It’s pointless to tell you now that Einstein was the one who developed the theory of relativity and one of the most important scientists, but I could tell you that he influenced Yoda’s aspect in Star Wars.
Because I don’t want to borrow you, I let you here some interesting things, probably less known by most of us, about Albert Einstein the genius.
- childhood: due to the fact that he was born with a large and irregular shaped head, he was considered a deformed child. But, although after a few weeks, the size of his head was normal, he was always considered as having a mental abnormality, he had speech problems before the age of 9 years (he had hard time pronouncing words, he said a sentence only in the moment he was absolutely sure of pronouncing it correctly, all that process was happening in his mind). He was considered a mentally retarded child by his parents although their attitude was not totally justified.
- The spark: at the age of 5 years, being ill, his father brought him a pocket compass and the young boy marveled at the fact that regardless of where the compass was turned, the needle always pointed north. That was the moment that initiated his interest in science and problem-solving.
- school:he left Germany at the age of 15 years to avoid the military service. At Munich he was considered a brilliant child understanding the mathematics and science concepts. Initially, he failed the admission exam because he didn’t pass the grammar, history and geography tests, obviously passing math and science tests, but he said: “Before I was 15 I had mastered differential and integral calculus”. At 17 years old, in 1896, he renounced his German citizenship and he enrolled at “Swiss Federal Polytechnic School” in Zurich.
- children: Einstein had an illegitimate daughter. This thing was revealed in some personal letters. She was born before his marriage with her former colleague, Mileva Maric. It seems that Lieserl had been taken by Mileva’s family, but she died of scarlet fever in 1903. Other people gave another interpretation of his letters, telling that his illigitimate daughter was adopted immediately after her birth. He had also two sons with Mileva, but he didn’t have a good relation with his oldest son, Hans Albert.
- “miracle year”: the year 1905 is known as the miracle year because Einstein published 4 revolutionary articles representing his most creative work, they were about the relativity theory and the famous equation E = mc2 . In conformity with two American physicists’ words, the most famous equation could have its origins in the researches of an Austrian physicist, Friedrich Hasenoehrl, but we have to mention that he had found a wrong coefficient, his equation being E = (3/8) mc2. Thus, in 1905, Einstein gave the relationship between mass and energy (electrodynamics of moving bodies).
Einstein was appointed associate professor in 1909, after 10 years from his graduation.
- Solar eclipse:in 1915, Einstein published the new theory of general relativity, based on his calculations, (light from another star should be bent by Sun’s gravity), but the theory was controversial until the solar eclipse in May 1919. Sir Arthur Eddington, an English astronomer, took some pictures of the eclipse in West Africa (the place with the best conditions to photograph the eclipse) and, analyzing the image, he confirmed Einstein’s theory, publishing his observations in the international media. Thus, Einstein became world famous, he started travelling all over the world, holding speeches about his general theories. Einstein’s biographer, Walter Isaacson, stated that, after 1919, there were written in 6 years more than 600 books about the theory of relativity.
- FBI:in December 1932, when Hitler came to the power in Germany, Einstein left Germany. His move to the United States was permanent, he has never entered the country of his birth again. He took up a position at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. His support of civil rights, pacifist and socialist causes made FBI to spy on him for 22 years. His phones were listened, his correspondence was checked, his garbage was checked too to expose his subversive actions or the fact that he was a Russian spy. The campaign failed, Einstein died in 1955. His file had no more than 1800 pages.
- President of Israel:in 1952 when the president of Israel, Haim Weizmann, died, the government of Israel offered Einstein the opportunity of becoming the second state Although he gave a delayed response, Einstein politely refused the offer, saying that he didn’t have the natural aptitude and experience to deal with people properly. And he could only understand a little of science and none of human nature.
- Atomic bomb:at the end of 1930, the German scientists started a new research concerning the atomic bomb. Willing to express his fear regarding the idea the Nazis having such an apocalyptic weapon, Einstein, together with the Hungarian physicist, Leo Szilard, wrote a letter to President Roosevelt warning of the destructive potential of an atomic chain reaction. After the atomic bomb attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Einstein declared his regret (although he had never actually worked on the Manhattan project), “Had I known that the Germans would not succeed in producing an atomic bomb, I never would have lifted a finger”, he told Newsweek. He gave strong support to organisations fighting against militarism and atomic weapons and, before his death, in 1955, he signed, together with the philosopher Bertrand Russell, the “Russell – Einstein Manifest”, a public letter in which he described the disaster of a nuclear war and urged the governments to solve their problems and litigation peacefully.
- brain:he died in 1955. At his autopsy, the pathologist from Princeton, Thomas Harvey, removed Einstein’s brain having a personal desire: to find out the secret of the genius, but he couldn’t start his research, he didn’t obtain the approval of Einstein’s son. After many years he sent parts of Einstein’s brain for research to different scientists. A series of studies took place, but most of them rejected. The most known study is that made by researchers from Canada in 1999. Those people said that Einstein’s brain had atypical folds on the parietal lobe, that part of the brain responsible for mathematical and spatial abilities, being larger than a regular one.
- eyes: It looks that Harvey didn’t take just Einstein’s brain but the eyes too, sending them to Einstein’s doctor, Henry Abrams, Nowadays, they are kept in a safe box in New York City. He said in an interview that “Having his eyes means the professor’s life has not ended. A part of him is still with me.” so creepy!!!
I would have a lot to say about Einstein; in these links you have detailed information, you can read also here or here or many, many other articles.
you can find other articles in the category interesting birthdays 🙂 enjoy! 🙂