What You Already Know
Just who was Albert Einstein? Really, who was he? Let’s start with some of the facts that you probably already knew.
He was born in Germany into a Jewish family. He worked for a while at a patent office, which is really what got his mind thinking in such a way that he eventually became one of the world’s foremost theoretical physicists. He was responsible for the “general theory of relativity.” He was the creator of what became known as the “world’s most well-known formula, which is E = mc2.
He later came to the United States, and helped us out during World War 2 with the “Manhattan Project,” which allowed the U.S. to develop the atomic bomb before the Nazi Germans (the Germans never did).
His views of physics, gravity, space-time, and cosmology helped to fundamentally change the way we see reality and the universe.
What You Don’t Know About Einstein
He was a citizen of five different countries during different times in his life. This includes the Kingdom of Württemberg, which later became part of Germany, Switzerland, Austria, when it was the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Germany, after its many kingdoms became unified and he moved back there in his 40’s and 50’s, and also the United States during World War 2 and the final decade of his life. So, he moved around a lot. In fact, he went through one period where he was “stateless,” and other periods of his life where he was not an official citizen of any country, but was an official resident – this includes Belgium, England, and the United States before he became one of its citizens.
He liked to play the violin and was actually quite good at it. Although he never performed publicly, he did sometimes perform chamber music before private audiences of colleagues, friends and family. People have noted that he had a tremendous love of music, and expressed this love as he played his violin.
Like a lot of people, Einstein had trouble finding work after graduating from college. In the year 1900, Einstein graduated from Zürich Polytechnic in Switzerland, with a teaching diploma. Do you know that it took him about 2 years to finally secure a job? It was only with the help of a friend that he finally secured employment for himself, and it was with the Federal Office for Intellectual Property in Bern, Switzerland – this was the famous patent office job Einstein was known to have, which stimulated his creativity with discovering new ideas in the realm of physics. So, just remember, if you are a young adult who just graduated from college or university, and you are having trouble finding work, you’re not alone.
When Einstein was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1922, he was unable to attend his own awards ceremony because he was traveling the far east, including Japan, Singapore, and Ceylon (present-day Sri Lanka).
Einstein was, for the most part, an anti-war pacifist. He was, for most of his life, against war. Although he was one of the people that encouraged the U.S. government to develop the atomic bomb, and later helped out with the Manhattan Project, he did not like the idea of nuclear weapons being used for war – he even later wrote a paper with Bertrand Russel in which they talked about their opposition.
While living in the United States, Einstein was known to have become a member of the NAACP, supporting the civil rights of African Americans. He was a friend of, and stood up in defense of W.E.B. DuBois in 1951.
Another thing many people may not know was that Einstein was a Socialist, and opposed some of the practices of Capitalism. He even wrote a paper entitled “Why Socialism?“
He liked the idea of a world federation of nation states, with a global government that was democratically elected.
He was also a more prominent figure in the Zionist Movement, that is, the movement of Jewish people to reestablish a Jewish homeland. He helped in some ways to start the modern state of Israel.
After he died in 1955, the pathologist at Princeton Hospital removed his brain. Because this was done without the family’s permission, some people would say that his brain was stolen. It was hoped that in the future that it could be discovered why he was so intelligent.
These are all interesting facts about Albert Einstein alongside all of the scientific and physics papers he wrote throughout his life. Such was the life of Einstein.
