Let's expose! Was Einstein a loser? July 22nd, 2013
Many poor students console themselves with the thought that Albert Einstein, the great physicist, author of the famous theory of relativity, Nobel laureate, was also a poor student in childhood.
Is this true?
Facts speak better than words. So, here is Albert Einstein’s matriculation certificate, which he received at the cantonal school of Aarau (Switzerland) in September 1896 at the age of 17 (grades were given on a six-point system).
Translation:
German language – 5
French - 3
English language - -
Italian language – 5
History - 6
Geography - 4
Algebra - 6
Geometry (planimetry, trigonometry, stereometry and analytical geometry) – 6
Descriptive geometry – 6
Physics - 6
Chemistry - 5
Natural history - 5
Artistic drawing – 4
Technical drawing - 4
As you can see, Einstein shone in the exact sciences, and had decent grades in other subjects. He received the highest score in history, algebra, trigonometry, geometry and physics. In other subjects, grades are a little more modest. The lowest grade - 3 - was received by him in French. However, during a visit to Jerusalem in 1923, he free gave a lecture in French. Einstein was not certified only in English, and this circumstance made his life very difficult when he moved to the United States in 1933.
Where then did the myth about the poor performance of a genius come from?
The thing is that Einstein studied most of the time in Germany, but received a school certificate in Switzerland, where the grading system was the opposite of the German one: in Germany the highest score was one, just below two, and so on, and Swiss teachers used a straight six-point system.
At school (Luitpold Gymnasium in Munich), Albert Einstein was indeed not one of the first students (although he never had problems with mathematics, Latin and physics). The reason for this was the free-thinking of the future Nobel laureate. He did not tolerate the authoritarian attitude of teachers towards students, or the atmosphere in the gymnasium, which was close to a military one. “Teachers in the lower grades behave like sergeants, and in the upper grades like lieutenants,” Einstein later recalled. “I despise those who gladly march in formation to a music lesson - they were given a brain by mistake. A spinal one would be enough!” - he wrote. The student did not hide his hostility towards the teachers, and it was mutual. One day one of the teachers confessed to him: “How great it will be when you finally leave the gymnasium.” When Einstein objected that he had done nothing wrong, he explained: “Your presence and indifferent attitude towards everything we teach in class undermines the reputation of the entire school.”
In addition, in the sixth grade of the gymnasium, Albert began to have serious problems with some of the teachers due to the fact that he “constantly demanded evidence of religion and chose free-thinking.” Such skepticism was very rare in those days and was not encouraged, especially in an educational institution of this type.
Passport
Thus, Einstein was a “bad” student only in the sense of behavior in a militarized school system that was reduced to rote learning (“I was ready to endure any punishment, just so as not to learn incoherent nonsense from memory”). But this is just another proof of the extraordinary personality of the future Nobel laureate. Meanwhile, he studied a lot on his own and was fond of reading. Of his childhood impressions, Einstein later recalled as the most powerful: Euclid’s “Elements” and I. Kant’s “Critique of Pure Reason.” In addition, on his mother’s initiative, he began playing the violin at the age of six. Einstein's passion for music continued throughout his life. Already in the USA in Princeton, in 1934 Einstein gave a charity concert in favor of scientists and cultural figures who emigrated from Nazi Germany, where he performed works by Mozart on the violin.
A significant role in the creation of the myth of Einstein the poor student was also played by the mistake of one of the early biographers of the genius, who confused the Swiss system of assessing knowledge with the German one.
Thus, dear poor students, there is no need to justify your laziness and lack of diligence with tales that the author of the most incomprehensible theory in the world did not study well - this is pure fiction. To get closer to Einstein, first try to get straight A's in mathematics or understand something in the works of Immanuel Kant.
By the way…
Here we should dispel another myth from the same series: that Einstein failed his final exam and passed it only the second time. To do this, we will tell you in more detail about the history of obtaining the certificate, a copy of which is given on this page.
