Death of a Genius
Time Magazine
May 2, 1955
Almost every morning for the last 22 years, a self-effacing
little man, careless-clad in baggy pants and a blue stocking
cap, stepped down from the front porch of a modest frame
house at 112 Mercer Street, Princeton, N.J., and trudged
off to the Institute for Advanced Studies. At a glance, the
little man could have been the caretaker or a gardener.
He puffed meekly at his pipe; he sidled in quietly; he seldom spoke unless
spoken to. But on a second look, a rare quality seemed to glow in that sad and
wizened face, with its disordered halo of white hair and its soulful brown eyes.
The quality was genius, a compound of soaring intellect and wide-ranging
imagination that had carried Albert Einstein past the confines of man's old
scientific certitudes and deeper into the material mysteries of the universe than
any man before.
Einstein's father, Hermann, ran an
electrical technology business. But the
business often teetered on the brink of
failure.
Einstein's mother, Pauline, forced him to
take violin lessons. At first he objected
vehemently, but in time he came to love the
music with a passion.
Einstein at the age of
fourteen with his sister Maja.
Two years younger, she was
his most beloved confidant
throughout his life.
Family Tree
Albert Einstein
Maleva Maric
1879 - 1955
1875 - 1948
Lieserel
1902 - ?
Hans Albert
1904 - 1973
Eduard
1910 - 1965
distinguished professor of hydraulics at the
University of California, Berkeley
Bernhard Caesar
1938 -
Klaus
1932-1938
Thomas Martin
1955-
Evelyn
1941 –
(adopted?)
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Born March 14, 1879
1896 - entered the Polytechnic Institute
in Zurich to study to become a teacher
1901 – accepted a job in the Swiss
Patent Office
1905 – completed his doctorate
1909 – Professor Extraordinary in
Zurich
1911 – Prof of Theoretical Physics in
Prague
1912 – back to Zurich
1414 – Head of Kaiser Wilhelm
Institute in Berlin
Became a German citizen in 1914, and
renounced this in 1933
1933 – Became Research Professor at
Institute for Advanced Studiy in
Princeton
1940 – became a U.S. citizen
Einstein as a Pacifist
• By 1939 Einstein felt strongly that the U.S. had to
develop the atomic bomb to prevent dictators like
Hitler from building the bomb and destroying the
rest of the world
• In 1947 he stated that the U.S. must stockpile the
bomb, but only “to deter another nation from
making an atomic attack when it also has the
bomb.”
• By 1950 Einstein wrote to Eleanor Roosevelt that
“the idea of achieving security through national
armament is, at the present state of military
technique, a disastrous illusion.”
The Letter from Albert Einstein to President
Franklin D. Roosevelt
With the 1938 discovery of nuclear fission, Germany had a twoyear head start on developing nuclear energy; the Americans'
fear was that the Nazis would shape it into a weapon of mass
destruction. Germany also had in its grasp two materials critical
to its development -- heavy water and uranium. They were
available in abundance only in Norway and Czechoslovakia,
both under Nazi control. In August 1939, Leo Szilard and fellow
Hungarian physicists Eugene Wigner and Edward Teller urged
Albert Einstein to sign a letter they had drafted for President
Roosevelt.
Einstein's letter noted that the work of Fermi and Szilard "leads
me to expect that the element uranium may be turned into a
new and important source of energy in the near future."
President Roosevelt responded by appointing an Advisory
Committee on Uranium. On December 6, the day before the
bombing of Pearl Harbor, Roosevelt authorized the Manhattan
Project.
Nuclear Weapons and World Peace
"Today, the physicists who participate in watching the
most formidable and dangerous weapon of all time...
cannot desist from warning and warning again: we
cannot and should not slacken in our efforts to make the
nations of the world and especially their governments
aware of the unspeakable disaster they are certain to
provoke unless they change their attitude towards each
other and towards the task of shaping the future. We
helped in creating this new weapon in order to prevent
the enemies of mankind from achieving it ahead of us.
Which, given the mentality of the Nazis, would have
meant inconceivable destruction, and the enslavement of
the rest of the world...
