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From: BURT on 21 Mar 2010 21:21
On Mar 21, 7:38 am, Marvin the Martian <mar...(a)ontomars.org> wrote:
> I think the message of this thread is not so much that Einstein was a
> poser and a putz, which he was... it is that so many physicist are so
> mindlessly accepting and repeating what they told that they just ACCEPT
> that Einstein was a physics god without even stopping to think about what
> Einstein actually did.
>
> You have to wonder about scientist who are so unquestioning and willing
> to be blinded by hero worship.

Einsten was a worshiper of a Creator.
"I want to know how God created this world. I want to know His
thoughts. All the rest are just details." Albert Einstein
From: Robert Higgins on 21 Mar 2010 22:04
On Mar 21, 10:38 am, Marvin the Martian <mar...(a)ontomars.org> wrote:
> I think the message of this thread is not so much that Einstein was a
> poser

i.e., "poseur"

>and a putz,

Nice use of the Yiddish!

> which he was...

Or, at least, Marvin thinks so. Too bad Nobel Laureates Lorentz,
Planck, Wien, Bohr disagree. What do they know? Certainly MARVIN THE
MARTIAN is a better judge of the quality of cutting edge physics
research than the very people he has held up as being the true
pioneers! Certainly MARVIN THE MARTIAN knows more than Lorentz,
Planck, and Bohr!

> it is that so many physicist are so
> mindlessly accepting and repeating

So PLANCK was fooled into thinking that Einstein's "plug and chug" was
something great, even though he was the originator of the concept? Who
told Planck this? How could Planck be brilliant enough to develop the
concept of quanta, but be so stupid as to be fooled by Einstein's hack
work? In fact, be so fooled as to publicize Einstein's work when
nobody in the world knew who the hell "EInstein" was?

It is a very puzzling view of Planck.

> what they told that they just ACCEPT
> that Einstein was a physics god without even stopping to think about what
> Einstein actually did.

>
> You have to wonder about scientist

like Lorentz, Wien, Planck?

>who are so unquestioning and willing
> to be blinded by hero worship.

From: Marvin the Martian on 26 Mar 2010 09:45
On Mon, 22 Mar 2010 09:01:05 -0700, PD wrote:

> On Mar 21, 7:46 pm, Marvin the Martian <mar...(a)ontomars.org> wrote:
>> On Mon, 22 Mar 2010 09:53:34 +1100, Inertial wrote:
>> > "Marvin the Martian" <mar...(a)ontomars.org> wrote in message
>> >news:N6ednY0sc9PEsjvWnZ2dnUVZ_hignZ2d(a)giganews.com...
>>
>> >> I think the message of this thread is not so much that Einstein was
>> >> a poser and a putz, which he was... it is that so many physicist are
>> >> so mindlessly accepting and repeating what they told that they just
>> >> ACCEPT that Einstein was a physics god without even stopping to
>> >> think about what Einstein actually did.
>>
>> > Nope
>>
>> Nope? Spoken like a dope.
>>
>> There is little other explanation why Einstein's contributions are so
>> grossly overstated, other than the mindless acceptance of what they are
>> being told.
>
> I really don't think they are overstated, at least among physicists.

If you can't say why you don't "think" they're overstated, then your
argument will fail to convince, as that shows you, yourself, have no
rational reason for believing so.

You simply PROVE my mindless acceptance theory. :-D

> Physicists know the contributions of others, both before and Einstein,
> to relativity and to the other things he's known for. Same is true for
> Newton's contemporaries, or Maxwell's, or anyone else you care to think
> of.

Like I said, other than the Lorentz transformation, what did Einstein do?

Oh, wait! Lorentz discovered the Lorentz transformation. IT was Lorentz,
not Einstein, who postulated time dilation and mathematically shown how
the Lorentz-Fitzgerald contraction follows from the invariant
transformation of Maxwell's equations.

