Chronological List of Correspondence, 1895–1920
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Ricci, Levi-Civita, and the Birth of General Relativity Reviewed by David E
BOOK REVIEW Einstein’s Italian Mathematicians: Ricci, Levi-Civita, and the Birth of General Relativity Reviewed by David E. Rowe Einstein’s Italian modern Italy. Nor does the author shy away from topics Mathematicians: like how Ricci developed his absolute differential calculus Ricci, Levi-Civita, and the as a generalization of E. B. Christoffel’s (1829–1900) work Birth of General Relativity on quadratic differential forms or why it served as a key By Judith R. Goodstein tool for Einstein in his efforts to generalize the special theory of relativity in order to incorporate gravitation. In This delightful little book re- like manner, she describes how Levi-Civita was able to sulted from the author’s long- give a clear geometric interpretation of curvature effects standing enchantment with Tul- in Einstein’s theory by appealing to his concept of parallel lio Levi-Civita (1873–1941), his displacement of vectors (see below). For these and other mentor Gregorio Ricci Curbastro topics, Goodstein draws on and cites a great deal of the (1853–1925), and the special AMS, 2018, 211 pp. 211 AMS, 2018, vast secondary literature produced in recent decades by the world that these and other Ital- “Einstein industry,” in particular the ongoing project that ian mathematicians occupied and helped to shape. The has produced the first 15 volumes of The Collected Papers importance of their work for Einstein’s general theory of of Albert Einstein [CPAE 1–15, 1987–2018]. relativity is one of the more celebrated topics in the history Her account proceeds in three parts spread out over of modern mathematical physics; this is told, for example, twelve chapters, the first seven of which cover episodes in [Pais 1982], the standard biography of Einstein. -
Warburg Effect(S)—A Biographical Sketch of Otto Warburg and His Impacts on Tumor Metabolism Angela M
Otto Cancer & Metabolism (2016) 4:5 DOI 10.1186/s40170-016-0145-9 REVIEW Open Access Warburg effect(s)—a biographical sketch of Otto Warburg and his impacts on tumor metabolism Angela M. Otto Abstract Virtually everyone working in cancer research is familiar with the “Warburg effect”, i.e., anaerobic glycolysis in the presence of oxygen in tumor cells. However, few people nowadays are aware of what lead Otto Warburg to the discovery of this observation and how his other scientific contributions are seminal to our present knowledge of metabolic and energetic processes in cells. Since science is a human endeavor, and a scientist is imbedded in a network of social and academic contacts, it is worth taking a glimpse into the biography of Otto Warburg to illustrate some of these influences and the historical landmarks in his life. His creative and innovative thinking and his experimental virtuosity set the framework for his scientific achievements, which were pioneering not only for cancer research. Here, I shall allude to the prestigious family background in imperial Germany; his relationships to Einstein, Meyerhof, Krebs, and other Nobel and notable scientists; his innovative technical developments and their applications in the advancement of biomedical sciences, including the manometer, tissue slicing, and cell cultivation. The latter were experimental prerequisites for the first metabolic measurements with tumor cells in the 1920s. In the 1930s–1940s, he improved spectrophotometry for chemical analysis and developed the optical tests for measuring activities of glycolytic enzymes. Warburg’s reputation brought him invitations to the USA and contacts with the Rockefeller Foundation; he received the Nobel Prize in 1931. -
EINSTEIN and NAZI PHYSICS When Science Meets Ideology and Prejudice