In fact, Einstein left the gymnasium without receiving a certificate, for the reasons disclosed above.
The young man’s father insisted that he get all this “philosophical nonsense” out of his head and think about how to get an intelligent profession; he was leaning towards the engineering field, since his son was so keen on mathematics and physics. I had to follow my father's advice. At the family council, it was decided to send Albert to a technical school. Moreover, it was necessary to choose one where teaching was conducted in his native German language. Germany was excluded - Albert intended to renounce German citizenship so as not to serve in the army, where he was drafted at the age of 17. Outside Germany, the Zurich Polytechnic Institute (Polytechnic) was the most famous, and Einstein went there in the fall of 1895, although he was 2 years short of the required 18 years to enroll.
If you believe his own memories, he did not like the specialty that his parents had chosen for him to such an extent that he practically did not prepare for those subjects that did not interest him - botany, zoology, foreign languages. Accordingly, he passed them almost worse than all the applicants, although he distinguished himself in exams in mathematics and physics. The lack of a high school certificate also played a role: he was not accepted. However, the director of the institute, amazed by the young man’s mathematical erudition, gave him good advice: finish one of the Swiss high schools to obtain a certificate and a year later try again to enter the institute. He recommended the cantonal school in the small town of Aarau as the most advanced both in teaching methods and in the composition of teachers. Albert did just that, and in September of the following year he successfully passed all the final exams, and already in October 1896 he was admitted to the Polytechnic to the Faculty of Pedagogy without exams.
Well, “by the way,” the physicist received the Nobel Prize not for the theory of relativity, as many believe, but for the development of the quantum theory of the photoelectric effect.
Well, I’ll refrain from one more revelation or clarification.
If you have never seen this photo, it is at least strange. But few people know how the famous photo appeared. And it all happened on March 14, 1951, when Albert Einstein celebrated his 72nd birthday. He left Princeton University with Dr. Eidelot and his wife. The three of them got into the car after celebrating the birthday of a physics genius at the university. They were constantly harassed by photographers and reporters. But one of them stood aside, waiting for the main crowd of journalists to disperse. Having waited, Arthur Szasz approached those sitting in the car and asked the professor to smile for a photo card on his birthday.
In response, Einstein showed his tongue!
Here's what the full version of the famous photo looks like. This frame has become a legendary symbol of the originality of a man of genius.
In the editorial office where Artur Sas worked, they could not decide for a long time whether it was worth publishing such an unusual shot, and the shot was published anyway. Seeing himself with his tongue hanging out on the front page of a newspaper, Albert Einstein fell in love with the photo. He immediately cut the photo to the sizes we were used to and made copies, which he sent to his friends as postcards. A year before his death, he wrote to one of his friends that
However, “bad” in this case is a relative concept. For a future genius, perhaps it’s a bit bad. For an ordinary child - pretty good. He was not considered the best student, one might even say that he was a C student, but his only grade was “3” in French. And, of course, he had no problems with mathematics and physics, having the highest score in them: “6”.
True, there are some nuances. In 1895, Albert graduated from the Prussian gymnasium, and intended to live and continue his education in Switzerland. And it was then that it became clear that the young man’s gymnasium training received in Prussia was weak. Natural talent allowed him to pass the exact sciences perfectly, but he still failed French and botany. Before trying to enroll again, he spent a year in the graduating class of one of the Swiss schools. Below is a copy of Albert Einstein's certificate, which he received at this school before his second - this time successful - attempt to enter the Faculty of Education of the Zurich Polytechnic. Please note that the notorious “C” in French is the result of the fact that in Switzerland this language is widespread along with German, therefore, the requirements for knowledge of French were much higher than in Prussia, where French was classified as a foreign language.
