Albert Einstein and J. Robert Oppenheimer, two iconic scientists
of the twentieth century, belonged to different generations, with
the boundary marked by the advent of quantum mechanics. By
exploring how these men differed in their worldview, in their work,
and in their day this book provides powerful insights into the
lives of two critical figures and into the scientific culture of
their times. In Einstein s and Oppenheimer s philosophical and
ethical positions, their views of nuclear weapons, their ethnic and
cultural commitments, their opinions on the unification of physics,
even the role of Buddhist detachment in their thinking, the book
traces the broader issues that have shaped science and the
world.
Einstein is invariably seen as a lone and singular genius, while
Oppenheimer is generally viewed in a particular scientific,
political, and historical context. Silvan Schweber considers the
circumstances behind this perception, in Einstein s coherent and
consistent self-image, and its relation to his singular vision of
the world, and in Oppenheimer s contrasting lack of certainty and
related non-belief in a unitary, ultimate theory. Of greater
importance, perhaps, is the role that timing and chance seem to
have played in the two scientists contrasting characters and
accomplishments with Einstein s having the advantage of maturing at
a propitious time for theoretical physics, when the Newtonian
framework was showing weaknesses.
Bringing to light little-examined aspects of these lives,
Schweber expands our understanding of two great figures of
twentieth-century physics but also our sense of what such greatness
means, in personal, scientific, and cultural terms.
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