(1879-1955)
 "Why do I need to go to school, Dad?.." The serious-looking father looked at his 8-year-old son from above. -‘‘Albert, do you want to grow up to be grossly ignorant?..” -“What does grossly ignorant mean ?..” A laughter was heard from the other end of the well furnished, spacious living-room. The father and son turned to the mother at the piano, she said, -“Oh Herman, don’t you know you cannot beat Albert in that game.” -“Well; to be honest with you, I don’t know what you mean,” said her husband. Mrs. Einstein answered as she played an old Hungarian folk song, -“Come on, don’t act like you don’t know, I know that you are trying to stop him from asking questions by responding him with more questions. As you see, it does not work.” Albert walked towards his mother. Her talented fingers sliding on the keys made him forget his question for a moment. It sounded almost like the piano was singing. She ended the piece by a strong blow on two keys, turned on her stool and hugged her son. She smiled to her husband over her son’s wavy, dark, and luxuriant hair, -“You see! Only my music can stop him from asking questions.” The father smiled also, before he could respond, the boy in his mother’s arms turned and asked, -“Is it a bad thing to ask questions?” Now, it was the father’s turn to laugh; -“This one was for you ! Don’t be so sure ! It doesn’t look like your music can stop him either.” The mother ignored the father and spoke to her son; -“There’s nothing bad about asking questions sweetheart, as long as your questions are not aimed to belittle or hurt someone.” -“But I don’t do that mom. There is so much I don’t know and I want to learn by asking questions. I want to learn everything.” The mother smiled with pride, the father hesitated for a second and interrupted, -“Allright son, if you want to learn everything, as you said, then why do you question the necessity of going to school. Isn’t the school a place where questions are answered?” -“No dad,” said the boy, “forget about answering questions, they don’t even let you ask them. I don’t like school. It feels like a prison and teachers are no different than prison guards, the guards that are walking up and down between desks!” The husband and wife gave each other concerned looks; what could they say against these accusations? In future, this child who has been questioning everything would become the focus of the world with his great scientific success and his unpretensious, virtuous and wise personality. Albert Einstein was born in Ulm, Germany to a Jewish family leading a life which was very much involved with rich cultural activities. In spite of this, his development in his early years was causing worry. This introverted boy who didn’t like being with other children worried his family with his delayed speech. If there had not been the special concern of his uncle, an engineer, he would have quit school altogether. However, owing to his uncle’s involvement, he continued to study. For him, among all other subjects Geometry was of a special interest. Later on he said: “If one is not fascinated by Geometry you cannot expect him to advance in theoretical science.” The calender was showing the year 1905; There was a young man working in the the franchise office in Bern. He was only 26... The colleagues addressed him only as Albert... After he had left behind the troublesome years spent for his education, his ideas about life made him become famous world wide. He was now addressed with respect and honour as: - Mr. Einstein... “The thing we call as space does not exist outside of us. All the separate things that we perceive in space are in reality an undivided whole arranged in succession going from the inner structure of existence to the outer structure or vice versa. Even time is a part of this arrangement and is nothing but a method of comparing one to the other...” These statements had turned the traditional ideas upside down. The explanation that “The Objects which we see are the solid forms of energy” rebutted the centuries-old understanding in classical physics ‘’ matter is made of structural blocks.’’ It became apparent that the objects which were being seen did not have massive structures. Actually matter is the form that energy takes by becoming more dense. In the material scale, the image of the energy that has been formulated through ‘’change’’ depends on the means/devices that see it. As a matter of fact whatever we are perceiving as objects or as space have no difference at all at the sub-atomic level, and they are not sepearted from each other the with given lines. This fact also is proving the existence of the Universal, limitless whole. The statement emphasized in mystical works as ‘’The Universe is a conscious, living Structure and all of the things that are being perceived through the limits of the five senses are all imaginary’’ has been determined years ago by those people who have understood their truth. Einstein formulated the fact that the mass of an object was the equivalent of a certain amount of energy, in terms of E=mc 2. This formula, at the same time was the proof stating that the objects were not static structures. In other words, what existed was the Universal Energy not the matter. Through nuclear fusion and fission a very large amount of energy is released. This shows openly the equivalence of matter and energy(1). The best example of this is the atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima; with the explosion of a 6-gram bomb, only 1 gram of material was lost and 10^21 erg worth of energy came out. With the theory of general relativity, Einstein has described the structure of space in mathematical terms. He said that the universe is made of continuous space and time and it is in the shape of a complicated 4-dimensional curve. This statement led to unimaginably difficult thoughts. “Space is no longer a plane, but a structure that becomes curved with the effect of the things it contains.” As approved by all the experiments, Einstein’s universe has a curved space, and a gravity that changes the geometric order. In this universe dimension and mass are changeble and time passes differently for things that travel in different speeds, in short nothing is the way it seems(2). In other words time changes with respect to place and speed. There is no such thing as unconditionally flowing time; we can only talk about one’s time according to one’s speed. and the place he is present. For instance, time in the sun passes slower, and also, for beings that can travel with a speed closer to the speed of light, time flows slower. In 1972, in order to test the theory of relativity, two American researchers flew around the world on a jet plane. There were four extremely sensitive atomic clocks on the plane. During the flight it has been observed that the clocks on the plane were 50 nanoseconds behind the clocks on earth. (One nanosecond means 1/1 billion seconds. However, a jet plane’s speed is almost nothing when compared to the speed of light. If a jet plane goes 1800 km an hour, its speed per second will be 0.5 km. Whereas the speed of light is 300,000 km per second.) If such a comparatively low speed could slow the time, it became obvious that the theory was correct. Many scientists described Einstein’s studies as incomprehensible and unbelievable. Even the ones that examined the theories from a mathematical point of view were not willing to accept such opposing results. Several experiments were conducted to test his theories. These experiments were extremely expensive and exhausting and required utmost sensitivity. However, after having been tested for more than three quarters of a century, his theories of Relativity were found to be in accordance with the observations. He then became a man with world-wide importance whether he wanted it or not. He was recognised as a unique scientist without a match. In 1933, when Nazis came to power in Germany, they confiscated all his possessions. When he was torn from his country, USA gave him a warm welcome and he worked at Princeton Higher Research Center in New Jersey until the end of his life. This is how he described himself: “I am a horse that was created to run alone. I cannot be cooperative or do team work. I could never have a close bond with a country, a person, or with a circle of friends and even my family. There was always a distance in all these relationships. My tendency to withdrawal and introversion became stronger in time. Such an isolation is painful for a person. However, I don’t regret being away from others’ understanding and sympathy. There is no doubt that I have losses because of this. However, in return my gain is to be independent from others’ prejudices and evaluations.” To understand the secrets of this distinctive genius, after his death several examinations were done on his brain. Recently, experts reached interesting results from these studies and informed the press that the difference in the structure of the brain made up the genius. The scientists said “None of us has such a brain!’’ The section between the two ears, that is thought to be related to mathematical logic, is 15% larger in his brain. Also, the sulcus that lies from the front of the brain to the back, is shorter from birth. This short distance allows more neurons to connect and work together better. These data show that he was born a genious(3). Einstein said, “God does not roll dice”. We believe that he had great scientific contributions to humanity, especially in detecting the way matter was formed. But still, he could not solve the relationship between matter and spirit and, against all his understanding he still could not free himself from the concept of a god far beyond. In spite of these facts we are still considering him among those who have enlightened humanity because, he had built the road leading to the true reference. Ahmet F. Yuksel Bibliography:
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