It is also true that none of the teachers at the Zurich Polytechnic gave young Einstein recommendations for engaging in scientific activities. But that was later. And let's not forget that a personal recommendation is the result of not only successful studies, but also a special relationship. Surely, among Albert’s classmates there were guys who knew how to get along with teachers better than him. According to the robot, with the article "Don't believe that Einstein did poorly at school" thematically related:
German theoretical physicist Albert Einstein is often included in lists of brilliant scientists who were poor students at school. Unlike the problems of Thomas Edison, the underachievement of the future Nobel Prize laureate in physics is a myth that continues to be replicated, despite the fact that in the mid-1980s a documentary refutation was found.
Albert Einstein spent his childhood in Munich, where his poor family moved a year after the birth of their son. Even though Einstein's parents were Jewish, he was sent to a Catholic primary school at the age of five because it was close to home. Albert hated the classical model of education since childhood: schoolchildren had to walk to a line, and for every wrong answer they were hit on the hands with a ruler. In addition, anti-Semitic sentiments began to intensify in Germany, and peers often bullied the boy for his origin.
In 1888, 9-year-old Albert entered the Luitpold Gymnasium, which was famous for its level of teaching mathematics, natural sciences and ancient languages, and also had a modern laboratory.
The change of place of study did not change Einstein’s feelings about the organization of the process itself: he hated cramming and hammering useless facts into the heads of schoolchildren, he hated teachers who evaded questions and the barracks discipline that they tried to instill in their students. Young Albert never kicked a ball or climbed trees with his peers, but he could happily explain things that they did not understand, for example, how the telephone works. For this, his peers affectionately called Einstein a nerd and a big bore.
Despite his complete rejection of the school as an institution, Albert always received high grades and was among the best students
Academic records pulled from the archives in 1984 show that Einstein was a child prodigy who had mastered college-level physics by age 11, was an excellent violinist, and had high grades in every school subject except French.
In his free time, Albert studied science on his own. His parents bought him textbooks in advance, and during the summer holidays the boy could get much ahead in mathematics. Albert's uncle Jacob Einstein, who together with his father Hermann ran an electrical equipment trading company, came up with difficult algebra problems for his nephew. Albert sat over them for hours and did not leave the house until he found a solution.
In addition to his uncle, the future physicist had another mentor, medical student Max Talmud, whom the Einsteins hosted at their home on Thursdays. The Talmud brought books to Albert, among them a series of popular science essays by Aaron Bernstein, “The People's Books of Natural History.” Bernstein often wrote about the speed of light, immersing readers in various exciting situations: for example, being on a high-speed train whose window is hit by a bullet, or moving along a telegraph line with an electrical signal.
Influenced by these essays, Einstein asked a question that would dominate his thoughts for the next decade: what would a beam of light really look like if you could ride with it hand in hand? Even as a child, it seemed to him that a ray of light could not be a wave, because then it would be motionless, but no one had ever seen motionless light rays.
When Albert was 12 years old, the Talmud gave him a geometry textbook, which the boy read in one gulp and called his sacred little book on geometry. From mathematics, the student mentor moved to philosophy and introduced Einstein to Immanuel Kant, who became the favorite philosopher of the future Nobel laureate.
Einstein could not stand stupid people, regardless of their age and position in the social hierarchy, and he did not know how to hide his feelings, so he often had conflicts with teachers. A boy could be kicked out of class for sitting in the last row and grinning.
One of the teachers once said in his hearts that Einstein would never achieve anything.
Despite this, the schoolboy continued to make progress, which cannot be said about his father: in 1894, his company went bankrupt, and the Einsteins moved to Milan. Albert, on the other hand, had to spend several years in a Munich hostel as he needed to finish school. The teenager could not bear the sadness and loneliness that fell upon him, and just six months later he knocked on the door of his parents’ house.
Thus, Einstein found himself in the position of a teenager who dropped out of school, hiding from the army in a foreign country (Albert was soon turning 17; in Germany, from this age young people had to perform military service). However, he did not have the skills that would allow him to get a job.
To get out of the situation, Einstein applied to the ETH Zurich, since they were allowed to take the entrance exams without the equivalent of a high school diploma.