MONOGRAPH Mètode Science Studies Journal, 10 (2020): 147-155. University of Valencia. DOI: 10.7203/metode.10.13472 ISSN: 2174-3487. eISSN: 2174-9221. Submitted: 29/11/2018. Approved: 23/05/2019. EINSTEIN AND NAZI PHYSICS When science meets ideology and prejudice PHILIP BALL In the 1920s and 30s, in a Germany with widespread and growing anti-Semitism, and later with the rise of Nazism, Albert Einstein’s physics faced hostility and was attacked on racial grounds. That assault was orchestrated by two Nobel laureates in physics, who asserted that stereotypical racial features are exhibited in scientific thinking. Their actions show how ideology can infect and inflect science. Reviewing this episode in the current context remains an instructive and cautionary tale. Keywords: Albert Einstein, Nazism, anti-Semitism, science and ideology. It was German society, Einstein said, that revealed from epidemiology and research into disease (the to him his Jewishness. «This discovery was brought connection of smoking to cancer, and of HIV to home to me by non-Jews rather than Jews», he wrote AIDS) to climate change, this idea perhaps should in 1929 (cited in Folsing, 1998, p. 488). come as no surprise. But it is for that very reason that Shortly after the boycott of Jewish businesses at the the hostility Einstein’s physics sometimes encountered start of April 1933, the German Students Association, in Germany in the 1920s and 30s remains an emboldened by Hitler’s rise to total power, declared instructive and cautionary tale. that literature should be cleansed of the «un-German spirit». The result, on 10 May, was a ritualistic ■ AGAINST RELATIVITY burning of tens of thousands of books «marred» by Jewish intellectualism. -
Math, Physics, and Calabi–Yau Manifolds
Math, Physics, and Calabi–Yau Manifolds Shing-Tung Yau Harvard University October 2011 Introduction I’d like to talk about how mathematics and physics can come together to the benefit of both fields, particularly in the case of Calabi-Yau spaces and string theory. This happens to be the subject of the new book I coauthored, THE SHAPE OF INNER SPACE It also tells some of my own story and a bit of the history of geometry as well. 2 In that spirit, I’m going to back up and talk about my personal introduction to geometry and how I ended up spending much of my career working at the interface between math and physics. Along the way, I hope to give people a sense of how mathematicians think and approach the world. I also want people to realize that mathematics does not have to be a wholly abstract discipline, disconnected from everyday phenomena, but is instead crucial to our understanding of the physical world. 3 There are several major contributions of mathematicians to fundamental physics in 20th century: 1. Poincar´eand Minkowski contribution to special relativity. (The book of Pais on the biography of Einstein explained this clearly.) 2. Contributions of Grossmann and Hilbert to general relativity: Marcel Grossmann (1878-1936) was a classmate with Einstein from 1898 to 1900. he was professor of geometry at ETH, Switzerland at 1907. In 1912, Einstein came to ETH to be professor where they started to work together. Grossmann suggested tensor calculus, as was proposed by Elwin Bruno Christoffel in 1868 (Crelle journal) and developed by Gregorio Ricci-Curbastro and Tullio Levi-Civita (1901). -
The Collaboration of Mileva Marić and Albert Einstein
Asian Journal of Physics Vol 24, No 4 (2015) March The collaboration of Mileva Marić and Albert Einstein Estelle Asmodelle University of Central Lancashire School of Computing, Engineering and Physical Sciences, Preston, Lancashire, UK PR1 2HE. e-mail: [email protected]; Phone: +61 418 676 586. _____________________________________________________________________________________ This is a contemporary review of the involvement of Mileva Marić, Albert Einstein’s first wife, in his theoretical work between the period of 1900 to 1905. Separate biographies are outlined for both Mileva and Einstein, prior to their attendance at the Swiss Federal Polytechnic in Zürich in 1896. Then, a combined journal is described, detailing significant events. In additional to a biographical sketch, comments by various authors are compared and contrasted concerning two narratives: firstly, the sequence of events that happened and the couple’s relationship at particular times. Secondly, the contents of letters from both Einstein and Mileva. Some interpretations of the usage of pronouns in those letters during 1899 and 1905 are re-examined, and a different hypothesis regarding the usage of those pronouns is introduced. Various papers are examined and the content of each subsequent paper is compared to the work that Mileva was performing. With a different take, this treatment further suggests that the couple continued to work together much longer than other authors have indicated. We also evaluate critics and supporters of the hypothesis that Mileva was involved in Einstein’s work, and refocus this within a historical context, in terms of women in science in the late 19th century. Finally, the definition of, collaboration (co-authorship, specifically) is outlined. -
