Albert Einstein , without any doubt, is one of the greatest scientists of the twentieth century. Perhaps that is why a lot of rumors and myths have always circulated around his figure, many of which are still popular, although they do not correspond to reality at all.

I bring to your attention a small note in which an attempt is made to refute a couple of such persistent false ideas about the personality of the great physicist.

I assure you that I am not going to lure anyone into deep theoretical jungle in this note, especially since I myself know little about physics (only at the level of a long-forgotten school curriculum). To make sure of this, I will begin my post with an anecdote about Einstein (and end it with an anecdote).

An American journalist once interviewed Einstein.
What is the difference between time and eternity? she asked.
- Dear child, - Einstein answered good-naturedly, - if I had time to explain this difference to you, it would be an eternity before you would understand it ..

Try to ask someone Why did Albert Einstein get Nobel Prize . Most likely they will answer you what kind of creation theory of relativity .
In fact, this is not at all the case.

Albert Einstein in 1921
(Einstein's Nobel Prize was awarded precisely for 1921)

Nobel committee in 1922 awarded Einstein the prize for discovery of the laws of the photoelectric effect (and confirmation by this of the quantum theory of Max Planck).
However, Albert Einstein had previously been nominated for the Nobel Prize three times (and precisely for the theory of relativity) - in 1910, 1911 and 1915. But the members of the Nobel Committee found Einstein's work so revolutionary that they hesitated to acknowledge it.

This is best seen in a letter to Einstein from the Secretary of the Swedish Academy of Sciences, Christopher Aurivillius, dated November 10, 1922: "As I have already informed you by telegram, the Royal Academy of Sciences at its yesterday's meeting decided to award you the prize in physics for the past year, thus acknowledging your work in theoretical physics, in particular the discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect, without taking into account your work on the theory of relativity and the theory of gravity, which will be evaluated after their confirmation in the future".

Among modern schoolchildren-losers (of those who are ordinary lazy people, who are not deprived of intellectual abilities, otherwise they would not even know the name of a physicist) has long been walking the story that Einstein did poorly in school and even failed a math exam. Apparently, they are trying to justify themselves with this: you see, Einstein was, like me, a loser, and then he became a great scientist! And I can, look here!

I hasten to disappoint them.

Einstein's grades in both mathematics and physics were beyond praise. Another thing is that he was intolerant of cane discipline that reigned in the Munich Gymnasium (now, by the way, it bears his name). According to Einstein, the teachers of junior classes reminded him of sergeant majors in their behavior, and senior teachers - of lieutenants. The teachers didn’t particularly like him either, because the behavior of the obstinate student called into question the entire harmonious education system at the school. It was because of this that he earned a reputation as a bad student, and not because of a lack of knowledge or ability to think.

Albert Einstein's certificate from the Swiss school in Aarau in 1879
(ratings are given on a 6-point scale). As you can see, in algebra, geometry and physics
the highest scores are given, and the "troika" is only in French:

In fairness, it should also be noted that among the legends about the great scientist there are stories that, quite likely, could actually happen to him.

So, they write that once he opened the book and found in it as a bookmark an unused check for one and a half thousand dollars. This could well have happened, because Everyday life Einstein was extremely distracted. It is said that he did not even remember his home address - 112 Mercer Street, Princeton, New Jersey.

It is possible that the following anecdotal story is also true:

Albert Einstein in his youth liked to walk around in one tattered jacket.
- How do you dress so casually, what will they say about you? the neighbors wondered.
- Why, - Einstein asked again, - no one here knows me anyway.
Thirty years have passed. Einstein wore the same jacket.
- Why do you dress so casually, what will they say about you? - the new neighbors were already surprised.
- And what? - asked the already famous physicist. - Everyone here knows me!

Thank you for attention.
Sergei Vorobyov.

Prize for 1921

It was obvious that someday Einstein would receive the Nobel Prize in Physics. In fact, he has even agreed to transfer the bonus money to his first wife, Mileva Marić, when this happens. The only question was when. And for what.

When in November 1922 it was announced that he had been awarded the prize for 1921, new questions arose: why so late? And why "especially for the discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect"?

