The Everything Einstein Book: From Matter and Energy to Space and Time, All You Need to Understand the m an and His Theories (Everything Series)

Rating:
Summary: Very readable & informative
Review: This is a very readable and enjoyable book about the great physicist. The easy-going but informative style is reminiscent of the "Dummies" series books which I'm a great fan of for their ability to impart a great deal of information painlessly and enjoyably. I learned many interesting things about Einstein the scientist and Einstein the man that I didn't know before, and I've read several other bio's of the great physicist. After providing some historical background on the scientific events that led up to Einstein's great discoveries, discussing the ideas of Ernst Mach, Helmholtz, Hertz, Planck and so on, the authors launch into a discussion of his most important contributions, which were the paper on the photoelectric effect, the special theory of relativity, and the general theory of relativity.

There is such a wealth of information and detail about both Einstein's scientific ideas and his public and personal life that it's difficult to summarize it all, but I'd like to mention a few of the more interesting things that I learned. Einstein's role as scientist, cultural icon, humanitarian, father, public speaker, and legendary and mythic genius are all discussed.

One interesting thing is that the book explodes one myth about Einstein, which is that he did poorly in the German gymnasium in everything but math and science. Actually he excelled in Latin and languages too, so contrary to the popular myth, he wasn't a total failure in the public schools. He did run into trouble with the form-master at the gym and graduated without a diploma, and in high school he was even less happy and threw fits so he could be declared mentally unstable by the family doctor so he could stay home from school. Despite this Einstein was reading Kant's ideas about epistemology and logic by the time he was 13. This also enabled him to avoid required military service. In college Einstein routinely skipped classes although he got caught up using his friend Marcel Grossman's notes. But Einstein still graduated at the bottom of his class.

Einstein's increasing discomfort with the conclusions of quantum theory such as the famous uncertainty principle led him to try to disprove it in a famous paper he authored with the younger David Bohm (who only recently passed away). His opposition to the theory despite all the evidence once led Oppenheimer to say, "Einstein is cuckoo."

In addition to his more well-known contributions, I didn't know that Einstein had collaborated with fellow physicist Leo Szilard on the invention of a new refridgerator pump. The idea for the pump came from a famous but tragic incident in which an entire Berlin family was killed when the pump leaked toxic gases into their home. Einstein and Szilard set out to develop a safer pump using magnetic fields and coils and sold two of their designs to the Electrolux Co. Eventually they would hold 45 patents for three different models of the home refridgeration pump. Einstein developed a new type of compass, a hearing aid, and had a patent for an auto-exposure camera.

Einstein had more romantic dalliances that one might expect for such a cerebral man, and in some ways the most interesting part of the book, since I was already familiar with his scientific ideas from other books, was the section on what happened to his children and grandchildren. Hans Albert Einstein, his oldest son, became a civil engineer and was professor of civil engineering at U.C. Berkeley when he retired. He was an expert on the transportation of sediment by water and the process he developed is still in use today. Unlike the older son, the younger brother wasn't especially talented at math and science and prefered the humanities, but he suffered from depression and even schizophrenia his entire life, and after being looked after by his mother until she passed away, was placed in a mental institution where he lived the rest of his life. Lieserl, the daughter, is thought to have been put up for adoption since she was born before Einstein and Mileva were married because of the stigma of illegitimacy in those days. Although no-one really knows, she is thought to have died in childhood but nothing is really known of her life.

Of Einstein's two grandchildren by Hans, Bernard is a physicist and author and wrote a biography of his famous grandfather. The grandaughter Evelyn is a psychologist and cult-deprogrammer. Evelyn has another dubious distinction, which is that after Thomas Harvey autopsied Einstein's brain to see what was so special about it, she received a portion of it. Apparently, it was transported across country by automobile and resulted in a book entitled Driving Mr. Albert: A Trip Across America with Einstein's Brain, by Michael Paterniti. I don't know if the book is any good but with a title like that I'll have to look it up and see. But I can certainly recommend the present book for anyone interested in the life and ideas of the great physicist, and this would probably be the first book I'd recommend to someone who wanted to read up on Einstein.