Marcel Grossmann Awards
MG15 MARCEL GROSSMANN AWARDS ROME 2018 ICRANet and ICRA MG XV MARCEL GROSSMANN AWARDS ROME 2018 and TEST The 15th Marcel Grossmann Meeting – MG XV 2nd July 2018, Rome (Italy) Aula Magna – University “Sapienza” of Rome Institutional Awards Goes to: PLANCK SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATION (ESA) “for obtaining important constraints on the models of inflationary stage of the Universe and level of primordial non-Gaussianity; measuring with unprecedented sensitivity gravitational lensing of Cosmic Microwave Background fluctuations by large-scale structure of the Universe and corresponding B- polarization of CMB, the imprint on the CMB of hot gas in galaxy clusters; getting unique information about the time of reionization of our Universe and distribution and properties of the dust and magnetic fields in our Galaxy” - presented to Jean-Loup Puget, the Principal Investigator of the High Frequency Instrument (HFI) HANSEN EXPERIMENTAL PHYSICS LABORATORY AT STANFORD UNIVERSITY “to HEPL for having developed interdepartmental activities at Stanford University at the frontier of fundamental physics, astrophysics and technology” - presented to Research Professor Leo Hollberg, HEPL Assistant Director Individual Awards Goes to LYMAN PAGE “for his collaboration with David Wilkinson in realizing the NASA Explorer WMAP mission and as founding director of the Atacama Cosmology Telescope” Goes to RASHID ALIEVICH SUNYAEV “for the development of theoretical tools in the scrutinising, through the CMB, of the first observable electromagnetic appearance of our Universe” Goes to SHING-TUNG YAU “for the proof of the positivity of total mass in the theory of general relativity and perfecting as well the concept of quasi-local mass, for his proof of the Calabi conjecture, for his continuous inspiring role in the study of black holes physics” Each recipient is presented with a silver casting of the TEST sculpture by the artist A. -
In Defense of Robert Andrews Millikan by David Goodstein
30 ENGINEERING & SCIENCE NO. 4 He also has been accused of male chauvinism, anti-Semitism, mistreating his graduate students, and, worst of all, scientific fraud. In Defense of Robert Andrews Millikan by David Goodstein Robert Andrews Millikan was the founder, first Thomson and his colleagues tried to do it by leader, first Nobel Prize winner and all-around observing how an applied electric field changed patron saint of the California Institute of Technol- the rate of gravitational fall of clouds of water ogy, an institution that has given me employment droplets that had nucleated on ions in a cloud for more years than I care to remember. He also chamber. The upper edge of the cloud, which had has been accused of male chauvinism, anti- the smallest droplets, could be assumed to contain Semitism, mistreating his graduate students, and, single charges. In this way, a crude but correct worst of all, scientific fraud. Since we at Caltech estimate of the unit of electric charge could be feel a solemn duty to defend our hero, my purpose obtained. These cloud-chamber experiments were Isaac Newton (framed) and here is to tell his story, look into these various the starting point of Millikan’s efforts. accusations, and, to the extent that I can, mount Working with a graduate student named Louis Robert Millikan: colleagues a defense for Professor Millikan. Begeman, Millikan had the idea of applying a in crime? Speaking of Millikan was born in 1868, son of a Midwestern much stronger electric field than had previously crime, the Newton portrait minister. -
Pragmatic and Dogmatic Physics: Anti-Semitism in Nature, 1938
