If Al Einstein really said that, I'll excuse him.
He didn't. Enough nonsense has been attributed to him that there is a cottage industry among students of his work to vet those allegations. Einstein is not the only victim of misattribution, of course. The desired statements are commonly attributed to famous thinkers -- especially noted scientists -- in order to give them gravity (pun intended). These statements vary from common aphorisms (e.g., "Insanity means doing the same thing and expecting different results") to self-serving statements (e.g., astronauts endorsing Islam). Even in the dominant fringe religion where I live (Mormonism) there are claims that important people have in some way endorsed the Mormon faith. Among the religious this seems to be a common practice aimed at mainstreaming their beliefs.
Sadly Einstein did say some fairly wacky things. This is what makes him a frequent target for stuff like what Kumar is trying to do. You can find enough legitimately documented Einstein quotes to make it seem plausible that Einstein would have said some particular thing, even if it's not related to physics. And really, when it's believers telling themselves things, it's not as if everyone's going to rush off and try to confirm the quote. That's how the attribution game is played.
In the sciences and engineering, when a man steps out of his field, he pretty often makes a fool of himself. Geniuses too.
Quite right. Albert Einstein was one of the first celebrity physicists. And this made him a particular case. The public was all too happy to give him full and exclusive credit for the theory of relativity, when in fact it was more a collective effort. Einstein made a crucial finding that put others' work in an effective perspective, and that's an important thing. Moving forward, Einstein's respect among scientists didn't last, especially when he rejected quantum mechanics. So he started relying more and more upon lay public attention to build interest in his follow-on work. Unfortunately, before he learned how the media worked -- especially how the media treated celebrities -- he allowed a fair amount of oddball commentary to enter the public record attached to his name.
Geniuses don't always have to step far outside their fields of specialty in order to make mistakes. Yet another celebrity physicist, Michio Kaku, has spoken publicly on points of space engineering and the history of space exploration, and has sometimes made clear factual errors. When I try to correct those for people who cite him, the corrections often fall on deaf ears. "Are you saying one of the most famous physicists in the world is wrong?" "Yes! Yes, I am, because he
is."
In case it's not obvious, many celebrity scientists don't enjoy nearly as high a reputation among their science peers as they do among their adoring fans. This is precisely because they're not always right and not always innovative and not always representing the science. Just as it's not too far a leap to suppose that an astrophysicist would also be an expert in space engineering, it's not too far for the media to leap to suppose that someone who unraveled the physics of the universe would also have authoritative answers (or at least informed opinions) on its metaphysics. Celebrity scientists drift into
hic sunt dracones waters because the questions they're asked are the ones the public really wants answers to. The property of celebrity demands a congeniality that in turn demands an answer, even if it's a poorly supported one. And from metaphysics it's not a large leap to each individual scientist's personal beliefs, usually wrongly presuming that a scientist's personal beliefs have the same rigorous basis as his science findings. "Well if Einstein believes in God, then there really must be one because Einstein is a smart guy."
Did Einstein endorse Jainism? No, he didn't. But even if he had, upon what basis would that endorsement have been made? What makes Einstein an important physicist is the work he produced in the vernacular of scholarly physics. The real work behind Einstein's genius was grindingly tedious mathematics that had to pass muster among all those similarly qualified. It takes great effort to get that right, and it's on the shoulders of that work that the conclusions stand. He didn't put that rigor into the offhand comments he made on the record.
BTW folks: You're assuming that Mahakumar knows the meaning of "burden of proof." You really shouldn't do that. IMHO. (STFU, sackett. GTFO. Go watch a DVD.)
Hehe, I'm actually assuming he doesn't know what "burden of proof" means. But his ignorance of the concept doesn't mean it doesn't exist and doesn't affect his argument.
