As 1905 dawned, the soon-to-be 26-year-old Albert Einstein faced life as a failed academic. Most physicists of the time would have scoffed at the idea that this minor civil servant could have much to contribute to science. Yet within the following year, Einstein would publish not one, not two, not three, but four extraordinary papers, each on a different topic, that were destined to radically transform our understanding of the universe.
随着1905年的到来, 即将26岁的阿尔伯特·爱因斯坦面临着 作为一个失败的学者的生活。 当时的大多数物理学家都会嘲笑, 这个小公务员可能对科学有很大贡献的想法。 然而在接下来的一年里, 爱因斯坦发表了不是一篇, 不是两篇, 不是三篇, 而是四篇课题各不相同却都非同凡响的论文, 它们注定将彻底改变我们对宇宙的认识。
The myth that Einstein had failed math is just that. He had mastered calculus on his own by the age of 15 and done well at both his Munich secondary school and at the Swiss Polytechnic, where he studied for a math and physics teaching diploma. But skipping classes to spend more time in the lab and neglecting to show proper deference to his professors had derailed his intended career path. Passed over even for a lab assistant position, he had to settle for a job at the Swiss patent office, obtained with the help of a friend's father.
这也就是为什么爱因斯坦数学没过是一个谜。 他15岁时已经自己掌握了微积分, 在慕尼黑中学和瑞士理工学院 都表现良好, 他在那里攻读数学和物理教学文凭。 但是,为了更多地待在实验室里而逃课, 并且忽视了对教授的适当尊重, 让他偏离了预期的职业道路。 连一个实验室助理的职位都不被考虑, 他只好在一位朋友的父亲的帮助下, 在瑞士专利局谋了一份工作。
Working six days a week as a patent clerk, Einstein still managed to make some time for physics, discussing the latest work with a few close friends, and publishing a couple of minor papers. It came as a major surprise when in March 1905 he submitted a paper with a shocking hypothesis. Despite decades of evidence that light was a wave, Einstein proposed that it could, in fact, be a particle, showing that mysterious phenomena, such as the photoelectric effect, could be explained by his hypothesis. The idea was derided for years to come, but Einstein was simply twenty years ahead of his time. Wave-particle duality was slated to become a cornerstone of the quantum revolution.
尽管作为一个专利审查员一周要工作六天, 爱因斯坦仍然能给物理学留出一些时间, 与几个好友讨论最新的著作, 并发表了几篇小论文。 令人大吃一惊的是, 他在1905年3月发表了一篇有着惊人假设的论文。 尽管有几十年的证据表明光是一种波, 但爱因斯坦提出,光,实际上可以是粒子, 并表明一些神秘的现象,比如光电效应, 可以用他的假说来解释。 这个观点在接下来的几年里被人嘲笑, 但爱因斯坦只是领先了他的时代二十年。 波粒二象性被定位于成为量子革命的一个基石。
Two months later in May, Einstein submitted a second paper, this time tackling the centuries old question of whether atoms actually exist. Though certain theories were built on the idea of invisible atoms, some prominent scientists still believed them to be a useful fiction, rather than actual physical objects. But Einstein used an ingenious argument, showing that the behavior of small particles randomly moving around in a liquid, known as Brownian motion, could be precisely predicted by the collisions of millions of invisible atoms. Experiments soon confirmed Einstein's model, and atomic skeptics threw in the towel.
两个月之后的5月,爱因斯坦提交了第二篇论文, 这次是解决几个世纪的古老问题 ——原子是否存在。 尽管某些理论是建立在看不见的原子的想法上, 但一些著名的科学家仍然认为 它们是一种有用的虚构, 而不是真实的物理对象。 但爱因斯坦使用了一个巧妙的论证, 表明在液体中随机移动的小颗粒的行为, 即所谓的布朗运动, 可以通过数百万看不见的原子的碰撞来精确预测。 实验很快就证实了爱因斯坦的模型, 原子论的怀疑者也拱手认输。 第三篇论文发表于6月。
The third paper came in June. For a long time, Einstein had been troubled by an inconsistency between two fundamental principles of physics. The well established principle of relativity, going all the way back to Galileo, stated that absolute motion could not be defined. Yet electromagnetic theory, also well established, asserted that absolute motion did exist. The discrepancy, and his inability to resolve it, left Einstein in what he described as a state of psychic tension. But one day in May, after he had mulled over the puzzle with his friend Michele Besso, the clouds parted. Einstein realized that the contradiction could be resolved if it was the speed of light that remained constant, regardless of reference frame, while both time and space were relative to the observer. It took Einstein only a few weeks to work out the details and formulate what came to be known as special relativity. The theory not only shattered our previous understanding of reality but would also pave the way for technologies, ranging from particle accelerators, to the global positioning system.
在很长一段时间里, 爱因斯坦一直被物理学中两个基础原理的 不一致所困扰。 公认的相对论理论, 可追溯到伽利略时代, 指出绝对运动是无法定义的。 然而同样被广泛接受的电磁理论, 则声称绝对的运动是存在的。 这种不一致,以及他无法解决这个问题, 使爱因斯坦处于他所描述的一种心理紧张状态。 但是5月的一天, 在和他的朋友米歇尔·贝索琢磨了这个难题后, 一切豁然开朗。 爱因斯坦意识到,这个矛盾是可以化解的, 即如果是光速保持不变, 无论参考系如何, 而时间和空间都是相对于观察者而言。 爱因斯坦只用的几周时间就完成了细节, 并用公式表达出了后来被称作狭义相对论的内容。 这个理论不仅打破了我们之前对现实的认识, 还为技术发展铺平了道路, 从粒子加速器, 到全球定位系统。
One might think that this was enough, but in September, a fourth paper arrived as a "by the way" follow-up to the special relativity paper. Einstein had thought a little bit more about his theory, and realized it also implied that mass and energy, one apparently solid and the other supposedly ethereal, were actually equivalent. And their relationship could be expressed in what was to become the most famous and consequential equation in history: E=mc^2.
你也许认为这已经足够了, 但是在9月, 第四篇论文以狭义相对论论文的后续的方式诞生了。 爱因斯坦进一步思考了他的理论, 意识到这还意味着质量和能量, 一个是明显实体的,另一个被认为是飘渺的, 实际上是等价的。 它们之间的关系可以用历史上最著名和 最重要的方程式来表达: E=mc^2.
Einstein would not become a world famous icon for nearly another fifteen years. It was only after his later general theory of relativity was confirmed in 1919 by measuring the bending of starlight during a solar eclipse that the press would turn him into a celebrity. But even if he had disappeared back into the patent office and accomplished nothing else after 1905, those four papers of his miracle year would have remained the gold standard of startling unexpected genius.
爱因斯坦在接下来的近15年里都没有成为举世闻名的偶像。 直到他后来的广义相对论在1919年 通过测量日食期间的星光弯曲而得到证实后, 媒体才把他变成了一个名人。 但是,即使他在1905年之后又消失在专利办公室里, 没有任何其他成就, 他那奇迹般的一年里写出的4篇论文 仍能使他成为令人震惊的天才。