Editor: John Stachel. Foreword by Roger Penrose
The anno mirabilis was 1905, when an obscure patent examiner published several
papers. This volume consists of translations of Einstein's revolutionary papers
that year, with introductions by physicist Roger Penrose and others that explain
why these papers are among the most important scientific documents of this century -
if not all time. As a group they are notable for bridging mechanical theories of
physics--particles whizzing around--and the relativistic view. In the former category,
Einstein figured out the sizes of molecules, and that their bombardments kept
microscopic particles in motion, both mysterious matters hitherto. The relativity
papers announce the two things everyone knows about Einstein besides his iconic
appearance, that energy and mass are equivalent and that time is not absolute. That
the soul of this book is Ph.D.-level mathematics doesn't disqualify it from public
libraries: mightn't some wunderkind of the future fondly remember in her memoirs the
day she discovered Einstein's actual equations in the stacks?-Gilbert Taylor

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