> The only place there seems to be an unseemly amount of attention is in
> the Barnes & Noble bookracks, where part of the reason for the interest
> is not his science, but his colorful personality and his influence on
> the historical developments of the time. But the popular press has its
> own rules for lifting certain people up. Feynman was no smarter than
> Dirac, but he was a much more interesting and amusing person, and so you
> see a lot more popular books about Feynman than you do about Dirac.

Maybe so. But the real genius of Einstein was to market himself. He was
quite a bit of a poser.
From: PD on 26 Mar 2010 10:44
All this is a rather tired and tiring exercise in debating the
qualifications of a nebulous term like "great". The same exercise is
applied to hockey players, presidents, and CEOs, with similar
futility.

There is no lack of people who are willing to try to depose a dead
physicist from the ranks of greatness. They will quibble about what
the proper metrics of greatness should be. They will blather about,
given such-and-so metrics of greatness, did this dead physicist
actually meet all those metrics. They will foam about why there are so
many books at Barnes & Noble about this great physicist and hardly any
about this other equally great physicist.

If someone is conventionally recognized as one of the great ones, but
you don't agree that those are the metrics of greatness by which one
should be judged, then consider that nobody really cares about your
own personal metrics of greatness. If someone else meets your metrics,
then feel free to call that other person great.

If someone is conventionally recognized as one of the great ones, but
you don't agree that this person has satisfied what you think are the
metrics of greatness, then consider that nobody really cares about
your estimation of that person's qualifications. Greatness is an
attribution measured by applause, and applause is a phenomenon of an
entire audience, and does not change if you don't find yourself
clapping.

If someone is conventionally recognized as one of the great ones, but
you think that others are just as deserving, then consider that rack
space at Barnes & Noble is not a good measure of what physicists think
about the relative merits of these people.

Physicists have always built on the work of others, and sometimes the
greatness is in the synthesis more than in the great leap. Physicists
have always enjoyed the benefits of collaborators, and sometimes the
greatness is in the consistent participation in the best
collaborations. Physicists usually find fulfillment in the work
itself, and enjoy support insofar as they gain more freedom to do the
work, but care little for the count of people that will consider them
great after they are dead.

PD

From: Inertial on 26 Mar 2010 10:49

"PD" <thedraperfamily(a)gmail.com> wrote in message
news:dc01c316-28dd-4e76-b85b-7d19eaea9fba(a)g11g2000yqe.googlegroups.com...
> All this is a rather tired and tiring exercise in debating the
> qualifications of a nebulous term like "great". The same exercise is
> applied to hockey players, presidents, and CEOs, with similar
> futility.
>
> There is no lack of people who are willing to try to depose a dead
> physicist from the ranks of greatness. They will quibble about what
> the proper metrics of greatness should be. They will blather about,
> given such-and-so metrics of greatness, did this dead physicist
> actually meet all those metrics. They will foam about why there are so
> many books at Barnes & Noble about this great physicist and hardly any
> about this other equally great physicist.
>
> If someone is conventionally recognized as one of the great ones, but
> you don't agree that those are the metrics of greatness by which one
> should be judged, then consider that nobody really cares about your
> own personal metrics of greatness. If someone else meets your metrics,
> then feel free to call that other person great.
>
> If someone is conventionally recognized as one of the great ones, but
> you don't agree that this person has satisfied what you think are the
> metrics of greatness, then consider that nobody really cares about
> your estimation of that person's qualifications. Greatness is an
> attribution measured by applause, and applause is a phenomenon of an
> entire audience, and does not change if you don't find yourself
> clapping.
>
> If someone is conventionally recognized as one of the great ones, but
> you think that others are just as deserving, then consider that rack
> space at Barnes & Noble is not a good measure of what physicists think
> about the relative merits of these people.
>
> Physicists have always built on the work of others, and sometimes the
> greatness is in the synthesis more than in the great leap. Physicists
> have always enjoyed the benefits of collaborators, and sometimes the
> greatness is in the consistent participation in the best
> collaborations. Physicists usually find fulfillment in the work
> itself, and enjoy support insofar as they gain more freedom to do the
> work, but care little for the count of people that will consider them
> great after they are dead.
>
> PD
>

Nicely put


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