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Einstein's Lost Key: How We Overlooked the Best Idea of the 20th Century
New edition 2022!One hundred years after the completion of the General Theory of Relativity, conferences, meetings, and celebrations are taking place all around the world. Yet a decisive consideration on the subject by Albert Einstein has completely fallen into oblivion. Already in 1911, he held the key to an even greater discovery in his a theory concerning the variable speed of light that would have explained the origin of gravity by referring to distant masses in the universe. Eventually, the consequences for modern cosmology would be the picture of an expanding universe and the Big Bang would need to be revised. Sadly, Einstein's ingenious idea came twenty years too early. For it took until the 1930s before the true size of the universe was revealed, which would have confirmed his formula about the variable speed of light. Due to a series of accidents, the theory remained practically unknown, although the Nobelists Erwin Schrödinger and Paul Dirac had worked on similar ideas. Einstein's Lost Key is a description of relativity comprehensible for lay people, a vividly exposed history of science, and a serious, though controversial input for modern research. Dr. Alexander Unzicker is a German physicist and award-winning science writer. His books "Bankrupting Physics" and "The Higgs Fake' have generated controversy in the physics community. With "Einstein’s Lost Key", Unzicker gives an account of his long-lasting pursuit of Einstein's ideas. KIRKUS ...the author’s ideas are engaging and he presents them well. [...] turns into a screed against the scientific establishment.
237 pages, Kindle Edition
Published February 13, 2016
26 people are currently reading
56 people want to read
About the author
Alexander Unzicker
19 books25 followersMy aim is: to teach you to pass from a piece of disguised nonsense to something that is patent nonsense.
– Ludwig Wittgenstein
– Ludwig Wittgenstein
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
July 20, 2016
This time around I'm dealing with his Alexander Unzicker's most recent book, Einstein's Lost Key: How We Overlooked the Best Idea of the 20th Century. An ambitious title, sure, but not entirely overstated. In the book, Unzicker starts with a little-known paper published by Einstein in 1911 in which he proposes a variable speed of light (VSL). It was an idea he used to predict the bending of light as it passed through a gravitational field (GF). The tragically condensed synopsis of how this played out is this:
Einstein's equation to estimate the amount light would bend when passing through a GF involved variables for both time (seconds) and length (meters). His earlier thought experiments had led him to understand that a GF will slow time down, thus impacting the frequency/speed of light passing through the GF and causing a deflection. This is analogous to the deflection of light passing from air to water. But he overlooked the GF's impact on wavelength. Just as the GF *slows the clock* that defines light's frequency, it also *shortens the ruler* that defines light's wavelength. This Einstein had not taken into account. His calculated value of light's deflection was exactly half of what was observed, leading him to seemingly abandon the idea.
If he had accounted for this wavelength change, his VSL equation would have correctly predicted the amount light bends when passing close to the sun or through other GFs. Even more importantly, he would have realized that, *as light travels,* it's frequency and wavelength both change. In other words, the longer it has traveled, the slower it moves and the redder it looks to our observations.
The red shift of light coming from the far reaches of the cosmos is used as evidence of stars receding from us, i.e. the expansion of the universe. But in fact light shifts to the red as it propagates through space. The longer it has traveled by the time it reaches us, the more red-shifted it is. That is exactly what we see when looking at the heavens, but it is now *interpreted* as cosmic expansion. In truth, there is no cosmic expansion! The cornerstone of Big Bang cosmology - the cosmological redshift - is an artifact of light's properties as it propagates.
What happens to cosmology without expansion as a cornerstone? Bye bye dark matter and dark energy, as well as the theory of cosmic inflation to name just a few, all proposed as ad hoc explanations for various anomalies in the expansion model.
Had Einstein realized that both frequency *and wavelength* change with propagation, then Hubble's discovery about 2 decades later of a red-shifted universe vastly beyond our own Milky Way (remember the Milky Way was the extent of the known universe until the 1930s) would likely have been correctly interpreted. With adjustments to both frequency and wavelength properly accounted for, the profound fundamental and reciprocal relationship emerges:
Light moving through time but not space has a change in frequency (speed).
Light moving through space but not time has a change in wavelength (color).
Light moving through both has a change in both. The longer it propagates, the greater those changes. Light from the sun, the moon, and even the light that bounces off of objects outside your window all suffer these changes, but it simply has not propagated long enough to observe. This is why, not surprisingly, Hubble noted that stars close to use seem not to be involved in "expansion." There is no redshift to be seen until you get outside of our local cluster of stars. Get far enough away, though, and stars are said to be racing away from us at over 5x the speed of light based upon their degree of redshift! A better explanation is that the light is just old and weary, slower and redder.
