In this context of contested memories, Olivier Darrigol proposed a kind of “peace treaty” on the basis that “it seems wiser to acknowledge that Lorentz, Poincaré and Einstein all contributed to the emer- gence of relativity. While this is obvious for political com- memorations, it is no less true of scientific ones, and the UNESCO international year of physics in 2005, celebrating Einstein’s annus mirabilis of 1905, revived the old ghost of Poincaré’s contribution to relativity. INTRODUCTION One of the side effects of commemorations is often to reactivate old debates that had been forgotten or were lying dormant. Sci., xlvi (2008) THE COLLECTIVE CONSTRUCTION OF SCIENTIFIC MEMORY: THE EINSTEIN-POINCARÉ CONNECTION AND ITS DISCONTENTS, 1905–2005 Yves Gingras Université du Québec à Montréal “Non ridere, non lugere, neque detestari sed intelligere.” “I have made a ceaseless effort not to ridicule, not to bewail nor to scorn human actions, but to understand them.” Spinoza, Political treatise (1.4.2) 1. Though many historians will tend to agree with that generous proposition, I think, on the contrary, that as an historical assertion That Poincaré and Einstein offered two different versions of this theory, and that Einstein provided the version that is now judged better”. The book also explores the misunderstandings and paradoxes apparent in the theory of relativity, and unravels the subtleties and creativity of Einstein.The Collective Construction of Scientific Memory: The Einstein-Poincaré Connection and its Discontents, 1905–2005 The Collective Construction of Scientific Memory: The Einstein-Poincaré Connection and its.
The book discusses Einstein’s and Poincaré’s creativity and the process by which their ideas developed. Poincars non orthodox point of view seems overthrowed by qnantum theory of electron: According to Einsteins famous quotation: electron (quantum of charge. In the May 1905 letters to Lorentz, Poincaré presented the basic equations of his 1905 “Dynamics of the Electron”, meaning that, at this point, Poincaré and Einstein both had drafts of papers relating to the principle of relativity. In May 1905, Henri Poincaré sent three letters to Hendrik Lorentz at the same time that Einstein wrote his famous May 1905 letter to Conrad Habicht, promising him four works, of which the fourth one, Relativity, was a rough draft at that point. Whether you look to Poincar (Poincar, Sur la dynamique de l'lectron, 1906a) or Einstein (Einstein, Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter Krper, 1905). Unfortunately, there are no surviving notebooks and manuscripts, no notes and papers or other primary sources from this critical period to provide any information about the crucial steps that led Einstein to his great discovery. Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd Journal of Physics. For many years before 1905, he had been intensely concerned with the topic in fact, he was busily working on the problem for seven or eight years prior to 1905. The Poincar-Einstein synchronization: historical aspects and new developments. The end result was that Einstein published nothing regarding the special theory of relativity prior to 1905. He probably discarded many pieces of papers and calculations and flung them in the waste paper basket in the Patent Office.
One can imagine Einstein trying to hide from his boss, writing notes on small sheets of paper, and, according to reports, seeing to it that the small sheets of paper on which he was writing would vanish into his desk-drawer as soon as he heard footsteps approaching his door.
Between 19, Einstein sat in the Patent Office and may have made calculations on old pieces of paper that were once patent drafts. This book pieces together the jigsaw puzzle of Einstein’s journey to discovering the special theory of relativity.