Is Einstein's Genius Overrated in the World of Physics?

[eljose]

The "Einstein Mith"

NOw that we are in 2005 the so claimed year of physics, perhaps is time to speak about some of its greatest miths..

Einstein:= the proud discoverer of relativity,photoelectric effect and other...in fact did you know that the einstein formulation of Specific heat is not sufficient?..in fact according to Einstein,s formulation Cp=Cv and also he made several mistakes for the energy of oscilators he put $$E_{n}=\hbar{n}w$$ omitting the term $$E_{0}=\hbar{w}/2$$ but when you normalize the integral the term magically disappear.

The photoelectric effect is only a direct consecuence of Planck,s principle of quantization of energy, every student could have discovered..i don,t know if in 1900,s they were all stupid not to see that..

The relativity (special) was discovered earlier than Einstein by Poincare. Lorentz and others..but Einstein got all the merit...

einstein believed that universe had always existed..but if this were true the universe would have reached to its thermodinamical equilibrium..and the temperature would be T=0 K, i think this is a serious mistake...

The formulation of Boson,s statistic could have been also derivated by using Dirac,s approach but instead of with Fermions with Bosons...

The only "real" thing Einstein discovered was general relativity..and this was only a direct conclussion of Riemannian Geometry..then my question is..¿why is considered einstein a genious?..later i will make a discussion about Heisenberg,Dirac and other "masters" of physics.

I don,t know if this post goes here,..if so feel free to move it to the adecuate forum..thanks for your comprehension.

 

[ZapperZ]

And I could go on and say that Watson and Crick didn't do anything other than use everyone else's work and put them together and voila! They came up with the DNA.

The more you get into this field, the MORE you will appreciate the fact that being able to sit back and put different things together is a skill that not many possess. Do not trivialize such a thing. I personally believe that the general public has over glamorized Einstein. But I am in no position to belittle his accomplishment, or his impact on physics. I die happy just to accomplish 1/10th of what he has managed to do.

Zz.

 

[octol]

I'm no expert but if I understood it right the photoelectric effect was a far greater leap than Planck's quantization of the emitted energy.

At the time, matter was not in any way understood in terms of fundamental constituents, and what Planck did was to show that energy was _emitted_ from this poorly understood matter in a quantized fashion. Einstein then made the conceptual leap that energy not only was emitted in discrete steps but also that it could only exist as discrete quanta (photons). And it took far longer for the scientific community to accept this photon concept; even Planck rejected it for years.

And no, I wouldn't say that Poincare/Lorentz discovered SR, even though they laid the majority of the groundwork. It's like with Aristotle, who was very close to inventing the (integral) calculus but still isn't credited as such, since he didn't really go all the way.

Claiming GR is just a direct conclusion of Riemannian geometry is not really fair either. Fundamental physics is very rarely just the result of the mathematics used to describe it.

Yeah sure looking back the mathematical deductions might seem straightforward. But that has more to do with that today we know which of the different paths physicists in the day were pondering were right, and as such makes it all much easier. To take those steps back in the day and interpret what it meant in terms of physical events is far more difficult. This is especially true of SR, Poincare/Lorentz did most of the theoretical work, but it was still Einstein who took the final conceptual step of what it meant.

Contributions to science is of course not proportional to the fame the authors get, but you can't really deny that Einstein made several very important contributions that not a lot of people can claim to match.

 

[Geoff St. Germaine]

You're right, Einstein did nothing useful and any idiot could have figured that stuff out.

 

[ZapperZ]

I'm no expert but if I understood it right the photoelectric effect was a far greater leap than Planck's quantization of the emitted energy.

At the time, matter was not in any way understood in terms of fundamental constituents, and what Planck did was to show that energy was _emitted_ from this poorly understood matter in a quantized fashion. Einstein then made the conceptual leap that energy not only was emitted in discrete steps but also that it could only exist as discrete quanta (photons). And it took far longer for the scientific community to accept this photon concept; even Planck rejected it for years.

And you're not too far off with this opinion. John Ridgen even went as far as to say that of all his 1905 papers, the photoelectric effect paper was the TRULY revolutionary.

http://physicsweb.org/articles/world/18/4/2

Zz.

 

[Tide]

Methinks the questions being asked reveal some serious lack of understanding and misrepresentation of Einstein's works.

Besides that, I agree this topic is in the wrong PF area.

 

[ZapperZ]

Yeah, but where do you think it should go? Skepticism and Debunking?

:)

Zz.

 

[Tide]

Yeah, but where do you think it should go? Skepticism and Debunking?

:)

Zz.

PF Lounge?

 

[samalkhaiat]

PF Lounge?

THERE SHOULD BE A PF-GARBAGE AREA.


SAM

 

[Integral]

THERE SHOULD BE A PF-GARBAGE AREA.
SAM

There used to be a PF garbage dump, we called it Theory Development, it got to stinky for any of us to stand so we buried it.

 

[tariq5]

eljose
yes I see "King is naked"

 

[Evo]

THERE SHOULD BE A PF-GARBAGE AREA.
SAM

Oh great, it ended up here, the PF round file.

I'll remember this.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

The problem is that there are about 10,000 more new "theories" per day than there are mentors.