1 Pragmatic and Dogmatic Physics: Anti-Semitism in Nature, 1938. A. Loewenstein*, Chemistry Department, Technion, Israel Institute of technology, Haifa 32000, Israel. Tel: 972-4-8293758 Fax: 972-4-8242996 E-mail: [email protected] Abstract The German physicist J. Stark has published, in April 1938, an article entitled: “The Pragmatic and Dogmatic Spirit in Physics” in the prominent scientific journal Nature. In this paper Stark divides the world of Physics into Dogmatic and Pragmatic fractions. According to Stark Jewish scientists dominate the undesired dogmatic spirit while the desired pragmatic fraction is represented mostly by Aryans scientists. The circumstances that led to this publication and the response it received from the scientific community are discussed in this communication. It is interesting to learn how such a combination of anti-Semitic and scientific views found their expression in the pages of Nature. Key words: Nature, J. Stark, A.S. Eve, anti-Semitism and scientific publication. * Aharon Loewenstein is Professor of Chemistry (Emeritus) at the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel. 2 It is well known that anti-Semitism was an important factor in the progress of scientific research, in particular during the Second World War period. The expulsion of Jewish scientists from Nazi Germany had an adverse effect on German science and tremendously promoted the scientific research of the Allied. The contribution of Jewish "émigré" scientists to the development of the atomic bomb and the Radar can not be underestimated. It may be interesting to note that anti-Semitism has also infiltrated into non-German scientific publication media and the present study examines such a case. -
A Debate on Magnetic Current: the Troubled Einstein–Ehrenhaft Correspondence
BJHS 44(3): 371–400, September 2011. © British Society for the History of Science 2010 doi:10.1017/S0007087410001299 First published online 8 October 2010 A debate on magnetic current: the troubled Einstein–Ehrenhaft correspondence GILDO MAGALHÃES SANTOS* Abstract. The unconventional correspondence between physicists Albert Einstein and Felix Ehrenhaft, especially at the height of the alleged production by the latter of magnetic monopoles, is examined in the following paper. Almost unknown by the general public, it is sometimes witty, yet it can be pathetic, and certainly bewildering. At one point the arguments they exchanged became a poetic duel between Einstein and Ehrenhaft’s wife. Ignored by conventional Einstein biographies, this episode took place during the initial years of the Second World War, but was rooted in disputes dating back to the early years of the twentieth century. The interesting intersection of a series of scientific controversies also highlights some aspects of the personal dramas involved, and after so many years the whole affair in itself is still intriguing. The issues in the Ehrenhaft–Einstein epistolary Science has now practically forgotten the polemic figure of Felix Albert Ehrenhaft (1879–1952), an Austrian physicist who in the 1900s and 1910s assumed the existence of electric charges smaller than the electron, based on his experimental work. Three decades later, Ehrenhaft came up with what appeared to be another heresy, insisting that he had observed isolated magnetic poles. He maintained a correspondence with Albert Einstein on these subjects for about thirty years, trying to convince Einstein of the validity of his arguments, while Einstein attacked Ehrenhaft’s conclusions, but followed his experimental work. -
Hilberts Ruf Nach Bern
Gesnerus 57 (2000) 182-205 Hilberts Ruf nach Bern Tilman Sauer* Summary Attempts to find a successor for the late Berne professor of mathematics Johann Heinrich Graf in winter and spring 1919 proved fruitless when, unexpectedly, the renowned Göttingen mathematician David Hilbert intimated that he himself would, under certain conditions, accept a call to Berne. Subsequent negotiations between Hilbert and the Bernese and Prussian authorities mainly concerned the question of salary, with offers of unusually high compensation both in Berne and in Göttingen. Although Hilbert eventually declined for financial reasons, it is argued that his consi- derations may well have been rather complex and reflect both his own situation in Göttingen and the general state of affairs of university mathe- matics in Germany and Switzerland after the First World War. Zusammenfassung Nach erfolglosen Versuchen im Winter und Frühjahr 1919, einen Nachfolger für