Einstein

by Philipp Frank

  Since no world government exists at present, however, Einstein’s view seems to suggest that the secret should remain for the time being with the original manufacturers, the United States, Great Britain, and Canada. Hence, he was accused by some people of being idealistic and impractical and by others of being reactionary and taking sides with the “brass hats.”

  When I discussed with Einstein recently his views on the international aspects of the atomic bomb he protested vehemently against these interpretations of his views. He realizes exactly that the “control of atomic energy” is primarily not a technical but a political problem which cannot be solved except in the form of a peace settlement between the big nations. Every “control” requires an international agreement that entrusts agents with the supervision of the war research and industry of all nations. Such an agreement presupposes a high degree of mutual trust, and if such a trust exists, there will be no danger of war, bomb or no bomb.

  Einstein realizes that this vicious circle cannot be broken by singling out the “control of atomic energy” but only by a comprehensive territorial and economic agreement. He hopes that the fear of atomic warfare may become so great that governments and people will be prepared to sacrifice their sovereignty to a greater degree than they would without this threat.

  7. Life in Princeton

  Einstein’s wife Elsa died in 1936. She had been strongly attached emotionally to her German homeland, and after losing her, Einstein became even more strongly linked to his new country. His first wife never left Switzerland, but their eldest son, who had been born in Bern at the time of Einstein’s first great discoveries, is now also active in the United States as an engineer. Of Einstein’s two stepdaughters, one died after leaving Germany; the other, Margot, a talented scupltress, was divorced from her husband and now lives mostly with Einstein in Princeton.

  In 1939 Einstein’s only sister Maja moved from Florence, Italy, to Princeton. She is married to the son of that teacher Winteler of the cantonal school of Aarau, to whom Einstein had been strongly attracted. She had felt uneasy because of the increasing Nazi influences in Italy. Her husband returned to Switzerland temporarily, while she visited her brother. Her manner of speaking and the sound of her voice, as well as the childlike and yet skeptical formulation of every statement, are unusually similar to her brother’s mode of expression. It is amazing to listen to her; it arouses a sense of uneasiness to find a replica of even the minor traits of a genius. Nevertheless, there is also a certain feeling of reassurance at seeing even the greatest genius as a link in a chain of ordinary natural events.

  Since 1928 Einstein’s secretary and later his housekeeper is Miss Helen Dukas. She is trim, intelligent, and energetic. She is a native of Einstein’s Swabian homeland, and comes from the same small place as Elsa Einstein. These three women now form Einstein’s immediate environment.

  In 1933 when Einstein came to the United States he had only a visitor’s visa. Under the American immigration law there is no place within the country where one can obtain permission to become a permanent resident of the United States. Such permission can be given only by an American consul, and these officers are only to be found in foreign countries. Consequently Einstein went to the English colony of Bermuda in order to apply to the American consul there. Einstein’s visit to the island was a gala occasion. The consul gave a dinner in his honor and gave him permission to enter the United States as a permanent resident.

  Only then was Einstein able to announce his intention of becoming a citizen of the United States and to receive his first citizenship papers. He still had to wait five years before he could become a citizen. During this time he had to prepare himself for an examination on the American Constitution and the rights and duties of an American citizen. This he did with zeal. In 1941 Einstein together with his stepdaughter Margot and his secretary, Miss Dukas, received American citizenship. He was asked to broadcast to the public the ideas and emotions which he felt at that moment.

  Thus this mighty tree with its roots was transplanted into new earth. What is his life here?

  Various things from his Berlin apartment have been brought to his cottage, situated in the midst of a large garden on a suburban street. Here various rare objects such as adorned the living-room of a well-to-do Berlin family can be seen again, for example, Byzantine icons from Russia with their gold background mysteriously darkened by incense. At Princeton Einstein actually lives like a strange guest just as he did in the upper middle-class household in Berlin. His profoundly bohemian nature has not changed even with his sixtieth birthday, which he celebrated at Princeton in 1939.

  He has no social life in the traditional meaning of the word. He takes no part in the series of dinners and receptions that are given by the faculty members in university communities. The conclusion should not be drawn, however, that he does not like to see people. On the contrary, he likes to receive people whom he can advise or help, with whom he can discuss some interesting subject or have a pleasant chat, or, what he prefers most of all, with whom he can play music together. He likes people who are ready and enthusiastic to accompany his violin playing on the bass viol, or cello, or the piano. Most of his visitors are not members of Princeton University or of the Institute for Advanced Study. His thoughts are always more occupied with things that are distant than with those that are near. Nevertheless, hardly an afternoon passes without a visitor from out of town coming to talk with him.

  Among these visitors are, first of all, physicists, philosophers, or even theologians who come to Princeton and want to use the occasion to obtain some impression of the man who has given their particular field so many new ideas. There is also the great number of refugees from Europe who seek advice and help from him. Sometimes there are people from Europe who stay with him for a few days because they are destitute. There are Zionists who want to hear his position on certain political questions. Even members of the faculty of the University of Jerusalem come to him because they want him to intervene in their favor. There are writers, journalists, artists, who want to interest him in their work, hoping thereby to find a larger audience. The number of people who wish to see him is great, and Miss Dukas has to use a good deal of tact, energy and kindness to keep the atmosphere around him as quiet as he needs it.