Albert received the highest marks in physics and mathematics, but overall he failed the exam
Impressed by the boy's abilities, the director of the polytechnic advised him to obtain a high school diploma and try again. In early 1896, three months before his 17th birthday, Einstein renounced his German citizenship and was stateless for several years until he received a Swiss passport. That same year he graduated from the cantonal school of Aarau in Switzerland. His academic performance has not undergone any fundamental changes: top marks in physics and mathematics, a C in French (on a six-point scale), B in geography and drawing.
It was probably the academic records from the Swiss school that misled Einstein's biographers when they mistook him for a poor student. The fact is that in the last trimester of Albert’s education, the school administration turned the rating scale upside down and “6” became the highest rating. In previous trimesters in mathematics and physics, Einstein had a “1” because the scale was reversed.
The physicist remained a critic of the German education system until the end of his life, which, in his opinion, brainwashed schoolchildren.
Albert Einstein born on March 14, 1879 in the southern German city of Ulm, into a poor Jewish family.
The scientist lived in Germany and the USA, however, he always denied that he knew English. The scientist was a public figure and humanist, an honorary doctor of about 20 leading universities in the world, a member of many academies of sciences, including a foreign honorary member of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1926).
Einstein at 14 years old. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
The discoveries of the great genius in science gave enormous growth to mathematics and physics in the 20th century. Einstein is the author of about 300 works on physics, as well as the author of more than 150 books in the field of other sciences. During his life he developed many significant physical theories.
AiF.ru has collected 15 interesting facts from the life of the world famous scientist.
Einstein was a bad student
As a child, the famous scientist was not a child prodigy. Many doubted his usefulness, and his mother even suspected her child’s congenital deformity (Einstein had a big head).
Einstein never received a high school diploma, but assured his parents that he himself could prepare to enter the Higher Technical School (Polytechnic) in Zurich. But he failed the first time.
After all, having entered the Polytechnic, student Einstein very often skipped lectures, reading magazines with the latest scientific theories in cafes.
After receiving his diploma, he got a job as an expert in a patent office. Due to the fact that assessing the technical characteristics of the young specialist most often took about 10 minutes, he spent a lot of time developing his own theories.
Didn't like sports
Apart from swimming (“the sport that requires the least energy,” as Einstein himself said), he avoided any vigorous activity. A scientist once said: “When I come home from work, I don’t want to do anything other than work with my mind.”
Solved complex problems by playing the violin
Einstein had a special way of thinking. He singled out those ideas that were inelegant or disharmonious, based mainly on aesthetic criteria. Then he proclaimed a general principle by which harmony would be restored. And he made predictions about how physical objects would behave. This approach produced stunning results.
Einstein's favorite instrument. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
The scientist trained himself to rise above a problem, see it from an unexpected angle and find an extraordinary way out. When he found himself at a dead end, playing the violin, a solution suddenly popped into his head.
Einstein "stopped wearing socks"
They say that Einstein was not very tidy and once spoke about this as follows: “When I was young, I learned that the big toe always ends in a hole in the sock. So I stopped wearing socks."
Loved to smoke a pipe
Einstein was a life member of the Montreal Pipe Smokers Club. He had great respect for the smoking pipe and believed that it “contributes to a calm and objective judgment of human affairs.”
Hated science fiction
To avoid distorting pure science and giving people a false illusion of scientific understanding, he recommended total abstinence from any type of science fiction. “I never think about the future, it will come soon enough,” he said.
Einstein's parents were against his first marriage
Einstein met his first wife Mileva Maric in 1896 in Zurich, where they studied together at the Polytechnic. Albert was 17 years old, Mileva was 21. She was from a Catholic Serbian family living in Hungary. Einstein's collaborator Abraham Pais, who became his biographer, wrote in a fundamental biography of his great boss, published in 1982, that both of Albert's parents were against this marriage. Only on his deathbed did Einstein's father Hermann agree to his son's marriage. But Paulina, the scientist’s mother, never accepted her daughter-in-law. “Everything in me resisted this marriage,” Pais quotes Einstein’s 1952 letter.
