The Collected Papers of Albert Einstein: The early years, 1879-1902 PDF Download

Author: Albert Einstein
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Physicists
Languages : en
Pages : 228

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Author: Thomas Levenson
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 0525508953
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 498

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In a book that is both biography and the most exciting form of history, here are eighteen years in the life of a man, Albert Einstein, and a city, Berlin, that were in many ways the defining years of the twentieth century. Einstein in Berlin In the spring of 1913 two of the giants of modern science traveled to Zurich. Their mission: to offer the most prestigious position in the very center of European scientific life to a man who had just six years before been a mere patent clerk. Albert Einstein accepted, arriving in Berlin in March 1914 to take up his new post. In December 1932 he left Berlin forever. “Take a good look,” he said to his wife as they walked away from their house. “You will never see it again.” In between, Einstein’s Berlin years capture in microcosm the odyssey of the twentieth century. It is a century that opens with extravagant hopes--and climaxes in unparalleled calamity. These are tumultuous times, seen through the life of one man who is at once witness to and architect of his day--and ours. He is present at the events that will shape the journey from the commencement of the Great War to the rumblings of the next one. We begin with the eminent scientist, already widely recognized for his special theory of relativity. His personal life is in turmoil, with his marriage collapsing, an affair under way. Within two years of his arrival in Berlin he makes one of the landmark discoveries of all time: a new theory of gravity--and before long is transformed into the first international pop star of science. He flourishes during a war he hates, and serves as an instrument of reconciliation in the early months of the peace; he becomes first a symbol of the hope of reason, then a focus for the rage and madness of the right. And throughout these years Berlin is an equal character, with its astonishing eruption of revolutionary pathways in art and architecture, in music, theater, and literature. Its wild street life and sexual excesses are notorious. But with the debacle of the depression and Hitler’s growing power, Berlin will be transformed, until by the end of 1932 it is no longer a safe home for Einstein. Once a hero, now vilified not only as the perpetrator of “Jewish physics” but as the preeminent symbol of all that the Nazis loathe, he knows it is time to leave.

Author: David Adler
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 1489922601
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 448

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The Institute for Amorphous Studies was founded in 1982 as the international center for the investigation of amorphous mate rials. It has since played an important role in promoting the und er standing of disordered matter in general. An Institute lecture series on "Fundamentals of Amorphous Materials and Devices" was held during 1982-83 with distinguished speakers from universities and industry. These events were free and open to the public ,and were attended by many representatives of the scientific community. The lectures themselves were highly successful inasmuch as they provided not only formal instruction but also an opportunity for vigorous and stimulating debate. That last element could not be captured within the pages of a book I but the lectures concentrated on the latest advances in the field I which is why their essential contents are he re reproduced in collective form. Together they constitute an interdisciplinary status report of the field. The speakers brought many different viewpoints and a variety of back ground experiences io bear on the problems involved I but though language and conventions vary I the essential unity of the concerns is very clear I as indeed are the ultimate benefits of the many-sided approach.

Author: Michel Janssen
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521828341
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 579

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These fourteen essays by leading historians and philosophers of science introduce the reader to the work of Albert Einstein. Following an introduction that places Einstein's work in the context of his life and times, the essays explain his main contributions to physics in terms that are accessible to a general audience, including special and general relativity, quantum physics, statistical physics, and unified field theory. The closing essays explore the relation between Einstein's work and twentieth-century philosophy, as well as his political writings.

Author: Roger Highfield
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 9780312302276
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 380

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This controversial account of Albert Einstein's scandalous personal life challenges the image of this genius, painting a shocking portrait that exposes him as "an adulterous, egomaniacal misogynist who may have even beaten his first wife"(The New York Times Sunday Magazine). Photos.

Author: Vicki Daitch
Publisher: Joseph Henry Press
ISBN: 0309084083
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 489

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What is genius? Define it. Now think of scientists who embody the concept of genius. Does the name John Bardeen spring to mind? Indeed, have you ever heard of him? Like so much in modern life, immediate name recognition often rests on a cult of personality. We know Einstein, for example, not just for his tremendous contributions to science, but also because he was a character, who loved to mug for the camera. And our continuing fascination with Richard Feynman is not exclusively based on his body of work; it is in large measure tied to his flamboyant nature and offbeat sense of humor. These men, and their outsize personalities, have come to erroneously symbolize the true nature of genius and creativity. We picture them born brilliant, instantly larger than life. But is that an accurate picture of genius? What of others who are equal in stature to these icons of science, but whom history has awarded only a nod because they did not readily engage the public? Could a person qualify as a bona fide genius if he was a regular Joe? The answer may rest in the story of John Bardeen. John Bardeen was the first person to have been awarded two Nobel Prizes in the same field. He shared one with William Shockley and Walter Brattain for the invention of the transistor. But it was the charismatic Shockley who garnered all the attention, primarily for his Hollywood ways and notorious views on race and intelligence. Bardeen's second Nobel Prize was awarded for the development of a theory of superconductivity, a feat that had eluded the best efforts of leading theorists-including Albert Einstein, Neils Bohr, Werner Heisenberg, and Richard Feynman. Arguably, Bardeen's work changed the world in more ways than that of any other scientific genius of his time. Yet while every school child knows of Einstein, few people have heard of John Bardeen. Why is this the case? Perhaps because Bardeen differs radically from the popular stereotype of genius. He was a modest, mumbling Midwesterner, an ordinary person who worked hard and had a knack for physics and mathematics. He liked to picnic with his family, collaborate quietly with colleagues, or play a round of golf. None of that was newsworthy, so the media, and consequently the public, ignored him. John Bardeen simply fits a new profile of genius. Through an exploration of his science as well as his life, a fresh and thoroughly engaging portrait of genius and the nature of creativity emerges. This perspective will have readers looking anew at what it truly means to be a genius.

