Hi,
What most people forget is that Einstein was one of many who had
reached a similar theory at the same time. (Some more gifted)
He wasn't overly brilliant compared to other brilliant people of the
time.
In fact he refused to believe in the probabilty function (God doesn't
play dice), which has since been used, and proven very effective.
The latest theory is the string theory and multi-dimensions, the other
dimensions existing at the Planck? length, which combines gravity with
the other micro and macro forces.
In fact after Einsteins equations, many advanced his theories and
showed some of its weirder outcomes.
Ditto for Steve Hawkins, he is not regarded by those in the know as
being brilliant.
They just fit into people's popular ideas of a scientist.
Cheers
Liam
On Sat, 19 Jun 1999 23:09:17 +1000, "John"
<johnhkm at netsprintXXXX.net.au> wrote:
>Thanks Ron,
>>>Being dense I have lent the text out and so cannot provide references from
>the same but in The Arrow of Time, Peter Coveney and Roger Highfield, they
>make reference to some relevant details of Einstein's life. I don't know
>where they got the information from and suspect that it is not referenced in
>the work, but if memory serves me the following is stated:
>>When Einstein was born his head was so large and angular that his mother
>thought him deformed. His language acquisition was so slow that they thought
>about sending him to a special school. One of his maths teacher thought nil
>of him and I remember reading at least two of his colleagues who were of
>opinion that Einstein was not in fact a "good" mathematician. Einstein
>failed an entrance exam to the university of Zurich in Engineering (first
>attempt) and only made 2nd class technician at the Swiss patent office;
>being unsuccessful in finding an academic post.
>>In Beyond Einstein, Kaku and Thompson, the authors suggest that the
>physicists Einstein, Feynman, and Hawking, use a very visual approach to
>problem solving. They quote
>>Freeman Dyson
>>"The reason Dick's [Feynman]physics was so hard for ordinary people to grasp
>was that he did not use equations. The usual theoretical physics was done
>since the itme of Newton was to begin writing down some equations and then
>to work hard calculating solutions of the equations ... Dick just wrote down
>the solutions out of his head wihtout ever writing down the equations. He
>had a physical picture of the way things happen, and the picture gave him
>the solutions directly with a minimum of calculation. It was no wonder that
>people who had spent their lives solving equations were baffled by him.
>Their minds were analytical; his was pictorial."
>>Einstein's breakthrough, by his own account, began with a daydream about
>riding on a wave of light, which kept him pre-occupied for a good decade.
>Feynman's autobiographical work, Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman, contains
>accounts of how Feynman's relied on visualisation for problem solving (an
>interesting story!). I don't know about Hawking, but I remember Jacob
>Bronowski commenting in The Ascent of Man TV series how von Neumann could
>look at explosions and map the maths onto the images, to wit Bronowski
>stated that he had no real idea how von Neumann did this but it was
>obviously very powerful.
>>I have known natural maths whizzes and often their teachers stare in awe at
>them, it is like a natural ability that flows out. This does not sound like
>the Einstein above. There was something different about his brain, but I
>think it is a big leap to assert that this difference is about mathematics.
>If it is , then this ability of Einstein's must have occurred later in life.
>However, this difference (the missing sulcus) appears to be too large to
>account for by neural plasticity; like I'd know.
>>I remember from years ago that at that time they only difference detected in
>Einstein's brain was a higher dendritic density in the parietal lobe, and
>have heard of the same in a brilliant painter's visual cortex. What I can't
>understand about this latest finding is why it has taken so long to find?
>This is
>an exterior anatomical difference and now only noticed? Perhaps they should
>look at his skull.
>>John
>Remove XXXX in reply address
>>>>"Ron Blue" wrote in message <001f01beb9a2$f35c3720$2736fbd0 at pavilion>...
>>>>>>http://abcnews.go.com/sections/science/DailyNews/einstein990617.html>>>>>>>>>>