Einstein with his first wife Mileva Maric (c. 1905). Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
2 years before the wedding, in 1901, Einstein wrote to his beloved: “...I have lost my mind, I am dying, I am burning with love and desire. The pillow you sleep on is a hundred times happier than my heart! You come to me at night, but, unfortunately, only in a dream...”
However, after a short time, the future father of the theory of relativity and the future father of the family writes to his bride in a completely different tone: “If you want marriage, you will have to agree to my conditions, here they are:
- firstly, you will take care of my clothes and bed;
- secondly, you will bring me food three times a day to my office;
- thirdly, you will renounce all personal contacts with me, except those necessary for maintaining social decency;
- fourthly, whenever I ask you to do this, you will leave my bedroom and office;
- fifthly, without words of protest you will perform scientific calculations for me;
- sixthly, you will not expect any manifestations of feelings from me.”
Mileva accepted these humiliating conditions and became not only a faithful wife, but also a valuable assistant in her work. On May 14, 1904, their son Hans Albert is born, the only successor of the Einstein family. In 1910, a second son, Edward, was born, who suffered from dementia since childhood and ended his life in 1965 in a Zurich psychiatric hospital.
Firmly believed that he would receive the Nobel Prize
In fact, Einstein’s first marriage broke up in 1914; in 1919, during the legal divorce proceedings, the following written promise from Einstein appeared: “I promise you that when I receive the Nobel Prize, I will give you all the money. You must agree to the divorce, otherwise you will get nothing at all.”
The couple were confident that Albert would become a Nobel laureate for the theory of relativity. He actually received the Nobel Prize in 1922, although with a completely different wording (for explaining the laws of the photoelectric effect). Einstein kept his word: he gave all 32 thousand dollars (a huge amount for that time) to his ex-wife. Until the end of his days, Einstein also took care of the handicapped Edward, writing letters to him that he could not even read without outside help. While visiting his sons in Zurich, Einstein stayed with Mileva in her house. Mileva had a very hard time with the divorce, was depressed for a long time, and was treated by psychoanalysts. She died in 1948 at the age of 73. The feeling of guilt before his first wife weighed on Einstein until the end of his days.
Einstein's second wife was his sister
In February 1917, the 38-year-old author of the theory of relativity became seriously ill. Extremely intense mental work with poor nutrition in warring Germany (this was the Berlin period of life) and without proper care provoked acute liver disease. Then jaundice and a stomach ulcer were added. The initiative to care for the patient was taken by his maternal cousin and paternal second cousin. Elsa Einstein-Lowenthal. She was three years older, divorced, and had two daughters. Albert and Elsa had been friends since childhood; new circumstances contributed to their rapprochement. Kind, warm-hearted, motherly and caring, in a word, a typical burgher, Elsa loved to look after her famous brother. As soon as Einstein’s first wife, Mileva Maric, agreed to the divorce, Albert and Elsa got married, Albert adopted Elsa’s daughters and had excellent relations with them.
Einstein with his wife Elsa. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
Didn't take troubles seriously
In his normal state, the scientist was unnaturally calm, almost inhibited. Of all the emotions, he preferred smug cheerfulness. I absolutely couldn’t stand it when someone around me was sad. He didn't see what he didn't want to see. Didn't take troubles seriously. He believed that jokes made troubles go away. And that they can be transferred from a personal plan to a general one. For example, compare the grief from your divorce with the grief brought to the people by war. The Maxims of La Rochefoucauld helped him suppress his emotions; he constantly reread them.
Didn't like the pronoun "we"
He said “I” and did not allow anyone to say “we”. The meaning of this pronoun simply did not reach the scientist. His close friend only once saw the imperturbable Einstein in rage when his wife uttered the forbidden “we.”
