Einstein's Masterwork

by John Gribbin

Overview

In 1915, Albert Einstein presented his masterwork to the Prussian Academy of Sciences, a theory of gravity, matter, space and time: the General Theory of Relativity. Einstein himself said it was “the most valuable theory of my life,” and “of incomparable beauty.” It describes the evolution of the universe, black holes, the behavior of orbiting neutron stars, and why clocks run slower on the surface of the earth than in space. It even suggests the possibility of time travel.And yet when we think of Einstein's breakthrough year, we think instead of 1905, the year of Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity and his equation E=mc2, as his annus mirabilis, even though the Special Theory has a narrower focus.Today the General Theory is overshadowed by these achievements, regarded as "too difficult" for ordinary mortals to comprehend. In Einstein's Masterwork, John Gribbin puts Einstein's astonishing breakthrough in the context of his life and work, and makes it clear why his greatest year was indeed 1915 and his General Theory his true masterpiece.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781681772653
Publisher:	Pegasus Books
Publication date:	09/06/2016
Sold by:	SIMON & SCHUSTER
Format:	eBook
Pages:	240
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

John Gribbin, Ph.D., trained as an astrophysicist at the University of Cambridge before becoming a full-time science writer. His books include the highly acclaimed In Search of Schrödinger's Cat, The First Chimpanzee, In Search of the Big Bang, In the Beginning, In Search of the Edge of Time, In Search of the Double Helix, The Stuff of the Universe (with Martin Rees), Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science, and Einstein: A Life in Science (with Michael White). He lives in East Sussex with his wife and two sons.
John Gribbin, Ph.D., trained as an astrophysicist at the University of Cambridge. He is the author of several books, including the highly acclaimed In Search of Schrödinger's Cat, and the co-author of Stephen Hawking: A Life in Science. He lives in East Sussex with his wife and two sons.

Table of Contents

About the Author ix

Introduction xi

1 In the Beginning 1

Early life; Breaking free; Einstein and the Poly; Rejection; Rescue

2 The Annus Mirabilis 45

The doctoral thesis; Jiggling atoms; Particles of light; The special one

3 The Long and Winding Road 113

The geometry of relativity; Moving on; In the shadow of a giant; On the move; First steps; What Einstein should have known; The masterwork

4 Legacy 155

Black holes and timewarps; Beyond reasonable doubt; Making waves; The Universe at large

5 The Icon of Science 185

Personal problems; Fame; A last quantum hurrah; Exile; Spooky action at a distance; The final years

Further Reading 209

Endnotes 213

Index 217

Editorial Reviews

07/25/2016
Contrary to widespread belief that 1905 was Einstein’s most important year, British astrophysicist and science writer Gribbin (13.8: The Quest to Find the True Age of the Universe and the Theory of Everything) posits that 1915, the year that Einstein published his general theory of relativity, holds much more historical and scientific importance. Leading up to this argument, Gribbin describes Einstein’s life, mingling personal events with his work, and successfully humanizing the iconic image of the scientist, describing him more as “a cross between God and Harpo Marx.” Gribbin tells the sad fate of Einstein’s first marriage from both sides and describes Einstein’s social interactions within the wider international physics world. Einstein’s work might not have been recognized as revolutionary if not for the support of respected scientists such as Max Planck and Einstein’s old friend Marcel Grossmann. Despite Gribbin’s claim, he devotes the book’s longest chapter to the excitement surrounding the special theory of relativity in 1905. When Gribbin finally arrives at 1915, instead of making the case that it was Einstein’s true annus mirabilis, he points out that those who came before Einstein laid the groundwork for the idea of a curvature of space-time. The book’s primary virtue is Gribbin’s clear explanations of Einstein’s theories, which can be understood by those lacking an extensive background in math or science. Illus. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

Einstein's Masterworkprovides an engaging evaluation of Einstein's theories on relativity, and isan ideal read for anybody who is curious about the iconic scientist's life.”

All About History

Steering mercifully clear of the mathematical complexities, Gribbin explores the ways [Einstein’s general theory] has illuminated a wide range of cosmic phenomena. A must-read for armchair physicists.

Booklist (starred)

A beautifully written and highly accessible account of the genesis of a great theory.

Physics World

An engrossing read.

Forbes

An absorbing and readable account of Einstein's life and work.

From the Publisher

2016-07-04
A prolific British science writer examines the creation of Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity.Special relativity—Einstein’s startling 1905 assertion that time and space are flexible, varying predictably according to one’s frame of reference—is easy, writes Gribbin (13.8: The Quest to Find the True Age of the Universe and the Theory of Everything, 2016, etc.). General relativity is considered much more difficult, but the author insists that anyone can understand Einstein’s 1915 theory of gravity as a fourth dimensional distortion of space-time around any massive body. He exaggerates, but careful readers will understand most of this book, which, despite the title, is a fine account of Einstein’s life and work with modest emphasis on general relativity. Gribbin checks all the boxes. Born in a middle-class Jewish German family, Einstein was—despite the myth—a good if obstreperous student. He failed to obtain an academic position after his 1900 graduation from Swiss Federal Polytechnic because theoretical physics professorships were much more rare then, but it’s also a myth that the scientific establishment ignored him. Europe’s leading physics journal, Annalen der Physik, accepted all of his groundbreaking 1905 papers, but it had been accepting his papers since 1900. By 1908, he was a significant figure in the scientific community, and in 1914, Berlin’s pre-eminent Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physics created a position especially for him. General relativity turned out to be so difficult for Einstein that he needed help from a mathematician friend to get it right, but it made him a scientific superstar. As Gribbin notes, he had “discovered a fundamental absolute truth about the universe…to rank with such fundamental mathematical truths as Pythagoras’ theorem.” Walter Isaacson goes deeper into his life and Dennis Overbye into his work, but readers will find this shorter biography entirely satisfactory.

Kirkus Reviews