Albert Einstein Essay, Research Paper

Albert Einstein(1879-1955) You may say that if you are good at school, then you will do good for yourself. This is true for many, but not for all. Not many people say that if you were expelled from school, and you got bad grades you can change the whole world. This is not true for Albert Einstein. Albert Einstein changed the way that the whole world sees things. Someone does not have to be a really good student in school to achieve success in life, and Albert Einstein proved that among many other things. Albert Einstein was born on March 14, 1879. He was born in Ulm, Germany. His family was Jewish. Albert s father s name was Hermann Einstein, and his mother s name was Pauline Koch. Albert also had a sister named Maria. As a child, Albert was much slower in learning how to speak, in fact at one time, his parents feared that he was retarded. Albert s speech was not yet fluent by age 9. In his free time, he enjoyed playing with jigsaw puzzles, and building14 story card houses (Dank 3-6). He also learned how to play the violin before age 5 (Who 1). Albert showed a lot of unusual manual dexterity. He was not into any sports, or games, he mainly liked mechanical toys, and he loved trying to figure out how they worked. When he was around 4 or 5, he was sick in bed, so his father gave him a magnetic compass. The compass entertained him for hours, which is pretty unusual for a 4 or 5 year old child (Dank 6-7). The first school that Albert attended was a Catholic elementary school. His parents chose for him to be enrolled in a Catholic school simply out of convenience. He was the only Jewish student enrolled in the Catholic school, but it did not effect him in any way. Albert was a rebellious and stubborn student throughout elementary and high school. His lack of attention, and hesitant speech made him unpopular with his teachers. In fact, once his dad went to the headmaster of his school and asked him what future career his son should follow. He was told that it didn t matter, because Albert Einstein would never amount to anything (Dank 8). Albert s father had his own business. It failed when Albert was 16, so his mother, father, and sister moved to Italy where his mother had family who would help with money. Albert was left in Germany to finish high school. After about 6 months he wanted to follow his family. He went to a doctor, and convinced him that the separation of him and his family put him on the edge of a nervous breakdown. The doctor then wrote him a certificate saying that a period of rest in Italy was necessary to his health. Before Albert could give the certificate to his school, he was informed that he was expelled for being unruly in class and his insolent, undisciplined attitude toward his fellow students. When Albert went to Italy, he enjoyed it so much. After a while, he decided that he wanted to get into the Federal Institution of Technology (FIT). He thought that he could pass the exam, but the language barrier was a major problem. Albert did not pass the exam. In the summer of 1896, he had a degree from Aarau, and he was admitted to the FIT. In August of 1900, he graduated from the FIT with an average grade of 82% (Dank 10-22). In the spring of 1900, Albert graduated as a secondary school teacher of mathematics and physics. He also accepted a full-time position as a foundation member of the school of mathematics at the New Institution for Advanced Study in Princeton NJ (Who 2-5). In January of 1903, Albert married Mileva Maric, whom he had met in college, and was also interested in relativity. Mileva and Albert had 2 sons: Hans Albert (Dank 22), and Eduart. In 1914, Albert moved to Berlin where the Prussian Academy of Science had offered him a position where he could continue his research with just occasional diversion of lecturing at the University of Berlin. In 1919, Mileva and Albert got a divorce. A few months later, he was married to his cousin Elsa. Who stayed married until death (Who 3).

Early 1905, Albert published a thesis, A New Determination of Molecular Dimensions in the prestigious physics monthly Analen der Physik. Later, that thesis won him a Ph.D. from the University that he taught from (Who 2). Also in 1905, Einstein created the Special Theory of Relativity, in which he demonstrates that measurements of time and distance vary systematically as anything moves relative to anything. This theory proved Newton s theory wrong. In March of 1905, Albert Einstein also created the quantum theory of light, which is the idea that light exists as tiny packets, or particles that we now call photons. Then in April and May, he published 2 papers. One invents a new method of counting and determining the size of the atoms or molecules in a given space. The second paper explains the phenomenon of Brownian motion. This paper also ended the old debate on the fundamental nature of the chemical elements. The results of those papers is proof that atoms actually exist – which was still an issue at that time-. June of 1905, Mr. Einstein completed Special Relativity. Later that year, an extension of Special Relativity in which Einstein proves that energy and matter are linked in the most famous relationship in physics: E=mc2. Which the energy content of a body is equal to the body times the speed of light squared. 1905 was one of the most significant years in history, everyone called it the miracle year. The whole time that Albert was making all this history, he was working a 40 hour week at a patent office (How 2-3). In the year 1907, Einstein confronted the problem of gravitation- which was the same problem that Newton confronted, and solved almost (How 4). In 1908, Albert became a part-time teacher at Bern University (Dank 41-43). In 1911 Albert declared resolving the quantum issue to be the central problem of physics. Then in 1915, He completes the General Theory of Relativity- which was the product of 8 years of working on the problem of gravity (How 4-5). Finally in 1916, while living in Berlin, Einstein finished his general theory of relativity (Who 3). Albert published a paper in 1917 which used the general relativity theory to model the behavior of an entire universe. This paper was the starting point, it was the first in the field of cosmology. By the year 1919, Einstein recognizes that there might be a problem with the classical notion of cause and effect, but that didn t stop him from contributing to the history of math and physics (How 5). Some time in the 1920 s he started his endless search for the unified field theory. This search occupied the rest of his life. Then in 1924 and 1925, Einstein was still making significant contributions to the development of the quantum theory. Albert Einstein won the Nobel Prize in 1921 for the paper on the photoelectric effect. There was nothing mentioned about relativity in his Nobel Prize, because it was still too controversial. In 1933, Albert had a vacation in the United States, but he never returned to Europe because of the Nazis who came to power. Since Einstein knew so much about chemicals, and bomb stuff, he knew the possibility of the Nazis making a uranium bomb, he warned President FDR to watch out, but later regretted it. On April 18, 1955, at the age of 76, Albert Einstein died in his sleep at Princeton Hospital (Who 4-5). Albert Einstein had an immense affect on the way we learn and look at the universe. Without him, who knows where we would be. It is amazing how just one person can have such an effect on the whole world. Especially one who was expelled from school, and had such bad behavior. That just goes to show the world what one person can do though.