Albert Einstein

Introduction

"To raise new questions, new possibilities, to regard old problems from a new angle, requires creative imagination and marks real advance in science."-Albert Einstein. 

One of the greatest men to ever walk this earth was Albert Einstein. He is the definition of genius. Through his struggles and hard ship he made this world a smarter and better place to live. He came up with a ton of theories, and changed the outlook we have on life forever.

Early life

Albert Einstein was born on March 14,  1879. His mother was Pauline Einstein and his father was Herman Einstein. They lived in Germany, a block or so from the Gothic Cathedral Church in Ulm. In 1880, they gathered their stuff and left for a near by Munich, where his father and uncle set up a electrical equipment business. 

Although they were Jewish, Albert went to a catholic school because it was closer. Surprisingly he received no discrimination for being Jewish. This was probably because WW2 hadn't happened yet.

Albert was usually very quiet all the time. He said that he didn’t really talk because he wanted to speak in complete sentences. So he thought a lot about what he going to say instead of saying it. He had a terrible temper, would throw things and his face would go ghost white.  He didn’t like to play with the other children. He would enjoy reading more than social contact. He cried when the soldiers came home because he saw them as machines and thought no human should live like that. He hated anything that had to do with politics. Unlike his older self he didn't really question the universe, but he was often day dreaming.

Education

Albert is a terrible example of a good student. Albert got terrible grades, (according to teachers) was always day dreaming, and skipped class a lot. He said he never tried to learn anything he wasn't interested in. Fun fact: He's also a high school drop out. Lets just say that many of his teachers and family didn’t believe in him. Thankfully someone, or some people, did believe in him and helped him reach his goal. Two of which were his uncles. Uncle Jakob always pushed Alberts interest in math. He would come for mid-day dinner and would bring hard algebra problems with him. The other uncle, Uncle Ceaser, or as albert called him "my best loved uncle", gave him a model steam engine. The third was med student named Max Talmey. Max would come for dinner every Thursday. To show his thanks for the meal he would loan little albert books on science. Albert was also heavily influenced by a compass that his father gave him. He was infatuated with the needle and how it, no matter what, pointed north. He asked his father why it did that. His father didn’t have and answer, so he decided, not being happy with his fathers reply, that he would find out why it did that. 

Struggles

 Everybody has to go through some struggles at some point in their life, even geniuses. Albert was no exception. On top of almost non of teachers believing in him and his terrible grades, he also had a very bad anger issues and would throw things, often injuring people. When he was born his parents thought that he was mildly retarded because he barely spoke and when he did his speech was slow.  These are just the struggle from his younger years.

Many physicists thought he was crazy. Because he was so invested in his work his wife left him and took his kids with her. He was alone in his work and because of the stress put on him to prove his theories he became mentally and physically ill. WW2 broke out making him put  a halt to his research. Because he was a German Jew his safety was at a major risk.  HIs father passed away believing his son was a complete failure.

Accomplishments

Though he had many hard ships, Einstein,  still became a genius. He had many ground breaking theories. He contributed to light, gravity, time and energy manly. He explained the nature of space and time, he added to the theory of gravitational pull, he also came up with the famous formula: E=mc2, which states that energy equals mass times speed of light squared. He answer the all famous question "why  is the sky blue?" He published two very renowned papers: one that used general relativity to model the behavior of the entire universe, published in 1917. The other paper was published in 1915 named General relativity. He also had the guts to challenge the wave theory of light. The man proved that absolute time had been replaced by a new and better absolute: the speed of light. One of his amazing theories states that time is not as constant as light. He explained that light came in photons. He discovered the law of the  photoelectric effect.  

For his great achievements in science he won many awards. In 1921 he awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in physics, in 1925 The Copley Medal, the Max Planck medal in 1929, The Franklin Medal in 1936, and in Time magazine he was named Person of the Century in 1999. 

There are even a ton of awards named after him! 

 
What we can learn from Einstein

"Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning." -Albert Einstein

He showed us that we can never stop questioning. He always said that imagination was worth more than absolute knowledge. He showed us that nothing is impossible and to do what you love no matter what. Albert had to go through many tough times in his life to get where he was, but he never gave up. Not when his wife left him, not when WW2 stared, and not when his father died. When everyone was against him in childhood and all through teens and early adulthood, he didn’t give up. He proved everyone wrong and became the terrific person he was. He questioned things that no one dare question. He saw the flaws in science and society and tried to make it better. He was a great man, one that will go down in history forever.     
 

Conclusion  

In conclusion, he was a amazing man. He rightfully earned the title of genius.  He faced so many hard ships in life and taught us so much. He will be remembered and the gifts he gave to science will live on. 

Bibliography

Amin, Rola "achievements" bibalex.org, 2005. Web. February 22, 2016. <www.bibalex.org/Einstein2005/Achievements.htm>

Pakhare, Jaysashree. "Accomplishments of Albert Einstein" Buzzle.com, January 11, 2016. Web. February 22, 2016. <www.buzzle.com>

Severance, John B. "Einstein, Visionary Scientist." New York: Clarion Books, 1999

Chung, Arthur "Albert Einstein. His struggles. His failures" medium.com, May 4, 2014. Web. February 25, 2016. <www.medium.com>

Wikipedia contributors. "Einstein awards and honors" Wikipedia, the Encyclopedia. December 10. 2015 February 23, 2016