There is a legend: Einstein learned that he had finally become the winner, on the way to Japan. “The Nobel Prize has been awarded to you. Details by letter,” read a telegram sent on November 10. However, in fact, he was warned about this long before the trip, as soon as the Swedish Academy made its decision in September.

Even knowing that he had finally won, Einstein did not find it possible to postpone the trip - to some extent and because he was passed so often that it already began to annoy him.

He was first nominated for the prize in 1910 by Wilhelm Ostwald, a Nobel laureate in chemistry who had refused to hire Einstein nine years earlier. Ostwald referred to special relativity, emphasizing that it was a fundamental theory of physics and not just a philosophy, as some of Einstein's detractors claimed. He defended this point of view again and again, repeatedly putting forward Einstein for several more years in a row.

The Swedish Nobel Committee strictly followed Alfred Nobel's will: The Nobel Prize is awarded for "the most important discovery or invention." The members of the committee believed that the theory of relativity did not exactly meet any of these criteria. Therefore, they replied that “before agreeing with this theory and, in particular, awarding the Nobel Prize for it”, one should wait for its more explicit experimental confirmation 2 .

Throughout the next decade, Einstein continued to be nominated for the Nobel Prize for his work on the creation of the theory of relativity. He received the support of many eminent theorists, such as Wilhelm Wien. True, Lorentz, who was still skeptical of this theory, was not one of them. The main obstacle was that the committee was suspicious of pure theorists at the time. Between 1910 and 1922, three of the five members of the committee were from the Swedish Uppsala University, known for its ardent passion for improving experimental technology and measuring instruments. “The committee was dominated by Swedish physicists, known for their love of experimentation,” says Robert Mark Friedman, a science historian in Oslo. – Precision measurement they considered highest goal his science." This was one of the reasons why Max Planck had to wait until 1919 (he was awarded the prize for 1918, which had not been awarded the previous year), and Henri Poincaré did not receive the Nobel Prize at all.

In November 1919, disturbing news arrived: an observation solar eclipse largely confirmed Einstein's theory - 1920 was the year of Einstein. By this time, Lorenz was no longer so skeptical. Simultaneously with Bohr and six other scientists who officially had the right to nominate for the Nobel Prize, he spoke out in support of Einstein, emphasizing the completeness of his theory of relativity. (Planck also wrote a letter in support of Einstein, but it came too late, arriving after the deadline for nominations.) As Lorentz's letter stated, Einstein "ranks among the most eminent physicists of all time." Bohr's letter was just as clear: "Here we are dealing with the achievement of fundamental importance" 4 .

Politics intervened. So far, the main justification for refusing to award the Nobel Prize has been purely scientific: the work is entirely theoretical, not based on experiment, and does not seem to involve the “discovery” of new laws. After observing the eclipse, explaining the shift of Mercury's orbits, and other experimental evidence, these objections were still raised, but now they sounded more like a prejudice related to the difference in cultural levels, as well as a prejudice against Einstein himself. For Einstein's critics, the fact that he suddenly became a superstar—the most famous scientist on an international scale since lightning tamer Benjamin Franklin was the idol of the Parisian streets—was more a testament to his penchant for self-promotion than that he was worthy of a Nobel Prize.

Such implication was clearly felt in the internal seven-page report written by Arrhenius, chairman of the Nobel Committee. Arrhenius explained why Einstein would not be awarded the prize for 1920. He pointed out that the results of observing the eclipse are ambiguous and scientists have not yet confirmed the prediction of the theory, according to which the light coming from the sun is shifted to the red region of the spectrum due to the attraction of the sun. He also cited the discrediting arguments of Ernst Hercke, an anti-Semite, critic of relativistic theory, one of the organizers of the famous anti-Einstein congress, which was held in the summer of that year in Berlin. Gercke argued that other theories could explain the shift in Mercury's orbits.

Behind the scenes, Philip Lenard, another leading anti-Semitic critic of Einstein, led preparations for crusade against him. (On next year Lenard nominated Gercke for the prize!) Sven Gedin, a famous Swedish traveler, geographer and prominent member of the Academy, later recalled that Lenard went to great lengths to make him and everyone else believe that “the theory of relativity is not really a discovery” and that there is no proof of its validity 5 .