Through the bulk of Unzicker's book he shows that Einstein's VSL idea would have had an even more profound impact on cosmology than this. Bringing in a wide cast of characters, each contributing crucial pieces to a puzzle, Unzicker walks Einstein through a set of realizations he never had because of that initial (and, given the circumstances, understandable) oversight. Ultimately, Einstein would very likely have given a mathematical voice to the fundamental connection between gravity, and the total mass and size of the universe. In short, gravity's strength would not simply be a measured value - the gravitational constant G - but would be derived from other numbers.
I have wrung virtually every bit of fascination out of Unzicker's brilliant and conceptually challenging historical account of these ideas with my summarizing. The book offers a chronology that involves more than just landmark moments in physics and mathematics. Einstein's brilliance was driven by both a philosophical dispositions toward parsimony in explanations, and a strong sense of intuition that informed his work. Unzicker has done an enormous service to the field of cosmology by tying together diverse lines of thinking by several outstanding minds. The end result is a compelling explanation of the gravitational constant and a radically different understanding of the cosmos. Unfortunately, the reigning model, riddled with inconsistencies and patch-work explanations as it is, won't be retired anytime soon.
Unzicker's brilliance in telling this story is in his heavy attention paid to intuition as an essential element of discovery for Einstein. Intuitive discovery was once the driver of revolutions. Einstein, speaking about quantum mechanics, famously said, "God does not play dice." It was an expression of his *intuition* that the numbers describing the universe were not "just so" stories, but could be derived from first principles. The presence of a "free parameter" like the gravitational constant was considered an uncomfortable intrusion. Einstein felt that all constants of nature should have explanations, not simply be measured and written down, accepted as what they are for no reason other than that they aren't something else.
"I cannot imagine a unified and reasonable theory which explicitly contains a number that the whim of the Creator might just as well have chose differently" (43).
The gravitational constant is just such a number to this day in the Standard Model of cosmology. In fact, modern cosmology is accumulating free parameters at an impressive pace. There were just a few of them in Einstein's time, each one he considered a mystery to be pondered. Modern cosmology can count over a dozen free parameters - such as the theoretical strength of dark energy - each being a patch to a broken model.
Today, intuition gets squashed by a facade of mechanistic explanations. In cosmology that mechanistic explanation is endlessly sought in particle physics. Such explanations are, in a word, lame. As an explanation, science can say virtually nothing. That is where intuition takes over.
Einstein's equation to estimate the amount light would bend when passing through a GF involved variables for both time (seconds) and length (meters). His earlier thought experiments had led him to understand that a GF will slow time down, thus impacting the frequency/speed of light passing through the GF and causing a deflection. This is analogous to the deflection of light passing from air to water. But he overlooked the GF's impact on wavelength. Just as the GF *slows the clock* that defines light's frequency, it also *shortens the ruler* that defines light's wavelength. This Einstein had not taken into account. His calculated value of light's deflection was exactly half of what was observed, leading him to seemingly abandon the idea.
If he had accounted for this wavelength change, his VSL equation would have correctly predicted the amount light bends when passing close to the sun or through other GFs. Even more importantly, he would have realized that, *as light travels,* it's frequency and wavelength both change. In other words, the longer it has traveled, the slower it moves and the redder it looks to our observations.
The red shift of light coming from the far reaches of the cosmos is used as evidence of stars receding from us, i.e. the expansion of the universe. But in fact light shifts to the red as it propagates through space. The longer it has traveled by the time it reaches us, the more red-shifted it is. That is exactly what we see when looking at the heavens, but it is now *interpreted* as cosmic expansion. In truth, there is no cosmic expansion! The cornerstone of Big Bang cosmology - the cosmological redshift - is an artifact of light's properties as it propagates.
What happens to cosmology without expansion as a cornerstone? Bye bye dark matter and dark energy, as well as the theory of cosmic inflation to name just a few, all proposed as ad hoc explanations for various anomalies in the expansion model.
Had Einstein realized that both frequency *and wavelength* change with propagation, then Hubble's discovery about 2 decades later of a red-shifted universe vastly beyond our own Milky Way (remember the Milky Way was the extent of the known universe until the 1930s) would likely have been correctly interpreted. With adjustments to both frequency and wavelength properly accounted for, the profound fundamental and reciprocal relationship emerges:
Light moving through time but not space has a change in frequency (speed).
Light moving through space but not time has a change in wavelength (color).
Light moving through both has a change in both. The longer it propagates, the greater those changes. Light from the sun, the moon, and even the light that bounces off of objects outside your window all suffer these changes, but it simply has not propagated long enough to observe. This is why, not surprisingly, Hubble noted that stars close to use seem not to be involved in "expansion." There is no redshift to be seen until you get outside of our local cluster of stars. Get far enough away, though, and stars are said to be racing away from us at over 5x the speed of light based upon their degree of redshift! A better explanation is that the light is just old and weary, slower and redder.