  Einstein in his study at the Institute of Advanced Study, Princeton, 1940 (Illustration Credit 12.1)

  Einstein in the study of his home 112 Mercer Street, Princeton, 1938 (Illustration Credit 12.2)

  His attitude in this matter is the same as in all problems of social life; he feels himself very much apart from other people and he can never identify himself very strongly with others. He always has a certain feeling of being a stranger, and even a desire to be isolated. On the other hand, however, he has a great curiosity about everything human and a great sense of humor, with which he is able to derive a certain, perhaps artistic pleasure from everything that is strange and even unpleasant. Finally, he is very good-natured and feels strongly the equality of all human beings. Perhaps he often says to himself: It is just the most unpleasant people with whom one should be least inclined to be short, since they suffer most because no one wants to talk with them.

  As a result it is often the rejected inventors and other misunderstood geniuses who come to him. Ever since the time when he was employed in the patent office at Bern he has retained a certain pleasure in listening to the most senseless projects. All of them contain some element of human inventive faculty, even though in a distorted state; and for Einstein’s active and penetrating mind it has always been a pleasure to follow through a confused train of thought, to unravel it, and to find the errors in it.

  Occasionally he is also visited by physicists who are carrying on research on the basis of ideas that do not agree with those recognized as correct by present-day physicists. Such aberrant scientists can equally well be forerunners of important innovations or simply muddle-headed fellows. Einstein is more willing than others to listen to such physicists and to
give careful consideration to their ideas, since it is always a pleasure for him to see the possible seeds of future ideas. At any rate, it is pleasant mental exercise for him to follow through logically a series of deductions, without being sure at the start whether they lead to any reasonable or useful conclusion.

  It sometimes happens, however, that some of these inventors and scientists would feel insulted if he did not accept their conclusions as correct. Just because he is possibly the only famous physicist who is willing to listen to them and to consider their ideas, all the hatred of an unrecognized physicist for those who have achieved fame occasionally concentrated itself against Einstein. This led to the paradoxical result that he was sometimes attacked and condemned most severely by the very persons to whom he had devoted the most attention.

  Since immigrating to America, Einstein has rarely spoken at public meetings. Organizations of all kinds have tried to induce him to do so, but he has spoken only when the subject concerned was one in which he was greatly interested. Neither has he attended scientific meetings very often. Only very few times has he discussed his actual researches in professional circles. Nor has he done it very readily, because he often felt that his work was not in line with the trend of research preferred by most physicists. His work has been devoted through many years to the construction of a “unified field theory” that would eventually account for the subatomic phenomena too. He often thought that the researches with which he was occupied would not be received with much interest by those who believed that they should not divert their attention from the central task of today’s physics, the interpretation of atomic phenomena by means of Bohr’s quantum theory or his principle of complementarity. On some occasions, however, Einstein lectured at scientific congresses on his views on the present and future of physical science in general. One such rare instance was his address in Philadelphia “On Physical Reality,” in which the sentence occurs that forms the motto of this book.

  The world around Einstein has changed very much since he published his first discoveries. He began his work during the time of the German Kaiser in the environment characteristic of the German and Swiss petty bourgeoisie; he lived during the second World War in the last bulwark of democracy, the United States of America. He was able to make a substantial contribution toward an earlier conclusion of the war than had been expected, and is now anxious to help in making the peace a lasting one. But his attitude to the world around him has not changed. He has remained a bohemian, with a humorous, even seemingly skeptical approach to facts of human life, and at the same time a prophet with the intense pathos of the Biblical tradition. He has remained an individualist who prefers to be unencumbered by social relations, and at the same time a fighter for social equality and human fraternity. He has remained a believer in the possibility of expressing the laws of the universe in simple, even though ingenious mathematical formulæ, but at the same time doubting all ready-made formulæ that claim to be the correct solution for human behavior in private and political life.

  When a visitor whom he has known in the old country comes to his home in Princeton, Einstein often says: “You are surprised, aren’t you, at the contrast between my fame throughout the world, the fuss over me in the newspapers, and the isolation and quiet in which I live here? I wished for this isolation all my life, and now I have finally achieved it here in Princeton.”

  Many famous scholars live in the distinguished university town, but no inhabitant will simply number Einstein as one among many other famous people. For the people of Princeton in particular and for the world at large he is not just a great scholar, but rather one of the legendary figures of the twentieth century. Einstein’s acts and words are not simply noted and judged as facts; instead each has its symbolic significance — symbolic of his time, his people, and his profession.

  People in Princeton tell many anecdotes about Einstein. It is related that one of his neighbors, the mother of a ten-year-old girl, noticed that the child often left the house and went to Einstein’s home. The mother wondered at this, whereupon the child said: “I had trouble with my homework in arithmetic. People said that at number 112 there lives a very big mathematician, who is also a very good man. I went to him and asked him to help me with my homework. He was very willing, and explained everything very well. It was easier to understand than when our teacher explained it in school. He said I should come whenever I find a problem too difficult.” The girl’s mother was alarmed at the child’s boldness and went to Einstein to apologize for her daughter’s behavior. But Einstein said: “You don’t have to excuse yourself. I have certainly learned more from the conversations with the child than she did from me.”

  I do not know, nor have I made any effort to check, whether this story is true. People tell it in different versions together with the much simpler story that in summer Einstein is often to be seen walking through the streets of Princeton in sandals without stockings, in a sweater without coat, eating an ice-cream cone, to the delight of the students and the amazement of the professors.

  Since not only Einstein’s personality but also his times and environment should be described in this book, all such stories are certainly true. Even if they do not tell us anything that is factual about Einstein, they are a true description of the world in which he has lived.

  In 1945 Einstein retired from his position as professor at the Institute for Advanced Study. This change in his official status, however, did not mean any change in his actual work. He continues to live in Princeton and to carry on research at the Institute.