Often withdrawn into himself
To be independent of conventional wisdom, Einstein often isolated himself in solitude. This was a childhood habit. He even started talking at the age of 7 because he did not want to communicate. He built cozy worlds and contrasted them with reality. The world of family, the world of like-minded people, the world of the patent office where I worked, the temple of science. “If the sewage of life licks the steps of your temple, close the door and laugh... Do not give in to anger, remain as before as a saint in the temple.” He followed this advice.
Relaxed, playing the violin and falling into a trance
The genius always tried to stay focused, even when he was babysitting his sons. He wrote and composed, answering the questions of his eldest son, rocking his youngest son on his knee.
Einstein loved to relax in his kitchen, playing Mozart melodies on his violin.
And in the second half of his life, the scientist was helped by a special trance, when his mind was not limited by anything, his body did not obey pre-established rules. I slept until they woke me up. I stayed awake until they sent me to bed. I ate until they stopped me.
Einstein burned his last work
In the last years of his life, Einstein worked on the creation of the Unified Field Theory. Its main purpose is to use one single equation to describe the interaction of three fundamental forces: electromagnetic, gravitational and nuclear. Most likely, an unexpected discovery in this area prompted Einstein to destroy his work. What kind of work were these? The answer, alas, the great physicist took with him forever.
Albert Einstein in 1947. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
Allowed me to examine my brain after death
Einstein believed that only a maniac obsessed with one thought could achieve significant results. He agreed to have his brain examined after his death. As a result, the scientist’s brain was removed 7 hours after the death of the outstanding physicist. And then it was stolen.
Death overtook the genius at Princeton Hospital (USA) in 1955. The autopsy was performed by a pathologist named Thomas Harvey. He removed Einstein's brain for study, but instead of making it available to science, he took it for himself.
Risking his reputation and job, Thomas placed the brain of the greatest genius in a jar of formaldehyde and took it to his home. He was convinced that such action was a scientific duty for him. Moreover, Thomas Harvey sent pieces of Einstein’s brain for research to leading neurologists for 40 years.
The descendants of Thomas Harvey tried to return to Einstein’s daughter what was left of her father’s brain, but she refused such a “gift”. From then to this day, the remains of the brain, ironically, are in Princeton, from where it was stolen.
Scientists who examined Einstein's brain proved that the gray matter was different from normal. Scientific studies have shown that the areas of Einstein's brain responsible for speech and language are reduced, while the areas responsible for processing numerical and spatial information are enlarged. Other studies have found an increase in the number of neuroglial cells*.
*Glial cells [glial cell] (Greek: γλοιός - sticky substance, glue) - a type of cell in the nervous system. Glial cells are collectively called neuroglia or glia. They make up at least half the volume of the central nervous system. The number of glial cells is 10-50 times greater than neurons. Neurons of the central nervous system are surrounded by glial cells.
Many careless students cite the following argument to justify their grades: some geniuses, for example, did extremely poorly at school.
This is not true: yes, little Albert was not among the first students, but he certainly was not a poor student either. The thing is that Einstein studied most of the time in Germany, but received a school certificate in Switzerland, where the grading system was the opposite of the German one: in Germany the highest score was one, just below two, and so on, and Swiss teachers used a straight six-point system.
At school, Einstein excelled particularly in mathematics and science, devoting less time to French, geography and drawing - subjects he was not particularly interested in, but his average score was about five out of six (in the Swiss system).
By the way, the physicist received the Nobel Prize not for the theory of relativity, as many believe, but for the development of the quantum theory of the photoelectric effect.
7 useful lessons we learned from Apple
10 deadliest events in history The Soviet “Setun” is the only computer in the world based on a ternary code 12 previously unreleased photographs by the world's best photographers 10 Greatest Changes of the Last Millennium Mole Man: Man Spent 32 Years Digging in the Desert 10 Attempts to Explain the Existence of Life Without Darwin's Theory of Evolution Unattractive Tutankhamun Pele was so good at football that he “paused” the war in Nigeria with his play.