In his report, Arrhenius cited Lenard's "persuasive critique of the oddities of Einstein's general theory of relativity." Lenard stated his point of view as a criticism of physical ideas not based on experiment and specific discoveries. But, although implicitly, Lenard's hostility was strongly felt in the report, expressed in such words as, for example, "philosophizing", which he considered feature"Jewish Science" 6 .

Therefore, in 1920, the prize went to another graduate of the Zurich Polytechnic, Charles Edouard Guillaume, who was the scientific opposite of Einstein. This man was the director of the International Bureau of Weights and Measures. His modest contribution to science is associated with the refinement of the standards used in measurements, and the discovery of metal alloys that had practical applications, in particular, in the manufacture of measuring rods. “When the physics community embarked on an incredible intellectual adventure, it seemed astonishing that it was Guillaume's achievements, the result of routine work and ingenious theoretical calculations, that were considered a beacon that pointed the way to success,” Friedman says. “Even opponents of the theory of relativity recognized Guillaume's advancement as strange” 7 .

For better or worse, in 1921, Einstein mania reached its peak, and his work gained wide support among both theorists and experimenters. Among them was a German like Planck, and among the foreigners was Eddington. Einstein was supported by fourteen people who officially had the right to nominate applicants, much more than for any of his competitors. “Einstein, like Newton, is far superior to all his contemporaries,” Eddington wrote. In the mouth of a member of the Royal Society, this was the highest praise 8 .

The committee has now commissioned Alvar Gulstrand, professor of ophthalmology at the University of Uppsala and winner of the 1911 Nobel Prize in Medicine, to give a talk on the theory of relativity. Not being competent either in physics or in the mathematical apparatus of the theory of relativity, he sharply but illiterately criticized Einstein. Gulstrand clearly intended to reject Einstein by any means necessary, so in his fifty-page report, for example, he argued that the bending of a light beam could not really be a true test of Einstein's theory. He said that Einstein's results were not confirmed experimentally, but even if this were true, there were other possibilities to explain this phenomenon within the framework of classical mechanics. As for the orbits of Mercury, Gulstrand stated, "without further observations, it is not at all clear whether Einstein's theory corresponds to experiments in which the precession of its perihelion was determined." And the effects of the special theory of relativity, in his words, "are beyond the limits of experimental error." As a man who won laurels with the invention of equipment for precision optical measurements, Gulstrand in Einstein's theory, apparently, was especially indignant at the fact that the length of a rigid measuring ruler can vary depending on the movement of the observer 9 .

Although some members of the entire Academy were aware that Gulstrand's objections were naive, it was not an easy obstacle to overcome. He was a respected, popular Swedish professor. He publicly and privately insisted that the great Nobel Prize should not be awarded to a highly speculative theory that causes inexplicable mass hysteria, the end of which can be expected in the very near future. Instead of finding another speaker, the Academy did something that could be less (perhaps more) a public slap in the face of Einstein: the academics voted not to select anyone and, as an experiment, to reschedule the prize for 1921

The deadlocked situation threatened to become indecent. Einstein's lack of a Nobel Prize began to have a negative impact not so much on Einstein as on the prize itself. “Imagine for a moment what they will say in fifty years if Einstein's name is not on the list of Nobel Prize winners,” wrote the French physicist Marcel Brillouin in 1922, nominating Einstein 10 .

Salvation came from the theoretical physicist Carl Wilhelm Oseen of the University of Uppsala, who became a member of the Nobel Committee in 1922. Ozeen was a colleague and friend of Gulstrand, which helped him carefully deal with some of the obscure but stubbornly defended objections of the ophthalmologist. But Oseen understood that this whole relativity story had gone so far that it was better to use a different tactic. Therefore, it was he who made considerable efforts so that the prize was awarded to Einstein "for the discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect."

Every part of this phrase has been carefully considered. Of course, it was not the theory of relativity that was nominated. Although some historians believe so, it was not, in fact, Einstein's theory of light quanta, even though the corresponding article from 1905 was mainly meant. The prize was generally not for any theory, but for discovery of the law.

The previous year's report discussed "theory photoelectric effect” by Einstein, but Oseen clearly indicated a different approach to the problem, naming his report "Law photoelectric effect of Einstein” (author’s italics). Oseen did not elaborate on theoretical aspects Einstein's work. Instead, he talked about the law of nature proposed by Einstein and confirmed with reliability by experiments, which was called fundamental. Namely, mathematical formulas were implied showing how the photoelectric effect can be explained, assuming that light is emitted and absorbed by discrete quanta, and how this relates to the frequency of light.

