10 scientists

Albert Einstein:

Biography 

Mr. Albert Einstein 

Albert Einstein was born at Ulm, in Württemberg, Germany, on March 14, 1879. Six weeks later the family moved to Munich, where he later on began his schooling at the Luitpold Gymnasium. Later, they moved to Italy and Albert continued his education at Aarau, Switzerland and in 1896 he entered the Swiss Federal Polytechnic School in Zurich to be trained as a teacher in physics and mathematics. In 1901, the year he gained his diploma, he acquired Swiss citizenship and, as he was unable to find a teaching post, he accepted a position as technical assistant in the Swiss Patent Office. In 1905 he obtained his doctor’s degree.

During his stay at the Patent Office, and in his spare time, he produced much of his remarkable work and in 1908 he was appointed Privatdozent in Berne. In 1909 he became Professor Extraordinary at Zurich, in 1911 Professor of Theoretical Physics at Prague, returning to Zurich in the following year to fill a similar post. In 1914 he was appointed Director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Physical Institute and Professor in the University of Berlin. He became a German citizen in 1914 and remained in Berlin until 1933 when he renounced his citizenship for political reasons and emigrated to America to take the position of Professor of Theoretical Physics at Princeton*. He became a United States citizen in 1940 and retired from his post in 1945.

After World War II, Einstein was a leading figure in the World Government Movement, he was offered the Presidency of the State of Israel, which he declined, and he collaborated with Dr. Chaim Weizmann in establishing the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Einstein always appeared to have a clear view of the problems of physics and the determination to solve them. He had a strategy of his own and was able to visualize the main stages on the way to his goal. He regarded his major achievements as mere stepping-stones for the next advance.

At the start of his scientific work, Einstein realized the inadequacies of Newtonian mechanics and his special theory of relativity stemmed from an attempt to reconcile the laws of mechanics with the laws of the electromagnetic field. He dealt with classical problems of statistical mechanics and problems in which they were merged with quantum theory: this led to an explanation of the Brownian movement of molecules. He investigated the thermal properties of light with a low radiation density and his observations laid the foundation of the photon theory of light.

In his early days in Berlin, Einstein postulated that the correct interpretation of the special theory of relativity must also furnish a theory of gravitation and in 1916 he published his paper on the general theory of relativity. During this time he also contributed to the problems of the theory of radiation and statistical mechanics.

In the 1920s, Einstein embarked on the construction of unified field theories, although he continued to work on the probabilistic interpretation of quantum theory, and he persevered with this work in America. He contributed to statistical mechanics by his development of the quantum theory of a monatomic gas and he has also accomplished valuable work in connection with atomic transition probabilities and relativistic cosmology.

After his retirement he continued to work towards the unification of the basic concepts of physics, taking the opposite approach, geometrisation, to the majority of physicists.

Einstein’s researches are, of course, well chronicled and his more important works include Special Theory of Relativity (1905), Relativity (English translations, 1920 and 1950), General Theory of Relativity (1916), Investigations on Theory of Brownian Movement (1926), and The Evolution of Physics (1938). Among his non-scientific works, About Zionism (1930), Why War? (1933), My Philosophy (1934), and Out of My Later Years (1950) are perhaps the most important.

Albert Einstein received honorary doctorate degrees in science, medicine and philosophy from many European and American universities. During the 1920’s he lectured in Europe, America and the Far East, and he was awarded Fellowships or Memberships of all the leading scientific academies throughout the world. He gained numerous awards in recognition of his work, including the Copley Medal of the Royal Society of London in 1925, and the Franklin Medal of the Franklin Institute in 1935.

Einstein’s gifts inevitably resulted in his dwelling much in intellectual solitude and, for relaxation, music played an important part in his life. He married Mileva Maric in 1903 and they had a daughter and two sons; their marriage was dissolved in 1919 and in the same year he married his cousin, Elsa Löwenthal, who died in 1936. He died on April 18, 1955 at Princeton, New Jersey.

Charles Darwin: Delivering the Evolutionary Gospel

Mr. Charles darwin 


Charles Darwin would not have been anyone’s first guess for a revolutionary scientist.

As a young man, his main interests were collecting beetles and studying geology in the countryside, occasionally skipping out on his classes at the University of Edinburgh Medical School to do so. It was a chance invitation in 1831 to join a journey around the world that would make Darwin, who had once studied to become a country parson, the father of evolutionary biology.

Aboard the HMS Beagle, between bouts of seasickness, Darwin spent his five-year trip studying and documenting geological formations and myriad habitats throughout much of the Southern Hemisphere, as well as the flora and fauna they contained.

Darwin’s observations pushed him to a disturbing realization — the Victorian-era theories of animal origins were all wrong. Most people in Darwin’s time still adhered to creationism, the idea that a divine being was responsible for the diversity of life we find on Earth.

Darwin’s observations implied a completely different process. He noticed small differences between members of the same species that seemed to depend upon where they lived. The finches of the Galapagos are the best-known example: From island to island, finches of the same species possessed differently shaped beaks, each adapted to the unique sources of food available on each island.

This suggested not only that species could change — already a divisive concept back then — but also that the changes were driven purely by environmental factors, instead of divine intervention. Today, we call this natural selection.

When Darwin returned, he was hesitant to publish his nascent ideas and open them up to criticism, as he felt that his theory of evolution was still insubstantial. Instead, he threw himself into studying the samples from his voyage and writing an account of his travels. Through his industrious efforts, Darwin built a reputation as a capable scientist, publishing works on geology as well as studies of coral reefs and barnacles still considered definitive today.

Darwin also married his first cousin, Emma Wedgwood, during this time. They had 10 children, and by all accounts Darwin was an engaged and loving father, encouraging his children’s interests and taking time to play with them. This was a level of attention uncommon among fathers at that time — to say nothing of eminent scientists.

Through it all, the theory of evolution was never far from his mind, and the various areas of research he pursued only strengthened his convictions. Darwin slowly amassed overwhelming evidence in favor of evolution in the 20 years after his voyage.

All of his observations and musings eventually coalesced into the tour de force that was On the Origin of Species, published in 1859 when Darwin was 50 years old. The 500-page book sold out immediately, and Darwin would go on to produce six editions, each time adding to and refining his arguments.

In non-technical language, the book laid out a simple argument for how the wide array of Earth’s species came to be. It was based on two ideas: that species can change gradually over time, and that all species face difficulties brought on by their surroundings. From these basic observations, it stands to reason that those species best adapted to their environments will survive and those that fall short will die out.

Though Darwin’s theory was logically sound and backed up by reams of evidence, his ideas faced sharp criticisms from adherents of creationism and the religious establishment around the world — just as he had feared.

Although it wouldn’t become widely accepted until the 1930s, Darwin’s theory of natural selection and his ideas on evolution have survived largely intact. “I can’t emphasize enough how revolutionary Darwin’s theory was and how much it changed people’s views in so short a time,” says Jerry Coyne, professor emeritus in the Department of Ecology and Evolution at the University of Chicago. “On the Origin of Species is absolutely thorough and meticulously documented, and anticipated virtually all the counterarguments. There’s nothing you can really say to go after the important aspects of Darwin’s theory.”