Continuing with the historical theme of these blogs, but also the countdown to the 2023 Nobel awards, I was notified of an anniversary today of Einstein's seminal paper establishing the Theory of Relativity in 1905.
On September 26, 1905, Einstein's paper "On the Electrodynamics of Mobing Bodies" was published. Classical Einstein put on proverbial blast Maxwell, Newton, and Michelson-Morley and in turn, defined his own theory later coined as the "Special Theory of Relativity."
Now I was never a physics expert, but I spent time today thinking through what this theory was and what Einstein concluded to be a failure of the present-day (at the time) equations and theorems.
What is the Special Theory?
The special theory, in a nutshell, is an explanation of the relationship between time and space. It is termed "special" due to the circumstances by which Einstein concluded his findings in which the singular use of space and time is referred to as "spacetime" and is in turn "flat" (or that the impact from gravity is negligible).
In this seminal paper of 1905, Einstein presented two postulates:
The laws of physics are the same for all frames of reference.
In a vacuum, the speed of light is the same for all observers.
Why is this important?
The power of this special theory and the newest finding from Einstein is that it countered much of the traditional understanding that other physicists had emphasized. Following these postulates and this publication, it took Einstein nearly a decade to publish his follow-up to "special relativity" as "Theory of General Relativity."
Additionally, when being discovered in concert with Quantum mechanics, the theories were used to extrapolate electron spin and antiparticles thus more accurately describing their interactions. This would be the foundational work of Quantum Field Theory and most appropriate to Oppenheimer's work on the Manhattan Project.
To consider
If you would like to read Einstein's original manuscript please see here. While I am always a fan of reading original manuscripts and the scientist's thought process, this is quite the paper. Granted it was written in 1905, I'm blaming the difference in eras. I would love to know your thoughts on this, let me know in the comments!
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