in Germany.
Fearful that the Nazis would develop an atomic bomb, Einstein wrote to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1939 in order to encourage him to begin the United States on a program of uranium research. After World War II, however, Einstein would work for nuclear disarmament. In 1952, in recognition of his devotion to the causes of peace and Zionism, Einstein was offered, but refused, the presidency of Israel. He died in Princeton, New Jersey, on April 18, 1955, after a long illness.
Albert Einstein published works of interest to the layperson: The Nature of Relativity (1923), Builders of the Universe (1932), Why War? (with Sigmund Freud) (1933), The World As I See It (1934), and Out of My Later Years (1950).
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