Title- Einstein: His Life & Universe
Author: Walter Isaacson
Walter Isaacson definitely has to be a wizard of the science of some sort. Isaacson was not even 3 years old at that time Elbert Einstein died. But it is really hard to believe all of his accounts that he wrote about the famous Einstein life. And that too with such vividness and so specific. It wouldn’t be of any surprise if Isaacson was literally with Einstein throughout his life. Because of the preciseness that he writes.
There are actually quite a lot of books on Einstein. It’s okay to say that and I am pretty comfortable saying, that no one could beat an incredible version of Isaacson’s account on Einstein.
It is a long book with 704 pages in the paperback version, and it is worth the read.
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The objective in the thinking
The biggest takeaway from the book is that Einstein was able to kill it in his life and with his science because he threw away all of society’s norms. Now how did he achieve that you say, all lies In the idea? That he did what he wanted and did not worry about what others thought? There are norms and standards within the science and physics communities. And the reason Einstein was able to come up with his special theory of relativity. Which lead to his general theory was that he was able to take an idea that was established as a fact by Isaac Newton and dismiss it.
This quote at the end of the book: “Freedom is the life and blood of creativity. The development of science and the creativity of spirit requires freedom that is independent of thought from authoritarian and social prejudice. Nurturing this freedom should be the primary role of government and education.”
Einstein had this freedom and he was able to look at everything in his life from a purely free standpoint which contributed greatly to his work. Some of the greatest thinkers of our time, not just scientists, are amazing at this. It’s a thought that definitely blew everyone’s mind.
We are conditioned in society to behave a certain way, follow a certain set of rules, believe in certain things. But the revolutionaries are the ones that don’t buy into this dogma. In most cases maybe all, it seems like the revolutionaries never bought into the norms and that’s how they were able to think so independently. Objectively we see ourselves having fallen into some of these norms. Though, so pushing ourselves to think differently is a difficult but rewarding exercise. Reading about Einstein has motivated quite a lot of people a lot more to really be ourselves and follow our interests, intellectual curiosities, etc.
Concepts of a higher being
There is a fair amount that Einstein has said about religion, God, a higher being and so on. The one thing about this is quite noteworthy. He is someone who understands the physical words and the way that things work better than almost anyone. With all of that knowledge, Einstein has publicly said that there must be a higher power. He came to realize that there was no better way that the physical world could have been established than the way that it was. He even said that during his thought experiments, he would think “If I were God, would I have created the world in such a way?”
Regardless of religious affiliation or belief, all of this is fascinating. He understands the world at such a deep level and he was confident that there’s a higher power that has created this world we live in.
The last super noteworthy thing is that Einstein was constantly writing letters and communicating with the leaders in the scientific community. Upfront, that makes sense. That being said, it took his effort to write letters, keep up with people, share his findings, etc. His collaboration with other brilliant people both aided in his efforts as well as inspired and aided in others work and efforts on improving the world.
Conclusion
While this is an incredibly in-depth account of Einstein, there were a lot of things in here. Isaacson also talked about moments that were important and interesting in Einstein’s life that we all couldn’t relate to as well. The nature of a biography is that all the stories and events that he mentioned were almost certainly worth including. But that’s a caveat to consider. Overall, outlook everyone should read relatively soon.
