NEW EINSTEIN THEORY

Evening Star, Issue 20132, 23 March 1929, Page 6

NEW EINSTEIN THEORY

POSSIBLE MILESTONE IN THOUGHT A WIFE-PROTECTED SCIENTIST A little six-pago pamphlet, published in Berlin on January JU at the price of one mark, or about 24 cents, may prove, many commentators tell us, to be a milestone in the history of thought comparable in importance to those set up by such men as Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, and Darwin. The pamphlet, in which the text consists almost whollv of complex mathematical formulae is by Dr Albert Einstein, famous originator of the theory' of relativity, and represents the labour of ten years, jt is called ‘ Zur Einheitliehen Eehitheoric,’ or On a Uniform .Field Theory.’ According to newspaper rumours circulated in advance of its publication, (lie purpose of Dr Einstein’s paper was to prove that “ the forces of electricity and magnetism arc the same as those of gravitation but in his own words, what he lias done is “ to give uniform significance to the held of gravitation am! the electromagnetic held.” H. R. 'Knickerbocker, in a Berlin despatch to (ho Now York ‘ Evening Post,’ quotes him further as saying: 1 For years it lias been my greatest ambition"' to resolve the duality of natural laws into unity. The duality consists of the fact that physicists have hitherto been compelled to postulate two sets of laws—those which control gravitation and those which control the phenenn mi of electricity and of magnetism. •• Gravitation and its laws give us the basis upon which wo have built our whole system of mechanics and ol ’.notion. Electro-magnetism and its iaws give us the basis upon which wo have ' built our doctrine of light, of electrical phenomena, and of heat. '•The general theory of relaLivily did not aHempt to. or at any rate did not sufficiently, span this gup. Many piivsicists have siiopectcd that the two sets of laws must he based upon one general law, hut neither experimentation nor theory' has until now succeeded in formulating this law. I believe now that I. have lound the proper lorm. I have thought out a spatial cmislriiotion which is diHercntiated through certain conditions from that of the relativity theory _ and from other theories of fonr-dimensional space through certain conditions. Jhcse conditions bring under the same mnlhematiea! cfinations the laws which govern tho electromagnetic held and those which govern tho held of gravitation.” HOW THE SAVANT IS SHIELDED. This ■,irr(!“"om!'”'t -ivc- as i ghmuse of the man himseU : “ It was not easy lor the visitor to worm himself into the presence ol the quiet, middle-aged man, who is tho greatest living scientist and perhaps one of the greatest thinkers of all time. “The professor’s Hat- in Haherland street is ideally arranged for the quiet j labours of a philosopher. On the lourth iloor arc the rooms where lie lives, eats, and sleeps. “ Here Fran Einstein presides. Her life is literally devoted to .shielding 'Albert.’ Dining the past two weeks .she has stood at the telephone for hours explaining that her husband could not speak to anyone and trying to make it plain that it isn’t because he is proud or grumpy or unsociable, hut because d he 7)nee look up the receiver ho would spend his whole lime answering questions which he prelers to let his dissertation answer. “Above their dwelling, on the filth floor, just beneath the roof, is one Jiighceilinged attic loom. it has an iron dour. This room is Dr Einsteins retreat. In the true souse ol the term it is a work.Jiop of thought in which have boon evolved more theories, hypotheses. and laws ol physics than have proceeded troin tho workshop ol any thinker ol Hus generation, and probably more Hian have come Jrom any mental laboratory since Newton's time. ‘‘lndicative of the many-sided nature of the professor's intellect is the tact that in this room, devoted lor the most part to ratiocinations which express themselves .n equations, lornuhe, and all those hieroglyphics which characterise the mathematician's art. stands opposite his desk a grand piano. He is a passionate lover of music,” AN UNBELIEVER. Fur sonic time, we arc (old. mathematicians will he busy checking Dr Einstein's arguments, hut ‘‘ the ultimate proof or disproof of his theory will rest with the physicists.” As we go to press, mathematicians and physicists, in the main, seem to he either reserving their judgments or conceding that Uh! doctor has probably made his ease. But an exception is Dr Charles Lane Poor, professor of celestial mechanics at Columbia Univeisity, who has been combating the Einstein theory of .relativity I'm ten years, “.Professor Einstein lias hypnotised the world, and everyone is climbing on the hand wagon,” says Dr Poor, as quoted by the New York ' Herald-Tribune,’ and he goes on to say of Einstein's methods; “They are the methods ol the inathematlcinii and the dreamer, who has no regard for the hard lads of reality; the methods of the “ not, altogether unbiased’ advocate who selects such observations a, may suit, him ami disregards all others. “ .Mathematical processes merely constitute a sort of specialised short hand ; they furnish simplified methods lor carrying on elaborate and complicated arguments from assumed or stated premises, “ A conclusion E derived from certain do hi life premises, and sm.-h conclusion must inevitably involve and depend upon such premises. There is in mathematics a, law of ‘conservation ol knowledge.’ and yon can ever get, out of any mathematical (-filiations or formulas anything mure than you put into in the first place. Yon can not, in reality, prove anything by mathematics.” FAR REACHING PROHIBITED. it must not be supposed that Einstein's revolutionary ideas, if maintained and rounded out. will operate only in the sphere of science, remarks the New' York ‘ World ’: “They will invade other fields and colour many sides of human life. This was true of the great innovations of thought in the past. The demonstra-

tions of Galileo shook flic religious world of his lime, fundamentally changed man’s ideas of his relations to Nature and to society, and made such a scheme of thought as we find in Dante seem suddenly antique am quaint. Newton’s mechanics afiected the siructurc of religion, society, and perhaps above all polities. The stabilised and balanced Whig system, which found its great exponents in Locke and Montesquieu and which loiL such a heavy mark on our Constitution, had a definite relation to Newton s ideas. Jt was an attempt to supply to government the cheeks, balances, and fixed movements which Newton’s laws f omit 1 in Nature, As for Darwin, w-e arc still in Hie midst of the sweeping currents of change which the evolutionary uoc-

trine sot in motion. It is impossible as yet to predict the forms in which the ideas of relativity, which only the expert few can now understand, wall alfect thought and society. But the effects will occur, and they will ultimately be far-reaching.” The new pamphlet itself is not likely to he popular reading. T lie opening sent ence has been largely quoted “One can arrive at my theory il one aftnhnioM to the lonr-dimoiisional Kontiiiiium, besides the Rieniann-Metrik, also the quality of Far-Rarallelism.