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Especially now that we know Einstein was responsible for the discovery of basically nothing. Not only did he stand on the shoulders of giants, but he essentiall
by gonational 5y ago
Especially now that we know Einstein was responsible for the discovery of basically nothing. Not only did he stand on the shoulders of giants, but he essentially lifted much of his special theory of relativity from the thoughts and musings of Ernst Mach, amongst other earlier actual geniuses. Once you learn to appreciate these facts, the lore of Einstein fades, and Einstein becomes something the charlatan who traveled from here to there talking with important people, and playing science politics.
Pertaining the "atom bomb", Oppenheimer was instrumental in managing the Manhattan project... Einstein was sent a letter that described, at a high-level, what was going to be worked on, asking whether it seemed legit; he replied, essentially saying, "yeah that should work".
Einstein's only contribution to science was the photoelectric effect, which also leaned on the prior efforts of Alexandre Becquerel, et al.
- ben_w 5y agoAs someone currently working though the entirety of brilliant.org, I can say that even merely being able to comprehend the Einstein field equations well enough to produce coherent results is impressive — inventing it, even with help, more so. Everyone leans on the shoulders of giants; it is neither secret nor shameful. This is not to deny there are embellishments in his life story. Personally, I suspect his “Miracle year” was him publishing his wife’s work as his own [0]. Given systematic sexism of the era, there is at minimum reason to at least suspect she would’ve had difficulty publishing herself, so even this isn’t as harsh a claim against Einstein as it would be if it happened today, yet it would still be embellishment even at the time. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mileva_Marić https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mileva_Marić