His wrong wastebasket

When 54-year-old Albert Einstein arrived in the United States, the cruise ship Land of the West was pulling into new york Harbor. The official welcome committee is waiting for him, but he and his entourage are nowhere to be found.

Abraham Flexner, director of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Princeton, New Jersey, tends to stop promoting celebrity professors. So he sent a tugboat to take the great man away from the western continent quickly and mysteriously when the passenger ship passed the quarantine. Einstein's hair came out of his black hat and quietly stepped off the boat that took him and his party member to lower Manhattan, where a car would soon take them to Princeton. "All Dr. Einstein wanted was peace and quiet." Flexner told reporters.

As the winner of 192 1 Nobel Prize in theoretical physics, Einstein has an office in the college. He was asked what equipment he needed. "A desk, a chair, some writing paper and pencils," he replied. "Oh, and a big wastebasket, so I can throw away all my wrong ideas."

He and his wife elsa rented a house in Princeton. He likes America, although its wealth inequality and racial discrimination are more like the elite system in Europe. "The democratic nature of the people made newcomers devote themselves to this country." Then he was surprised. "No one will be humble to others."

Not always Einstein

However, he was not an Einstein with high IQ since he was a child. He grew up in Munich, Germany, the eldest son of Herman and Pauling Einstein, and learned to speak very slowly. "My parents were very worried about it," he recalled, "so they consulted a doctor."

Even when he was two years old, he began to use language, and something strange happened, which made his nanny call him an idiot. "What he said was normal," his sister Maya recalled. "He opened his mouth and repeated it softly." The slow development of language ability and rude resistance to authority led a German headmaster to pack him up and go home, while another headmaster declared that Einstein was useless.

"I can't help asking myself how I discovered the theory of relativity. It seems to exist in the following situations. " Then Einstein explained. "Ordinary adults don't worry about space and time. These are all their thoughts when they were young. But I am slow to develop. When I grew up, I began to think about space and time. I have explored this issue more deeply than ordinary children. "

Happy science

My father runs a family business and my mother loves music. They all gave Einstein encouragement. He spent a lot of time playing puzzles and building toy towers. "Perseverance is one of his characteristics." His sister mentioned it.

Once, Einstein was ill in bed before going to school, and his father brought him a compass. Einstein remembered it later, and he was very excited when he checked the compass and found its wonderful power. He was shivering and cold. The performance of the magnetic needle seems to be affected by the hidden strong area, not by mechanical touch. "There is something deep behind this." He said.

He was surprised by magnetic fields, gravity, inertia and linearly polarized beams. He retained the ability to hold two ideas in his mind at the same time. When these two ideas conflict, he is confused and annoyed, and what makes him happy is to see the potential unity between them. "People like you and me don't get old." Many years later, he wrote this to a friend. "In front of the mysterious world where we were born, we always act like curious children."

Contrary to popular belief, Einstein was good at mathematics. At the age of 13, "he preferred to use algorithms to solve complex problems," his sister recalled. His uncle Jacob Einstein, an engineer, introduced him to the interesting things of algebra and called it "the happy science". Whenever Einstein wins, he is "extremely happy".

He read popular science books, which showed that most of the contents of the Bible were untrue, and Einstein began to resist all forms of dogma. As he wrote in 190 1, "stupid belief authority is the greatest enemy of truth."

Proud Americans

Einstein left Germany at the age of 15 and went to northern Italy, where his parents relocated their industry. /kloc-at the age of 0/6, he wrote his first theoretical physics paper.

1900 Einstein graduated from Zurich University of Technology at the age of 2/kloc-0. He discovered the theory of relativity, involving intuitive knowledge and personal experience. 1905, he worked in the Swiss patent office and began to develop the theory of relativity, but his theory was not fully accepted. Until 19 19, the observation of the solar eclipse confirmed his prediction that the gravity of the sun could bend the light.

19 19 years, when Einstein was 40 years old, he suddenly became a world-famous figure. He also married his second wife, elsa, and had two sons from his first marriage. 192 1 In the spring of, he became famous in one fell swoop and went to the United States for a two-month grand visit, which was warmly welcomed. Everywhere he went, the masses were crazy about it. There has never been a scientific celebrity star with such a reputation in this world.

Einstein loved America and appreciated its prosperity because of freedom and individualism. 1933 In March, as Hitler came to power in Germany, Einstein realized that he could not continue to live in Europe. He settled in Princeton that autumn. By 1940, he was naturalized in the United States and proudly called himself an American citizen.

Harmony between Nature and Mathematics

On Einstein's first Halloween in America, he cleaned up the troublemakers who serenaded the violin in front of his house. At Christmas, members of the local church sang carols and passed by his house. He stood outside the door and borrowed a violin to accompany them happily.

Einstein soon became such a legendary figure, an affable professor, sometimes irritable but always affable, and seldom combed his hair and put on socks. "I have reached the age when I was told to wear socks, and I chose not to wear them." He told the local children like this.

He once helped Henry Rosso, a child aged 15, to be interviewed by him. Rosso's teacher suggested that interviewing scientists can get high marks, so Rosso went to Einstein's house to find him, but he was turned away. The milkman gave him a hint: Einstein would take a fixed route at 9: 30 every morning, so Rosso slipped out of school to follow Einstein.

But this student, suddenly confused, didn't know what to ask. So Einstein suggested that he ask some questions about mathematics. "I found that nature is built in a beautiful way, and our task is to find the mathematical structure." Einstein explained his teaching philosophy like this, "It is a belief that helps me spend my life."

This interview made Henry Rosso get an A in his grades.