den verstorbenen Berner Ordinarius für Mathematik Johann Heinrich Graf zu finden, liess unerwarteterweise der bekannte Göttinger Mathema- tiker David Hilbert durchblicken, dass er selbst unter bestimmten Bedin- gungen bereit wäre, einen Ruf nach Bern anzunehmen. Obwohl es in den nachfolgenden Verhandlungen Hilberts mit den Berner und Preussischen Unterrichtsbehörden vornehmlich um Gehaltsfragen ging und Hilbert nach ungewöhnlich grosszügigen Angeboten aus Bern und Berlin den Berner Ruf schliesslich ablehnte, mögen Hilberts Überlegungen dennoch komplex * Ich danke Robert Casties, Hans-Joachim Dahms, Gerd Grasshoff, Andrea Loettgers, Karin Nickelsen, Franziska Roggcr und Klaus Sommer für Anregungen, Hinweise und Kommentare. Tilman Sauer. Universität Bern, Institut für Exakte Wissenschaften, Sidlerstr. 5, CH-3012 Bern ([email protected]). 182 Downloaded from Brill.com10/11/2021 06:36:08AM via free access gewesen sein. -
Albert Einstein - Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia Page 1 of 27
Albert Einstein - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Page 1 of 27 Albert Einstein From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Albert Einstein ( /ælbərt a nsta n/; Albert Einstein German: [albt a nʃta n] ( listen); 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist who developed the theory of general relativity, effecting a revolution in physics. For this achievement, Einstein is often regarded as the father of modern physics.[2] 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". [3] The latter was pivotal in establishing quantum theory within physics. Near the beginning of his career, Einstein thought that Newtonian mechanics was no longer enough to reconcile the laws of classical mechanics with the laws of the electromagnetic field. This led to the development of his special theory of relativity. He Albert Einstein in 1921 realized, however, that the principle of relativity could also be extended to gravitational fields, and with his Born 14 March 1879 subsequent theory of gravitation in 1916, he published Ulm, Kingdom of Württemberg, a paper on the general theory of relativity. He German Empire continued to deal with problems of statistical Died mechanics and quantum theory, which led to his 18 April 1955 (aged 76) explanations of particle theory and the motion of Princeton, New Jersey, United States molecules. He also investigated the thermal properties Residence Germany, Italy, Switzerland, United of light which laid the foundation of the photon theory States of light. In 1917, Einstein applied the general theory of relativity to model the structure of the universe as a Ethnicity Jewish [4] whole. -
Einstein's Controversy with Drude and the Origin of Statistical Mechanics
EINSTEIN’S CONTROVERSY WITH DRUDE AND THE ORIGIN OF STATISTICAL MECHANICS: A NEW GLIMPSE FROM THE “LOVE LETTERS“ Jürgen Renn 1. Introduction: Statistical Mechanics as a Conduit from Classical to Modern Physics In this paper I argue that statistical mechanics, at least in the version published by Einstein in 1902,1 was the result of a reinterpretation of already existing results by Boltzmann. I will show that, for this reinterpretation, a certain perspective on these results was decisive which was shaped by Einstein’s occupation with specific problems of the constitution of matter and radi- ation, as well as with atomism as a general foundation of physics. Using newly available evi- dence, I will identify the electron theory of metals as the key problem triggering the elaboration of statistical mechanics. In this way, a conjecture by the Ehrenfests on the role of electron the- ory for a renewal of statistical physics, as well as a hypothesis by the editors of volume 2 of Einstein’s Collected Papers concerning its role for Einstein’s work, receive an unexpected con- firmation. In addition, I will argue that a controversy between Einstein and Drude in 1901 was, in effect, not so much a dispute about the latter’s electron theory of metals, as has been assumed so far, but a controversy in which Einstein’s real opponent was, at least in part, Boltzmann and whose issue was the foundation of an atomistic theory of matter. It was this controversy which became the starting point of Einstein’s elaboration of his approach to statistical mechanics.