Notes on Einstein by Walter Isaacson

I really enjoyed the biography of Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson, and so I decided to check out his book on Einstein: His Life and Universe.

I enjoyed the book a lot and learned a lot of interesting details about the time period Einstein lived in and the hard work behind the science he discovered. I was fascinated by the amount of handwritten letters that went back and forth across continents and between friends, family, and work colleagues; people got so much done back then even without email! And people were obviously more patient.

I was also inspired by the sheer quantity of hard work that Einstein put in to come up with his theories and papers. I also liked learning that a lot of his discoveries came about through active discussions and collaboration with other physicists, all of whom helped each other out. I also saw how Einstein was (for much of his life) a true scientist willing to abandon his own theories quickly when they didn't stand up to real world testing and how easily he could get up from failure and try again, each time 100% confident something would work. In that sense, Einstein was a true experimentalist and reminded me of the atitude entrepreneurs need to have when pivoting and approaching businesses from a lean standpoint.

I also realized that Einstein was quite a complex person, not just a solitary "nerd" but one with intense emotions and "complicated" relationships with people; some people he was extremely close to, and it seems like he used science to escape from difficult emotional situations but that he also craved human contact and developed strong friendships with fellow scientists.This is a great read for anyone interested in science. The book explains a lot of Einstein's theory in plain language, and the reader can get a good sense for concepts like special relativity, wave-particle duality, and (high-level) general relativity.

My full notes on the book are below.

Ch. 1: Light Beam Rider

• Wrote a few papers while patent examiner 
• Couldn't get job as prof
• Wave-particle duality
• Size of atom
• Existence of molecules
• Special relativity
• Mass-energy equivalence
• Non-conformist
• Told wife that if he will win the Nobel Prize and give her the money if she will give him a divorce
• Didn't want to accept that G-d plays dice
  
• Thought experiments, not lab work
  
• Appreciation for science important for citizenship
  
• Thought schools should foster creativity
  
• Imagination is more important than knowledge

Ch. 2: Childhood (1879-1896)

• Slow to talk until 2
• Didn't think in words but pictures (thought experiments)
• Jewish merchant parents
• Valued education
• Jewish intellectual tradition, not religion
• Mesmerized by how a compass works
• Hidden order behind universe
• Force fields
• Learned violin and loved Mozart
• Used music to solve problems

School

• Sense of outsider
• Went to Catholic school
• Never failed math
• Top grades
• Truth by reasoning alone
• Read math books early
• Read philosophy and Kant
• Rebelled against religious dogma
• Worst subject: French

Ch. 3: Zurich Polytechnic

• Realized math critical to physics
• Didn't follow instructions
• Flunked lab class
• Read theorists
• Disdain for ostentation
• Frayed clothing
• Absent minded, forgetful
• Had relativity experiment ideas in college

Ch. 4: The Lovers

• Graduated from college
  
• Met girl who was also nonconformist
  
• Couldn't find job
• Tutoring
• First published paper on capillary action
• Wanted to be Swiss citizen
• Got turned down for academic positions repeatedly
• Developed kinetic theory of gases
• Girlfriend pregnant, couldn't pass science exams
• Never told anyone of his daughter's birth
• Never met his daughter
• Wanted job at patent office
• Came up with his own ideas during work
• Also did tutoring
• Finally married but without family present
• Daughter hidden and all evidence of existence destroyed
• Boy born

Ch. 5: Miracle Year

• Fascinated by field theory
• Electromagnetism, Maxwell
• Visual imagination, questioning status quo
• Created light quanta
• Worked with Planck
• Photoelectric effect
• Wave-particle issues
• Photon description of light; physical reality from statistical model
• Recoiled from what it meant about statistical nature of world
• PhD dissertation on discovering Avogadro's number
• Paper on brownian motion

Ch. 6: Special Relativity

• All is relative
• Hunt for ether that light waves pass through
• Relative effects of waves
  
• But speed of light always constant no matter relative speed
  
• Thought experiment of riding right next to a light beam
  
• Led to special relativity
  
• Tension between Newtonian physics and Maxwell's electromagnetism
  
• No ether detection meant relativity must apply to light
• Preferred deduction from big principles
  
• Started with idea that laws same for all reference systems
  
• Emission theory rejected for wave theory
  
• Light always at same speed no matter speed of source
  
• Speed of observer couldn't change speed of light
  
• Dilemma
  

The "Step" that solved the dilemma

• Analysis of concept of time is key
  
• Key insight that 2 events appearing simultaneous cannot be proven so
  
• No such thing as absolute time
  
• Simultaneous events only in one reference frame
  
• Train moving while lightning strikes in 2 places (in front and behind) equal distance away; strikes simultaneous for bystander but not passenger
  
• Time in patent office stimulated him to think of practical theories
  
• Time itself only defined by simultaneous events (arrow pointing to number on clock)
  
• No such thing as absolute rest
  
• Constancy of light speed and relativity
• Time going more slowly for train passenger
• Time dilation
• Twin paradox: which ages more?
• No ether
  
• All inertial reference frames equally valid
  
• Time relative to observer's motion
  
• Einstein cast off Newtonian physics
  
• E=mc^2 coda
  
• Mass as energy of a body

Ch. 7: The Happiest Thought

• Thought: Man in free fall doesn't feel his own weight
  
• Equivalence of gravity and acceleration
  
• Equivalence of inertial and gravitational mass
  
• General relativity generalizes special theory by relaxing special restriction of uniform motion
  
• If accelerating in frame of reference, no way to know if accelerating or in gravitational field
  
• Gravity bends light and time
  
• Finally became university professor
  
• Disorganized teaching
  
• Lots of stumbles along the way to becoming appointed professor
  
• Drifted apart from wife who was jealous
  
• Quantum theory and wave theory of light from Maxwell
  
• Wave-particle duality

Ch. 8: The Wandering Professor

• Couldn't get another post because Jew even though didn't identify as one
  
• But then allowed
  
• Intense friendships with other scientists
  
• Revered Lawrence
• Forced to declare a religion
• Fell in love with cousin
• By 34, invited as youngest prof in Berlin
• Wife had depression
• Separated with wife and kids

Ch. 9: General Relativity

• Equivalence between elevator going up and accelerating or being in a gravitational field
  
• Light beam bends in gravitational field
  
• Needed non-Euclidian geometry
  
• Normal geo couldn't work in case of rotating disc or accelerating body because of distortions due to special relativity (circle circumference of rotating disc changes but diameter does not so ratio not pi)
  
• Riemann developed non-Euclidian geo and tensor
  
• Gravity curvature of space-time
  
• Looked at problem from physics and math standpoints
  
• First wrote outline which didn't work
  
• Gravity equivalence with uniform acceleration
  
• Conservation of energy and momentum
  
• Collapses into Newtonian physics as special case of weak or static field
  
• Theory had to be tested during eclipse to see if star light bent when passing near sun
  
• Freundlich wanted to do eclipse measurement
  
• But couldn't measure due to World War 1
  
• Einstein hated nationalism and conflict
  
• Equations needed to have covariance property
  
• Switched to focusing on mathematical covariance equation from Riemann
  
• Finally cracked theory
  
• Predicted Mercury's shift in orbit; happiest moment in his life
  
• Hilbert (physicist) competed with him
  
• Objects curve space-time, and curved space-time tells matter how to move
  
• Ricci tensor
  
• Hilbert gave credit to Einstein who did theory and Hilbert finished math independently
  
• Einstein did general theory by age 36

Ch. 10: Divorce

• Totally drained by field equations work
  
• Couldn't spend time with sons
  
• Work shielded from personal
  
• Wrote book for layperson called Relativity
  
• Difficult to get divorce from wife
  
• Offered her Noble Prize if gave divorce
  
• Married cousin
  
• She took care of him, made him food and clothes, gave him space to think alone

Ch. 11: Einstein's Universe

• Cosmology is study if universe
  
• If enough mass within Schwarzschild radius then would bend space-time into itself and light could not escape
  
• Stars collapse
  
• Black holes
  
• Imagined finite universe that curves in on itself and has no boundaries
  
• Space curves in on itself in corners
  
• Curved universe
  
• But universe had to be expanding or contracting in his equations
  
• Data later showed that universe expanding
  
• Eclipse experiment to check gravity bending star light

Ch. 12: Fame

• Books and lectures
  
• Growing antisemitism
  
• Relativity was heretical
  
• Uncertainty, moral relativity, less faith with absolutes
  
• But misinterpreted as relativism

Ch. 13: Wandering Zionist

• Supported Israel
  
• German currency collapsed
  
• Reaction against Jewish science
  
• Stronger connection to Jews
  
• Became celebrity
  
• Went to America to support Jewish university in Israel
  
• Nature hides its secrets but not malicious
  
• Lord more subtle than malicious
  
• Lots of pomp in travel to Asia for lectures

Ch. 14: Nobel Laureate

• Kept denying him prize for stupid reasons
  
• Only given for photoelectric effect, not relativity because many disagreed
  
• Einstein resisted quantum mechanics
  
• Wanted to find unified field theory
  
• Was much more creative before 40 than after
  
• Link between creativity and youthful rebelliousness
  
• Move from revolutionary to conservative around quantum mechanics
  
• Specific states of electron orbits by Bohr, quantum leap changes discrete and discontinuous
  
• Relativity still kept causality
  
• But didn't like randomness of electron and photon choosing when to emit and what direction which was never determinable with all info and random
  
• Einstein contributed to quantum mechanics but uncomfortable
  
• Spooky instant action at a distance in quantum mechanics that Einstein didn't like
  
• Heisenberg uncertainty principle: can't know position and momentum at once
  
• Act of observing affects location
  
• No absolute reality
  
• Einstein supported Newton's method now

Ch. 15: Unified Field Theories

• Kept coming up with wrong theories and revisions
• Bothered by quantum mechanics action at a distance

Ch. 16: Turning 50

• Loved sailing and solitude
  
• Worked at Cal Tech
  
• Advocated pacifism
  
• Got statue in Protestant church
  
• Lots of fundraisers and celebrity events
  
• Movie premiere with Chaplin
  
• Politics more involved, anti-war activism
  
• Had idea for United Nations
  
• Wanted group to run Israeli and Arab relations

Ch: 17: Einstein's G-d

• Deepening appreciation for Judaism
  
• Appreciation for awe of science
  
• Faith in orderliness of universe
  
• Loved mystery of nature
  
• Believed in determinism not free will

Ch. 18: The Refugee

• Recruited to Princeton
  
• Went to Cal Tech
  
• Hitler took power, Einstein couldn't return
  
• Renounced German citizenship
  
• Jews banned from university, best professors left and helped allies make atom bomb
  
• Altered pacifist views to advocate defense force against Germany
  
• For scientist, altering philosophy on new facts is not sign of weakness

Ch. 19: America

• Loved violin
  
• Moved to Princeton
  
• Dismissive attitude towards grooming
  
• Cared passionately about people
  
• Absent-minded professor
  
• Wanted to help Jews, lots of talks
  
• Believed all people should be tolerated

Ch. 20: Quantum Entanglement

• Action at a distance
  
• Final state of second particle influenced by measure of first
  
• Observations determine reality
  
• Thought only action at speed of light but wrong 
  
• 2 particles who interacted are now part of 1 system and entangled
  
• Schrodinger's Cat
  
• Bohr did classic atom model and supported quantum one
  
• Einstein didn't like spooky action at a distance
  
• Can't use entanglement to send info
  
• Trait of tenacity, coming back to problem year after year
  
• Realism: belief in absolute reality beyond our observations
  
• Not ruled by chance
  
• Obsessed with finding unified field theory
  
• Lots of failures but kept excitement

Ch. 21: The Bomb

• Fission using uranium
  
• Einstein wanted to warn Roosevelt about atom bomb potential
  
• His colleagues got meeting and Roosevelt started secret committee to investigate
  
• But Einstein not allowed to participate due to misunderstandings and security risk
  
• Became US citizen
  
• Proposed stronger international league of nations

Ch. 22: One World

• Only salvation against arms is world government authority
  
• Hated repression of free thought
  
• Cold War
  
• Hated racial segregation

Ch. 23: Landmark

• Einstein now landmark not beacon
  
• Godel's incompleteness theory
  
• Offered Israeli presidency but declined
  
• Didn't have aptitude to deal with people
  
• Never could do administrative tasks

Ch. 24: Red Scare

• McCarthyism
  
• Security investigations
  
• Scare of communists
  

Ch. 25: The End

• Got pet parrot
  
• Tons of equation hopes and many disappointments
  
• Don't know what weapons will be used for WW3 but do know for WW4: rocks
  
• Wrote petition by scientists to prevent WW3
  
• Scribbled equations even on deathbed in hospital

Epilogue

• Died and cremated
  
• But pathologist stole his brain and kept it
  
• Doled out slices to researchers
  
• Einstein's answer: curiosity
  
• Child seeing compass needle point north
  
• What would mean to race near light beam?
  
• Curiosity has own reason for existing: helping understanding
  
• Mental pictures, imagination
  
• Behind formulas, saw physical reality
  
• Scientific leaps from imaginative leaps
  
• Aimed for simplicity and beauty in theories
  
• Instinct for unification of relativity, field theories, politics/world government
  
• Fight against all dogma based on authority
  
• Joyous non-conformity
  
• Freedom is lifeblood of creativity
  
• Tolerance underpinned by humility
  
• Awed by nature's handiwork, must be humble to nature
  
• Science leads to humility
  
• Feeling of reverence at nature
  
• If he were G-d, would he arrange things in such a way?