Rating:
Summary: Very readable & informative
Review: This is a very readable and enjoyable book about the great physicist. The easy-going but informative style is reminiscent of the "Dummies" series books which I'm a great fan of for their ability to impart a great deal of information painlessly and enjoyably. I learned many interesting things about Einstein the scientist and Einstein the man that I didn't know before, and I've read several other bio's of the great physicist. After providing some historical background on the scientific events that led up to Einstein's great discoveries, discussing the ideas of Ernst Mach, Helmholtz, Hertz, Planck and so on, the authors launch into a discussion of his most important contributions, which were the paper on the photoelectric effect, the special theory of relativity, and the general theory of relativity.

There is such a wealth of information and detail about both Einstein's scientific ideas and his public and personal life that it's difficult to summarize it all, but I'd like to mention a few of the more interesting things that I learned. Einstein's role as scientist, cultural icon, humanitarian, father, public speaker, and legendary and mythic genius are all discussed.

One interesting thing is that the book explodes one myth about Einstein, which is that he did poorly in the German gymnasium in everything but math and science. Actually he excelled in Latin and languages too, so contrary to the popular myth, he wasn't a total failure in the public schools. He did run into trouble with the form-master at the gym and graduated without a diploma, and in high school he was even less happy and threw fits so he could be declared mentally unstable by the family doctor so he could stay home from school. Despite this Einstein was reading Kant's ideas about epistemology and logic by the time he was 13. This also enabled him to avoid required military service. In college Einstein routinely skipped classes although he got caught up using his friend Marcel Grossman's notes. But Einstein still graduated at the bottom of his class.

Einstein's increasing discomfort with the conclusions of quantum theory such as the famous uncertainty principle led him to try to disprove it in a famous paper he authored with the younger David Bohm (who only recently passed away). His opposition to the theory despite all the evidence once led Oppenheimer to say, "Einstein is cuckoo."

In addition to his more well-known contributions, I didn't know that Einstein had collaborated with fellow physicist Leo Szilard on the invention of a new refridgerator pump. The idea for the pump came from a famous but tragic incident in which an entire Berlin family was killed when the pump leaked toxic gases into their home. Einstein and Szilard set out to develop a safer pump using magnetic fields and coils and sold two of their designs to the Electrolux Co. Eventually they would hold 45 patents for three different models of the home refridgeration pump. Einstein developed a new type of compass, a hearing aid, and had a patent for an auto-exposure camera.

Einstein had more romantic dalliances that one might expect for such a cerebral man, and in some ways the most interesting part of the book, since I was already familiar with his scientific ideas from other books, was the section on what happened to his children and grandchildren. Hans Albert Einstein, his oldest son, became a civil engineer and was professor of civil engineering at U.C. Berkeley when he retired. He was an expert on the transportation of sediment by water and the process he developed is still in use today. Unlike the older son, the younger brother wasn't especially talented at math and science and prefered the humanities, but he suffered from depression and even schizophrenia his entire life, and after being looked after by his mother until she passed away, was placed in a mental institution where he lived the rest of his life. Lieserl, the daughter, is thought to have been put up for adoption since she was born before Einstein and Mileva were married because of the stigma of illegitimacy in those days. Although no-one really knows, she is thought to have died in childhood but nothing is really known of her life.

Of Einstein's two grandchildren by Hans, Bernard is a physicist and author and wrote a biography of his famous grandfather. The grandaughter Evelyn is a psychologist and cult-deprogrammer. Evelyn has another dubious distinction, which is that after Thomas Harvey autopsied Einstein's brain to see what was so special about it, she received a portion of it. Apparently, it was transported across country by automobile and resulted in a book entitled Driving Mr. Albert: A Trip Across America with Einstein's Brain, by Michael Paterniti. I don't know if the book is any good but with a title like that I'll have to look it up and see. But I can certainly recommend the present book for anyone interested in the life and ideas of the great physicist, and this would probably be the first book I'd recommend to someone who wanted to read up on Einstein.