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Einstein made his share of errors. Here are three of the biggest
nbc ^ | Mar.14.2018 / 8:14 AM ET | Dan Falk /

Posted on 03/15/2018 9:29:33 PM PDT by BenLurkin

1. Starlight bends — but how much?

Einstein performed a series of calculations to determine the size of the predicted shift but initially muffed the effort, arriving at a number that was half the correct value.

Had the astronomers managed to test this number in their initial eclipse-viewing efforts, their observations wouldn’t have matched his prediction. But their attempts were stymied by weather in 1912 and by war in 1914. By the time they made the necessary observation, in the spring of 1919, Einstein had corrected his blunder — and astronomers saw exactly the shift that he had predicted.

2. Gravitational waves don’t exist — or do they?

Einstein moved on to other problems. When he returned to it two decades later, he concluded that gravitational waves couldn’t exist because they’d create “singularities” — regions in which space and time are stretched to infinity.

Einstein had goofed because of the mathematical coordinate system he used to tackle the problem. It's a bit like what happens with the latitude and longitude used to track positions on Earth... It works in most places on the planet. But as one gets close to the poles, lines of longitude converge and the system breaks down.

3. Einstein and the expanding universe

Einstein was uncomfortable with some of relativity’s implications, including one of the biggest — that the universe isn’t a static thing but an entity that must expand or contract. This was unthinkable to Einstein, who believed the universe existed in a “steady state.”

So Einstein added a fudge factor to his equations, a kind of energy associated with empty space. This cosmological constant allowed for a stable universe. But sure enough, astronomers in the 1920s confirmed that the universe was expanding. Einstein later called the cosmological constant the “greatest blunder” of his career.

(Excerpt) Read more at nbcnews.com ...


TOPICS: History
KEYWORDS: einstein; einsteinwaswrong; haltonarp; marriedhiscousin
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To: Cronos

I don’t think it is fair to judge Einstein on his political knowledge errors - he never called himself a political expert nor did he foist his political opinions on others.

___________________________________________________________

The problem with many academics is because they know so much in an arcane field they think they must know much and have wisdom in fields where they know little or nothing. Most medical doctors are that way that I have met. They are educated very well in medicine, very well, and many keep up through the years but can’t see past their nose in politics. But it works both ways. I studied economics and politics is a hobby, I know a lot about both, but not so much about medicine.

I’ll be glad to shut up about advising people on medicine if they will shut up about politics.


41 posted on 03/16/2018 6:12:25 AM PDT by JAKraig (my religion is at least as good as yours)
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To: Rocky
Funny how people like Einstein can be so smart in some ways, and not learn obvious lessons in other areas.

MY father was a professor of Physics at a major university. You will never meet a more arrogant man. He believed that because he understood the physical workings of the world better than you, he understood all the workings of the world better than you.

A Fuller Brush Man understands the world better than my father.

42 posted on 03/16/2018 6:13:21 AM PDT by super7man (Madam Defarge, knitting, knitting, always knitting)
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To: djf

The media needs a single “greatest of all time” to the exclusion of anyone else for its simple-minded messages to its siumple-minded audience.

So Picasso, even though much of his work is work is gibberish, is chosen as the only painter.

Ali, who was a mediocre heavyweight fighter as compared to the best heavyweight champions, is rabidly promoted as the media’s “greatest of all time.”

Einstein is the media’s choice as the single scientist and “smart man.” To hell with any other mathematicians and physicists.


43 posted on 03/16/2018 6:26:27 AM PDT by MarvinStinson
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To: BenLurkin

Never liked Einstein. Arrogant a$$hole.
After Oliver Heaviside corrected Maxwell’s equations due to incorrect assumptions on the part of Maxwell, Einstein refused to credit Heaviside for this work and insisted on calling them Maxwell’s Equations, because Heaviside never went to college and did not have a degree from a university. Heaviside was poor and could not afford to go to college and was self taught. Thus, no degree, so no credit for brilliant work. Einstein would rather give the credit to the idiot who got it wrong.


44 posted on 03/16/2018 6:32:00 AM PDT by BuffaloJack (Chivalry is not dead. It is a warriors code and only practiced by warriors.)
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To: MarvinStinson
Ali was a mediocre heavyweight fighter?

I did not know that!

Tell us, if you will - what gave you this special insight?

CA....

45 posted on 03/16/2018 6:37:12 AM PDT by Chances Are (Seems I've found that silly grin again....)
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To: FredZarguna

“He was, like Newton, the kind of physicist who comes along once in a few hundred years.”

Very wrong.