Oseen also offered to give Einstein the prize not awarded in 1921, which allowed the Academy to use this as the basis for simultaneously awarding the 1922 prize to Niels Bohr, given that his model of the atom was based on the laws that explain the photoelectric effect. It was a smart ticket for two, guaranteeing that two of the greatest theorists of the day would win Nobel Prizes without irritating conservative academic circles. Gulstrand agreed. Arrhenius, having met Einstein in Berlin and fascinated by him, was ready to accept the inevitable. On September 6, 1922, a vote was held at the Academy: Einstein received the prize for 1921, and Bohr, respectively, for 1922.

So, Einstein won the Nobel Prize for 1921, which, according to the official wording, was awarded "for services to theoretical physics and especially for the discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect." Both here and in the letter from the Secretary of the Academy officially informing Einstein of this, an apparently unusual explanation was added. Both documents specifically emphasized that the prize was awarded “without regard to your theories of relativity and gravity, the importance of which will be appreciated after their confirmation” 11 . In the end, Einstein did not receive the Nobel Prize either for special or for general theory relativity and nothing else but the photoelectric effect.

That it was the photoelectric effect that allowed Einstein to win the prize seemed like a bad joke. In deriving this "law" he relied mainly on measurements made by Philipp Lenard, who was now the most passionate campaigner in the persecution of Einstein. In a 1905 paper, Einstein praised Lenard's "pioneering" work. But after the 1920 anti-Semitic rally in Berlin, they became worst enemies. Therefore, Lenard was doubly furious: despite his opposition, Einstein received the prize, and, worst of all, for his work in the area where he, Lenard, was a pioneer. He wrote an angry letter to the Academy—the only official protest he received—where he claimed that Einstein misunderstood the real nature of light and, moreover, that he was a Jewish flirtation with the public, which was alien to the spirit of a truly German physicist 12 .

Einstein missed the official award ceremony on December 10. During this time, he traveled by train around Japan. After much arguing about whether he should be considered German or Swiss, the award was presented to to the German ambassador, although both citizenships were indicated in the documents.

The speech of the chairman of the Arrhenius Committee, who represented Einstein, was carefully calibrated. “There is probably no physicist alive today whose name is as widely known as that of Albert Einstein,” he began. “His theory of relativity has become the central topic of most discussions.” He then went on, with obvious relief, that "this is chiefly epistemological, and therefore hotly debated in philosophical circles."

Briefly dwelling on other works of Einstein, Arrhenius explained the reasons for the choice of the Academy. “Einstein's law of the photoelectric effect has been very carefully tested American physicist Millikan and his students and passed this test brilliantly,” he said. “Einstein's law became the foundation of quantitative photochemistry, just as Faraday's law is the foundation of electrochemistry” 13 .

Einstein gave his Nobel lecture the following July at a scientific conference in Sweden in the presence of King Gustav V Adolf. He spoke not about the photoelectric effect, but about the theory of relativity, and ended by emphasizing the importance of his new hobby - the search for a unified field theory, which should unite the general theory of relativity, electromagnetism, and possibly quantum theory 14 .

That year the monetary bonus was 121,572 SEK, or $32,250, more than ten times the average salary of a professor for a year. According to the divorce agreement with Marich, Einstein sent part of this amount directly to Zurich, placing them in a trust fund, from which she and their sons were to receive income. The rest was sent to an account in America, the interest from which she too could use.

This caused another scandal. Hans Albert complained that the trust agreement, which was agreed in advance, allows the family to use only a percentage of the money invested. Zanger intervened again, and the arguing managed to calm down. Einstein jokingly wrote to his sons: “Someday you will be very rich, and the day will come so beautiful that I can ask you for a loan.” Ultimately, Marich spent the money to buy three tenement houses in Zurich 15 .

XV. Nobel Prize If it is true that great life- is carried out in adulthood dream of youth, then Fleming will remain in the history of those happy man who made his dream come true. Dr. Gracia In September 1945, Fleming, at the invitation of the French