In 1879, one of the world's greatest scientists was born in Ulm: Albert Einstein . In the 17th century, Isaac Newton had explained the laws governing the motion of bodies and celestial objects. This helped unify terrestrial and celestial physics, leading to a much broader understanding of mechanics up to the present day. By the end of the 19th century, however, many physical phenomena remained unexplained by Newton's teachings. Therefore, Albert Einstein had to overcome these limitations and created a new paradigm: the theory of relativity.
In this article we are going to tell you all the biography and exploits of Albert Einstein and the importance of the theory of relativity as a starting point for modern physics.
Albert Einstein's biography
Albert Einstein's explanatory model defied common sense. In other words, this theory signaled and marked the beginning of the divide between ordinary people and a science that was becoming increasingly specialized and unintelligible. However, both during Einstein's lifetime and afterward, many aspects of relativity that were both surprising and incomprehensible at the time have been confirmed . This is one of the reasons why Albert Einstein is one of the most celebrated and admired scientists in the history of science.
What is most striking about this scientist's discovery is that all his ideas, which were barely conceivable at the time, turned out to be true. One of them, for example, is that the mass of an object increases with its speed. However, this celebrated figure was a poor student in his youth. As a child, he was quiet and withdrawn, and his intellectual development was quite slow. Later in life, Einstein himself attributed this slowness to the very creation of the theory of relativity. In other words, according to him, most people begin to grapple with problems of space and time when they are young. Due to his slow development, he didn't begin to ask questions about spacetime until he was older. These questions were the origin of the theory of relativity.
By 1894, his entire family was experiencing financial difficulties, forcing them to move to Milan. Einstein remained in Munich to complete his secondary education. He had several sons named Hans Albert and Eduard, born in 1904 and 1910, respectively. Einstein later divorced his partner and remarried his cousin Elsa.
The theory of relativity
He published five papers in 1905. One of them earned him a doctorate from the University of Zurich, and the remaining four would ultimately bring about a radical change in the scientific understanding of the universe. These papers offered a theoretical explanation of Brownian motion in statistical terms. They also provided an interpretation of the photoelectric effect. This interpretation was based on the hypothesis that light is composed of individual quanta. In later physics, these quanta were called photons.
The two remaining works laid the foundation for the theory of relativity. This theory establishes the equivalence between the energy of a given quantity of matter and its mass. This is the famous equation E = mc². Given the immense effort behind their work and research, they were considered among the most eminent physicists in Europe. Later, true public recognition came to Albert Einstein when he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1921.
The theory of relativity attempts to explain some anomalies in the concept of relative motion. However, over time, the evolution of this theory has become the foundation of the physical sciences. It has also become the primary reference that helps demonstrate the essential unity of matter and energy, space and time, and the equivalence between the forces of gravity and the effects of acceleration in a system.
This theory had two different formulations. The first was known as the special theory of relativity and deals with all systems that move relative to each other at a constant velocity . The other was called the general theory of relativity and explains systems that move at a variable velocity. It is in this variable velocity that acceleration is introduced.
Albert Einstein's unifying theory
It is well known that physics needs laws that can unify all explanations of systems, both those in stable motion and those in unstable motion. Therefore, all of Albert Einstein's work focused on perfecting the general theory of relativity. The main postulate of this theory was that gravity is not a force, but a field created by the presence of mass in the space-time continuum.
Later, in 1919, his international fame grew, forcing him to give numerous lectures all over the world. He also became known as a third-class commuter. He was famous for traveling everywhere with a violin case under his arm. Playing the violin was one of his hobbies.
All of Albert Einstein's efforts in the following decade focused on finding a mathematical relationship between electromagnetism and gravitational attraction. Einstein's main objective was to discover the common laws governing the behavior of all objects in the universe . He believed that a single law existed that described the behavior of all objects, whether in terrestrial or celestial physics. All these behaviors should be grouped into a single unified field theory.
This scientist once stated that politics had a temporary value, while an equation was valid for all eternity. This was a result of the difficulty he faced when he had to leave Germany for the United States due to Hitler's rise to power in 1933. In the final years of his life, the bitterness of not failing to solve the formula that would reveal to humanity the secret of how objects behaved caused his health to worsen.
After the Nagasaki and Hiroshima explosions ended the Second World War, Einstein united all the scientists to prevent the future use of the bomb and proposed the formation of a world government from the United Nations.