46 posted on 03/16/2018 6:39:00 AM PDT by MarvinStinson
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To: odawg

Large Hadrian Collider? Dang, those Romans were ahead of their time!


47 posted on 03/16/2018 6:42:32 AM PDT by Still Thinking (Freedom is NOT a loophole!)
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To: Chances Are

Since you are clueless on the topic, that would be impossible.

(I notice you also truncated what I actually said—a favorite trick if the media—whose promotion you so avidly swallow).

Do you also believe that Obama is the greatest president of all time?


48 posted on 03/16/2018 6:52:46 AM PDT by MarvinStinson
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To: Still Thinking

Hadron - in a hurry.


49 posted on 03/16/2018 7:00:24 AM PDT by odawg
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To: BenLurkin; AdmSmith; AnonymousConservative; Berosus; Bockscar; cardinal4; ColdOne; ...

Why did Albert Einstein marry his cousin?
https://www.quora.com/Why-did-Albert-Einstein-marry-his-cousin


50 posted on 03/16/2018 7:24:33 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (www.tapatalk.com/groups/godsgravesglyphs/, forum.darwincentral.org, www.gopbriefingroom.com)
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To: dr_lew

That is Newtonian physics, putz. Tell me about yer black hole again. And not the one that everyone has but no one talks about.


51 posted on 03/16/2018 8:20:59 AM PDT by crusty old prospector
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To: BenLurkin

Can you imagine Einstein in a modern lab today high powered computer systems?

We would probably already have a colony on Mars building a portal for wormhole travel.


52 posted on 03/16/2018 8:26:43 AM PDT by shotgun
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To: Slyfox

Magnetic waves. )8-p


53 posted on 03/16/2018 8:35:45 AM PDT by SgtHooper (If you remember the 60's, YOU WEREN'T THERE!)
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To: odawg

Figured it was a phone spellcheck issue. Those are my worst enema.


54 posted on 03/16/2018 8:59:07 AM PDT by Still Thinking (Freedom is NOT a loophole!)
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To: MarvinStinson
Typical lefty post!

(1) You allege me clueless, without pointing out why you think I'm clueless. You just smooth on past the point, with no explanation, and shift gears to...

(2)make a point (which isn't a point - it's just diversion) that has nothing to do with the discussion point. I didn't truncate anything there - I copied and pasted your actual phrase.

(3)Finally, in a surprising non sequiter you somehow invoke President Obama. Yet another shifted goal post!

I mistakenly thought I could engage you on an interesting point of contention, sports-wise, but it seems you wrote something down without really knowing what it was, and then hurried on back to your bong.

No problem. That is undoubtedly more satisfying to you than anything this board has to offer.

Happy trails!

CA....

55 posted on 03/16/2018 10:33:36 AM PDT by Chances Are (Seems I've found that silly grin again....)
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To: BuffaloJack

Dropped the quaternions math for vectors. Resulted in a simplified subset of Maxwell’s work suitable for engineering, rather than a specialized physics.

https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/technical-articles/maxwells-equations-in-present-form/


56 posted on 03/16/2018 11:22:44 AM PDT by Ozark Tom
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To: shotgun

Computers just allow one to speed up Edison’s method of finding thousands of ways not to succeed, before stumbling upon one that works. It’s called a simulation model.

The slide rule era relied upon creative insight to avoid dead-end avenues.


57 posted on 03/16/2018 11:30:55 AM PDT by Ozark Tom
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To: Chances Are

“I didn’t truncate anything there - I copied and pasted your actual phrase.”

You lie.


58 posted on 03/16/2018 11:34:23 AM PDT by MarvinStinson
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To: MarvinStinson
Sorry, but my PhD in physics and 30+ years of teaching physics at university say otherwise: Einstein, Newton and Archimedes are in EVERYBODY'S top five lists of physicists of all time.

There IS NO disputing Einstein's contribution.

None.

Anyone who challenges Einstein as a physicist is a fool, whose opinion disqualifies him from any further consideration.

59 posted on 03/16/2018 12:09:35 PM PDT by FredZarguna (And what Rough Beast, its hour come round at last, slouches toward 5th Avenue to be born?)
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To: Campion
Not really.

Einstein was not that kind of physicist.

Once you write down E=mc2 you've pretty much got all of the nuclear weapon you're going to get from him. The theory of a nuclear weapon is trivial compared to the materials handling, metalurgy, physical chemistry, ordnance, electrical, mechanical and other engineering challenges you have to solve.

As a pure theorist, Einstein would not have been a lot of help.

60 posted on 03/16/2018 12:14:24 PM PDT by FredZarguna (And what Rough Beast, its hour come round at last, slouches toward 5th Avenue to be born?)
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