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The whole premise of the book is looking at some of Einstein's actions through the lens of his Jewish identity and heritage (and also as a philosopher). Which i

The whole premise of the book is looking at some of Einstein's actions through the lens of his Jewish identity and heritage (and also as a philosopher). Which is quite different compared to the prism he's usually viewed through, namely as a scientist. I don't understand why that bothers you so much. Are you equally bothered when people identify as a 'coder' or 'entrepreneur' as is quite common in this forum?

formulaT 12y ago
For me the issue is that Jewish identity is presented as always being good, while Aryan/White/European/Whatever_you_want_to_call_it identity is presented as being evil and racist. Sure, these things exist at a different granularity, but that doesn't explain why one is ok and the other is evil.
- jasonlmk 12y ago
  Many of Einstein's actions were driven by the fact that he detected growing anti-Semitism early on. In fact, he relinquished his German citizenship twice because of this, and it was largely his fear and prediction of persecution that brought him to the US. I don't think it's a question of Good vs Evil, but rather what was happening at that specific point in time - the fact that Jewish Germans were very publicly discriminated against (to the point where Jewish University academics in Germany were forced to hand in their resignation and barred from ever being public servants almost overnight).