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One of my enlightening experiences has been to visit the Einstein's house in Bern and walk on the same path that he did every day to get to the patent office. T
by sytelus 7y ago
One of my enlightening experiences has been to visit the Einstein's house in Bern and walk on the same path that he did every day to get to the patent office. The question in my mind had always been how Einstein suddenly started thinking about synchronizing clocks using light signals out of nowhere? My walk had the answer:
In Bern, you see clocks everywhere! Towers after towers, buildings after buildings have clocks of varying sizes and shapes and artwork. The city of Bern is crazy about having giant clocks all over. In 1905, all these clocks must be manually synchronized and people may have often noticed slight differences as they walked and you cannot not think about synchronization every day!
Inventors in Bern were working on how to synchronize them automatically. One of those patents landed on Einstein's desk which started his thought process on synchronizing clocks using the fastest signals possible, i.e., light. But then things got weird when you think about light signal taking time to arrive. What if the clock is on the railway station and we need to synchronize the clock on the train? Now the train is moving away and the light signal is taking longer and longer. And so the relativity begins... It is very likely that these ideas would not have born if Einstein wasn't in Bern and working in that damn patent office!
- rburhum 7y agothank you for this comment :) very interesting indeed
- mettamage 7y agoIt's thoughts like these that I think: we don't have free will. Fortunately, we do have free choice.
- selestify 7y agoWhat’s the difference?
- throw1234651234 7y agoThere is none.
- chrisshroba 7y agoPerception, maybe?
- logicallee 7y agoThis writeup is worth publishing somewhere.
- ackbar03 7y agoThis is amazing. Thanks for choosing to share this
- lihaciudaniel 7y agoEinstein had autism.
- BenoitEssiambre 7y agoIf I remember correctly, this intricate clock: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zytglogge https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zytglogge , is just outside Einstein's apartment.
- rytill 7y agoWhat a critical story that's not been propagated yet.
- rrss 7y agoFor those interested, Peter Galison has written a bit about his thoughts on how Einstein's work at the patent office influenced his work on physics. This interview is pretty interesting: https://history.aip.org/exhibits/einstein/essay-einsteins-time.htm https://history.aip.org/exhibits/einstein/essay-einsteins-ti...
- rrss 7y agoThere's also this NYTimes article (paywalled, unfortunately) discussing Galison's research for "Einstein's Clocks, Poincare's Map." > Einstein's relativity has long been regarded by scholars as a monument to the power of abstract thought. But if Dr. Peter Galison, 48 -- a Harvard professor of the history of science and of physics, a pilot, art lover and nascent filmmaker -- is right, physics and Einstein have flourished more in their connections to the world than in any ivory tower aloofness. And one clue to the origin of relativity can be found in something as mundane and practical as a 19th-century train schedule. https://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/24/science/science-historian-work-peter-galison-clocks-that-shaped-einstein-s-leap-time.html%20paywall https://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/24/science/science-historian...
- throwqwerty 7y ago> Harvard professor of the history of science and of physics, a pilot, art lover and nascent filmmaker lol why is this at all relevant to einstein
- redis_mlc 7y agoIn that era, railroads were expanding across Europe and needed to sync time. Likely those patent application crossed his desk so he was forced to deeply think about "relative time" according to something I watched. But his Brownian motion and photoelectric effect papers ...
- stared 7y agoYour passage on Bern feels like if it were from the "Invisible Cities" by Italo Calvino. As far as I remember, it would fit in the "Cities & Signs" or "Cities & Eyes" line.
- airstrike 7y agoThat's a great write up, thanks for sharing. I'd add that a genius like Einstein would have thought of fantastic things wherever he was – it just so happened that this was the experience he was exposed to which led him to think about time and light, per your story. I wonder what sort of amazing discoveries he would have made if he had been exposed to, say, biology and healthcare instead!
- edmundsauto 7y ago> I'd add that a genius like Einstein would have thought of fantastic things wherever he was – it just so happened that this was the experience he was exposed to which led him to think about time and light, per your story. I don't think this is true. Because of survivor bias, we have no idea how many Einsteins never had the opportunity. It seems likely there have been a million people with similar cognitive capabilities, yet very few make such progress.
- numtel 7y agoCredit to Stephen Jay Gould for this
- edmundsauto 7y agoCan you say a little more about SJG? I've heard the name and been meaning to read something of his, but never got around to it. Would appreciate a good rec!
- airstrike 7y ago> It seems likely there have been a million people with similar cognitive capabilities That not a valid counterpoint to my claim in that itdoesn't negate the fact that he could have been a genius in many other fields if he had touched them and assuming he "had the opportunity". Similar to how someone who's highly athletic is usually great in pretty much every sport across the board at a young age and then later specialize into one (or more!) to get to a professional level.
- rowanG077 7y ago
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- milquetoastaf 7y agoYou would love this book - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einstein%27s_Dreams https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Einstein%27s_Dreams