ENG
111
Fall
2002
READING
GUIDE: Einstein: A Life in Science, chapters 7-9
Vocabulary
. . .
|
Peripatetic
(p. 101) |
Rapport
(p. 102) |
Raison
d’etre (p. 102) |
|
Exude
(p. 105) |
Gregarious
(p. 111) |
Uncouth
(p. 113) |
|
Paradigm
(p. 119) |
Un-/abate
(p. 121) |
Esoteric
(p. 143) |
|
Lay
(p. 146) |
Stolid
(p. 147) |
Euphemism
(p. 148 |
|
Insidious
(p. 155) |
Eclectic
(p. 159) |
|
Notes
. . .
Chapter
7: The Peripatetic Professor
At
this point in his life, immediately following his breakthrough articles and
notoriety in the scientific community, Einstein had a succession of jobs. Note how those jobs required him to
relocate—and relocation raised the (by now) familiar issues of citizenship,
religion, and office politics.
p.
117 Einstein’s response to World War
I.
p.
122 Einstein needs someone to take
care of him. His second marriage.
Chapter
8: The Masterwork
Here’s
another even-numbered chapter time-out from the narrative of Einstein’s
life. This one explains and illustrates
the general theory of relativity. The
authors claim that it really isn’t so hard to understand. Read the chapter and see for yourself!
Chapter
9: Fame But No Fortune
p.
146 Four categories of opposition to
the theory of relativity. Note how the
authors dismiss the first three. The
fourth, though, was much more dangerous—and on p. 149 we see Einstein’s
response to it. I wonder if this act
was as courageous at the time as it seems to us now, knowing (as we do) what
happened in Germany in the 1930s and 40s.
p.
153 Einstein as a social being. He was brilliant, but, when I read this, I
wonder: was he happy?
p.
166 The final section in this
chapter. “The great awakening” that our
authors speak of here is called “modernism.”
We can—and probably should—take some class time to locate Einstein in
this period of intellectual history.
Here’s an appetizer for you: a
new book contends that Einstein and Picasso were really solving the same
problem of spacetime, but in different disciplines . . . Einstein in physics;
Picasso, with cubism, in painting.