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Authors Scientist Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein

Theoretical physicist · 1879–1955

Physicist whose theories of relativity transformed understanding of space, time, gravity and the universe.

Lifetime
Mar 14, 1879 – Apr 18, 1955 (age 76)
Primary field
Scientist
Secondary fields
Academic Activist
Tags
General relativitySpecial relativityQuantum theoryNobel Prize in PhysicsInstitute for Advanced Studye=mc2

Albert Einstein was born in Ulm, Germany, and studied at the Swiss Federal Polytechnic in Zurich. While working as a patent examiner in Bern, he published four papers in 1905 covering the photoelectric effect, Brownian motion, special relativity and the equivalence of mass and energy.

His general theory of relativity, completed in 1915, described gravity as the curvature of space and time. Observations during the solar eclipse of 1919 supported its predictions and brought him international fame. He received the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on the photoelectric effect.

Einstein left Germany in 1933, after the Nazi party came to power, and settled in the United States, joining the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. In later years he spoke publicly on pacifism, nuclear disarmament and civil rights. He died in Princeton in 1955.

Quotations

“One thing I have learned in a long life: that all our science, measured against reality, is primitive and childlike—and yet it is the most precious thing we have.”

Albert Einstein · Relativity: The Special and the General Theory, 1920 · Primary source

“The search for truth is more precious than its possession.”

Albert Einstein · Ideas and Opinions , 1954 · Primary source

“I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious.”

Albert Einstein · Letter to Carl Seelig, 1952 · Primary source

“The release of atomic energy has not created a new problem. It has merely made more urgent the necessity of solving an existing one. One could say that it has affected us quantitatively, not qualitatively.”

Albert Einstein · Ideas and Opinions , 1954 · Primary source

“Education is that which remains, if one has forgotten everything he learned in school.”

Albert Einstein · Ideas and Opinions , 1954 · Primary source

“I believe it to be an invariable rule that tyrants of genius are succeeded by scoundrels.”

Albert Einstein · Ideas and Opinions , 1954 · Primary source

“A theory is the more impressive the greater the simplicity of its premises is, the more different kinds of things it relates, and the more extended is its area of applicability.”

Albert Einstein · Autobiographical Notes, 1949 · Primary source

“It is, in fact, nothing short of a miracle that the modern methods of instruction have not yet entirely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry; for this delicate little plant, aside from stimulation, stands mainly in need of freedom; without this it goes to wrack and ruin without fail.”

Albert Einstein · Autobiographical Notes, 1949 · Primary source

“Science is a wonderful thing if one does not have to earn a living at it. One should earn one’s living by work of which one is sure one is capable. Only when we do not have to be accountable to anyone can we find joy in scientific endeavor.”

Albert Einstein · Letter to E. Holzapfel, 1951 · Primary source

“The belief in an external world independent of the perceiving subject is the basis of all natural science.”

Albert Einstein · Ideas and Opinions , 1954 · Primary source

“As long as I have any choice, I will only stay in a country where political liberty, tolerance, and equality of all citizens before the law prevail.”

Albert Einstein · Ideas and Opinions , 1954 · Primary source

“The only rational way of educating is to be an example—if one can’t help it, a warning example.”

Albert Einstein · Ideas and Opinions , 1954 · Primary source

“The ideals which have lighted my way, and time after time have given me new courage to face life cheerfully, have been Kindness, Beauty, and Truth.”

Albert Einstein · Ideas and Opinions , 1954 · Primary source

“Development of Western science is based on two great achievements: the invention of the formal logical system (in Euclidean geometry) by the Greek philosophers, and the discovery of the possibility of finding out causal relationships by systematic experiment (Renaissance).”

Albert Einstein · Letter to J.S. Switzer, 1953 · Primary source

“One reason why mathematics enjoys special esteem, above all other sciences, is that its propositions are absolutely certain and indisputable, while those of all other sciences are to some extent debatable and in constant danger of being overthrown by newly discovered facts.”

Albert Einstein · Ideas and Opinions , 1954 · Primary source

“The American lives even more for his goals, for the future, than the European. Life for him is always becoming, never being.”

Albert Einstein · Ideas and Opinions , 1954 · Primary source

“Intellectual individualism and scientific eras emerged simultaneously in history and have remained inseparable ever since.”

Albert Einstein · Ideas and Opinions , 1954 · Primary source

“The pursuit of knowledge for its own sake, an almost fanatical love of justice and the desire for personal independence—these are the features of the Jewish tradition which make me thank my stars that I belong to it.”

Albert Einstein · Ideas and Opinions , 1954 · Primary source

“He [the American] is friendly, self-confident, optimistic—and without envy.”

Albert Einstein · Ideas and Opinions , 1954 · Primary source

“Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world. He who understands it, earns it. He who doesn’t, pays it.”

Albert Einstein · No reliable source

“Everything should be as simple as possible, but not simpler.”

Albert Einstein · No reliable source

Selected works

Scientific paper · 1905
On a Heuristic Point of View Concerning the Production and Transformation of Light

The proposal that light energy travels in discrete quanta rather than continuous waves, and what that explains about the photoelectric effect.

Scientific paper · 1905
On the Movement of Small Particles Suspended in Stationary Liquids Required by the Molecular-Kinetic Theory of Heat

How the random jittering of tiny particles suspended in a liquid follows from the motion of unseen molecules, and how it can be measured.

Scientific paper · 1905
On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies

How measurements of time and distance depend on the observer's motion, and why the speed of light is the same for everyone.

Scientific paper · 1905
Does the Inertia of a Body Depend Upon its Energy Content?

The argument that a body giving off energy loses mass, and that mass and energy are therefore two measures of the same thing.

Scientific paper · 1916
The Foundation of the General Theory of Relativity

A theory of gravity in which mass and energy curve space and time, and objects follow the shape of that curvature.

Book · 1920 FEATURED WORK
Relativity: The Special and the General Theory

Einstein’s own account of special and general relativity, written for readers without training in the mathematics of theoretical physics.

Letter · 1939
Letter to President Roosevelt

A warning to the United States president that uranium research might produce extremely powerful bombs, and a call for government action.

Autobiographical essay · 1949 FEATURED WORK
Autobiographical Notes

Einstein’s account of how his thinking developed, from childhood wonder to relativity and his objections to quantum mechanics.

Essay collection · 1954 FEATURED WORK
Ideas and Opinions

A collection of non-technical writings by Albert Einstein on science, religion, ethics, politics, pacifism and education, drawn from across his career.

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