Through the bulk of Unzicker's book he shows that Einstein's VSL idea would have had an even more profound impact on cosmology than this. Bringing in a wide cast of characters, each contributing crucial pieces to a puzzle, Unzicker walks Einstein through a set of realizations he never had because of that initial (and, given the circumstances, understandable) oversight. Ultimately, Einstein would very likely have given a mathematical voice to the fundamental connection between gravity, and the total mass and size of the universe. In short, gravity's strength would not simply be a measured value - the gravitational constant G - but would be derived from other numbers.
I have wrung virtually every bit of fascination out of Unzicker's brilliant and conceptually challenging historical account of these ideas with my summarizing. The book offers a chronology that involves more than just landmark moments in physics and mathematics. Einstein's brilliance was driven by both a philosophical dispositions toward parsimony in explanations, and a strong sense of intuition that informed his work. Unzicker has done an enormous service to the field of cosmology by tying together diverse lines of thinking by several outstanding minds. The end result is a compelling explanation of the gravitational constant and a radically different understanding of the cosmos. Unfortunately, the reigning model, riddled with inconsistencies and patch-work explanations as it is, won't be retired anytime soon.
Unzicker's brilliance in telling this story is in his heavy attention paid to intuition as an essential element of discovery for Einstein. Intuitive discovery was once the driver of revolutions. Einstein, speaking about quantum mechanics, famously said, "God does not play dice." It was an expression of his *intuition* that the numbers describing the universe were not "just so" stories, but could be derived from first principles. The presence of a "free parameter" like the gravitational constant was considered an uncomfortable intrusion. Einstein felt that all constants of nature should have explanations, not simply be measured and written down, accepted as what they are for no reason other than that they aren't something else.
"I cannot imagine a unified and reasonable theory which explicitly contains a number that the whim of the Creator might just as well have chose differently" (43).
The gravitational constant is just such a number to this day in the Standard Model of cosmology. In fact, modern cosmology is accumulating free parameters at an impressive pace. There were just a few of them in Einstein's time, each one he considered a mystery to be pondered. Modern cosmology can count over a dozen free parameters - such as the theoretical strength of dark energy - each being a patch to a broken model.
Today, intuition gets squashed by a facade of mechanistic explanations. In cosmology that mechanistic explanation is endlessly sought in particle physics. Such explanations are, in a word, lame. As an explanation, science can say virtually nothing. That is where intuition takes over.
November 12, 2019
God has given us a gift and "we" have overlooked it. Shame, you sinful beasts! Repent!
Also, it's hilarious how Unzicker, in his unique wisdom, could measure and compare The BEST. And, given this is an "overlooked" idea, Unzicker has surveyed other overlooked ideas as well.
Also, it's hilarious how Unzicker, in his unique wisdom, could measure and compare The BEST. And, given this is an "overlooked" idea, Unzicker has surveyed other overlooked ideas as well.
March 15, 2023
A great book about possibly the greatest miss of the last century in physics and cosmology. Einstein’s idea of variable speed of light, if proven true later, could be the most astonishing theory that fundamentally changes the way of understanding the universe that we are living in. More mind-twistingly, our sense of time, space, and many basics will have to be rewritten if the speed of light is not constant.
The author, as a physicist, found this interesting topic and gave us detailed history about why Einstein may have missed or gave up this topic and what the implications about it.
The latest James Webb Telescope would help us decode this?
The author, as a physicist, found this interesting topic and gave us detailed history about why Einstein may have missed or gave up this topic and what the implications about it.
The latest James Webb Telescope would help us decode this?
August 2, 2020
Gets back to basics
It is stimulating intellectually to have basic assumptions questioned. I have only followed the popular science writers ( starting with Asimov when I was young) and am only familiar with the outlines of relativity, quantum mechanics and cosmology. It seems like a good thing to note that the various theories are not even theories if they they can’t make falsifiable predictions.
It is stimulating intellectually to have basic assumptions questioned. I have only followed the popular science writers ( starting with Asimov when I was young) and am only familiar with the outlines of relativity, quantum mechanics and cosmology. It seems like a good thing to note that the various theories are not even theories if they they can’t make falsifiable predictions.
April 6, 2023
I follow many of the videos and written work by Dr. Unzicker. This is an especially lucid book on his continuing focus on a Variable Speed of Light approach to Cosmology. I will have to read this book a couple of dozen times to fully comprehend all the details it offers... but I look forward to doing this!
May 17, 2018
Brilliant!
A brilliant book, a voyage that will enrich and take you to the edge of time and universe. Very Well Written.
A brilliant book, a voyage that will enrich and take you to the edge of time and universe. Very Well Written.
March 9, 2023
Change
A massive change is needed in how we look at the world and this book is a good start as to how to change our view of the Cosmos.
A massive change is needed in how we look at the world and this book is a good start as to how to change our view of the Cosmos.
March 10, 2022
Unfortunately above my level of understanding. Unzicker's philosophical arguments can otherwise be found in his other books as well; but I can safely say I relate better to variable light speed theory.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews