Einstein’s miracle year

We hear the names Einstein or Newton, and we immediately associate the tags of “Geniuses” with them. However, what we don’t seem to notice is that these geniuses didn’t start out big, rather, they were ridiculed for their works by society.

Nevertheless, thanks to their inventions and theories, science and technology are what they are today. Pioneers are always laughed at initially because no one makes anything out of their discoveries. In those terms, they were merely ahead of their times.

Let’s take a look at how Einstein rose to the situation despite all the challenges.

Contents

1905: Einstein’s Miracle Year

Einstein didn’t start out as a scientist, rather as a minor civil servant with a love for science. The year 1905 became the time when he came up with four different papers describing various phenomena.

It wasn’t that Einstein wasn’t good at studies. It was actually his love for the practical application of science that made him spend endless hours in the lab instead of the classrooms. This later became an issue for his academic qualifications.

Anyhow, he started working as a clerk while maintaining time for discussions of physics.

Einstein and his discoveries-

Einstein developed four papers in a year, each one of them responsible for groundbreaking inventions in the modern age.

Paper 1

His first paper was released in March 1905 which shattered the previously believed notion that light was a wave. According to Einstein it was a particle instead, which further proved the workings of the Photoelectric Effect.

Although the idea wasn’t accepted at the time, this Wave/Particle debate became the ground for quantum revolution twenty years later.

Paper 2

A second paper followed in May that digged deeper into the existence of atoms.  Einstein put this to rest by using the example of Brownian Motion, wherein small particles moved randomly in a liquid. As per his model, this movement could be predicted due to the collisions of invisible atoms.

Paper 3

In June, the third paper came out and deepened the discussion on what is now known as Special Relativity.

Einstein finally understood that while talking about absolute motion, it is the speed of light which must remain constant with reference to an object, while time and space were unfixed as they were relative to the observer’s position. Due to this observation, technologies like the particle accelators came into existence.

Paper 4

Finally in September, the fourth paper carried the matter of Relativity forward.

On thinking more upon this issue, Einstein came up with an equation that related mass and energy together as E = mc

where E=energy, m=mass, c=the speed of light.

It was only after 1919 when his theory of General Relativity was confirmed that Einstein finally rose to fame. Nevertheless, it was his discoveries in 1905 that actually paved the way for many other scientific developments to come in the future, and therefore they can’t be ignored.

Read More

Related Articles

Responses

For Worksheets & PrintablesJoin Now
+