Without “placebo effect” and “Emperor’s New Cloth Syndrome” as described above, it is hard for the perpetual motionist to understand why physicists have become so excited about Einstein’s theory of relativity and surrendered them on feet of Einstein.  After about 1900 years, when Galileo challenged the authority of Aristotle by dropping light and heavy metal balls from the top balcony of leaning tower of Pisa, the excitement was understandable because they hit the ground simultaneously, thus, dethroning a great authority like Aristotle  at some stage. But what change and revolution does relativity theory promise in physics except vitiating experimental character of science?

 

Einstein hated his high school and had no respect for his teachers. A teacher rightly suggested Einstein leave school, since mere presence of matter distorts space time, his very presence destroyed the other students' respect for the teacher. Later, Einstein even challenged existence of personal God. “The son of entirely irreligious (Jewish) parents”[i], Einstein himself developed hatred for a personal god, as he refused to baptize his son.  Einstein  remarked: “My position concerning God is that of an agnostic. I am convinced that a vivid consciousness of the primary importance of moral principles for the betterment and ennoblement of life does not need the idea of a law-giver, especially a law-giver who works on the basis of reward and punishment.” His Special theory of relativity that challenges ‘absolute time’ and ‘absolute space’- all “Absolute” realm of God,   naturally insult all traditional religions. Einstein belittled Holy Bible with these remarks: “The word god is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish. No interpretation no matter how subtle can (for me) change this.” Einstein must thank God that he lived in America which is a free democratic country for all kinds of idiots.  With his satanic verses and such great blasphemy, it is not hard to imagine what would have become of Einstein if he had lived in times of regime of Ayatollah Khomeini in Iran. In history, by desire to realize their own ambitions, atheists have often done great damage to traditional religions.  His “cosmic religion,” of which theory of relativity is an offshoot, makes mess of philosophy, religion, and fails to harmonize with any reasonable outlook or philosophy. It is the theory which seriously interferes with logical principles of metaphysics.  Einstein theory of relativity seriously interferes with everybody being an idealist or materialist, spiritualist, pragmatist, perpetual motionist or whatever else, therefore, only the fanatics can consider Einstein relativity theory as something revolutionary. Is there any point in teaching-learning of his theories in school curriculum? Creationists who are after ‘evolution’ must also gear up their efforts to get eliminated the theory of relativity from school curriculum. After all, future of the world rests on well being and good mental state of our children.

 

Thanks to Einstein for maintaining his intellectual honesty so late, as he himself never considered his theory of relativity as something revolutionary. He himself once confessed, “In the relativity theory, it is no question of a revolutionary act but of a natural development of lines which have been followed for centuries.”[ii] After lapse of many years since inception of his theory, on one more occasion Einstein admitted that this theory “grew out of the Maxwell-Lorentzian electromagnetics as a surprisingly simple summary and generalization of previously independent hypotheses.”[iii] Obviously, a “simple summary and generalization” of previous ideas has nothing to do with anything revolutionary!

 

Einstein said: “The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources.”[iv]  In his 1905 paper on Special theory of relativity, he didn’t give credit to his predecessors. Einstein has even been accused of plagiarism, but later, he himself frequently maintained that his theory of relativity rested on previous developments in physics; therefore, it should not be regarded as a revolutionary break with the past. On April 2, 1921, on his first visit to the United States, Einstein arrived in New York. When he was interviewed by reporters there, Einstein stated, “There has been a false opinion widely spread among the general public that the theory of relativity is to be taken as differing radically from the previous developments in physics. . . . The men who have laid the foundations of physics on which I have been able to construct my theory are Galileo, Newton, Maxwell, and Lorentz.”[v] He often called his theory “simply a systematic development of the electrodynamics of Maxwell and Lorentz,” and regarded it as an “evolution,” not a revolution, of the science of dynamics.”[vi]

 

Though theory of relativity and quantum theory were dubbed as revolution in physics, Einstein himself admitted that these theories did not possess any general theoretical basis for physics which can be regarded as its logical foundation.

 

Einstein states:

 

“The development during the present century is characterized by two theoretical systems essentially independent of each other: the theory of relativity and the quantum theory. The two systems do not directly contradict each other; but they seem little adapted to fusion into one unified theory. For the time being we have to admit that we do not possess any general theoretical basis for physics which can be regarded as its logical foundation.” [vii](Albert Einstein, 1940)

 

The real problems with Einstein's relativity were formulated by Einstein himself at the end of his life:

 

Einstein: “If the speed of light is the least bit affected by the speed of the light source, then my whole theory of relativity and theory of gravity is false.”[viii]

 

Einstein again: “I consider it quite possible that physics cannot be based on the field concept, i.e., on continuous structures. In that case, nothing remains of my entire castle in the air, gravitation theory included, [and of] the rest of modern physics.”[ix]

 

Gerald Holton who seriously devoted to the  study of the conceptual development of the theory of relativity, not only confirmed Einstein’s judgment of the non-revolutionary character of the theory, but also regarded  it as an example of the general rule that a “so-called scientific ‘revolution’ turns out to be at bottom an effort to return to a classical purity.”[x]

 

John Farrell also wrote: “Albert Michelson, famous as the American who devised the failed Michelson-Morley experiment to detect aether, the invisible medium that 19th century scientists supposed responsible for the propagation of light waves through space, never accepted relativity and he politely admitted this to Einstein when they met.”[xi]


 

 

 



[i] "I was the son of entirely irreligious (Jewish) parents," Einstein recalled. Cited by http://www.aip.org/history/einstein/early1.htm

 

[ii] C. Seelig, Albert Einstein—A Documentary Biography (Staples Press, London, 1956), p. 82.

[iii] A. Einstein, U¨ ber die spezielle und die allgemeine Relativita¨tstheorie (Vieweg, Braunschweig, 1920), p. 28.

[v] New York Times, 4 April 1921. Also quoted in G. Holton, “Einstein’s

search for the Weltbild,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical

Society 125 (1981): 1–15.

[vi] A. Einstein, “What is the theory of relativity?” London Times, 28

November 1919; reprinted in A. Einstein, Ideas and Opinions (Crown

Publishers, New York, 1954, 1982), pp. 227–232; p. 248.

[viii] Was Einstein a fake? | COSMOS magazine

www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/1162

 

[x] G. Holton, “On the origins of the special theory of relativity,”

American Journal of Physics 28 (1960): 627–636; reprinted in G. Holton, Thematic Origins of Scientific Thought: Kepler to Einstein (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1973), pp. 165–183.