Author: Olivier Darrigol
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 9780198505938
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 566

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This book recounts the developments of fundamental electrodynamics from Ampère's investigation of the forces between electric currents to Einstein's introduction of a new doctrine of space and time. The emphasis is on the diverse, evolving practices of electrodynamics and the interactions between the corresponding scientific traditions. A richly documented, clearly written, and abundantly illustrated history of the subject.

Author: Thomas Levenson
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
ISBN: 0812988302
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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The captivating, all-but-forgotten story of Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, and the search for a planet that never existed For more than fifty years, the world’s top scientists searched for the “missing” planet Vulcan, whose existence was mandated by Isaac Newton’s theories of gravity. Countless hours were spent on the hunt for the elusive orb, and some of the era’s most skilled astronomers even claimed to have found it. There was just one problem: It was never there. In The Hunt for Vulcan, Thomas Levenson follows the visionary scientists who inhabit the story of the phantom planet, starting with Isaac Newton, who in 1687 provided an explanation for all matter in motion throughout the universe, leading to Urbain-Jean-Joseph Le Verrier, who almost two centuries later built on Newton’s theories and discovered Neptune, becoming the most famous scientist in the world. Le Verrier attempted to surpass that triumph by predicting the existence of yet another planet in our solar system, Vulcan. It took Albert Einstein to discern that the mystery of the missing planet was a problem not of measurements or math but of Newton’s theory of gravity itself. Einstein’s general theory of relativity proved that Vulcan did not and could not exist, and that the search for it had merely been a quirk of operating under the wrong set of assumptions about the universe. Levenson tells the previously untold tale of how the “discovery” of Vulcan in the nineteenth century set the stage for Einstein’s monumental breakthrough, the greatest individual intellectual achievement of the twentieth century. A dramatic human story of an epic quest, The Hunt for Vulcan offers insight into how science really advances (as opposed to the way we’re taught about it in school) and how the best work of the greatest scientists reveals an artist’s sensibility. Opening a new window onto our world, Levenson illuminates some of our most iconic ideas as he recounts one of the strangest episodes in the history of science. Praise for The Hunt for Vulcan “Delightful . . . a charming tale about an all-but-forgotten episode in science history.”—The Wall Street Journal “Engaging . . . At heart, this is a story about how science advances, one insight at a time. But the immediacy, almost romance, of Levenson’s writing makes it almost novelistic.”—The Washington Post “A well-structured, fast-paced example of exemplary science writing.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

Author: Aant Elzinga
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780881352832
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 248

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In essence, Einstein did not win the Nobel Prize in Physics for 1921 for developing the theory of relativity. Instead the committee in charge considered his work on the photoelectric effect more worthy of attention. Here Elzinga (history of ideas and history of science emeritus, U. of Goteborg), working from his research in the Nobel archives of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, describes the complex story of how and why Einstein received the award, having been nominated 60 times from 1910 to 1922. He explores the possibilities of who and what were responsible for the sole successful nomination, the scientific community's skepticism about relativity, the role philosophy, politics and culture had in science in the cold war after the First World War, and what it was about Einstein himself that may have encouraged or discouraged the committee.

Author: Yuri Balashov
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 9780817642631
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 340

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This volume presents a selection of contributions by Russian scholars - historians and philosophers to science - to the Einstein Studies industry, broadly construed. This work explores the historical and foundational issues in general relativity and relativistic cosmology, Einstein's contributions to early quantum mechanics and the rise of Dirac's quantum electrodynamics. It also includes a detailed description of the physics colloquium Einstein established and coordinated in 1912-1913 and comments on his brief interest in the construction of the plane wing in 1916. most scholars. Materials from various Russian archives shed new light on the famous exchange (regarding the first evolutionary cosmological models) between Einstein and Alexander Friedmann in the early 1920s and on the role of Boris Podolsky and Vladimir Fock in the emergence of quantum electrodynamics. The little-known correspondence between Einstein and a famous German pilot Paul Erhardt suggests that during World War I, the former was involved with aero- and hydrodynamics research and ways of improving airplane design. Other articles introduce new approaches to important foundational questions in general relativity and cosmology.