Einstein: His Life and Universe

The de Broglie wavelength of a baseball thrown at 90 mph would be about 10

^–34

meters, incredibly smaller than the size of an atom or even a proton, so infinitessimal as to be unobservable.

*

In 1995, Bose-Einstein condensation was finally achieved experimentally by Eric A. Cornell, Wolfgang Ketterle, and Carl E. Wieman, who were awarded the 2001 Nobel Prize for this work.

*

From his 1905 special relativity paper: “It is well known that Maxwell’s electrodynamics—as usually understood now—when applied to moving bodies leads to asymmetries that do not seem inherent in the phenomena. Take, for example, the electrodynamic interaction between a magnet and a conductor.” From the 1905 light quanta paper: “A profound formal difference exists between the theories that physicists have formed about gases and other ponderable bodies, and Maxwell’s theory of electromagnetic processes in so-called empty space.”

*

“To be is to be perceived,” meaning that it makes no sense to say that unperceived things—most famously Berkeley’s example of trees in a forest “and no body by to perceive them”—actually exist (George Berkeley,

Principles of Human Knowledge,

section 23).

*

As Eddington showed, the cosmological term probably would not have worked even if the universe had turned out to be static. Because it required such a delicate balance, any small disturbance would have caused a runaway expansion or contraction of the universe.

*

The pacifists assumed that no other explanation was needed, but some contemporary accounts somehow thought the buttons referred to 2 percent beer.

*

There are two related concepts that Einstein uses.

Separability

means that different particles or systems that occupy different regions in space have an independent reality;

locality

means that an action involving one of these particles or systems cannot influence a particle or system in another part of space unless something travels the distance between them, a process limited by the speed of light.

*

An aneurysm is the ballooning or dilation of a blood vessel, as if it were blistering. The abdominal aorta is one of the large arteries from the heart, in the region between the diaphragm and the abdomen.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Main Characters

CHAPTER ONE The Light-Beam Rider

CHAPTER TWO Childhood, 1879–1896

CHAPTER THREE The Zurich Polytechnic, 1896–1900

CHAPTER FOUR The Lovers, 1900–1904

CHAPTER FIVE The Miracle Year: Quanta and Molecules, 1905

CHAPTER SIX Special Relativity, 1905

CHAPTER SEVEN The Happiest Thought, 1906–1909

CHAPTER EIGHT The Wandering Professor, 1909–1914

CHAPTER NINE General Relativity, 1911–1915

CHAPTER TEN Divorce, 1916–1919

CHAPTER ELEVEN Einstein’s Universe, 1916–1919

CHAPTER TWELVE Fame, 1919

CHAPTER THIRTEEN The Wandering Zionist, 1920–1921

CHAPTER FOURTEEN Nobel Laureate, 1921–1927

CHAPTER FIFTEEN Unified Field Theories, 1923–1931

CHAPTER SIXTEEN Turning Fifty, 1929–1931

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN Einstein’s God

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN The Refugee, 1932–1933

CHAPTER NINETEEN America, 1933–1939

CHAPTER TWENTY Quantum Entanglement, 1935

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE The Bomb, 1939–1945

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO One-Worlder, 1945–1948

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE Landmark, 1948–1953