World Peace
"Large parts of the world are faced with starvation, while
others are living in abundance. The nations were promised
liberation and justice, but we have witnessed and are
witnessing, even now, the sad spectacle of liberating armies
firing into populations who want their independence and
social equality, and supporting in those countries by force of
arms, such parties and personalities as appear to be most
suited to serve vested interests. Territorial questions and
arguments of power, obsolete though they are, still prevail
over the essential demands of common welfare and justice."
Pacifist Quotes
He who joyfully marches to music in rank and
file has already earned my contempt. He has
been given a large brain by mistake, since for
him the spinal cord would fully suffice. This
disgrace to civilization should be done away
with at once. Heroism at command, senseless
brutality, deplorable love-of-country stance,
how violently I hate all this, how despicable
and ignoble war is; I would rather be torn to
shreds than be part of so base an action! It is
my conviction that killing under the cloak of
war is nothing but an act of murder.
• I do not know with what weapons World War III will be
fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and
stones.
• Peace cannot be kept by force. It can only be achieved
by understanding.
• You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war.
• I am not only a pacifist but a militant pacifist. I am
willing to fight for peace. Nothing will end war unless
the people themselves refuse to go to war.
• The release of atomic power has changed everything
except our way of thinking…the solution to this
problem lies in the heart of mankind. If only I had
known, I should have become a watchmaker.
Zionism
The two social movements that received his full support
were pacifism and Zionism. After the war his continued
public support of pacifist and Zionist goals made him the
target of vicious attacks by anti-Semitic and right-wing
elements in Germany. He continued his active support of
Zionism but declined the offer made by leaders of the
state of Israel to become president of that country.
• For Einstein, Zionism served as an
alternative to Prussian militarism and as an
important means of preserving the Jewish
values of social justice and intellectual
aspiration.
• Einstein was drawn to the Zionist cause as a
result of the influence of Chaim Weizmann
• Although Einstein disliked Zionism’s
nationalism, he was determined to create a
place where Jews could gain an education
unrestrained by prejudice.
• Einstein called for a fair settlement of Jerusalem
based on both Arab and Jewish interests. He
appealed to Weizmann to cooperate peacefully
with the Arabs and suggested the creation of a
secret council of four Jews and four Arabs to
reconcile their differing views, an idealistic goal
that was never achieved.
• In 1952, four years after Israel became a Jewish
state, David Ben-Gurion, Israel's premier, offered
Einstein the position of president of Israel.
Although Einstein was deeply moved by the offer,
he explained that he did not feel that he had the
interpersonal skills for the job.
The Age of Einstein
He became, almost despite himself, the emblem
of all that was new, original and unsettling in
the modern age.
Einstein as an Icon
“Why is it that nobody understands
me and everybody likes me?"
Einstein as a world-recognized icon
Einstein’s image is recognized even in
non-western cultures, even in cultures
where the alphabet used in the formula
E=mc2 would not be recognized!
Relativity and Cubism:
What was the connection, if any, between the
simultaneous appearance of modern physics and modern
art at the beginning of the 20th century?
• Arthur Miller book entitled
Einstein, Picasso: Space,
Time, and the Beauty That
Causes Havoc (2001)
• Play by Steve Martin entitled
Picasso at the Lapin Agile
Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907)
Einstein: Man of the 20th Century
He was the pre-eminent scientist in a century dominated by
science. The touchstones of the era — the Bomb, the Big Bang,
quantum physics and electronics — all bear his imprint
• Much to his surprise, his ideas reverberated
beyond science, influencing modern culture
from painting to poetry
• He was engagingly simple, trading ties and
socks for mothy sweaters and sweatshirts.
• He tossed out profound aphorisms as easily as
equations.
• He was a cartoonist’s dream come true.
Who Was the Greater Genius?
• Galileo or Kepler (Galileo)
• Maxwell or Bohr (Maxwell)
• Hawking or Heisenberg
(Heisenberg)
There are two figures who are simply off the charts:
Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein. If pressed,
physicists give Newton pride of place, but it's a
photo finish—and no one else is in the race.
Einstein’s Personal Life