Was Einstein's Theory of Relativity deduced out of a mathematical error ?

Answer 1

I have not heard that one, but his wife is believed to have been the real developer of the E=mc^2 equation.

He did later abandon his wife to "shack up" with his cousin in New York.

Answer 2

You may be confusing his General Relativity (G.R.) Theory with its application to cosmology, the science of the structure of the whole Universe.

In 1915, after he found his final equations for G.R., he tried applying them to the whole Universe. At the time people thought that the whole Universe was static. His equations couldn't yield a static Universe, so he introduced the so-called "Cosmological Constant" term , effectively a very large-scale repulsive term to cancel out gravity, but unnoticeable locally.

Subsequently, the expansion of the Universe was deduced by Hubble and accepted by pretty much everyone. This meant that there was no need to introduce such a constant to just hold the Universe in a static condition. Einstein then dropped his "Cosmological Constant," calling it "the worst blunder of my life."

Ironically, the recent discovery of so-called "Dark Energy" requires a term in the cosmological equations essentially having the form of Einstein's discarded brainchild. So, in a sense,you could say that today's "Dark Energy" was essentially predicted by Einstein as a MISTAKEN SOLUTION TO A MISTAKEN PROBLEM, a DOUBLE MISTAKE, if you will!

Live long and prosper.

POSTSCRIPTS :

1. 'Overkill' clearly has little knowledge of Einstein's oeuvre. His whole path towards G.R. was a Zitterbewegung of incorrect physical and mathematical assumptions.

After he had found the final equations, Einstein began his second paper on gravitational radiation with the following (translated) sentence: "In my previous paper on gravitational radiation I made a horrible mathematical error." (!) Ironically, while that error had been a subtle one to do with a false condition he had assumed for a tensor, he made another, almost schoolboyish mistake in this second paper, becoming confused about the real and inaginary parts of a complex wave-form. As a consequence, his formula for the rate of emission by gravitational radiation was wrong by a factor of 2.

2. 'Ken B' has clearly only remembered the more sensational or salacious parts of his Physics history seminar series, and either that memory is quite deficient, or he was sold a bill of goods.

A.) It is certainly true that Einstein and his wife Mileva discussed and may even have worked together on aspects of his early papers. But to say that "his wife is believed to have been the real developer of the E=mc^2 equation" is a gross overstatement. Yes, there are a few feminists who have found it convenient to claim this, but there is little evidence that would pass scholarly scrutiny. At most there is a reference in one of Mileva's letters to "our work on ... [electrodynamics?]"

B.) He did not 'later abandon his wife to "shack up" with his cousin in New York.' This is incredibly garbled, and the real story is perhaps even more bizarre. He and his wife became estranged after a few years, and stopped living together. By then Einstein had moved to Berlin and become better acquainted with his cousin Elsa, and also with her daughter. He fell in love with his niece, and asked her to marry him. She declined, saying "Why not marry mother?!" So he did.

(Einstein also arranged, IN ADVANCE, that were he to win the Nobel Prize, the money would go to his former wife, who was raising their children. This was not exactly the financial "abandonment" that is all too common these days.)

If there was any "shacking up," it occurred in Berlin, but they were certainly married before he went to the U.S. And he never lived in New York, but rather on Mercer Street in Princeton.

Answer 3

No, Einstein doesn't make mathematical errors.